Across the country, on November 3, 2026, voters in the midterm elections overwhelmingly rejected the right-wing agenda of the Republican Party that has been characterized by political corruption, a deepening affordability crisis, the racist policing of immigrant workers, the continued genocide in Gaza, and a reckless, deeply unpopular war on Iran. Millions of people voted against war, poverty and racist ICE terror.
In San Francisco, tech and venture capitalist billionaires won by pouring millions of dollars into local, state and federal elections. The billionaires of the Democratic Party consolidated power through a falsely described “Clean Up” City Hall campaign and electing billionaire-dependent candidates.
UESF-endorsed candidates for the San Francisco Board of Education, Virginia Cheung, Ryan Hazelton, and Reina Tello, were all defeated by the billionaire-backed and Democratic Party-endorsed candidates, Phil Kim, Tim Tung, and Autumn Brown Garibay. UESF-endorsed congressional candidate Connie Chan was defeated by billionaire-backed and Democratic Party-endorsed Scott Weiner. UESF-endorsed community college board candidates Leah LaCroix, Dr. Bunny McFadden, and Jeremy Lee were also defeated by the same forces.
Billionaire-heir Mayor Daniel Lurie and his billionaire tech cronies won the passage of San Francisco Proposition D, which will make it more difficult for unions and other citizen groups to propose future ballot propositions. The billionaires overcame the affordable housing act (Prop I) in San Francisco and spent tens of millions to defeat a billionaire tax in California that would tax just 246 billionaires to fund healthcare.
There were some victories for educators in this election. UESF-endorsed San Francisco Proposition B passed, which will establish a public bank. San Francisco Proposition H, as well as the Regional Transit Measure (RTM), both passed, increasing funding for public transportation like Muni and BART. Proposition H and the RTM were also billionaire backed. While educators and many other unions supported the measures to save public transportation from dire futures, the taxes they will enact are regressive and require workers to pay for a crisis created by billionaire-backed politicians. California propositions 41 and 43, which would have produced obstacles for voter-approved initiatives and funding public services are failing.
The most important victory for educators in California is the passage of Proposition 3, which maintains a tax on high-income earners that funds public education. Richard Barrera, a staunch ally of public schools, was elected California Superintendent of Public Instruction.
The outcome of the San Francisco Board of Education election will have the most direct impact on the working conditions of UESF educators and the learning conditions of San Francisco students. In the coming contract bargain, we will face a school board majority that owe their positions to billionaires. The educators and the 40,000 people who joined us in the streets from February 9 to 12 won a great contract against the opposition of the school board majority. We can do it again if necessary. The passage of California Proposition 3 ensures that SFUSD will continue to have the funds to invest in the schools our students deserve.
UESF educators can celebrate the fact that, while we could not overcome the billionaires’ influence on the election, we did fight hard enough to make it a close contest. UESF-endorsed candidates won many more precincts than we did in the June Primary election when Cheung faced off against Kim and Brandee Marckmann. Furthermore, Cheung, Hazelton, and Tello all beat incumbent Commissioner Alida Fisher who came in seventh and will lose her seat on the board. This is an important demonstration of a political reality in San Francisco, one that now exists because United Educators of San Francisco struck for the first time in a half century unequivocally demanding sanctuary, housing, special education improvements, decent wages and fully-covered health benefits. Our bravery, passion and commitment to our students, schools, and fellow educators translated into organizing those victories.
The 2026 midterms have shown that there are now only two competitive lanes for candidates who want to get elected to the school board in San Francisco. They must align themselves clearly with the billionaires or with UESF. Those politicians who fail to make themselves reliable allies of either the billionaires or the workers, will not be able to compete.
We will never be able to outspend the billionaires in political contests. Our path to victory will be through organizing more volunteers and exercising greater people power. We will need many more of our own members to volunteer in the upcoming campaigns if we are going to prevail against billionaire political power. We will also need to find a way to lead more of the rest of the labor movement in a fighting campaign. It will take tens of thousands of organizers and activists to build working-class political power in San Francisco. For anyone feeling confused and upset by the consolidation of billionaire power in San Francisco, there is hope. We can continue to expand our organizing and build a movement based on a real and inspiring vision for a San Francisco workers deserve.
