Steyer: Senate decision hinges on ‘positive impact’

Potential California Senate candidate Tom Steyer (D) said his decision to run will hinge on whether he would have more influence in the Senate than he does outside it.

In an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit, Steyer said he doesn’t know yet if he will run for Senate in 2016.

{mosads}“Question is, can I have more positive influence by running? I’m trying hard to figure that out, and will do it pretty soon,” he wrote.

The answer did not add much to what he said earlier in the week, when he wrote that he “will decide soon” on whether to run for Senate.

Steyer, a billionaire environmentalist, former hedge fund manager and founder of NextGen Climate, gave $74 million to help seven candidates who support environmental policies, three of whom won.

He said that, if he does run for the Senate, he’ll be transparent about his finances, similar to how NextGen has “released as much information as we have.”

Steyer also used the Reddit platform to defend his finances and explain some of his environmental and political positions.

He said he has completely divested from fossil fuels and is now focusing his investments only on passive funds. He also plans to give away half of his assets.

On the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline, Steyer said the pipeline is part of a “complicated plan” to develop Canada’s oil sands.

“Right now, these remote assets cannot be delivered to market at the rate or cost that their owners want or can afford,” he said. “The pipeline will enable development of the asset.”

Steyer said he disagreed with the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United v. FEC decision, but he nonetheless defended his group’s spending in the midterm elections.

“The Koch brothers and their allies are spending hundreds of millions of money under that law to support ideas with which I fundamentally and devoutly disagree. And time is short. So we’re trying to work within the system — transparently — for the common good,” he said.