Nate Allbee worked for the past several years as a senior field representative for Assemblymember Matt Haney. He also, in our experience, handled most of Haney’s media. The job paid, according to Assembly records, $87,732 a year—not enough to make anyone rich, but around the median income for a single person in San Francisco.
But that’s not all Allbee did.
In the 2022 electoral cycle, he managed the Honey Mahogany for Supervisor campaign, collecting, according to public filings, $47,671 in consulting fees. He also worked for JCI Public Relations, handling PR work for Catholic Healthcare West; there’s no record of how much he made in that role.
Last fall, Allbee made $76,810 working on four School Board campaigns.
Allbee told us during the Mahogany campaign that he was doing all his outside work after 5pm and on weekends. Fair enough, and when we called him to talk about the campaign, he always called back after the end of the traditional workday—although very few people I know who have run campaigns at that level think it can be done effectively on that limited basis.
But let’s set aside the money for a moment, and look at a deeper issue: If a candidate hires Allbee to work for their campaign, there’s a potential expectation that the candidate will also probably get the support, endorsement, and possibly fundraising help of the elected member of the state Assembly who is Allbee’s boss.
CHW clearly has business at the Assembly: the outfits submitted comments or testified on some 30 Assembly bills since 2015.
And that, by any standard, creates the appearance of potential conflicts of interest.
Neither Haney nor Allbee responded to calls and texts seeking comment on this story. Allbee has recently left Haney’s office.
Allbee is by no means alone. A 48hills review of hundreds of state Assembly records shows that in the 2022 cycle, more that 150 Assembly staffers held outside employment in some type of political consulting or lobbying role.
That’s perfectly legal under state rules (although many other government agencies preclude this sort of outside employment). “There are limits on what we, as employers, can do,” Anthony Rendon, who served as Assembly speaker from 2016 to 2023, told us.
And yet, Rendon, who held the role of speaker longer than anyone in state history except Willie Brown, told us: “There’s a difference between what’s legal and what’s ethical.
“It’s too cute by half,” Rendon said. “It looks bad.”
The Assembly Rules Committee oversees outside employment by staffers, and anyone who wants to work another job has to fill out a form. We used the Legislative Open Records Act to request all those forms for anyone directly employed as an aide to an Assembly member for the 2022 cycle. It took a while; the committee had to redact a lot of information. But eventually, we got the data.
Many of the second jobs seem harmless: Some staffers are DJs at clubs on the weekend. One works weekends at a grocery store (which suggests that the state needs to raise the pay of Assembly staff). Some hold their own elected positions, as City Council or School Board members in small towns, or serve on the boards of nonprofits, and collect modest stipends.
One former Assembly staffer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, emphasized the important role that outside employment can play in bridging the gap between a staffers salary and a livable wage.
“Outside employment is just an important way for staffers to make ends meet when they are on a junior level,” the staffer said. “When I came to the capital the starting salary was about $30,000. I remember having to go to every single event after work just to get some free food.”
That’s one reason staff compensation and equity has become a topic of greater consideration in recent years. In September of 2023, the Legislature approved a bill that would allow for non-supervisorial staffers to form a union. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill in October.
However, amendments made in the previous months mean the bill will not take effect until 2026. This delay was suggested by the Senate’s Labor Committee, citing the need for further consideration to decide what union will ultimately represent the staffers.
But underpaid junior staffers are not the only ones who are taking outside political consulting and lobbying jobs.
Of the 80 people employed as a chief of staff in 2022, 35 held outside employment, with the vast majority of these working as political consultants.
The average chief of staff makes more than $150,000 a year. Furthermore, at least 10 of these employees made more than $200,000 a year. Indeed, this suggests that those staffers whose Assembly jobs have the highest pay and workloads were actually more likely to engage in similarly high paying outside employment.
Tom White, former chief of staff for Assemblymember Lisa Calderon, simultaneously held a secondary position with Ian Calderon’s 2026 Lieutenant Governor campaign; Ian is Lisa’s predecessor and step-son. Although this campaign has yet to be publicly announced in any form, White’s contributions have thus far earned him more than $60,000—in addition to his $220,000 state salary.
While some staff members named particular campaigns as their outside employers, others listed their employers as self-named LLCs, which are far more opaque.
In fillings and responses to our emails, many staffers insisted that their consulting work was entirely apolitical. For some, such as those who aimed their services at local businesses, this seems to be the case. For others, however, their Linkedin profiles and online presence tells a different story than their disclosures.
Cesar Anda, chief of staff for Assemblymember Cervantes—and recipient of a $180,000 salary—also operates Anda Consulting. In Anda’s fillings, he explains his work in three separate fillings as “Political and Business Consultant,” “Consulting, strategic planning, concept development,” and “Economic Analysis, political analysis, data management, risk assessment, conflict resolution, etc.” In Anda’s Linkedin profile, however, he is more forthcoming and emphasizes his work for the Dewey Square Group and Tenet Healthcare, the latter of which has testified or otherwise submitted written positions to the Assembly on more than 20 bills since 2015.
Some of the staffers stated in their forms that their outside work was “uncompensated.” Again, fair enough: There’s no reason state workers shouldn’t volunteer for nonprofits, serve on local boards, or do other community work.
But the forms aren’t aways accurate: Allbee stated that his work for Mahogany was uncompensated, but campaign filings show otherwise.
That suggests that the Assembly doesn’t fact-check the filings with Fair Political Practices Commission campaign filings.
Rendon told us that when he took over as speaker, he was given control of an office staffed by political consultants whose job was to help elect Democrats and keep the speaker in power—an outfit created years ago when Brown was speaker. “I shut down the Speaker’s Office of Management Services,” he told us. “It was inappropriate.”
And while none of what the outside employment of staffers involves is illegal, it certainly creates the appearance of a conflict. Haney, for example, endorsed all four of the candidates for School Board that Allbee represented (and Allbee put together that slate).
This sort of potential conflict, Rendon said, “undermines faith in government at a time when democracy in being challenged. Anything that undermines that faith is a serious problem.”
