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Californians couldn’t escape billionaire Tom Steyer’s political ads — during newscasts, sitcoms, or sporting events; on streaming services, YouTube, influencers’ social media feeds, or their mailboxes. Even the Puppy Bowl.

Yet despite spending a record-shattering $216 million of his wealth on his run for governor, the Democrat failed to win enough votes in last week’s primary to advance to the November general election to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom.

“Money isn’t everything, even though it obviously helps,” said Andrea Godfrey Flynn, a marketing professor at the University of San Diego. “It boosted Steyer way up. … But there are so many other factors at play that it may not have been enough.”

Steyer, a hedge fund co-founder turned environmental warrior, polled at 1% shortly before he entered the governor’s race in November, according to a survey by UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies that was co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times.

He climbed in subsequent polls, hitting 19% in the same poll shortly before the June 2 primary, putting Steyer in contention for winning one of the top two spots in the contest that would allow him to advance to the November election. But then he hit a ceiling, and on Tuesday, it became official that he failed to advance.

Steyer emailed supporters Tuesday expressing gratitude for their efforts backing his campaign, endorsements and votes.

“Together, we fought for a California that belongs to the people who keep it running every day, and we insisted that they do not have to settle for a system that protects corporate profits at the expense of working people,” he wrote. “I’m proud of how we never compromised our values or lowered our sights for what California can and should be.”

He pointed with pride at major corporations such as Chevron and Meta spending heavily to oppose his bid, and said their tens of millions of dollars spent attacking him shows the flaws in the electoral system. And he acknowledged that may be part of the reason some voters were skeptical of voting for a billionaire.

“I’m proud of the enemies we made,” Steyer said. “This campaign proved that business-as-usual depends on politics-as-usual, and there is no going back. We must continue to fight for a system where democracy serves Californians, not corporations — and where you do not have to be a billionaire to run on single-payer, or on breaking up monopolies, or on calling out a corrupt system when you see it. Because people are fed up with a system rigged to benefit billionaires and leave them behind.”

As of Tuesday evening, Steyer had received more than 1.9 million votes of the more than 9 million cast, lagging behind the two candidates who will appear on the November ballot: Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News commentator, and Democrat Xavier Becerra, a longtime elected official who most recently served in President Biden’s cabinet. Steyer was trailing Hilton, the second-place finisher, by just over 200,000 votes.

Steyer immediately endorsed Becerra, whom he had relentlessly attacked in the closing weeks of the campaign as beholden to corporations with business in front of the governor.

California has a history of unsuccessful self-funders. Former Northwest Airlines co-chairman Al Checchi spent more than $40 million of his money on an unsuccessful gubernatorial primary campaign in 1998, which broke records at the time.

More than a decade later, former EBay chief Meg Whitman spent $144 million of her wealth on her bid to become California’s governor, setting a new national record for spending on a state election. She won the GOP nomination but lost in the general election.

This year’s gubernatorial contest is not the first time Steyer has spent an inordinate sum seeking office. In 2020, he spent $342 million on a brief, unsuccessful presidential campaign.

Sheri Sadler, a veteran Los Angeles-based Democratic media buyer, said Steyer’s 2026 gubernatorial deluge was notable.

“I literally saw his spots ad nauseam,” she said. “They left almost no stone unturned.”

Sadler worked for Steyer in the final weeks of his presidential bid and scheduled $50 million of billionaire Rick Caruso’s money on ads during his unsuccessful 2022 Los Angeles mayoral campaign.

She believes that Steyer hit a ceiling because voters who are bombarded by ads eventually feel that the candidate is trying to purchase their affection.

“It’s one thing to give me a message I can resonate with. If they’re just trying to buy my vote, that feels different to me,” she said, adding that Steyer’s wealth undermined his platform, which included support for raising taxes on billionaires. “That’s my gut. And I feel like that’s what happened to us on Caruso and possibly why he didn’t run” for governor this year.

Steyer, 68, made his fortune founding a hedge fund that included investments in fossil fuels, private prisons and other businesses that are controversial among Democrats. He told voters that he walked away from the firm 14 years ago, leaving an enormous amount of money on the table, because it did not align with his morals. Steyer adds that he and his wife have pledged to give away most of their wealth before they die.

And unlike many wealthy self-funders, Steyer did not leap into a campaign as a political neophyte who assumed their business skills would translate into being an effective elected official.

Steyer and his wife, Kat Taylor, are longtime donors to Democratic candidates, but for well over a decade, they have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on liberal causes such as fighting climate change, mobilizing young voters, urging the impeachment of President Trump, opposing an effort by oil companies to suspend California environmental standards, increasing the state cigarette tax and supporting last year’s redrawing of the state’s congressional districts to counter Trump.

