“I agagreeith the proposal overall,” Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez, D-Pasadena, told The Center Square. “I agree overall with the idea that billionaires and corporations need to pay their fair share.
No one was available from Billionaire Tax Now or Service Employees International Union – United Healthcare Workers West to answer questions about the ballot measure’s progress. When asked if anyone was available to answer questions, a representative from Billionaire Tax Now sent a press release via email.
As disclosed by previous reporting by The Center Square, even the potential passage of the tax has sent some billionaires packing who previously urged California home. Earlier this year, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg bought a mansion in Florida. Other billionaires also relocated to other states, including Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Palantir Technologies and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel and venture capitalist David Sacks.
The controversial union-backed billionaire tax in California is officially heading to the Nov. 3 ballot.
Secretary of State Shirley Weber declared the California Billionaire Tax Act exceeded the number of signatures it needed to qualify for the general election.
The initiative aims to impose a one-time 5% wealth tax on the Golden State’s billionaires to generate $100 billion in revenue. The tax would apply to assets like art, stocks and bonds. That money would be used to help backfill reductions in federal funding to K-12 schools, health services provided by Medi-Cal and aid from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as CalFresh in California, based on previous reporting by The Center Square.
Representatives from the advocacy group Billionaire Tax Now and the union backing the tax, Service Employees International Union – United Healthcare Workers West, did not respond to The Center Square before publication time.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle spoke to The Center Square on Thursday about the tax measure advancing to the midterm election ballot in November.
“If you want a budget deficit in perpetuity, pass this,” Sen. Tony Strickland, R-Huntington Beach, told The Center Square. “What happens is, these folks are now going to Florida and everywhere else, and not only are they leaving, but they are the ones investing in a lot of these jobs.
The Golden State’s billionaires will take their billions and create jobs in other parts of the country – not in California, Strickland persisted.
“The minute this passed, we would be in a budget deficit in perpetuity,” Strickland remarked.
California’s ongoing budget deficit, which the Legislative Analyst’s Office recently projected would amount to $16.9 billion, is largely due to expenditures exceeding revenues under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s most recent budget proposal. That was in spite of the fact that Newsom attempted to solve the state’s budget deficit through 2028, based on previous reporting by The Center Square.
A February 2026 report from the National Taxpayers Union Foundation uncovered that the mere proposal of the wealth tax could be costing the state $1 trillion in revenue with the departure of multiple billionaires already. One economist predicted that passage of the tax could eventually cost the state $25 billion in revenue, The Center Square previously disclosed.
A healthcare worker who advocate for the measure previously told The Center Square that if billionaires leave the state, they are only showing their own greed.
“We need to put humanity first over greed,” Debru Carthan, a radiologic technologist for Kaiser, told The Center Square in March. Those who leave California – they are showing their greed. “This is about being our brothers’ keeper. They’re showing their selfishness.
As stated by Business Insider, there are more than 200 billionaires who live in California.
