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<\/p>\nSean Bell is a writer and journalist based in Edinburgh.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
California Gov. Gavin Newsom<\/span> is widely viewed as a strong contender for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination, particularly by Gavin Newsom. But his record is a real problem, just not in the way pundits think it is<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Take, for example, his determination to thwart<\/a> the 2026 California Billionaire Tax Act, which would impose a one-time 5 percent levy on residents of the state worth $1 billion or more. This is hardly Bolshevism, as keen mathematicians will note that 5 percent still leaves 95 percent, meaning those affected would wake up the next morning in the same economic bracket that calls to mind a camel and the eye of a needle. Regardless, Newsom remains firmly in the plutocrats\u2019 corner.<\/p>\n There was also his appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, late last month \u2014 always a popular destination for those angling for high office \u2014 amid President Donald Trump\u2019s lunge<\/a> toward Greenland<\/a>. Just as European leaders were discovering that, having tolerated U.S. imperialism in Venezuela<\/a>, it was now threatening their own backyard, Newsom kindly offered some unsolicited advice, scolding them<\/a> that \u201cTrump is a T. rex \u2014 you mate with him or he devours you, one way or the other, and you need to stand up to it.\u201d (The revelation that T. rexes can be defeated by standing up to them will come as a surprise to anyone who\u2019s seen \u201cJurassic Park.\u201d) Trump, for his part, merely shrugged in response<\/a>: \u201cI used to get along so great with Gavin.\u201d<\/p>\n Last week and with much publicity, Newsom launched a review of TikTok\u2019s moderation practices, accusing the platform<\/a> of suppressing Trump-critical content after a deal was finalized<\/a> to transfer Chinese ownership of the app to a consortium of pro-Israel, Trump-loving billionaires<\/a>, including Larry Ellison and Michael Dell. It is unsurprising that social media is an issue of concern for Newsom, as he is apparently the last person on Earth under the impression the Trump administration can be tweeted into submission,<\/a> a strategy which will surely pay dividends any day now.<\/p>\n Finally, students of shameless self-promotion may already be familiar with \u201cThis Is Gavin Newsom,\u201d the podcast launched in early 2025 in which the governor has sought to bridge the political divide by sitting down for chummy dialogue with far-right celebrities like Ben Shapiro and the late Charlie Kirk. What this looks like in practice is Shapiro goading Newsom into denying Israel\u2019s genocidal conduct in Gaza, while Kirk earned Newsom\u2019s fulsome agreement about the nefarious menace<\/a> of trans women playing sports<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Yet there are those in the political media unbothered by all this \u2014 if anything, it is the kind of thing they would like to see more of. Instead, their concern comes from a different direction, if not an alternate universe, altogether.<\/p>\n Writing in The Atlantic late last month, Marc Novicoff and Jonathan Chait argued \u201cGavin Newsom\u2019s Record Is a Problem<\/a>.\u201d While acknowledging he has \u201csensed what Democrats want \u2026 and is delivering it with a roguish charisma\u201d (your mileage may vary), they nevertheless worry he may be perceived as too progressive. This will, one assumes, be followed by essays on why Chuck Schumer is too courageous and JD Vance is too likable.<\/p>\n Novicoff and Chait posit that Newsom\u2019s tenure as governor has seen California \u201cfall hard for faddish progressive policies on immigration, education, and crime that either didn\u2019t work, violated the intuitions of most Americans, or both.\u201d As proof, they offer the state providing Medicaid to undocumented immigrants and gender-affirming health care for prisoners, both of which they present as catastrophic missteps that will come back to haunt him in 2028.<\/p>\n Such is the modern centrist credo: to overcome a perception rooted in fantasy, it may be necessary to make the reality of people\u2019s lives worse.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Such is the modern centrist credo: to overcome a perception rooted in fantasy, it may be necessary to make the reality of people\u2019s lives worse. In fact, it would seem their preferred litmus test for a candidate is that they not only refuse to recognize the rights and basic humanity of immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, and the incarcerated, but that they also must never offer even the most superficial indication to the contrary.