Capitol Weekly’s Top 100: John Latimer

No. 60 John Latimer

We don’t want to make any promises here, but if Bob White of California Strategies is a Top 100 Hall of Fame inductee this year, then it’s a good bet John Latimer is headed there someday too. Latimer’s lobbying firm, Capitol Advocacy, rivals CalStrat as one of the most successful in California history. It always is among the top grossing firms of the quarter these days — it topped over $3 million in receipts in four of the five quarters of this cycle — and regularly holds the No. 1 spot. Capitol Advocacy literally could do nothing for the rest of this session and still rank among the biggest and most active firms in the state. That is the definition of power and influence, and Latimer, a former legislative Chief of Staff, political campaign manager and 1998 Assembly candidate, manages it all with a deft hand.

Updated Aug. 11, 2026