“The People deserve leaders who work for them, not for the energy monopolies that light our homes on fire while charging us the highest rates in the nation,” argued then-Assemblyman Bill Essayli.
It’s no secret that The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is spending large sums to sway local races. The utility company, which provides natural gas and electricity to over 5 million homes in California, spent a whopping $5.2 million in donations during the most recent election cycle. The vast majority of that spending went to one side of the political aisle.
The biggest beneficiaries are Governor Gavin Newsom and Democrat candidates for State Senate and State Assembly positions. The company also spent $825,000 on Democrat-sponsored initiatives including climate projects and increased funding for public schools, as well as numerous six-figure contributions to PAC’s supporting incumbent candidates.
That massive $5.2 million sum eclipses the total spent by PG&E in the 2019-2020 election cycle ($1.7 million).
News of this spending comes off the heels of PG&E requesting another round of rate hikes so it can “adequately compensate investors” after a year of record-breaking profits.
Naturally, it’s led some to wonder whether taxpayer dollars are being used to fund political activities. Representatives from PG&E deny the claim outright. State Senator Jerry McNerney attested to KCRA that “right now they can, and they do… They shuffle the books a little bit to make it look like they’re not.”
“These monopoly utilities are spending millions to buy influence in Sacramento and to prevent us elected officials from holding them accountable,” said then-Assemblyman Bill Essayli on Twitter/X. “It needs to stop!”
Newsom in particular has received at least $700,000 from PG&E over the last two years—some of that money coming in the form of direct political contributions and some of it going towards “gender-justice films” run by the Governor’s wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom. It would seem PG&E has something of a storied history with the Siebel Newsom. The company is listed as an “associate producer” for two films produced by the Governor’s wife. Its charitable division also invested $358,000 to the Representation Project—a non-profit organization founded by Siebel Newsom—over the course of seven years.
Of the $200 million spent by PG&E since 2000, at least $2.5 million has gone to Newsom’s gubernatorial campaign.
This may explain Newsom’s failure to hold the company accountable for the damages that they have caused in the past, including when California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection investigations found the company infrastructure primarily responsible for causing two of the most devastating wildfires in California history. In this case, the company pleaded guilty to 84 counts of manslaughter.
“Newsom holds oil and gas companies responsible for wildfires, but not the utilities that caused most of them after he and his wife raked in hundreds of thousands in donations,” wrote Susan Crabtree and Jedd McFatter, authors of the muckraking book, Fool’s Gold: The Radicals, Con Artists, and Traitors Who Killed the California Dream and Now Threaten Us All. “While blaming the oil companies for contributing to climate change, he failed to hold PG&E and other utilities accountable for wildfires that spewed record amounts of carbon and other toxic smoke into the area.”
“If a company operates as a state-sanctioned monopoly, it has no business meddling in our elections,” said then-Assemblyman Bill Essayli. Essayli argued that PG&E is not a private company, but a government-protected monopoly “with captive customers who have no choice but to pay whatever they demand.”
“That’s why I introduced AB 884, which will ban all IOU political contributions to candidates for state office… The People deserve leaders who work for them, not for the energy monopolies that light our homes on fire while charging us the highest rates in the nation,” wrote Essayli. It’s unsure how far Essayli’s bill will go given that it would cut a lucrative revenue stream for many state legislators, including the Governor himself.
Former Governor Jerry Brown actually returned money to PG&E in 2017 after the utility company was convicted of six federal felonies for failing to prevent a 2010 pipeline explosion in San Bruno—a tragic event which killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes. Financial records show that PG&E had contributed over $300,000 to Brown and committees supporting his statewide campaigns. Brown clearly did not make the decision lightly—but did so in the knowledge that it would upset a longtime campaign financier. Similar sentiments were shared by State Assemblymember Timothy Grayson of Contra Costa County when he redirected a contribution from PG&E to his local United Way charity after meeting with residents who had lost their homes in the devastating 2018 wildfires.
One wonders why Newsom hasn’t done the same.
