SACROMENTO – Since his podcast debuted in March, California Gov. Gavin Newsom has flummoxed Democrats who fear politicians who think they’ve won liberal awards are considered mag-friendly.
The rap for “This is Gavin Newsom” is that the governor spoke to trans athletes who compete in women’s sports and deny the term “Latins” that includes gender, meaning he doesn’t sound like a newspaper they know.
“What’s going on with God’s name in Gavin Newsom?” CNN anchor Erin Burnett asked, citing a headline criticizing the podcast in a recent segment that tores clear changes in the governor.
“The country is trying to understand how he ended up interviewing Maga favourites such as Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk from the most liberal nation’s most liberal nation.”
The Democratic governor was surprised, but in response.
“I did what I said I was trying to do. So when I launched this, I said I wasn’t an argument with people I didn’t agree with, I said we didn’t agree. “And then I said I was going to meet specifically with members of the Maga movement. And we did that and people were shocked.”
A general takeaway from the podcast is that Newsom is about to shift to a medium level as he prepares to run towards the president in the aftermath of the Democrats’ disastrous 2024 election.
Newsom challenged the “weary” assumption. The governor provided his own fierce criticism against his party to explain why he was sitting in the now controversial GOP figures.
“Because our party kicked our ass,” Newsom said. “Because Democrat brands are toxic, because people don’t think we don’t care. They don’t think we’re making noise. They don’t think they support them. You fill them up. They don’t think they have value for them. They think we are elite. We’re talking to people. I think we’re smarter than people in the past.
The governor pauses saying he loves his party, but “we’ve lost our way” and he wants people to know he’s hearing it.
“I think you do it by having people you don’t agree with [on the podcast] Don’t be uncomfortable. ”
It’s not the first time the governor has opposed his fellow Democrats.
As speculations were made as to whether then-President Biden was worthy of running for president last summer, the news encouraged Democrats to support him, calling chattering from his own party “meaning useless” and “necessary.” A year ago he scolded Democrats because of his passive response to Republicans and a lack of offensive political playbooks.
Newsom created headlines nationwide in a premiere episode of his podcast to conservative activist and Trump loyalty Kirk, who said it was “deeply unfair” to allow trans athletes to compete in women’s sports. Newsom’s comments represent a clear break from progressives.
The rebound from the left was quick. Newsom was accused of losing his core LGBTQ+ constituency and flip-floping after an old social media post surfaced.
Newsom’s position was consistent with 66% of American adults who said they needed to compete in a team that was assigned to the gender they were assigned to at birth during the Pew Research Survey in February.
The governor was also criticized in a podcast with Kirk for using the term “Latins,” a gender-neutral term, to describe Latinos despite direct quotations from other governors. A 2024 Pew poll found that only 4% of Latinos described themselves as “Latinx.”
Eric Jay, chief consultant for Newsom’s 2003 mayoral campaign, said the governor was a sharp politician, but he opposed his decision to speak out against trans athletes.
“San Francisco has given birth to many extraordinary politicians, including Nancy Pelosi, Diane Feinstein, Willie Brown and Kamala Harris, but it surpasses Gavin Newsom’s head and shoulders above all of them,” Jay said. “He is deeply in harmony with the way the political winds are blowing, and so far has demonstrated an extraordinary ability to navigate the changing political climate.”
“The question now is, at what point will it be adapting to the changing times and at what point will it appear to be inaccurate, if not completely fake?”
On Friday, Newsom said he understood why he viewed his groundbreaking support for gay marriage as mayor of San Francisco and his podcast as a universal healthcare advocate as a departure from his liberal image.
However, the governor said his politics never fits into the “prism of ideology.”
Anyone who knows him remembers when he was a “small business supervisor” in San Francisco, he was furious at the board to raise the fees for business owners and defend “Care Not Cash.”
“I’m accepting arguments,” Newsom said. “I’m interested in the evidence. I have very strong values. I’m progressive, but I’m practical. That’s something anyone who followed me knows, and those who aren’t are learning a bit about it now.”
Still, Newsom has always been the leading architect of his public image.
The wine entrepreneur allied with the business community ran calmly in 2003 to win the mayor’s office against Green Party candidates. “Care Not Cash” was widely panned by Progressive, but it helped seal his victory.
When Newsom set his sights on California’s biggest political award in the 2018 governor’s race, he ran as a progressive advocate for single payer healthcare, pledging to build more affordable homes.
However, even if he promoted his liberal platform, Newsom could not shake criticism from his enemy that his position was a mirage.
A moderate Democrat, former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigoza, has accused the newspaper of selling “snake oil” in support of single payer health care in order to win the Nurse Coalition and Progressive.
Newsom delivered some of his campaign pledges in his first term as governor. He successfully advocated universal kindergarten and state-sponsored health insurance for all eligible Californians, regardless of their immigration situation. He also suspended executions.
The governor, who has close ties with the tech industry and counts Google founder Sergey Brin and Salesforce chief executive Marc Benioff as friends, shows his medium side in his second term.
He drew criticism from truck drivers for refusing to push them to demand more regulation of autonomous, large-scale rigs. He rejected a marquee bill last year, which would have called for artificial intelligence developers to protect the technology. Newsom rejected the Hollywood union when it rejected a bill that would allow workers to receive unemployment benefits during a strike.
He said this year he would reject a bill for a second time trying to limit the state prison system’s ability to coordinate with federal immigration authorities seeking to deport felons. He also rejected the proposal that immigrants in the country illegally participate in subsidized mortgage programs and that undocumented students would be allowed to work at public universities.
California Union Federation of Labor Unions President Lorena Gonzalez said she was not shocked to see Newsom appear more calm on the podcast.
“He’s always been a tech peer from Northern California who has the same kind of politics that we thought,” Gonzalez said.
Perhaps she said, “He played a liberal, but now he’s just going to be himself.”
Steve Kawa, Chief of Staff as Newsom mayor, sneered at the idea that Newsom had changed. He said the governor is always interested in talking to people from all aspects of policy ideas. Politicians are not one-dimensional, like ordinary people.
“Maybe he’s a moderate on this issue,” Kawa said. “Maybe he’s progressing on this issue. I don’t think he’s seen it under which line.
He criticises Trump campaign architects Bannon and Kirk as talking to Democrats like Minnesota Gov. Tim Waltz and commentator Ezra Klein for making him seem too comfortable, Newsom said he will always meet people he disagrees with. He mentioned a 90-minute sit-in with Trump in the oval office.
“It’s called life,” Newsom said. “I don’t decide who my friends are based on their politics. I’ve never met Charlie Kirk.
The friendliness he displayed on his podcast towards Republican figures the Democrats recognize as villains is no surprise to those who have followed his career closely.
“He sounds evenly about the opinions of people who think he finds dislike for his presence. It’s because of the way he is on a path of being beyond politics, and I think that’s reflected in the podcast.”
“He always had a fascinating life in politics, but he had more.”
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