Silicon Valley Steps Up to Fund-Raising Plate

For Democratic candidates who come to California seeking huge contributions, this weekend marks a dramatic realignment: The geeks of Silicon Valley are taking on the glitterati of Los Angeles as the state’s leading source of political money.

Here in this leafy, affluent community Friday night, 70 venture capitalists, software engineers and entrepreneurs--many of them making their first major political contributions--met with presumptive presidential nominee Al Gore and handed over more than $2.6 million in checks for the Democratic National Committee.

“This is not only the most successful event ever [in Silicon Valley] but it has broken the record by a long shot,” Gore said.

The take for the evening more than doubled the DNC’s original goal and brought it even with the event expected to be the centerpiece of the DNC’s fund-raising weekend: tonight’s party hosted by the undisputed masters of Clinton-era Democratic fund-raising, the DreamWorks SKG triumvirate.

Silicon Valley’s new largess comes even as the cash pipeline from Hollywood to Washington, which has flowed freely under President Clinton, appears to be tightening somewhat. Both changes reflect, among other things, the political pull of personality.

Bill Clinton, after all, can claim movie stars as friends, while Al Gore walks around with a Palm Pilot on his belt.

Burnout could also be a factor.

DreamWorks Trio Has Led the Pack

The DreamWorks trio has dependably hosted $2-million fund-raisers once or twice a year during Clinton’s tenure, but the filmmakers hope to crown their fund-raising streak tonight. Vice President Gore and Clinton will attend a $2.7-million, celebrity-packed event at the historic, oft-filmed Greystone mansion in Beverly Hills, with the money going to the DNC.

With their friend preparing to vacate the White House, David Geffen, Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg are hoping to pass the money-making baton.

“You can’t go back to the same well too many times,” says Andy Spahn, head of corporate affairs at DreamWorks. Spahn believes his group has raised more money for Clinton than anyone else in the United States over the last seven years.

Shift in Washington- Hollywood Connection

“It’s time for new leadership to emerge,” Spahn added.

Their decision does not reflect a lack of passion for Gore’s candidacy, Spahn stressed. But DreamWorks’ determination to cede its role as the Democrats’ key fund-raiser in Los Angeles foreshadows a significant change in the Hollywood-Washington connection, which in recent years has been highly personal.

Clinton dazzled the entertainment industry by rivaling its best in charisma and charm. Then he developed close relationships with top entertainment moguls. Geffen and Katzenberg not only wrote check after check but also did the hard work of raising cash from their colleagues.

“There are a handful of people who inspire you to want to do as much as you can. Bill Clinton has certainly been someone like that,” Spahn said.

Clinton has “all the glitter and all of the charm of celebrities as well as all of the pomp, circumstance and status of the president,” said Don Fowler, former chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

“There are lots of rich people in California who would like to be friends with President Gore,” Fowler said. “But it is hard for me to imagine three guys with that kind of prestige and status who can come in and match or duplicate or replicate what they have done.”

Several well-placed Democrats in Los Angeles agreed DreamWorks will leave a void. Hollywood’s longtime Democratic organizer extraordinaire, Lew Wasserman, 87, former chief of MCA Inc., has continued to host some fund-raising parties in recent years, but he has not worked the phones and raised the big money like Geffen and Katzenberg, they said.

Another key Democratic force, the Hollywood Women’s Political Committee, disbanded three years ago. That group, which had focused on raising money in chunks of up to $5,000, was overshadowed and disillusioned by the rise of mega fund-raisers, such as DreamWorks’, which collect $25,000, $50,000 and $100,000 checks from each couple attending.

As yet, there is no heir apparent to organize either the $1,000 donors or the $100,000 contributors of the entertainment industry.

Democrats in Hollywood and Washington stressed that even without a kingpin, the party can still expect money to flow from the most faithful Democrats in the entertainment industry, as well as the executives who regularly donate to both parties to build influence.

But the question is: Who will invest hours of time cajoling less-eager givers into writing huge checks whenever the Democratic Party needs an injection of cash?

Gore has his own supporters in the entertainment industry, some of whom have backed him since before his partnership with Clinton, including John F. Cooke, formerly a top Disney executive, now an executive vice president at the J. Paul Getty Trust.

Director Rob Reiner, who heads a public-policy foundation focused on young children and has been a big supporter of the Democratic Party during the Clinton era, unabashedly states his preference for the vice president.

Reiner stressed Gore’s readiness to govern and said he would be able to make more progress on policy matters because he does not have Clinton’s personal weaknesses.

First-Time High-Tech Contributions

“Clinton engendered so much hatred that he wound up with incredible distractions,” Reiner said. “I don’t think you’ll get that with Al Gore. He’s is a very down-to-earth person and very intelligent--to my mind, you can’t ask for anything better. And, he doesn’t run around on his wife.”

Despite Reiner’s enthusiasm for Gore, he has no aspirations to fill the shoes of the DreamWorks team.

“I would love to be in the position to do that,” Reiner said. “But I have one-billionth the amount of money they have.”

Reiner was one of several well-connected Hollywood Democrats who suggested that the DreamWorks leaders will continue their leading role.

“They’re the richest, that’s the problem,” he added. “They’re going to have to remain in that position.”

Silicon Valley’s would-be political kingmakers, meanwhile, are just gearing up. High-tech entrepreneurs here are eager to sit down with Gore and compare notes on technological advances and the future of the so-called new economy.

“Because of the style and personality of the vice president . . . there will be a shift north to Silicon Valley,” said Fowler, who remains active in Democratic fund-raising.

Joel Hyatt, who as financial co-chairman of the DNC organized Friday night’s event and hosted it in his home, suggests the shift is already happening.

“I think the event will go a long way toward overcoming the rap of Silicon Valley as not being involved,” said Hyatt, a Stanford University Business School professor of entrepreneurship and a successful high-tech entrepreneur. “Probably half of the people here are making a major commitment for the first time.”

Before the Internet’s explosion, technology leaders here tended to want nothing to do with Washington. But as Washington intercedes in their industry--in ways ranging from antitrust lawsuits to possibly taxing Internet sales--titans of the new economy want the same access to the White House and Washington that huge contributions have given other industries. And the phenomenal wealth in the region has spurred both parties to intensify their efforts to raise money here.

Joe Costello, chairman and CEO of Think3, a Santa Clara software firm, just wrote a $100,000 check to the DNC to support Gore, even though he preferred former Sen. Bill Bradley.

Loosely regulated soft-money donations, which account for most of the money the DNC is raising this weekend, cannot be used on direct campaign expenses but can be used on issue ads that highlight the differences between the candidates and the parties.

“I would really feel bad if George Bush were the president of the United States,” Costello said. “For those of us who have the financial wherewithal, we can make donations to try to keep that from happening.”