More than 1.5 million people have signed a petition to get the one-time, 5% wealth tax on statewide ballots in November, the people said. County election officials have to tally the signatures, verify them, and send them to California’s secretary of state before the measure can appear on the ballot. The people familiar with the campaign said they expect that will be more than enough to clear the required 875,000-signature threshold, even after accounting for illegible or invalid signatures.
The tax was proposed by the Service Employees International United Healthcare Workers West, which represents more than 120,000 healthcare workers, to offset cuts to healthcare funding in President Trump’s signature tax-and-spending law last year.
“When our growing coalition files these signatures, David will have won the first round against Goliath,” Suzanne Jimenez, spokeswoman for the Billionaire Tax Now coalition, said in a statement Sunday.
If passed, the tax would apply to the assets of individuals who resided in California as of Jan. 1 this year and who have net worths of $1 billion or more at the end of this year. SEIU-UHW says around 200 people meet those criteria.
