Barak Gila, @barakgila

April 30, 2026

SAN FRANCISCO — “Obviously your logical appeal is very strong, but I want to hear about your emotional appeal,” an audience member asked point blank near the end of California gubernatorial candidate Matt Mahan’s interview this past Monday, April 27, in San Francisco. “We wanna know your heart, Matt,” added interviewer Manny Yekutiel encouragingly. Mahan hesitated in his response, recounting three snippets about kids who couldn’t surf in their polluted Imperial Beach and were organizing; people paying mortgages on burned out lots in LA’s Palisades; and a homeless former businessman. “…so yeah,” he hesitantly transitioned, “The most inspiring part of my campaign is hearing their stories and thinking how to give everyone real opportunity and lift people up.” It was of a piece with the rest of the interview, in which Mahan came across as wonky, in firm command of policy, and excited to dive in and improve CA governance — but didn’t seem able to connect with people emotionally.

Yekutiel moderated the event at Manny’s, a community space he opened more than 7 years ago in San Francisco’s Mission district, with a warm blend of personal and policy questions. The audience was a mix of older, whiter folks and a younger tech set skewing male. The interview started promptly, and Mahan stuck around afterwards to pose for photos and talk to attendees one on one.

Mahan was most compelling on the theme of making government effective and responsive, focusing on the issues of housing and homelessness as examples. He said that under his leadership, trust in San Jose city government has increased by 40%. He emphasized the importance of defining the right outcomes and measuring them. San Jose has added dashboards with key performance indicators on its response to homelessness, and unsheltered homelessness has decreased in the city. Mahan, whose candidacy for governor has no endorsements from major California unions, was free to blame special interest capture for state government ineffectiveness.

His messaging to the engaged crowd at Manny’s was nuanced. Rather than standard anti-Trump invective, he described targeted resistance to certain Trump policies, but said “we have to own that many of the problems most harming California today are the result of Democratic policies not working in practice. The best resistance to Trump is delivering results on things that matter most in people’s lives.” Later, when an audience member complained that Californians’ federal taxes exceed federal spending in CA (by $250B in 2024 or an average of $30B since 2015), Mahan responded that believing in the U.S. as a union entails investing in shared public services, and that if we don’t invest in the Midwest, the nation will become even more divided and resentful, and tear itself apart politically.

On housing, he got into the weeds, mentioning construction defect liability laws in CA as a reason only 3% of new CA homes are condos. If potential lawsuits from damage years after a condo building is sold are very costly to hedge or address, that can be an incentive to build apartments instead. Since condos are often more affordable than existing single-family homes, and since there is little room to build more single-family homes in developed areas, this reduces the share of homes in CA that are for sale, especially relatively affordable starter homes; CA has the lowest homeownership rate in the country. Mahan recounted how growing up, it was hard for his parents to pay their mortgage, but owning a home allowed his middle-class family to build wealth. (There’s a pending bill to address the issues with construction defect liability in the legislature.) Pressed for a target on new homes built, Mahan answered that the state needs 300,000 homes per year to keep home price growth in line with wage growth; that we’re currently building 85,000/year (down from 110,000/year under Gavin Newsom’s leadership), and that he would aim to gradually increase that number by tens of thousands per year until the state is approaching that goal.

Though the crowd seemed generally supportive, Mahan didn’t particularly tailor his tone to specific audience questions nor connect with people on an emotional level. During the audience Q&A, one woman asked about housing specifically for extremely low income people and about a program to use food stamps at farmer’s markets, which may be cut in the state budget. Mahan responded with a detailed, accurate answer about needing an all-of-the-above approach on housing; about how the root cause of high costs is heavy regulation of market-rate housing; how current subsidized housing developments cost the government $1M/unit; how wealthier tech workers have been moving into lower-quality housing stock due to the lack of new construction; and even about Portland’s model of fully state-funded inclusionary development, as opposed to requirements in California that are unfunded and thus raise the cost of new construction. Asked a personal, heartfelt question, Mahan responded with dense policy detail.

The California governor’s race has a nonpartisan primary on June 2, 2026 that will narrow the field to two candidates. (It is possible for two Democrats or two Republicans to win the primary.) Mahan is currently a long shot to advance to the general, polling in mid-single digits. Kalshi, a prediction market, currently gives him an approximately 10% chance of making it past the primary. Mahan has effectively appealed to tech elite donors and supporters, as well as commentators like Matt Yglesias. But he’s running out of time to make a pitch that resonates with voters.

Quotes used in this piece have been edited for clarity.