Former Biden Cabinet member Xavier Becerra remains the top Democrat in the California governor’s race despite being targeted by a barrage of negative political ads and enduring sharp attacks from his rival candidates during recent debates, according to a new poll released Tuesday by the state Democratic Party.

Billionaire Tom Steyer, a Democrat who is shattering self-funding records for statewide office, has been flooding the television airwaves, internet and social media with ads ripping Becerra’s long record in public office, as well as for accepting campaign donations from oil giant Chevron. But, thus far, that has not been enough for Steyer to overtake Becerra.

The survey found that 21% of likely voters backed Becerra, who also served in Congress and as California’s attorney general, while 15% backed Steyer. Among the other top Democrats: Former Orange County congresswoman Katie Porter received 7%; San José Mayor Matt Mahan came in at 4%; and state Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa registered at 1%.

Becerra on Tuesday said he believes he has climbed in the polls because voters are now paying attention to the race.

“They’re really looking closely at who’s out there, and I think I’ve been one of the beneficiaries of folks looking for a place that they can feel comfortable, where they can trust,” Becerra told reporters after a campaign event in South Los Angeles. “I think more and more as people look at the candidates, they’re going to start to crystallize behind somebody who won’t need training wheels, as I say, when they get into the governor’s office and can hit the ground running, day one.”

He said he thinks Steyer’s attacks aren’t working because Californians are skeptical of the billionaire.

“He’s spending like no one before, and he’s hitting like no one before, and so far, it hasn’t made a difference,” Becerra said. “We continue to surge, even after weeks of his barrage of lies and attacks…. California voters are not anxious to have someone who wants to buy the office.”

Leading all candidates in the race was Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News host, who was supported by 22% of likely voters. His top GOP challenger, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, was backed by 10%, the poll showed.

While Hilton and Becerra right now appear to be the likeliest candidates to finish in the top two in California’s June 2 primary, which is required to advance to the November general election, there still remains plenty of time for political fortunes and voter support to rise or fall. Ballots were mailed to the state’s 23.1 million registered voters and early voting sites opened earlier this month, but most Californians have not sent them in thus far.

For Becerra, the strong poll results indicate an astounding turnaround for a campaign that appeared all but dead just weeks ago. In early April, the California Democratic Party tracking poll showed Becerra with support from just 4% of likely voters. That changed after then-Northern California Rep. Eric Swalwell, who had been the front-running Democrat in the race, withdrew from the campaign and resigned from Congress after he was accused of sexual assault and misconduct.

The California Democratic Party launched a series of tracking polls in March after leaders and allies grew increasingly concerned that Republicans would win the top two spots in the primary, shutting the party out of the November general election. This prospect, while statistically possible given the crowded field of candidates running for governor, has grown increasingly less likely as California voters finally focused on the contest to lead the nation’s most populous state and the world’s fourth-largest economy.

Under California’s top-two primary system, only the candidates who finish in first and second place in the primary advance to the general election, regardless of their political party or affiliation.

The poll of 1,200 likely voters took place between May 14 and 16 and has a margin of error of 2.83% in either direction.

HEBRON, KY – Ed Gallrein, the Republican congressional candidate backed by President Donald Trump who is challenging Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky for the GOP nomination, landed extra firepower on the eve of the state’s primary.

Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL and Kentucky farmer, was joined on the campaign trail Monday by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.

Massie has long been one of Trump’s most vocal GOP critics in Congress and the Republican primary in Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District, in the northeastern part of the state, the latest test of Trump’s immense grip over the GOP.

“President Trump needs reinforcements, and that’s what war fighters do. They stand behind leaders and have their back,” Hegseth said at an event organized by America First Works, a Trump-aligned nonprofit political advocacy group.

TRUMP SCORES MAJOR PRIMARY VICTORY AS CASSIDY OUSTED IN LOUSIANA

Massie, a libertarian-minded lawmaker who repeatedly takes aim at the president over foreign policy, including the Iran war and unconditional U.S. military aid to Israel, also successfully pushed for the release of government files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

But Hegseth argued that Massie’s record is one of “too much grandstanding, too few great votes, years of acting like being difficult is the same thing as being courageous. It’s not. Real courage means stepping up when the mission matters most, when we need that tough vote to beat left-wing lunatic Democrats the most.”

“President Trump does not need more people in Washington who are trying to make a point, especially from his own party. He needs people willing to help him win, to vote with him when it matters the most,” Hegseth added.

Hegseth’s remarks, which came soon after a stop at nearby Fort Campbell to award medals for service members, were rare for the civilian head of the nation’s military. Defense secretaries have traditionally avoided appearing at political events.