Darry Sragow, a veteran Democratic strategist who advised Checchi, said that Steyer’s focus on such causes had the potential to be meaningful to voters who are often skeptical about the sincerity and motives of rich candidates.

“Tom Steyer has done a good job in that respect, because if you’re going to overcome that skepticism, it’s very helpful for the candidate to show that he or she has actually been involved in the world of public policy and politics for an extended period,” and Steyer has, Sragow said.

Assemblyman Isaac G. Bryan (D-Los Angeles), who endorsed Steyer, argued that he promoted proposals that were against his personal interests, such as the proposed billionaire’s tax that is expected to appear on the November ballot.

“Interestingly enough, Tom Steyer is also the only candidate who’s talked about campaign finance reform and wanting to get money out of politics, including his money, to return power to the people and have publicly financed elections,” Bryan said after a Steyer rally near downtown L.A. on May 31.

Former Orange County Rep. Katie Porter and state Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond also campaigned on limiting the influence of corporate PAC money in elections, or implementing publicly financed elections in California. Porter often criticized Steyer for running as a “change agent” while spending millions he earned from investments in oil and gas.

“You paid the lowest tax rate on this stage and yet you made the billions that you’re using to fund your campaign off fossil fuels,” she said to Steyer during an April 28 debate in Claremont.

Political experts argue that messages that seem contradictory to a candidate’s background, as well as drowning voters with incessant ads, can be jarring and off-putting to the electorate.

“It can be an overload to voters where they hit that tipping point where they’re no longer interested,” Flynn said.

Despite Steyer’s foundational argument that his wealth meant he was not beholden to anyone, she said voters may be unable to reconcile a billionaire’s ability to understand or empathize about an average Californian’s needs.

“The messaging still is a giant factor,” Flynn said. “I’m curious [about] how believable it came across to voters — can you trust a billionaire to really care about affordability, someone who made money working with business or in business not to care about special interests?”

While Steyer campaigned as a hard-left liberal, he failed to be the top pick for progressives. Steyer had the support of 35% of likely voters who identified as strongly liberal while Becerra was backed by 37%, according to Berkeley’s May poll.

After talking to college Democrats at UCLA on the eve of the primary, Steyer said regardless of what happens in the primary, he will remain politically involved, though he would not run for president in 2028.

“I’m going to keep working on these issues, because I’ve been working full-time on these issues for 14 years,” Steyer said. “There’s no question what I’m going to do. How I do it is a little bit up in the air.”

Times staff writer Dakota Smith contributed to this report.

Bembou Silaty, Guinea – Mamadou Aliou walks through the small village of Bembou Silaty in northwestern Guinea carrying an irresolvable contradiction.

The 38-year-old works in the environmental health and safety department for a bauxite mining company, yet he is also an activist striving to improve life in his community, which often means criticising the actions of another mining company in the area.

“Before these companies arrived, we cultivated our land, and it sustained us,” Aliou told Al Jazeera.

“We could cover our daily needs, especially food. But now, when a piece of land is registered and belongs to a mining company, you have nothing there any more.”

The foreign-linked mining companies are part of the global scramble for Guinea’s bauxite. The West African nation holds the world’s biggest reserves of the ore, which is the source material for alumina and ultimately aluminium, a metal essential for car and aircraft frames, windows, wind turbines, and solar panels.

Over the past three decades, Guinea has multiplied its bauxite production tenfold. More than a dozen projects of bauxite production are currently ongoing in the country, according to the online cadastre.

As the global energy transition demands ever more aluminium, it has placed Guinea in a strategically crucial position. Approximately 75 percent of the bauxite exported by the country over the past decade has ended up in China, which produces 60 percent of the world’s aluminium.

Companies from Russia, the United States, and the United Arab Emirates have also established themselves in the country to secure the ore. In Bembou Silaty, an Indian company that began operations in 2019 now holds an exploitation concession until 2034.

Located in the prefecture of Telimele (Kindia region), Bembou Silaty has undergone a transformation since bauxite was discovered on its land about five years ago.

Yet, on the ground, many lament the cost: Contaminated water, loss of farmland, and a steep decline in agricultural productivity.

‘No land, no money’

In the traditional bauxite heartlands of Kindia and Boke, the main roads are in notably good condition, a cut above the rest of the country. Steady jobs in technical roles or transport logistics have created economic opportunities for some Guineans.

Yet Bembou Silaty remains a quiet, peaceful village without electricity, and farming methods that are untouched by mechanisation.

Less than 2km (1.2 miles) away, however, the lush green landscape and mild climate of the rainy season give way to the electric-powered site of the Indian mining company.

There, excavators and trucks laden with bauxite constantly traverse the wide, unpaved roads, built to accommodate the heavy traffic, in a noisy, busy zone where the mining economy bulldozes its way forward.

