Opinion|He Spent $558 Million. What a Waste.

Say this for Tom Steyer: He is persistent. Many billionaires, after blowing $342 million on a failed presidential run in 2020, would abandon the idea of trying to buy themselves a high-profile political office for which they were unqualified. Not Mr. Steyer. He just dropped $216 million on a failed bid for California governor. His was the most expensive primary campaign in the state’s history.

Even by the standards of self-funded vanity campaigns by the very rich, Mr. Steyer, a hedge fund manager turned climate activist, distinguished himself. Thanks largely to spending $201 million on campaign ads, he outpaced a host of notable self-funders from the past, including David Trone, who spent $60 million unsuccessfully running in Maryland’s 2024 Democratic Senate primary; Mehmet Oz, a.k.a. Dr. Oz, who spent nearly $27 million being defeated for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania in 2022; and Linda McMahon, who spent $97 million losing Senate races in Connecticut in 2010 and 2012.

Adjusting for inflation, Mr. Steyer came close to matching the self-funded flameout Meg Whitman, who sank $144 million into her campaign for California governor in 2010. Mr. Steyer has now spent more than $500 million in failed campaigns.

To be fair, California is an expensive place to run for office. And Mr. Steyer’s spending spree was nowhere near the $1 billion that Michael Bloomberg dropped in just 104 days on his 2020 campaign for president. Still, it was quite the endeavor.

Billionaires are more or less free to spend their money however they like. But surely all this money could have been better spent on something — anything — else to help Mr. Steyer’s fellow Americans. The possibilities are many and varied: