Two years ago Gavin Newsom was widely seen as a rising Democratic star and likely future presidential candidate. Meanwhile Donald Trump, facing massive legal troubles and the results of his own intemperance, seemed to many, like those at CNN, a fading figure.
How quickly things change. Over the weekend, Trump met with the California Governor as they toured parts of California devastated by the wildfires. As Newsom was forced to greet the President with his cap in hand, Trump wasted no time in attacking the state’s progressive policies. On his arrival, Trump called on Newsom to change the state’s water policies, blaming the spread of the fires on deficient supplies. This is partially accurate: although water policy has been poorly implemented, the immediate issue lay in the city’s failure to maintain fire spending and key infrastructure like water pressure for hydrants and keeping the local water reservoir filled and operable.
Trump’s demands have drawn attention to the state’s self-inflicted wounds, and its pattern of astounding incompetence. In 1971, the economist John Kenneth Galbraith described the state government as run by “a proud, competent civil service,” and enjoying among “the best school systems in the country”. This year Wallet Hub ranked the state last in terms of return on investment for taxpayers.
There are signs that the state’s residents are taking note and growing tired of the progressive regime. Only 40% of California voters approve of the legislature and almost two-thirds have told pollsters the state is heading in the wrong direction. Today less than one in three Californians approve of Newsom’s handling of the fires.
Much of the problem can be traced to Newsom’s green allies who have erected barriers to effective fire management, as the Little Hoover Commission found as far back as 2018, which discouraged such things as controlled burns and brush clearance. Even as the state reacted to major fires in 2020, its policies on such practices have been hampered by environmental lawsuits that delay implementation of such policies, as well as fire management budget cuts.
The emergence of Trump makes things all the more difficult for Newsom’s climate policies. Now he must cope with a new president whose campaign slogans is “drill, baby, drill.” So while Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Pennsylvania and Ohio are ready to get richer, Newsom is taking California in the opposite direction. He has pledged to shut down California’s once expansive energy industry, getting its oil from such progressive bastions as Saudi Arabia instead. This is not a good look to much of the country.
With Trump in Washington, Newsom soon may find that many of his favoured initiatives — like EV mandates or ending gas heaters and furnaces — will come to an end. Rather than the paragon of progressive success, Newsom’s California legacy is one of massive incompetence, fiscal promiscuity, and unceasing self-promotion amid inexorable decline. As the fires are extinguished, so too are the California governor’s presidential hopes.
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SubscribeAre Newsom’s presidential ambitions really extinguished? Trump’s mantra might be “drill, baby, drill”, but Newsom’s is “ideology, baby, ideology” and the core Democratic voting blocks still seem to agree with that mantra. Or has the tide really turned against progressivism?
Not progresiveness par se – just this combination of cul de sac and intellectual rabbit holes they have constructed for themselves.
Open Borders, Men pretending to be Women and Defund the Police should all be consigned very overtly to the Dustbin of Stupidity and then they can move on. Disassociate themselves from Wealthy Liberals in Entertainment industry who most people roll their eyes at when preached to.
It isn’t actually all that complicated. The establishment of both parties was hugely unpopular and used to fighting an opponent just as unpopular and out of touch as they themselves were. The ideology of progressivism never was all that popular, but the other party was filled with free trading union bashing big business Wall Street types who were worse regardless of ideology. They could get away with being smugly dismissive of the people because the other side was just as smug and just as dismissive and also wanted to reduce their social security check. Trump and populism messed all that up.
Trump and populism have upset the balance. A Republican party that’s throwing tariffs around, scolding big business for offshoring jobs, and not trying to cut social security and Medicare, is an entirely new animal. The old Democratic strategies aren’t working because they’re not fighting the same opponent as before. Some of the tactics don’t even make sense, like the Harris campaign running ads about “making billionaires pay” when anyone not living under a rock knows that corporate America and multinational billionaires lined up against Trump in 2016 and have been trying their darnedest to be rid of him. Any American can look at the plain facts of campaign spending and conclude that this is utter nonsense. Trump was massively outspent in both 2016 and 2024 despite being wealthy himself. Any thinking American is left to conclude that either the people running the Democratic party are clueless idiots or they think the voters are clueless idiots who can’t read and make basic logical inferences. Obviously, neither constitutes a reason to vote Democratic.
Using the same strategies and rhetoric they have been using since the 90s simply isn’t going to work anymore. The times are changing and people are adapting to the new normal. The vast majority of people never really believed in progressive ideology but went along out of expedience, profit, or just submissiveness are just dropping it because it’s been defeated and revealed as the fad ideology it always was. Most of the people shilling for DEI and such were doing so because they thought it would make them money, or help them advance their career, or let them keep their job, or because they were just following orders. If the situation changes and it’s no longer a path to power, if there’s no profit in it, if it isn’t hip and cool anymore, all the fake followers just vanish.