People working in technical roles at the mine can earn up to about $300 a month.

For other locals who make a living from farming, most don’t have a regular wage and rely on the yield from their crops.

Across Guinea, an estimated half of the population depends on agriculture for their livelihood.

Locals in Bembou Silaty say every hectare claimed by mining is a hectare lost to farming, in a country that spent more than $500m importing rice in 2024.

“They give you compensation for your land, but it’s not enough, and in the end, it’s mismanaged,” Aliou said.

“Within a month or two, someone who received 50 or 100 million Guinean francs ($5,700-11,400) has nothing left. No land, no money. They have to start over, from below zero.”

Locals who still own land continue to grow rice, cassava, peanuts and cashews in the village, but they have ever less space and agricultural productivity is falling.

The village women have set up an association, “Allawalli” (which means “God help us” in Fula), to work cooperatively.

‘Not enough’

Walking through the alleys of Bembou Silaty, a few houses stand out.

They are made of cement, which withstands the rains better than the more common mud-brick homes, though many remain unfinished.

Locals say they were built with compensation money.

Fatoumata Binta Bah, a neighbour of Aliou’s, comes from a family of farmers. They once cultivated cashews, their livelihood.

Then the Indian mining company started up operations and offered them less than 50 million Guinean francs (about $5,700) for their land. That compensation, paid as a lump sum, seemed like a decent amount of money, she says.

But now, the money is gone, and their new house is still incomplete.

“The land they took from us was productive. That’s what we lived on,” said Bah, 20, as she prepared tea over a fire in the family courtyard.

“In the end, it wasn’t enough,” she lamented.

The Indian company did not respond to Al Jazeera’s questions on the purchase of land.

Meanwhile, on the outskirts of the village, surgical holes drilled into the ground mark where mining companies have tested for bauxite – a reminder to the farmers that the impact on the land is felt even before extraction begins.

In a recent report, Djami Diallo, the Guinean minister of the environment and sustainable development, stated that each year, certain companies had their impact studies and evaluation reports rejected for failing to comply with environmental standards.

Three or four companies in Boke, Kindia’s neighbouring region that is considered the bauxite capital in the country, were said to be affected. But the minister acknowledged that “just because companies do not meet the conditions to obtain the compliance certificate does not mean that everything stops.”

Clean water, the greatest challenge

Not all homes in Bembou Silaty, a community of about 5,000, have indoor toilets and plumbing. In the centre of the village, there are communal latrines for those who do not have facilities available in their homes. Showers can be taken in the same place, using a bucket and water collected from the spring.

One small gain for the community since the mining company’s arrival is a new water point in the village. The tap serves nearly all the residents. Even Aliou uses it to fill buckets for his household – for cooking and drinking – though he says he knows the water contains iron, as contamination occurs.

Still, he considers himself luckier than his friends in the neighbouring village of Koussadji Dow, who rely on now-brown, contaminated river water.

Tala Oury Sow, a trader and farmer, washes her cooking utensils in the murky river water – a daily struggle.

She starts speaking softly, surrounded by neighbours, but her voice rises to a shout.

“Do you think we can live like this?

“We had hoped the mining company’s arrival would improve things, but it has gotten worse,” she protested.

“Since the mining companies came, we’ve had this problem with the water. The children get sick, and the parents too,” added Mariama Kindi Diallo, a farmer, in her courtyard.

“The doctors tell us not to drink the rain or river water. There are no roads, no school, no phone signal. What are we supposed to do? We are asking for help to have a dignified life,” she pleaded, as her family and neighbours nodded in agreement.

The Indian company did not respond to requests for comment on these issues.

‘We need refineries here’

To escape the increasingly difficult conditions in villages like Bembou Silaty, some people leave the rural areas and head to the capital, Conakry.

Bauxite mining so dominates Guinea that one can chance upon a driver of one of the trains hauling ore from the mines to the port of Kamsar.

Alpha, who did not want his real name published, works for a United States-backed company and provides a window into the immense volume of resources being exported.

“We operate six trains of 150 wagons each day,” he said, explaining that the annual target for 2025 was to export 17.5 million tonnes of bauxite.

“The government wants to change things, because the profits we make in Guinea right now are small. We need refineries here to increase the state’s revenue,” he added.

Alpha lives near the coast, where his job has allowed him to build a house for his family and achieve a standard of living unattainable for most of his compatriots.

The government of Mamady Doumbouya, which came to power in a 2021 coup, is attempting to reorganise the mining sector. It is pressing investors to process bauxite within Guinea, ensuring a portion of the value stays in the country.

Processing bauxite into aluminium can multiply its price by 37 times.

Instability in Iran amid the US and Israel’s war has contributed to rising aluminium prices, which surpassed $3,600 per tonne in April.