Ahead of the stop, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said Hegseth would appear only “in his personal capacity” and that “no taxpayer dollars will be used to facilitate his visit.”

Hegseth noted the unusual appearance.

“I have to say up front, for the lawyers, that I’m here in my personal capacity as a private citizen, a fellow American, and a fellow combat veteran.”

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But Massie, who’s locked in a competitive clash with Gallrein in what’s become the most expensive congressional primary in history, claimed in a Fox News Digital interview on Monday that Hegseth’s stop “shows that I’m up in the polls. They wouldn’t be sending the Secretary of War to my congressional district if I weren’t.”

“I think it also shows I’m tougher than Iran, and I don’t even have a nuclear weapon. I mean, they are all in at this race. It’s basically a national race at this point, the most expensive race primary in congressional history, and that’s because, you know, I’m up there, I’m getting things done. I got the Epstein files released, I’m getting legislation in the farm bill, I’m getting legislation passed on the floor, and they want to shut me down,” Massie emphasized.

Gallrein, speaking with Fox News Digital ahead of his event with Hegseth, charged that Massie’s “running against President Trump, and the agenda that has been put forward by the Republican Party.”

Kentucky’s primary is being held two weeks after Indiana’s primary, where Trump-backed challengers ousted five sitting Republican state senators who last December teamed up with Democrats to defeat the president’s push for congressional redistricting in the GOP-dominated Midwestern state.

And the ballot box showdown in Kentucky comes three days after Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana was ousted as he sought renomination. The senator came in third in the primary, behind Trump-backed Rep. Julia Letlow and conservative Louisiana Treasurer John Fleming.

Cassidy’s political defeat came five and a half years after he voted to convict Trump after he was impeached by the House for his role in the violent Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters who aimed to upend congressional certification of former President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. Trump was acquitted by the Senate.

Massie said he “absolutely can” overcome the Trump endorsement of Gallrein. “I’ve got the groundswell here, like my events. I’ve got 100-200 sometimes 300 people show up. My opponent had to cancel events because he couldn’t get enough people, you know, to fill up a Dairy Queen, half a Dairy Queen.”

SCOOP: TRUMP-BACKED FORMER NAVY SEAL LAUNCHES GOP PRIMARY CHALLENGE AGAINST MASSIE

The race has become the most expensive in House history in terms of ad spending, with over $32 million shelled out, according to the nationally known ad tracking firm AdImpact.

Much of that money has been shelled out by Trump’s allies and pro-Israel groups.

“Here’s the thing, I’ve got nothing against Israel. I just have never voted for foreign aid. When I said America First, I meant it. I don’t vote for foreign aid to Egypt, to Syria, to Ukraine. I’ve got a flawless record on this, and I’m not going to ruin it by sending foreign aid to one country,” Massie said as he defended his stance on Israel.

And Massie touted that while Trump’s allies and pro-Israel groups have spent tens of millions to take him out, he said, “I’ve got tens of thousands of grassroots donors who are funding me $50 at a time, $20 at a time. We’ve been able to match them to go toe to toe with them on TV using grassroots donors, and it’s really galvanized the nation.”

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Trump has repeatedly targeted Massie in social media posts in the closing days of the primary campaign.

The president said in a video posted to Truth Social on Monday that he hoped Kentucky voters would put Massie “out of business” and that “we’re in a fight against the worst congressman in the history of our country.”

And Trump praised Gallrein as “a great guy” and “a great patriot.”

But Massie said Trump’s taunts on social media may backfire.

“It shows he’s losing sleep, his reputation is on the line. He really shouldn’t have got involved in this race, because I vote with him 90% of the time,” the congressman said.

San José Mayor Matt Mahan’s run for California governor has been defined from the start by his donor list.

Mahan entered the race late and with little statewide name recognition, but catapulted into contention thanks to massive funding from billionaire tech titans, venture capitalists, cryptocurrency investors and other Silicon Valley elites. In a state with more than 23 million voters and hugely expensive media markets, the money signaled Mahan would be a contender.

It also spurred accusations from his more liberal Democratic competitors and powerful labor leaders that Mahan is beholden to Big Tech, including forces aligned with President Trump.

California Labor Federation President Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher recently described Mahan as “funded by Trump’s big tech billionaires,” while fellow Democratic candidate Tom Steyer — a billionaire running against corporate interests — called him “MAGA Matt Mahan.”

That framing has persisted, despite Mahan being a centrist Democrat who has publicly criticized Trump.

