New Donation is a Smoking Gun: Call Him Big Tobacco Becerra

Phillip Morris joins a murderer’s row of special interests  – Chevron, Meta, McDonald's, Uber, and DaVita – in backing Becerra

CALIFORNIA — Today, Phillip Morris became the latest special interest backing Xavier Becerra's campaign, joining an already crowded field of corporate donors including Chevron, Meta, McDonald's, Uber, and DaVita.

For Becerra, the money comes as special interests see how easily he can be manipulated. In exchange for endorsements and financial support, he flip-flopped on single payer, opened the door to new oil drilling, and gave fossil fuel companies a pass on oversight. Special interests keep lining up behind Becerra because they know how easily he’ll fold – and let them keep ripping off Californians.

On Big Tobacco, this race is a tale of two candidates. For Tom Steyer, taking on Big Tobacco is close to home.

"We have a moral responsibility to stand up to tobacco companies and keep kids from becoming lifetime smokers," Steyer told the Los Angeles Times in 2015.

Steyer co-chaired the Save Lives California campaign to raise taxes on tobacco companies and their predatory targeting of kids and families. The ballot initiative passed in 2015. 

 Since the $2-per-pack tax took effect in 2016, it has generated $9.6 billion for California — and smoking has gone down. 

"Big Tobacco knows firsthand what it looks like when Tom Steyer comes after you: you lose," said Ariana Andrade, spokesperson for Steyer for Governor. "These are the same predatory interests that have been picking California families' pockets for decades, and Becerra is happy to take their money. As governor, Tom will go after every last one of them, just like he's done before."

Big Tobacco joins the coalition funding the anti-Steyer effort reads like a who’s who of the corporate interests making California more expensive:

• Edison International, whose equipment has been linked to catastrophic wildfires that destroyed homes and devastated communities.
• Big Tech billionaires like Sergey Brin and corporations like Meta, which laid off thousands of workers while pouring money into politics to protect their own bottom lines.
• Realtor interests that keep housing costs high for renters and working families.
• Uber and gig economy corporations that spent hundreds of millions rewriting labor laws to benefit themselves.
• Fast food and corporate lobbying interests fighting worker protections and higher wages.

Steyer has pledged to lower costs for working Californians by closing a corporate tax loophole benefitting billionaires and commercial property owners, breaking up utility monopolies to lower electric bills, and imposing a windfall tax on Big Oil companies that are price-gouging Californians at the pump. 

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