The investigation calls out Sen. Mike McGuire and how his ballot measure committee “shows how special interests are able to funnel tens of thousands to the very lawmakers they spend months lobbying” with “very few restrictions.” The piece goes on to note that McGuire has not used the committee’s money on any ballot campaigns but instead “has been used primarily as a vehicle for fundraising: collecting large checks from special interests groups and spending thousands to attend fundraisers – including the Super Bowl event – and dinners.” Campaign finance records show that McGuire’s ballot committee spent $40,000 to attend the Super Bowl in Las Vegas.
“You can’t claim to be for working people while cozying up to the same corporations driving up their costs,” Denney said. “I’m running because our politics should serve families first, not donors with a VIP lane, and because faith in government won’t return until we shut the door on pay-to-play politics for good.”
The piece notes how many Sacramento politicians, including McGuire, relieve tens of thousands of dollars from special interests in exchange for attending fundraisers at “high-end resorts and other exclusive events,” including “Beyoncé and Taylor Swift concerts, Disneyland, Las Vegas and lavish resorts such as Pelican Hill in Newport Beach.”
The contrast between the candidates in California’s 1st Congressional District could not be more clear: Audrey Denney is a working class educator and nonprofit leader, rooted in Northern California building a grassroots campaign, while Mike McGuire is a career politician who has spent the last decade in Sacramento cozying up to special interests and corporate lobbyists.
Denney expanded, “I have never taken and will never take a dime of corporate PAC money, because regular people shouldn’t have to wonder whether their voice matters more than the special interests buying influence in our political system.”
Read highlights from the article below or the full piece here.
The Sacramento Bee: No campaign? No problem. Inside California political elites’ shadowy spending, 1/12/26
By: Nicole Nixon and Kate Wolffee
[…]
A few days later, McGuire attended the game in Las Vegas. He paid for the tickets not out of his own pocket, but through a ballot measure committee called “Progress for California.”
The committee spent $40,000 for tickets, meals, lodging and transportation for a three-day stay in Las Vegas during the event, according to campaign finance records, paying Super Bowl beer sponsor Anheuser-Busch directly. The company also gifted McGuire ticket packages worth $33,750.
A campaign spokesman for McGuire said the trip was for a fundraiser held with his predecessor, former Senate pro Tem Toni Atkins.
In the two years since he opened the account, McGuire’s “Progress for California” ballot committee has amassed more than $850,000 in political donations from labor unions, tribes, businesses and other political action committees.
But despite its name, it has yet to donate to any ballot measure.
[…]
A Sacramento Bee review of more than 100 accounts and lobbying records reveals how two types of accounts in particular – ballot measure committees and campaign accounts held by ex-lawmakers – are commonly used to shore up political connections and help elected officials live large, while spending little, if anything, on campaigns those accounts were ostensibly designed to support.
[…]
The Bee’s analysis of campaign accounts controlled by current and former elected officials, including dozens like the one used to steal from Becerra, reveals the price to get a state lawmaker’s ear for an evening or a weekend – and it’s not cheap. Special interests often donate tens of thousands of dollars to lawmakers and gain access to private fundraisers at high-end resorts and other exclusive events.
After years of lax oversight from the Fair Political Practices Commission, some elected officials exploit loopholes to cozy up to special interests. Others push legal and ethical boundaries to set themselves up for a career in the private sector after term limits. This type of political spending is legal under California law.
“Money in politics is kind of this perverse game where both parties are guilty of the pay-to-play,” said Sean McMorris, a program manager for California Common Cause, a nonpartisan group that advocates for democracy and good governance.
Campaign finance loopholes allow players to trade money and influence without breaking the law, he said. “So they can say, ‘Hey, I’ve done nothing wrong,’ and they often do. It patronizes the heck out of the public because we’re not stupid.”
[…]
McGuire’s ballot measure committee shows how special interests are able to funnel tens of thousands to the very lawmakers they spend months lobbying. In the same way that federal PACs can raise unlimited funds from special interests, these campaign accounts have few restrictions on how much they can raise from a single source.
Top donors to the committee include Smart Justice California, a criminal justice advocacy group, and health care company DaVita, which have each given more than $100,000 since 2024.
Many lawmakers who control ballot measure committees use them to raise money to sway voters on ballot propositions. But campaign finance records show that since creating the account in late 2023, McGuire has not used the committee’s money on any actual ballot campaigns.
Instead, his “Progress for California” committee has been used primarily as a vehicle for fundraising: collecting large checks from special interests groups and spending thousands to attend fundraisers – including the Super Bowl event – and dinners.
McGuire did cut checks totaling over $150,000 to the ‘Yes on 50’ campaign in 2025 as the redistricting measure went to voters – however, those donations did not come from Progress for California, but another campaign account he was using to run for a higher elected office.
[…]
The Bee reviewed 90 active ballot measure committees controlled by sitting or former elected officials and found that these accounts are funded almost exclusively by special interests, which cut checks worth thousands – sometimes tens of thousands – of dollars. The money is often given to attend fundraisers at entertainment venues or luxury resorts.
In exchange for a “suggested donation” to the committees, trade organizations and other businesses and industry groups that regularly lobby the legislature can send a representative to rub elbows with a host lawmaker for an evening or weekend away from the Capitol.
[…]
Since 2024, lawmakers have hosted fundraisers at Beyoncé and Taylor Swift concerts, Disneyland, Las Vegas and lavish resorts such as Pelican Hill in Newport Beach. Many lawmakers also use their ballot measure accounts to pay political consulting fees.
Because candidates and elected officials are not required to report certain details about these fundraisers, few specifics are known about who attends and whether potential legislation is ever discussed in private.
State laws prevent registered lobbyists from making political donations, but no rules prohibit a company or interest group from donating a large sum for access to an elected official’s fundraiser, and then sending their lobbyist to the event.
Lobbyists and other “moneyed interests” know that donating to an elected officials’ campaign account – or accounts – is a way to “curry favor,” McMorris said. Politicians know it, too, “so those are the first people they reach out to for campaign contributions.”
[…]
The Bee’s analysis found most lawmaker-controlled ballot measure committees do spend money to either support or oppose ballot propositions. But some committees have spent upwards of $100,000 on fundraisers paid for, and attended by, the same businesses and association groups that lobby the Legislature while spending little, if any, money trying to reach their voters about a particular issue.
[…]
