Gavin Newsom Has Some Explaining to Do About Personal Ties to Failed Silicon Valley Bank

When you’re Gavin Newsom and in the Uncle Gordon P. Getty and Aunt Nancy Pelosi orbit, you own several prominent businesses, and your wife’s a radical Leftist Hollywood producer, you have a lot of “friends” in California. Gavin Newsom has a lot of friends at one of his favorite banks: the failed Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). The bank supported three of his wine companies and gave a very generous donation to Newsom’s “First Partner’s” (wife’s) charity at the governor’s behest. And why wouldn’t it? SVB’s president sits on the board of Jennifer Lynn Siebel Newsom.

Don’t try this at home.

EXCLUSIVE: We've obtained photos of Governor Gavin Newsom at the Napa dinner party he's in hot water over. The photos call into question just how outdoors the dinner was. A witness who took photos tells us his group was so loud, the sliding doors had to be closed. 10pm on @FOXLA pic.twitter.com/gtOVEwa864

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) November 18, 2020

Since he enthusiastically lauded Joe Biden’s “swift and decisive” takeover of SVB (and indeed all of the nation’s banks with the president’s bailout promises), you think he would have mentioned somewhere along the line that hey, I’ve got why money tied up in this cluster too. But no.

The Intercept first reported that “CADE, Odette, and PlumpJack, three wineries owned by Newsom, are listed as clients of SVB on the bank’s website.” He also “maintained personal accounts at SVB for years, according to a longtime former employee of Newsom’s who handled his finances,” and his wife received charitable donations from the bank.

Newsom also didn’t mention his wife Jennifer Siebel’s professional ties to the bank. In 2021, Silicon Valley Bank gave $100,000 to the charity founded by Siebel, the California Partners Project, at the request of Newsom. John China, president of SVB Capital and responsible for SVB’s funds management, is himself a founding member of the California Partners Project’s board of directors. [emphasis added]

You’d think that the business owner and former investment advisor for the Getty Trust who became governor should have more business acumen than to keep his money in a bank that can’t seem to match the timing of its investments with its monthly bills, but maybe the friends and their perks were too good to give up. Newsom’s promise to Joe Biden of “I’ve got your back!” has been more than cemented now with this bank takeover by Uncle Joe.

Perhaps you’d think that Newsom’s personal fiscal abilities, lauded by the clapping seals in his media, would mean that he put his money in multiple accounts under the $250,000 insured limit. Maybe he did, but if he’s like the rest of the tech ballers banking billions in Silicon Valley Bank, he didn’t.

Indeed, the lit fuse that touched off this cluster of catastrophic proportions — the second worst bank failure in the nation’s history, nearly as bad as Washington Mutual — was started by Newsom’s own political party’s gross and debauched overspending. They launched inflation rates to 40-year highs, prompting the Fed to raise interest rates to make money more expensive. The Democrats’ greed for people-pleasing money giveaways to garner votes made everything more expensive.

the catalyst wasnt a 6mth lag from FED

it’s Biden’s massive spending Bills

$1.5T March 2022
$1.7T Dec 2022
$6.8T 2023 Proposed

As the FED gently try to dampen inflation Biden keeps injecting it with massive shots of growth hormone

Biden’s your problem not the FED

— SayinMinds (@SayinMinds) March 15, 2023

Here’s how Forbes explained what went wrong.

After the tech industry grew during the pandemic, SVB’s clients deposited billions, bringing the bank from $60 billion in total deposits at the end of the first quarter 2020 to nearly $200 billion two years later. While deposits came in, SVB invested in debt like U.S. Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities, but as the Federal Reserve began to increase interest rates to combat inflation, the value of SVB’s investments fell. Higher interest rates also took a toll on SVB’s clients: Startup funding began to dry up as private fundraising became more costly, causing its clients to withdraw funds. Amid the surge in withdrawals, SVB sold assets (including bonds that had lost value due to interest rate increases) which created $1.8 billion in losses.

Between the bank’s board not properly managing investment vehicles, not properly timing its money with its monthly bills, and not properly advising Silicon Valley billionaire venture capitalists of the $250,000 limit on accounts, we’ve got a dumb-people problem here. It should give you pause to know that the CEO of Silicon Valley Bank, Greg Becker, was, until a few days ago, a Fed governor. 

How many more of these woke bank execs at #SVB #SiliconValleyBank were working with the federal reserve? pic.twitter.com/ouIxUGZL1Z

— Victoria Taft, The Adult in the Room, FITF Squad (@VictoriaTaft) March 13, 2023

But back to Gavin Newsom. Newsom brags about heavily lobbying for the bank bailout.

On Friday, the FDIC created an entirely new bank — poof! — the National Bank of Santa Clara, to take care of covering Silicon Valley billionaires’ deposits meant for their tech start-ups.

Newsom’s lack of candor when he enthusiastically applauded Biden’s bank takeover is especially egregious when you read his entire statement.

The Biden Administration has acted swiftly and decisively to protect the American economy and strengthen public confidence in our banking system. Their actions this weekend have calmed nerves, and had profoundly positive impacts on California — on our small businesses that can now make payroll, workers who will get their paychecks, on affordable housing projects that can continue construction, and on non-profits that can keep their doors open tomorrow. California is a pillar of the American economy, and federal leaders did the right thing, ensuring our innovation economy can continue to grow and move forward.

It seems Newsom’s companies can make payroll now, thanks to you good taxpayers. Something he didn’t mention. Perhaps his sister, who’s in charge of the wineries, didn’t tell him.

The multimillionaire governor told reporters when he first ran for statewide office that he would never consider selling his companies because “these are my babies, my life, my family. I can’t do that. I can’t sell them.” And that’s understandable. Obviously, he’s not Trump, so it’s all OK.

Eventually, Newsom followed Trump and put his holdings into a trust with family and friends running it. Newsom also has control over his charitable giving. The Intercept reports Newsom has control over “behested payments,” which he uses liberally to give money to governmental or charitable purposes. There are no limitations on those. Last year he gave away $23.7 million. A behested payment is like the $100,000 donation SVB gave his wife at Newsom’s request.