<\/p>\n This is all par for the course from Chait, who maintains<\/a> Kamala Harris\u2019s 2024 defeat had little to do with her support for Israel<\/a> during a genocide<\/a>, her proud past as California\u2019s \u201ctop cop<\/a>,\u201d or her unwillingness to distance herself from Joe Biden\u2019s legacy. Instead, Chait blames those few instances during her Hindenburg-like 2019 stab at the Democratic nomination where she briefly and unconvincingly pivoted left before returning to the comfort of political moderation.<\/p>\n In the real world however, the arch-centrist Chait<\/a> got everything he could hope for in Harris, who promptly blew it; now, with Newsom as the alleged front-runner for 2028, the fact that Chait is already preemptively recycling the same excuses for failure does not inspire confidence.<\/p>\n \u201cJust about everything people don\u2019t like about the Democratic Party has come true in Newsom\u2019s California,\u201d Chait and Novicoff write, inadvertently stumbling onto a point. Many Americans despise the Democrats for their craven coddling of billionaires and corporate interests, their fealty to zombified Third Way snake oil, and their twitchy, terrified suspicion of any mass movement too radical for their own beige, milquetoast taste<\/a> \u2014 and sure enough, in the California governor\u2019s mansion sits a man who personifies all these grim qualities.<\/p>\n If Newsom \u2014 who treats billionaires as a treasured natural resource, who mobilized thousands<\/a> of National Guard troops to quash Black Lives Matter protests, who made a photo op of breaking down a homeless encampment<\/a> with his own hands \u2014 is not impeccably centrist enough for the likes of Chait, who the hell is? A John Fetterman who\u2019s on the ball<\/a> and not acting like a Republican<\/a>? A Kyrsten Sinema<\/a> whose personal life isn\u2019t straight out of a daytime soap opera<\/a>? A reanimated WelcomeFest<\/a> speaker stitched together in Matt Yglesias\u2019s laboratory?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \n By signing up, I agree to receive emails from The Intercept and to the Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Use<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n It does ring true that Newsom will be painted as a deranged radical out of some Californian hippie dystopia, because under Trump, what was once McCarthyism<\/a> is now standard practice.<\/a> So why would anyone still believe the forces he represents can be met halfway, given they will inevitably smear as commies anyone to the left of \u201cThe Turner Diaries<\/a>\u201d?<\/p>\n Watching Newsom\u2019s refusal to accept this reality has not been edifying. Following the murder of Renee Good<\/a> by ICE last month, Newsom\u2019s press office released a post<\/a> on X which simply read \u201cSTATE. SPONSORED. TERRORISM,\u201d a position which held for a little over a week until Ben Shapiro badgered him<\/a> into walking it back. For all his tough-guy posturing, one wonders how tough a politician can really be if Ben goddamn Shapiro <\/em>\u2014 whose greatest enemies are socialism, wokeness, and things on high shelves \u2014 can get you to fold like a cheap lawn chair. But this is Newsom\u2019s style: blustering proclamations that might, to the casual observer, be mistaken for principle or policy, closely followed by the reticence and cowardice that defines mainstream Democratic politics.<\/p>\n It should go without saying that Newsom\u2019s palling around with right-wing pseudo-intellectuals like Kirk and Shapiro \u2014 along with his assurances that he does not favor abolishing<\/a> the death squads currently occupying Minnesota \u2014 do not appear to have won him any converts, respect, or sympathy from the American right. And why should it? In Trump, they have found a president that will indulge their darkest desires, liberate their deepest prejudices and deliver the violence they yearn to see inflicted on all those they judge as deserving \u2014 in short, everything they could ever want. Meanwhile, there are still those who believe the key to defeating American fascism is making sure<\/a> the left gets none<\/em> of what it wants. Go figure.<\/p>\n Unsurprisingly, there has been little indication the American progressive left perceives Newsom as deserving anything but disdain. Recent weeks have only bolstered the sense that committing to the abolition of ICE<\/a> is a prerequisite for any remotely moral candidate in 2028. If Newsom fails to become that candidate, it will not be because he appeared too left-wing, but because he lacked the guts or the inclination to be anything except what he manifestly is: a preening political operator, beholden to a status quo that no longer exists.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n
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