What to know about Gavin Newsom, first partner’s finances as DOJ investigates
The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the finances of Gov. Gavin Newsom and his wife, First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom, officials confirmed Monday.
Newsom described the investigation as a “political witch hunt” meant to thwart his potential 2028 presidential bid and denied any wrongdoing.
The governor’s wealth has been a topic of fevered interest since at least his tenure as a young mayor of San Francisco, when his family connections to the affluent Getty family and slick image belied a more complicated upbringing with a mother who juggled multiple jobs.
In the years since, Newsom’s friendship with billionaire Gordon Getty helped grow his wine business, PumpJack Group, into a successful multimillion dollar operation. Siebel Newsom is a former actor who has gone on to establish a nonprofit focused on feminism.
Here’s what you need to know about their finances.
Newsom’s wine ventures started small, but now worth millions
PumpJack grew from a single store in San Francisco to an array of wineries, restaurants, bars, stores and a hotel, according to Forbes, which last year estimated the wineries alone to be worth $400 million.
It’s not clear how much Newsom’s stake in the company is worth since the disclosures only show a range. That paperwork also doesn’t include any diversified index funds or similar investments that are less likely to present conflicts of interest.
Newsom’s holdings in PumpJack have been locked in a blind trust since he was sworn in as governor in 2019; he also signed an executive order barring state agencies from doing business with the company. During the 2018 campaign for governor, he declined to sell them outright.
"These are my babies, my life, my family. I can't do that. I can't sell them," he said at the time.
The Newsoms own sprawling, multimillion dollar homes in Fair Oaks and Marin County.
Newsom doesn’t collect any real revenue from his podcast, but did report collecting more than $100,000 in publication fee and royalties last year for books he’s written.
Siebel Newsom’s paid and unpaid nonprofit ties
Siebel Newsom has her own blind trust with at least $1 million in holdings.
The first partner also earns roughly $300,000 annually from work connected to films she’s made and the Representation Project, a nonprofit she founded to promote feminism. The nonprofit paid her more than $161,250 last year for her 40-hour-a-week work as founder and COO, according to tax filings. It separately paid Siebel Newsom’s related film production company, Girls Club Entertainment, an identical amount for contracting work. In all, Siebel Newsom earned roughly $3 million in pre-tax salary and contractor payments since 2015. In its filings, the Representation Project said that GCE owns the copyright to four films written and produced by Siebel Newsom and has licensed it to the Representation Project for distribution. “Costs incurred by GCE for production purposes, including the writer/director/producer fee, were reimbursed by The Representation Project,” the nonprofit said in its returns.
A 2021 Bee investigation found more than $800,000 in donations to Representation Project from companies with business in front of the governor, including PG&E, AT&T and Kaiser Permanente.
Siebel is also the unpaid co-founder of the California Partners Project, which advocates for “gender equity across the state.”
The governor has solicited more than $4.8 million worth of donations since 2020 for the nonprofit. More than a third of that — $1.8 million — came from the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria, which operates the Graton Resort & Casino in Sonoma County and regularly lobbies lawmakers on legislation.
The so-called behested payments are legal under California law, but must be reported within 30 days. Last week, officials with the California’s Fair Political Practices Commission determined that 36 donations that Newsom solicited to the California Fire Foundation weren’t reported in a timely fashion and fined him $31,500. That followed a separate, $13,000 fine for a similar infraction in November 2024.
