This article is from Power Play, a twice-weekly newsletter rounding up the latest City Hall and local politics gossip. To sign up, visit The Standard’s newsletter page.
When Power Play learned last month that Mayor Daniel Lurie’s finance and philanthropy pals were forming an independent expenditure committee called “SF Believes” (opens in new tab) for the 2026 election cycle, we knew the dollar bills would start flying.
We weren’t wrong.
The group — started by the same people who established the 2024 mayoral campaign PAC that got a cool $1 million from Lurie’s mother — was created by financiers Adam Clammer and Alec Perkins. It has brought in a whopping $600,000 in the last month alone. The entity is backing Supervisors Stephen Sherrill and Alan Wong, Lurie allies who are facing serious challengers.
Clammer, of True Wind Capital, has thrown in $101,000; Perkins, of Hunter Capital, gave $51,000. Other donors are Jonathan Gans of Ironwood Capital Management, $100,000; investor David Lamond, $50,000; Michael Seibel of Y Combinator, $50,000; Oleg Nodelman of ECoR1 Capital, $75,000; his wife, Heather Nodelman, $75,000; and Matthew Paige of Twin Tree Venture, $100,000.
Campaign filings as of Wednesday show that SF Believes has spent only $24,705 so far, on a mailer. But the expenditures will almost certainly rise as the June 2 election approaches. A spokesperson for the PAC did not respond to a request for comment.
The Lurie-linked money comes on top of other cash flowing to Sherrill and Wong, whose moderate leanings have earned them the approval of the city’s tech and finance circles. Moderate-leaning political group GrowSF has its own PAC for each of the two candidates. The one backing Sherrill has been raking it in: $30,000 from Graphitic Energy cofounder Zach Jones, $50,000 from Permit Power CEO Nick Josefowitz, and $104,080 from 26 other donors, according to a Monday campaign filing. Wong has also been attracting some big bucks: $250,000 from venture capitalist and Standard chairman Michael Moritz, $10,000 from Substack star (opens in new tab)Noah Smith (opens in new tab) and $10,000 from Salesforce attorney Maco Stewart.
And as though Sherrill doesn’t have enough PACs behind him, there’s one more: ConnectedSF’s Griffin Lee has established “Committee to Support Supervisor Stephen Sherrill 2026,” though it is reports only a single donation so far: $1,500 from someone named Michael Morandi. — G.G.
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David Lee, a longtime Chinese American activist in San Francisco, is running for District 4. | Source: Han Li/The Standard
BEWARE OF UNDERDOG: Speaking of the District 4 ballot bout, have we got a surprise for you: One of that race’s underdog candidates is showing surprising strength in a poll that has insiders’ tongues wagging. A February poll by GrowSF shows San Francisco State University politics professor David Lee doing surprisingly better than challengers Natalie Gee and Albert Chow in first-place votes.
While the poll shows incumbent Wong coming out on top, sources say they were surprised by how well Lee did in the crowded field, especially considering Chow’s recent prominence in Joel Engardio’s recall and Gee’s labor backing.
GrowSF declined to comment on the poll. But as you can imagine, Lee was pretty stoked.
“There’s a race going on out here. We’re fighting hard every single day, and we haven’t spent any money,” Lee told Power Play. “To be up this much is a big boost to our campaign.”
Lee has run for office before, including for the state Assembly, but the bulk of his previous campaigning was in the Richmond, making his show of strength in the Sunset a surprise.
Not to throw cold water on Lee, but some questions in the poll show that support for him may be on shaky ground. And some sources speculate that he may have benefited from the ballot designation GrowSF used in the poll: “educator.” Why? It was conducted during the San Francisco teachers strike, when support for classroom workers was through the roof. — J.F.R.
SHE’S BACK: Many voters have never heard of the race for California insurance commissioner, but it carries enormous stakes. The office oversees the state’s roughly $3 trillion home and auto insurance market, amid growing wildfire threats and rising premiums.
A major San Francisco candidate is in the mix: former supervisor Jane Kim. A progressive activist with limited experience in the insurance industry, Kim has nonetheless racked up a long list of endorsements. Two stand out — both featured prominently (opens in new tab) on her website and campaign mailers: her longtime ally Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and, surprisingly, state Controller Malia Cohen, a former Board of Supervisors colleague from the other side of the aisle.
“Jane Kim and I have sparred for years on policy issues,” Cohen told a crowd Wednesday night at a Chinatown fundraising banquet. “She is a gracious woman — gracious when she wins and gracious when she loses.” Cohen, a moderate, served with Kim on the board from 2011 to 2019 but did not back Kim’s 2016 state Senate run or her 2018 mayoral bid.
Kim is running on a progressive platform aimed at taking on large insurance companies, including proposals to guarantee coverage and create a state-run insurance program. “How much of this industry should be in the for-profit market?” Kim asked at the banquet.
It’s unclear how much momentum she can build, given the limited media coverage and public attention on the race. But Kim is emerging as one of two Democratic front-runners: She and state Sen. Ben Allen — whose district includes the west side of L.A., Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades, and Malibu — each received about 40% (opens in new tab) of the vote in the California Democratic Party’s endorsement process. Another San Francisco candidate, parents advocate and chess grandmaster (opens in new tab) Patrick Wolff, trailed with about 6%. — H.L.
CRUSHING RUMORS: Following a chaotic year for the San Francisco Zoo that ended with the resignation of CEO Tanya Peterson, the much-hyped deal to bring giant pandas from China has largely gone quiet.
But on Thursday, SF Zoo Watch, a group led by animal activist Justin Barker, dropped a bombshell report claiming the panda deal is dead due to the zoo’s financial situation. The post cited unnamed insider sources but did not include a response from zoo officials.
The zoo’s new CEO (opens in new tab), Cassandra Costello, quickly pushed back, issuing a statement Thursday night denying the rumors.
“Recent claims by activist groups regarding giant pandas are not grounded in fact. As with any major development, the zoo will share updates publicly when there is confirmed information to report,” she said.
Costello confirmed a small round of layoffs, with three positions eliminated as part of what she described as a strategic reorganization. “This was a difficult decision and one we approached with care,” she said. “We are grateful for the contributions of those impacted and will support them during this transition.”
The zoo under Peterson had planned to debut pandas next month, but the timeline is now uncertain amid the leadership transition and ongoing renovations to the panda habitat. Sources say the zoo is moving forward with the panda project and continuing its fundraising efforts — estimated costs were $25 million when the initiative was announced in 2024. — H.L.