First, he studied the notes in his hand. Then, he held the camera to his face.
Ifeanyi Ifediba, a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, was used to posting videos about sports, anime and campus life. Now he stood in front of a campaign bus, where he had agreed to make a political ad for $250.
“Come with me on my first ever political protest type thing,” Mr. Ifediba, 26, said as he recorded a selfie video on his phone this month. He urged viewers to vote yes on a tax measure on the California ballot “because we really want to take power back from the billionaires.”
Those billionaires, many of them Silicon Valley tech titans, have contributed heavily to fight the onetime wealth tax on next Tuesday’s ballot. After raising more than $300 million, opponents have saturated the airwaves with commercials, filled social media feeds and sent a heap of glossy pamphlets to voters’ mailboxes.
Supporters of the tax, Proposition 40, are working with a much smaller budget. They have raised $34 million, most of which paid signature gatherers to get the tax on the ballot and left little for the actual campaign. So in the final weeks before the Nov. 3 election, tax supporters have used thrifty methods to spread the word.
A California health care workers union, the main backer of the tax, has trained its members to promote the tax through their social media networks. The union is also using special apps designed to help campaigns expand their reach through their supporters’ personal contacts. Lively rallies featuring musical acts and Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, provided content that supporters spread on social media.
And influencers are key, from those who volunteered to make videos to others who were paid.
“There was no way we were ever going to match whatever billionaires were going to be able to bring to oppose us,” said Suzanne Jimenez, chief of staff for the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, the union behind Proposition 40. “We knew we had to have a big presence on social media.”
The union’s leadership has been frustrated that other California Democrats, particularly Gov. Gavin Newsom, have tried to kill the tax even though the state Democratic Party endorsed it. The union has done little television advertising in California for Proposition 40 but recently announced that it would air ads in early presidential primary states criticizing Mr. Newsom, a likely presidential candidate, for his stance on the initiative.
If approved, the billionaire tax would be the first wealth tax in the nation, targeting accumulated assets instead of income. The proposal would impose a onetime tax of 5 percent on the wealth of Californians with at least $1 billion in assets, and most of the revenue would go toward health care.
Public polling has shown a tight race. Survey results released Tuesday by the Public Policy Institute of California showed 52 percent of likely voters opposed the billionaire tax, a shift since last month, when another P.P.I.C. poll found a slim majority in favor.
Billionaires funding the opposition campaign have been virtually invisible to the public. They formed a group called Building a Better California, which has been disclosed as the top donor on most of the opposition ads. Many commercials feature doctors and economists criticizing the tax, not the people who would have to pay it.
The billionaires have benefited from a strange bedfellows alliance of opponents who argue that the tax would hurt state revenues in the long run by driving entrepreneurs out of California. Teachers and firefighters have joined tycoons in trying to stop the tax. Both of the candidates running to replace Mr. Newsom oppose Proposition 40, a rare instance of bipartisan agreement between Xavier Becerra, a Democrat, and Steve Hilton, a Republican.
Dr. René Bravo, a past president of the California Medical Association, said in a statement on behalf of the opposition campaign that Proposition 40 was a “harmful tax scheme that permanently damages the state’s budget and economy.”
Young voters, however, have consistently supported the tax. And the campaign that stopped at U.C. Berkeley focused specifically on engaging campus creators.
“A message about taxing the ultrawealthy is something that is very much in the zeitgeist for young people,” said Igor Volsky, campaign manager for Tax the Ultra-Rich Now, a campaign funded in part by wealthy people who believe they should pay higher taxes. His group is backing the billionaire tax, as well as another initiative on the ballot that would maintain higher income taxes on top earners permanently.
His campaign bus, featuring an image of a roaring bear, served as a hub of activity for several hours this month in Berkeley. Campaign supporters handed out fliers, a professor who helped draft the billionaire tax gave interviews, and students stopped by to record promotional videos for social media.
“We’re here taxing the rich,” Syrak Micael said as he recorded his selfie.
Mr. Micael, a 23-year-old recent U.C. Berkeley graduate who is running for a seat on the Berkeley City Council, said he was not paid to promote the billionaire tax and had been talking about it with students as he sought support for his own campaign.
“We’ve literally been going dorm to dorm on campus,” he said.
Mr. Ifediba, the grad student who was paid to make a post from the event, said he liked the idea of taxing billionaires and would have done the video even without the $250 incentive. But just as importantly, he said, he liked the idea of building political power for small-scale TikTok creators.
“You can combat the hundreds of millions and millions that these billionaires just dump into TV ads, at a fraction of the cost,” he said.
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