Billionaire Sergey Brin has broken his silence on California’s proposed billionaire tax — invoking his Soviet upbringing as new details surface on a tense showdown with Gov. Gavin Newsom and his Trump-loving ‘gut influencer’ girlfriend.
Brin, the Google co-founder with an estimated net worth of $270 billion, discussed his family history under socialism in an extraordinary rebuke of the billionaire tax, which qualified for the November ballot after organizers submitted 1.6 million signatures.
“I fled socialism with my family in 1979 and know the devastating, oppressive society it created in the Soviet Union,” Brin told the New York Times in a statement.
“I don’t want California to end up in the same place.”
Media reports revealed this weekend that Brin had personally confronted Newsom, who opposes the billionaire tax, at a Christmas “treehouse party” hosted by billionaire Ripple chairman Chris Larsen.
Brin, who has been friendly with Newsom for decades, pulled the governor into a side room at the Marin County bash and said he could not tolerate the billionaire tax, the paper reports.
Brin’s girlfriend of two years, Gerelyn Gilbert-Soto, was reportedly at the center of a dramatic holiday confrontation — arguing the tax would kill the economy but also joking that she could forgive Newsom’s bad policies because he is “handsome.”
The California governor later complained that the couple gave him a “lingering cold,” per Bloomberg.
Brin was born in Moscow, Russia in 1973 and fled to the United States at the age of six.
The billionaire tax could leave Brin, whose estimated net worth is about $270 billion, with a $13 billion tax bill.
Gilbert-Soto, a MAGA-friendly wellness influencer who promotes gut health, yoga, self-care and “clean meat” on her 13,000-follower Instagram account, reportedly tried to defuse the tense exchange with Newsom, per the New York Times.
The tech titan has spent at least $57 million fighting the proposed tax, bankrolling a group called Building a Better California alongside a cadre of Silicon Valley venture capitalists and entrepreneurs.
Along with Peter Thiel, Larry Page and other billionaires, Brin has reduced his assets in California since the tax was first proposed, moving to a $42 million Lake Tahoe chalet to escape the levy.
Gilbert-Soto has called Trump her “bestie” and owns a clutch purse emblazoned with the president’s name, the New York Times reported.
The influencer bills herself as a holistic health coach and often flaunts her “obtainable” self-care routine on a luxury yacht, snapping pics of her toned physique in designer-packed closets and at a lavish home gym.
Her daily eats include eggs with caviar-topped rice cake for breakfast — which she’s claimed are “good for you.”
Brin has been dating the wellness influencer since at least March 2024, according to reports.
The billionaire’s opinionated former flames include Nicole Shanahan, a MAHA booster who was Robert F. Kennedy, Jr’s running mate in his failed 2024 presidential bid.
He was previously married to Anne Wojcicki, founder of 23andMe.