This is why top down social movements often appear successful initially but eventually fall apart. People in positions of power can get a high level of compliance from employees, servants, students, assistants, and other such people who may or may not care for the ideology but do have something to gain or lose from the person or organization pushing it, but it evaporates like water in the desert without the power behind it. Real social movements on the other hand have no power at first and have to endure adversity, hardship, and persecution at the hands of those who do have power. Only those movements that are strong enough to endure and overcome these challenges can achieve any lasting success. Maybe once they lose power the globalists can do things the right way and start a legitimate movement from the grassroots. I kinda doubt it.
“Any thinking American is left to conclude that either the people running the Democratic party are clueless idiots or they think the voters are clueless idiots who can’t read and make basic logical inferences.”
Well both statements appear to be true given that almost 50% of those that voted voted Democrat
A good point, but I have to believe the almost half of America who voted Democrat includes a great many who were simply voting against Trump because they think the man is an awful human being, which is almost certainly true, and/or they see his actions and rhetoric after the 2020 election leading up to Jan 6th as disqualifying. There’s probably quite a few people that voted for Harris because they actually like the economic aspects of globalism like unrestricted free trade and open borders, upper middle class country club types who want people who will walk their dogs and mow their lawns cheaply, many former Republicans. The decisiveness of Trump’s victory comes not from the margin, but from the circumstances. Trump was elected in 2024 despite his many and well documented personal flaws going back decades, despite losing in 2020 and making a royal ass of himself in the process, despite being prosecuted for trumped up (pun intended) charges by his overzealous and not terribly smart opponents, despite multiple assassination attempts, and despite the all out blitz from most of the media, the donor class of both parties, international finance, and many many others who came together to stop Trump. After all that, and after Jan 6th, Trump didn’t just barely eke out a win like in 2016. He swept the swing states, won the popular vote, and made noticeable inroads into traditionally Democratic demographics like minority and younger voters. That’s where his victory, despite its narrow margin, comes across as a historically significant political shift that no serious observer can deny. The bubble of neoliberal progressivism has popped, and one cannot un-pop a bubble.
Fair enough.
But as far as I am concerned there was a coup in 2020 and the election was stolen. I do not have a dog in the fight but if what went on in 2020 happened in any other country every one would be screaming fraud.
I don’t believe it was stolen simply because of the logistical difficulty and the number of people who would have to be involved in multiple districts and multiple states. The conspirators would thereafter have to keep silent, and the more people there are in any criminal enterprise, the more likely one of them is to talk. I watch a lot of true crime shows and any time there’s more than one person involved in a crime, one of the two usually rolls on the other, or confesses to a family member or friend who then turns them in. It’s hard for me to believe that anybody has the resources and diligence to keep dozens or hundreds of people silent for theoretically many decades or be stupid enough to think they can do that. If anyone can, I suppose it would be the IRS/FBI/CIA.
All that being said, given the fact that the 2020 election saw so many more votes cast overall than 2024 and a staggering majority were cast for one candidate, I’m not nearly as confident of that assertion as I was six months ago. Maybe Biden was a better candidate but that’s a lot of votes, and the 2020 election is an outlier based on previous elections as well. You’re correct to assert that if this happened somewhere like Guatemala or Nigeria, everybody would immediately suspect fraud.
Even if it was, since they couldn’t duplicate it in 2024 I’m not sure it’s wise to go digging into it now and risk damaging people’s faith in elections worse than it already had been. The time to investigate would have been right after the election in the first months of Biden’s presidency. If Biden had put together a bipartisan group of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans to investigate the allegations and the irregularities and found everything was legitimate, it would have reassured a lot of voters and somewhat restored people’s faith in the system. The image of a sitting President investigating the unproven claims simply to address the concerns of the other side’s voters would have been a very meaningful gesture to those people and might have convinced some of them Biden was trying to be a President who addressed the concerns of all Americans. A missed opportunity in my book, but there have been a lot of those under the globalist blob leaders from Bush 1 to Biden.
It’s now called democracy when you campaign on middle of the road issues and then implement radical policies that the electorate simply abhor. Who on earth demanded that we open the border, end the combustible engine or gas stoves and heaters, or cry out for the mutilation of young children other than a few college professors and dimwitted Hollywood celebrities?
Where do i start ? newsom in some regards is like harris , a rockstar in his bubble consisting of CA and a handfull of other progressive states but lacking appeal outside of this bubble ! could he win the nomination ? if he is not doing 500+ years in federal prison by 2028 he probably could but he might crash and burn in the general !
So now you probably ask where the 500 years come from , newsom was one of the first governors who boasted about his state taking steps to protect illegal aliens from deportation which was about the dumbest thing he ever did so far .
