Assemblymember Matt Haney has spent tens of thousands of dollars in campaign cash on international trips, Broadway shows, and sporting events since his election in 2022, including $75,000 on 49ers, Giants, and Warriors tickets.
Now he’s burning through donor dollars on a far less glamorous expense: attorneys fees.
Haney’s legal bills have surged amid two open investigations by the Fair Political Practices Commission, the state’s nonpartisan watchdog agency that enforces government ethics and campaign finance rules.
The first probe, which focuses on Haney’s 2022 and 2024 Assembly campaigns, was launched last year after The Standard revealed the lawmaker’s lavish spending on boozy fundraisers and ballgames. The games were listed in campaign records as fundraisers, but it’s unclear who attended beyond Haney’s friends and family, who were featured prominently in photos posted to his Instagram account. State laws prohibit spending campaign funds on personal expenses.
The second investigation, launched in September, is examining Haney’s failure to properly report a $5,000 donation he directed to his annual holiday toy drive, Joy to the City. The open case has not been previously reported.
Campaign filings submitted July 31 show that Haney, who represents the eastern half of San Francisco, was one of only a handful of elected officials in the California Legislature who spent more campaign money than they raised in the first six months of this year. Haney reported raising $182,000 for his 2026 campaign account, but his total expenditures surpassed $235,000. That difference is roughly the same amount he paid to the law firm Nossaman LLP.
David Latterman, a political analyst in San Francisco, said the fact that Haney’s campaign is losing money at a time when most of his colleagues are raking in cash for elections suggests that donors are “reticent to give Haney money because they don’t know where it will go.”
“Maybe it’s because of the ticket stuff,” Latterman said. “You've got to kind of lay low after a scandal like that.”
Neither Haney nor his attorney Amber Maltbie responded to requests for comment.
Campaign filings for the first half of 2025 show that just 11 individuals contributed to Haney’s 2026 campaign; his father is among them. The remaining donations — just over $160,000, or about 88% of the total contributed — came from political action committees, businesses, and Native tribes.
That left Haney with less than $200,000 cash on hand by the end of June and $30,139 in unpaid bills, including another $10,000 in attorneys fees.
“Whenever campaign money is used for personal legal defense, especially in the context of multiple ethics investigations, it naturally kind of raises public concern — and rightly so,” said Davina Hurt, director of government ethics for the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.
“When you talk about a shift away from multiple individual donors toward PACs and special interests, that signals a deeper problem of eroding public confidence and also outside influence,” Hurt said.
Haney’s 2025 donations are considerably less than the $466,000 he raised in the first half of 2023, after taking office in a special election the year before. Assemblymember Catherine Stefani, who represents the western half of San Francisco, has raised $105,000 more than Haney, with $287,829 donated to her campaign during the first half of this year.
The slowdown in fundraising could hinder Haney's chances at a state Senate seat if Scott Wiener gives up his spot in order to run for Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s position in Congress. Wiener’s open state Senate seat would set off a fierce — and expensive — race among San Francisco's ambitious politicians, and fundraising would be an important element.
The second FPPC investigation is focused on what’s called a behested payment that Haney solicited in May 2024 from Theatrical Stage Employees Union Local No. 16 for the Center for New Music, which serves as a fiscal sponsor for Code Tenderloin, the organizer of Joy to the City.
State law requires behested payments — donations that politicians direct to charities or nonprofits — to be reported within 30 days. But the union’s money was not reported until roughly three months after Haney directed the payment, according to FPPC investigation documents.
Haney has solicited more than $227,000 in behested payments since 2023 for Joy to the City. Among those he previously tapped for money are Salesforce, JPMorganChase, Uber, PG&E, and Amazon, as well as the Golden State Warriors, whose arena, Chase Center, has served as the venue for the toy drive for the last two years.
In a Sept. 12 letter to the FPPC, Haney blamed the Center for New Music for the reporting error. He noted that his office took immediate action after learning of the reporting failure.
“I assure you that my office’s delay in disclosing this payment was unintentional and not done in bad faith,” Haney wrote.
Brent Miller, executive director of the Center for New Music, attributed the error to staff miscommunication.
“I was properly chastised by Haney’s office,” Miller said Wednesday, adding that he now has weekly calls with the legislator’s staff to go over donations. “I didn’t realize the level of trouble that would cause. Live and learn.”
Despite the ongoing investigations, Haney continues to spend big on boozy fundraisers and what might have been another ballgame, according to campaign records.
Filings show he spent $1,271 on an undated fundraiser at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Haney also held fundraisers at Gold Bar Whiskey Distillery in San Francisco; Darling Aviary, a rooftop bar in Sacramento; and Meski, the new restaurant and bar co-owned by Warriors star Draymond Green.