With the reaction he received from the Democrats, you would think that California governor Gavin Newsom had admitted to something truly heinous on his podcast last week. In reality, all he did was utter words that are entirely in line with what the majority of Americans think – that is, that boys should not compete in girls’ sports, because it is unfair to girls.
Incredibly, to date, Newsom is the only high-profile Democrat to acknowledge this reality, while his party keeps doubling down in the opposite direction. Just last week, Congressional Democrats voted unanimously to block a bill that would deny federal funding to schools that allow trans-identified males to compete against girls.
Newsom, though, has appeared to break ranks. On his new podcast, This is Gavin Newsom, he sat down with MAGA influencer Charlie Kirk. During their conversation, which was remarkably civil, Newsom said that ‘the issue of fairness [in women’s sports] is completely legit’. He also called allowing male athletes to compete in female events ‘deeply unfair’. A poll from the beginning of this year found that 79 per cent of Americans (including 67 per cent of Democrats) agree.
So, was this a cringe ploy from Newsom to grab the headlines by posing as a champion of common sense? Or was it a sincere admission that the Democrats have actually got this issue wrong?
The former seems more likely. To me, Newsom comes across as thoroughly untrustworthy (and not just because he resembles one of those rich-kid villains from 1980s high-school movies who lords it over the nerds). After all, the California governor has been at the forefront of pushing trans ideology in the US. He has declared his state a ‘sanctuary’ for children who want to transition and has banned schoolteachers from notifying parents when a child changes his or her pronouns. If Newsom is now being sincere, this would be quite the Damascene conversion.
To give him credit, Newsom’s podcast episode was genuinely surprising. For a Democrat, never mind such a famous and powerful one, to even be in the same room as an actual – gasp – Trump-supporting Republican passes for the height of bravery these days.
As such, the reaction from the left was predictable. There was zero per cent introspection, 100 per cent name-calling. One Bluesky user called Newsom ‘scum’ and an ‘absolute toad of a man’. Over on X, one user accused him of ‘throwing the trans community… under the bus’ and of cavorting with a ‘known racist and incel’ in the form of Kirk. Politico called Newsom’s comments ‘stunning’, and not in a good way.
What these people fail or refuse to understand is that the extreme trans-activist position is loathed by the American electorate. The majority of people very reasonably don’t want people with dicks in female locker rooms, prisons and bathrooms. Yet for those trapped in woke la-la-land, expressing anything but the most fulsome praise for men in frocks is seen as a huge betrayal. It is hilarious that these so-called progressives actually seem to think that Newsom is suddenly not one of them, all because he committed the unforgivable crime of speaking to someone who does not see the world in exactly the same way.
Still, there are plenty of reasons to be cynical about Newsom. In another sin against identity politics, he has now claimed to hate the term ‘Latinx’, saying that ‘not one person in my office has ever used that word’. Yet there is a video of him complaining as recently as 2023 that Republicans are ‘banning the word Latinx’. X users immediately managed to dig up old tweets of his with the word Latinx.
Just before the presidential election last November, I met a television executive from Europe who works extensively in Los Angeles. He told me that he was confident Trump would win. Why? Because, even in Hollywood, people absolutely loathe that the Democrats keep going along with delusional males who demand their feelings trump the rights of women and girls – especially when it comes to girls’ sports. Newsom must be aware of this, too.
Whatever his reasons, it is an encouraging sign that the governor of California is willing to stick a toe in the water of common sense. Whether or not the rest of the Democratic Party follows suit will be a different story.
Jenny Holland is a former newspaper reporter and speechwriter. Visit her Substack here.