On Thursday, Mahan released a four-page “Plan to Hold Big Tech Accountable and Ensure AI Works for All Californians.” The proposal called for AI and data centers to pay for their power and water needs, fund workforce stability initiatives and ensure human oversight of AI tools in critical sectors such as healthcare. It also called for the state to use AI to become more efficient, to bar cellphones in schools and to require parental consent for kids 15 and under joining social media.

In an interview with The Times, Mahan, 43, said AI is “one of the most significant trends in society” and needs to be addressed.

He also rejected the notion that he would do Big Tech’s bidding, and the idea that his support from tech leaders is entirely or even largely premised on his plans for their industry.

“I’ve spoken very little about tech with any of my donors,” he said.

Mahan said his fundraising has instead been “centered on how we get California on a better path in terms of building housing, improving the quality of our public schools, solving our biggest problems,” which “just resonates with people in the tech industry.”

A ‘digital native’

Mahan, the son of a teacher and a mailman, grew up in the farming community of Watsonville but commuted to San José to attend high school at Bellarmine College Prep on scholarship as a low-income student. He went on to Harvard University, where he was student body president and classmates with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, spent a year in Bolivia building irrigation systems, and then taught for two years in Alum Rock as part of the Teach for America program.

He then joined Causes, an early Facebook application that allowed nonprofits to build grassroots support online, and rose to become chief executive. In 2014, he co-founded Brigade, a nonpartisan platform where voters could advocate for issues, which was acquired in 2019. He won a San José City Council seat in 2020, and was elected mayor in 2022.

An early mayoral profile described Mahan as painting a whiteboard behind his desk to “write on the wall as I did in my tech days.” Another noted he used ChatGPT to write speeches. A third recounted how he’d used AI to make city buses run faster.

Mahan said he learned as a startup leader and a classroom teacher that metrics matter — that “when we take our precious tax dollars and invest them in public services, we should measure our performance.”

He said he has always believed government should take the best tech has to offer while being vigilant about the risks it poses, which maybe comes naturally to him as a millennial who remembers “the world before the internet” but is also something of a “digital native.”

Donors explain

Between Jan. 1 and April 18, Mahan’s campaign raised nearly $13.5 million, according to state campaign finance filings. During the same period, an independent expenditure backing Mahan called Back to Basics raised about $22.7 million, while another launched by the group Deliver for California raised nearly $3.3 million.

The donors are a who’s who of tech leaders, venture capitalists and other leaders in the gig, gaming, digital media and AI defense fields.

Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google, gave the maximum individual contribution of $39,200 to Mahan directly, and $1 million to the Deliver for California committee. Reed Hastings, the co-founder and chairman of Netflix, gave the maximum contribution to Mahan, plus $1 million to the Back to Basics committee.

Some donors, such as LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, who gave the maximum to Mahan, are well-known supporters of progressive causes. Others, such as Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale and crypto founder David Marcus, who maxed out to Mahan, are also Trump backers.

Brin, a friend of Gov. Gavin Newsom since the Democrat was mayor of San Francisco, has been moving rightward recently. He has donated to the Republican National Committee and in March was appointed to the White House tech advisory council. He’s also a major donor to the nonprofit opposing the ballot measure for a new tax on California billionaires — which Mahan also is against.

Brin, Lonsdale and Marcus did not respond to a request for comment. Hastings and Hoffman declined to comment.

Several other tech donors did speak with The Times — and universally described their support for Mahan as less to do with his tech policies, and more to do with issues important to all Californians.

Jamie Siminoff, who sold his home security startup Ring to Amazon for $1 billion and gave the maximum donation to Mahan, said he thinks L.A., where he lives, is the “greatest city in the world” and California is the “best state in the world.” But he sees Mahan as someone who could make improvements by bringing the state toward the political middle on public safety, housing and homelessness.

“He’s just like a nice, pragmatic, sort of centrist person, from what I can see, [who] wants to make California better, and I’m 100% behind that.”

Siminoff said it doesn’t hurt that Mahan speaks the same language as many tech leaders, who are mostly just “pragmatic inventors and entrepreneurs” who want California’s leader to be “principled in thinking about fixing things.”

Ruchi Sanghvi, the first female engineer at Facebook and a former Dropbox executive who state records show donated $25,000 to Mahan, said she has known Mahan since he was leading Causes but fell out of touch. When he entered the governor’s race, and she “got all these emails from people that I respect” saying they were supporting him, she asked for a meeting.

At that meeting, she said, Mahan “really dug in on some of the core issues that I care about,” including housing, homelessness and education.

