OAKLAND — Hundreds of thousands of dollars are pouring into the race to choose Oakland’s next mayor — and almost all of the money is helping Barbara Lee and Loren Taylor, the two candidates widely seen as frontrunners.
The shortened fundraising cycle ahead of the April 15 special election has so far seen the two leading candidates generate similar levels of contributions, though labor spending to support Lee’s mayoral bid is reliably dominating the field of outside funding.
The campaign for Lee, the recently retired East Bay congresswoman, raised roughly $293,000 from individual donors between Jan. 1 and the end of the latest filing period, March 1.
Taylor’s campaign raised about $253,000 in individual contributions over the same period, though it also had raised an additional $57,000 by Dec. 31, before Lee launched her campaign the following month.
In a news release late last week, Taylor’s representatives focused on the cumulative fundraising total, $310,000, hailing the results so far as a strong showing for the former city councilmember.
“Despite Barbara Lee’s universal name identification and long career in Congress, Taylor’s fundraising results further show that his message is resonating with Oakland residents and the race to become Oakland’s next Mayor is likely to be close,” the campaign declared.
The two appear locked in a head-to-head showdown to decide who leads Oakland through November 2026, though others in the 10-candidate race may help influence the final outcome through the city’s ranked-choice voting system.
There is overlap among their supporters. Jesse Pollak, a cryptocurrency executive whose political committee flooded last November’s election with spending, including on the recall of former Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price, gave $650 to both campaigns.
As money goes, what could play a larger role than the cash raised by the two campaigns is all that’s spent by independent political committees built to support them.
A committee named Supporters of Barbara Lee for Oakland Mayor 2025 has raised $168,000 in contributions, including $50,000 from each of the city’s two largest public-employee labor unions, SEIU Local 1021 and IFPTE Local 21, plus $10,000 from the city firefighters’ union.
Pacific Gas and Electric Co. has donated $10,000 to the committee and Progressive Era PAC, a San Francisco-based political action committee, gave $20,000.
Taylor, meanwhile, has received support from a committee named Oakland Neighbors, Businesses & Public Safety Advocates for Loren Taylor for Mayor 2025, which so far has raised $36,000.
That includes $25,000 from Lafayette real estate developer Ronald Nahas, and $10,000 from retired insurance lawyer Charles Freiberg.
The committee is led by Brenda Grisham, a prominent activist in the recall effort of Pamela Price, the former Alameda County district attorney recalled by voters last November.
These committees, unbound by the same limits on individual donations that cap campaign fundraising, will often douse a race with cash in the final days before an election — usually for campaign flyers mailed to voters’ homes or television ads.
Currently, the city has contribution limits of $650 for individual donors and $1,300 for established political committees that meet certain criteria. Contributions to independent committees, on the other hand, can often range into tens of thousands of dollars.
Independent expenditures are widely seen as having helped former Mayor Sheng Thao eke out a victory over Taylor in the 2022 mayoral election, in which labor groups racked up $700,000 in independent spending.
Taylor has gone to lengths to subtly draw comparisons between Lee and Thao, who was recalled in November, federally indicted in January and now faces years in federal prison if convicted on bribery and conspiracy charges.
Lee, who opposed Thao’s recall but has since distanced herself from the ex-mayor, has refused to comment on Taylor directly, insisting her campaign is about promoting herself and avoiding political squabbles.
A small number of recall organizers have backed Lee’s campaign, including former city council candidate Derreck Johnson, who donated $650.
Lee and Taylor are set to debate Tuesday evening at the Oakland Museum of California, an event hosted in part by Empower Oakland, a political organization Taylor founded before running for mayor.
Shomik Mukherjee is a reporter covering Oakland. Call or text him at 510-905-5495 or email him at shomik@bayareanewsgroup.com.