Doumbouya is set to lead the country for the next seven years, after winning the December 2025 elections with nearly 87 percent of the vote. While opponents view him as illegitimate, many Guineans agree on the need to reform the mining sector.

Achieving this, however, requires a huge increase in electricity generation – power that is non-existent in villages like Bembou Silaty and unreliable even in Conakry, where blackouts are frequent when fans and TVs are switched on at night.

Guinea is working with neighbouring Senegal on a solution: Using Senegalese gas to generate enough electricity to process its bauxite on African soil. Currently, both countries export raw materials, while jobs and wealth are created elsewhere.

Following the bauxite route

More than 3,000km (1,900 miles) away, across the ocean, Spain is also a part of the Guinean bauxite story.

Parets del Valles, a municipality of 18,000 people less than 30km (19 miles) from Barcelona, represents the journey’s end.

From the town centre to its industrial outskirts, businesses specialising in aluminium are plentiful: Aluminium distribution, carpentry, and window fitting, much of them serving household needs.

For Spain, Europe’s largest consumer of Guinean bauxite, more than 90 percent of its imports come from Guinea-Conakry.

The aluminium produced there, mainly in the country’s north, feeds the automotive industry and serves both industrial and domestic purposes.

Parets is another world compared with the bauxite’s point of origin in Guinea.

In Spain, there is light, hot water, paved roads – all the base elements of a decent life. It’s why many say growing numbers of West Africans are arriving in Parets and across the Valles Oriental region. This is part of a broader trend in Catalonia and Spain, according to the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE): The Guinean population has quadrupled in Spain since 2000 – from 2,700 to 11,000 people – and in Catalonia from 1,000 to 4,000.

These figures don’t include those who go unregistered.

Increasingly, more boats are leaving directly from Guinea, towards the Canary Islands and on to mainland Europe. According to Frontex, the European Union border security agency, more Guineans arrived in the Canary Islands, Spain, in 2023 (2,324) than in the previous 13 years combined. In 2024 and 2025 combined, another 6,000 Guineans arrived.

Migrants, predominantly men from Senegal and increasingly from Guinea, come alone, settling where they have contacts and job prospects. The newest arrivals, often very young, spend long hours with their mobile phones as their sole companion – the only tether to the country they left behind.

Many left, following the bauxite trail, hoping to find something more in the places where their resources are both enjoyed and exploited.

As Aliou, back in Bembou Silaty, says: “If you compare the bauxite we export with what we get in return, the difference is enormous. We gain almost nothing. Just enough to survive.”

This article was produced in collaboration with the Catalan association SETEM Catalunya, promoted by the Connect for Global Change consortium and Lafede.cat, and with financial support from the European Union and the Government of Catalonia (Generalitat de Catalunya)

Norway is preparing to lift restrictions preventing its $2.2 trillion sovereign wealth fund from investing in government bonds issued by Syria.

The move follows the political transition after the ousting of Bashar al-Assad and the rise of Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose government has been seeking economic recovery and international reintegration after more than a decade of war and sanctions.

At the same time, Norway plans to newly restrict investments in bonds issued by Iran, aligning with ongoing international sanctions.

Policy Shift and Financial Context

The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund, the largest in the world, plays a major role in global financial markets. Its investment decisions often influence broader investor behaviour.

The updated policy removes Syria from the exclusion list for government bonds while adding Iran, reflecting changing geopolitical and sanctions dynamics.

Although the fund does not currently hold investments in Middle Eastern government bonds, the policy shift opens the door for future allocations and signals a reassessment of risk and legitimacy.

Geopolitical Significance

Norway’s decision represents a notable step toward Syria’s re-entry into the global financial system. It comes alongside other developments, including the restoration of Syria’s financial links with international institutions after years of isolation.

The move also highlights a divergence in how states are being treated: while Syria is gradually being reintegrated, Iran remains economically isolated due to continued tensions and sanctions.

As one of the world’s most influential sovereign investors, Norway’s stance could encourage other countries and institutions to reconsider their own restrictions on Syria.

Analysis

The decision reflects a broader recalibration of international economic engagement based on political change and shifting strategic priorities. By opening the possibility of investment in Syrian bonds, Norway is signalling cautious confidence in the new government’s direction and stability.

At the same time, the move remains largely symbolic in the short term. The wealth fund has no immediate exposure to Syrian debt, and actual investment will depend on risk assessments, market conditions, and institutional safeguards.

More importantly, the policy underscores how financial tools are increasingly used as instruments of foreign policy. Inclusion or exclusion from global capital markets can legitimise governments, incentivise reforms, or reinforce isolation.

In Syria’s case, gradual financial reintegration could support reconstruction and economic recovery, but it also raises questions about governance, transparency, and long-term stability after years of conflict.

With information from Reuters.