His public statement pretty much was a admission to shielding illegal aliens from deportation , under USC1324 harboring and shielding is a crime that is punishable with 5years in prison , if any illegal alien caused bodily harm than the punishment goes up to 20 years and since every illegal consitutes one count it adds up quickly
Newsom is an incompetent b**b – full stop. He’s an ideological zealot driven by fashionable luxury beliefs that have made California unlivable for everyone but the wealthy. He’s the poster child for progressive lunacy that has sparked the emergence of populism across the west.
Trump is a pragmatist. He’s not driven by ideology, but common sense solutions to emerging problems. That’s what I like about him. But for the love of god, can he please STFU. He’s been president for one week, and we have been buried by an avalanche of non-stop commentary and criticism of friends and enemies. Is it not possible to say this stuff in private?
Perhaps the realignment of countries to the Right is also going to extinguish Unherd.
Their editorial policy excludes any right wing views. That would reflect badly on Starmer.
So what they can do? There are only so many articles of liberal progressives feeling sorry for themselves that we can take.
It’s not just that they are liberal, left, and superficial, in the worst possible way, they are so stale and not worth reading.
Exactly. If they got some right wing writers in then the ones from the Left would have to make their case too. It would be interesting.
As we say in Lancashire… total bollocks.
Unherd if you are losing too much money, before throwing in the towell, sell Unherd to me. I’ll give you £5 for it.
I will then turn it into a truly Unherd magazine.
The first article I commission will be about Starmer, illustrated by the photo of him with the Drag Queen, which Downing Street published today. I have never seen him look so happy.
Learn to spell first.
Don’t tell me I can’t write Drag Queen. The picture came from No. 10.
This is ridiculous. My comment has gone into Unherd limbo.
That’s because you’re posting sh!te.
No it’s not. Those two words don’t go through.
I’ve rarely encountered such a self-pitying crybaby.
Just grow up, ffs.
Don’t telll me you’re the owner! That would explain why you’re always agitated.
Oh this is fun! Watching two morons argue is always entertaining!
As opposed to one moron in solipsistic mode?
By my count it is now 3
In terms of agitation, you take the biscuit.
Calm down, son.
Trolling Unherd is cowardly, when there’s so many other outlets you could be expending your energy on.
Why is criticism of mainstream media cowardly?
Where’s the j watson hydra account? You messed up with that Starmer photograph.
Whatever MAGA moron wrote this garbage clearly didn’t see Newsom absolutely dominating Trump on the tarmac yesterday and then showing him how you greet a lady. Melania seemed a lot happier getting a kiss from our boy Gav than from the orange blubber monster!
And then the pitiful sight of Trump’s mumbling incoherence at the press conference was sad to watch. The man has always been stupid but this was incoherence at a new level. Hopefully Hegseth is sober enough to keep him away from the launch codes…
Why didn’t Biden hire you to write his Twitter/X posts while he held office? They’re much more amusing than anything that was put out under his name.
Now that Trudeau is gone and AOC’s star is fading…Gov Gav is the last hope for Champagne Socialism in North America.
He really needs to lean into performance theatre. Maybe a policy that bans outdoor grilling but carves out an exemption for squatters and vagrants that just want to burn stuff.
Err – but Gav is boss of a failing state and Trump had just become president. Let me think – which one is on the up…
Socialists seem completely unable to spot a sociopath when they see one. Blair, Starmer and now Newsom.
Like his opposite in the South East Sunshine state, the sun soon stops shining on Gav as it did Rick when the Gorilla hits the fan – very had.
When Biden withdrew, I messaged my US family and said avoid an East Coast Liberal and a West Coast Liberal as well. They didn’t, they lost. If they pick a Newsome type next time they deserve to lose – it doesn’t matter how many war mongering GOPs like Cheney they attract
Now to be fair I also told Labour not to elect a North London liberal after 3 of the previous being so, and Starmer did win. So can’t say for certain but the Tories were especially despised.
Unherd, if you sell Unherd to me, I have a new user feature I will launch. It will allow users to select an account, for example, Champagne Socialist, and remove it from view. I promise here that I will never charge for this fantastic feature!
Maybe you are Champagne Socialist.
Two sock puppet accounts for the price of one.
But Saving the Planet! Fighting the oppression of the Oppressed Peoples!
“(Trump)[B]laming the spread of the fires on deficient supplies. This is partially accurate: although water policy has been poorly implemented, the immediate issue lay in the city’s failure to maintain fire spending and key infrastructure like water pressure for hydrants and keeping the local water reservoir filled and operable.”
So exactly the same thing then. Kotkin’s TDS is palpable and comical.
“Newsom’s California legacy is one of massive incompetence, fiscal promiscuity, and unceasing self-promotion amid inexorable decline.”
And you did not see this from the outset?
The pathetic thing is that he still is one of the Democrats’ rising stars.
The idea that Newsome is finished politically due to these fires is a hopeful outcome from this terrible situation.
But I doubt it. The American polity has the memory of a termite.
And that’s only the matter of environmental controls and oil drilling. Let’s talk about public order in California, shall we?