The San Francisco resident, political independent and mother of three said the idea that tech leaders are backing Mahan because they believe he will scratch their back in business is wrong. Referring to his tech plan’s restrictions on social media for youth, she said, “I don’t think of that as scratching my back.”

Instead, “what really resonates with me and my peers is that, yes, he is pragmatic,” Sanghvi said. “He cares about measurable outcomes, which I think is very critical.”

Marc Merrill, co-founder, co-chairman and chief product officer of L.A.-based video game developer and e-sports company Riot Games, gave the maximum to Mahan, as did his wife, Ashley, founder of the sleepwear brand Lunya. In a statement to The Times, Merrill said he and his wife are lifelong Californians who love the state and support Mahan because of his record “addressing California’s most pressing challenges with practical, results-oriented solutions” in San José.

Merrill said Mahan brought down violent crime, reduced homelessness with “data-driven programs that address root causes rather than just managing the problem,” and “fostered an environment where businesses are choosing to invest and grow in the city.”

Tech vs. labor?

Gonzalez Fletcher said tech leaders have long “been very clear about their desire to support candidates who won’t regulate AI, to support candidates who will go after organized labor” — and their support for Mahan is no different.

She pointed as an example to a March event attended by Mahan and hosted by one of his most vocal backers: Garry Tan, a venture capitalist and chief executive of Y Combinator, a startup incubator in San Francisco.

At the event — which was part of Tan’s launch of a new statewide group called Garry’s List, which he has described as a “Rotary Club for radical centrism” — Chris Larsen, the co-founder of the cryptocurrency network Ripple, railed against the influence of unions in California politics and the “weak” response from business leaders, according to video.

“We’ve got to fight on par with the unions when they’re proposing stupid, job-killing ideas like the San Francisco CEO tax,” Larsen said. He noted that several other candidates for governor, including former Orange County Rep. Katie Porter, whom he’d donated to, had backed the measure to tax companies that pay their chief executive 100 times more than their average employee.

Neither Tan nor Larsen responded to a request for comment.

Gonzalez Fletcher, a former state legislator, said the argument that California Democrats have caused the state’s biggest problems by bowing to unions is false, and that what is more true is that “ruling class” Democrats such as Newsom “acquiesce to business interests” driving the state’s affordability and homelessness crises.

She said employers get away with underpaying workers and big landlords are allowed to take advantage of renters. She said Airbnb, as a tech example, has gone unchecked despite causing “a lot of the removal of housing stock.”

She said one reason she opposes Mahan is that he “suffers from the same love affair with Big Tech” as Newsom.

Steyer — who has funded his own campaign to the tune of nearly $200 million — has repeatedly struck a similar note.

Earlier this month, his campaign wrote that “Mahan continues to fail working Californians by catering to tech billionaires and wealthy special interest groups.” In February, it wrote that although Mahan had the support of “powerful special interests hellbent on keeping California a playground for the rich,” Steyer had the backing of “bus drivers, cafeteria workers, and custodians.”

Airbnb declined to comment but in the past has denied claims its platform substantially contributes to housing affordability issues, and has donated to housing initiatives. Airbnb co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk, a Mahan donor, did not respond to a request for comment.

Mahan said he values unions, in part because he grew up in a union household and benefited from the high-quality healthcare that provided, included when he was hospitalized for a collapsed lung as a teenager.

He said he has also worked with tech employers who “are inventing the future, quite literally,” and “creating a lot of jobs and opportunity.”

Mahan said the idea the two are inherently at odds is false, because “business needs labor, and labor needs business,” and the real question is “how to balance everyone’s needs.”

“If we don’t have a strong enough regulatory environment, and business has too much power, workers can be exploited, the environment can be exploited and we can see really negative social outcomes,” he said. “But the flip side is also true. If labor in our politics has too much power, you can also see distortions, you can see investment flow elsewhere, you can see less housing get built.”

Mahan said that “neither side has a monopoly on the truth,” and that government has to “bring people together and strike the right balance.”

He also defended Airbnb, which in San José pays taxes just like hotels, he said.

“We don’t see Airbnb as an antagonistic thing. We don’t let them take over the market, we regulate them, we charge them, and we use their tax revenue to provide services to people.”

He said the state’s housing crisis is due to over-regulation slowing new building to the point where it cannot keep up with job growth — which he called “fundamentally unsustainable and unfair” to low-income folks pushed out of job centers as a result.

The answer is building more homes, more quickly, he said, including by reducing building fees and streamlining permitting processes — which he said he has done in San José and would replicate statewide as governor.

“I am, first and foremost, focused on making government deliver results that make a real difference in people’s lives,” he said. “That’s my North Star.”