Billionaire Steyer Won't Run But Will Spend Big For Dems

Wants to wash away the "stain" of Trump administration.

For most Americans, their first introduction to Tom Steyer came through his ad campaign to impeach Donald Trump. Now the Democrat donor and billionaire who made his fortune on investments in coal and private prisons, among other things, says he wants to wash away "the stain" of Donald Trump by flipping the House in the midterms and then working to remove Trump in 2020.

The Washington Post reports that Steyer will put $30 million into NextGen America, his voter registration and mobilization effort to get millennial voters to the ballot box:

The targets are 24 Republican-controlled congressional districts and a handful of swing seats currently held by Democrats, in 10 states: Arizona, California, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin. That money will supplement ongoing Steyer-funded NextGen efforts; it could also be increased as the campaign goes on.  

The campaign will target seats in California, Pennsylvania and even Paul Ryan's seat in Wisconsin. In an interview with the Post, Steyer said millennial voters are key if the Democrats are to make any gains:

“I’m going to continue to work on the grass-roots efforts we had in place, and amplify them, and make them bigger,” Steyer said. “We’re going to register voters, then encourage them to participate. That means we want to talk about issues people care most about. We need to — just go back and look at millennial turnout in 2014, the last midterms. It’s shocking how low it was.”  

Steyer, who left his San Francisco-based investment fund in 2012 and has spent the last several years on political causes, was expected by many to seek office - either running for Senate or Governor of California - but has said no to running in 2018. What Steyer hasn't done is rule out a run for president in 2020.