From Peter Thiel-linked tech investors to the creator of “Law & Order,” several notable people are gunning to vault San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan’s bid for California governor to frontrunner status — starting with a Super Bowl ad.
The 30-second ad, which vaunts Mahan for making San Jose the “safest big city in America,” brought the mayor’s name into households across California. That’s thanks to California Back to Basics, an independent expenditure committee set up to support Mahan’s gubernatorial bid. The committee, which is barred from coordinating with Mahan’s campaign, spent $1.5 million on the coveted commercial spot and has raised $3.2 million to date. Most of its funding came from eight people as of Feb. 5, according to finance disclosures reviewed by this news organization.
Committees are required to report large expenditures within 24 hours — but only beginning 90 days before an election.
“The Super Bowl ad gave us an opportunity to introduce Mayor Mahan to a statewide audience as a problem-solver rising above the toxic atmosphere that surrounds our politics today and the only candidate actually solving the problems that California voters want fixed: reducing homelessness, making housing more affordable and tackling crime,” committee spokesperson Matthew Rodriguez told San José Spotlight.
California Back to Basics spent $1.5 million to run an ad highlighting Matt Mahan’s run for governor during the Super Bowl. Screenshot from Super Bowl ad courtesy of California Back to Basics.
The committee’s top donor is Michael Seibel, a former partner-turned-advisor at YCombinator, a world renowned incubator of tech startups. Seibel gave $1 million to the committee. Seibel’s colleague at YCombinator — CEO Garry Tan, a self-described moderate with a reputation as a right-wing incendiary in San Francisco — is a vocal Mahan supporter, but is not listed as a top contributor to the committee.
Marc and Ashley Merrill, a couple who respectively founded the video game company Riot Games and loungewear brand Lunya, each gave $510,000 to California Back to Basics.
Neil Mehta, founder of venture capital firm Greenoaks, with investments in tech companies Databricks, Stripe and Canva, donated $500,000 to the committee. Mehta garnered controversy in San Francisco last year — and sparked displacement fears — for buying eight buildings across three blocks in the Fillmore District for $40 million through limited liability companies.
Brian Singerman, a venture capitalist and one of the earliest employees of Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund tech investment firm, donated $250,000, records show. Singerman eventually became a partner — and later stepped down to be a strategic advisor — of the firm that invested in Elon Musk’s SpaceX, as well as surveillance and defense companies Palantir and Anduril.
Dick Wolf, creator of the iconic television series “Law & Order,” also contributed $250,000. It’s a notable endorsement for Mahan, who has clashed with fellow Democrats on crime and drug use. Mahan led the charge for Proposition 36, a voter-approved initiative that ramps up criminal punishment for petty theft. Mahan also won court injunctions last year barring specific people suspected of drug dealing from “loitering” in downtown.
Paul Wachter, an investment advisor whose clients include Arnold Schwarzenegger and LeBron James, gave $150,000, while Joshua Resnick of Los Angeles gave $100,000.
The California Back to Basics committee is separate from Back to Basics, a 501(c)(4) advocacy group Mahan started to push his policy agenda on cost of living issues, housing, homelessness and public safety. The group’s 501(c)(4) status allows it to avoid disclosing its donors.
Jim Reed, Mahan’s former chief of staff who left to run the Back to Basics advocacy group, did not respond to requests for comment.
The Super Bowl ad disclosure comes after Mahan’s own campaign touted a fundraising push on social media that reaped more than $7 million as of Feb. 6. Official campaign fundraising reports are due April 23.
Who’s working on Mahan’s campaign
For the role of campaign manager, Mahan has enlisted 23-year-old Adrian Rafizadeh, a self-described conservative who used to work for Mahan when he was a councilmember and managed Mahan’s mayoral campaign. Before Reed, Rafizadeh previously served as CEO of the Back to Basics 501(c)(4) as recently as November 2024, according to state filings.
Eric Jaye, a San Francisco-based consultant who helped lead campaigns by former Mayor-turned-Congressman Sam Liccardo, is also advising the campaign. Jaye is CEO of Storefront Political Media, a firm linked to a racist campaign ad scandal in 2020 that forced the Silicon Valley Organization to rebrand as the San Jose Chamber of Commerce the following year. At one point, Jaye was also a longtime friend and former advisor to then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Newsom has publicly shrugged off Mahan’s bid for governor after Mahan publicly criticized him on TV and in newspaper opinion articles.
Jaye did not respond to a request for comment.
Some of Mahan’s City Hall staffers are also putting in work on his governor campaign. Tasha Dean, the lead spokesperson for Mahan’s office, was with the mayor at the Feb. 3 gubernatorial debate in San Francisco.
Dean said her involvement is strictly as a volunteer after hours without pay from the campaign. City employees are prohibited from engaging in paid political activity.
“I took three days of vacation when he launched and have taken a few hours of vacation time here and there over the last two weeks,” Dean told San José Spotlight.
She said she won’t be the campaign’s communications director, but may take a brief leave from Mahan’s office closer to the election.
Dean said an executive assistant in the mayor’s office filed an outside work permit for the campaign that has yet to be approved — and that no one else in the mayor’s office is involved in his campaign.
Mahan’s opponents in the governor race include Congressman Eric Swalwell, former Congresswoman Katie Porter, billionaire Tom Steyer, former Attorney General Xavier Becerra, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, conservative pundit Steve Hilton, State Superintendent Tony Thurmond and former State Controller Betty Yee.
Whichever two candidates get the most votes in the June 2 primary will advance to the Nov. 3 election.
Contact Brandon Pho at [email protected] or @brandonphooo on X.