Politics
Gavin Newsom Humiliated As ‘Major Address’ To State Suffers Technical Difficulties
A primetime address to Californians nearly went unheard after Governor Gavin Newsom’s team failed to ensure that their boss was properly miked up.
Newsom on Tuesday responded angrily to President Donald Trump’s decision to bypass his authority and call up 4,000 members of the California National Guard to quell the riots that have been rocking Los Angeles for nearly a week. The eight-minute speech was ostensibly meant to position the Democrat as a premier state-level opponent to the president, but technical difficulties perforated his appearance as a primetime-ready contender.
The first four minutes of Newsom’s speech came out as a garbled mess on the airwaves, oscillating between static and silence as broadcasters tried to determine the source of the problem.
“Not sure if that’s on the governor’s end, but we’re working to get that production up and running so you can listen in,” one anchor with CBS Los Angeles said shortly after Newsom walked out in front of the camera. “We’re efforting to get the audio of Governor Newsom’s speech.”
On Fox L.A., anchor Elex Michaelson said the feed was similarly spotty, a fact that Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton jumped on in an appearance.
“He literally can’t get anything right,” Hilton said, writing on X that Newsom’s address was a “hot, garbled mess.”
In his eight-minute monologue, Newsom denounced Trump for “inflammatory” actions that he said have contributed to violence in Los Angeles. On Tuesday, Mayor Karen Bass implemented an 8 p.m. curfew, and by Wednesday morning, most of the streets were calm as thousands of National Guardsmen and Marines took up positions around the city.
“This isn’t just about protests here in Los Angeles,” Newsom said. “This is about all of us. This is about you. California may be first, but it clearly will not end here. Other states are next. Democracy is next. Democracy is under assault before our eyes.”
Despite the technical difficulties, it’s clear Newsom is working to shore up the anti-Trump fervor on the left. He was labeled “the leader of the opposition” by the Wall Street Journal following his speech, and liberal media personality Ana Navarro sang his praises in her Tuesday evening appearance on CNN.
“I have been so thirsty for somebody that is not cowardly, bending the knee and selling out to Donald Trump as he does all of this to America,” she said.
The feud reached a fever pitch when President Trump threatened to arrest Newsom for interfering with federal immigration raids in the city, a threat that Newsom — aware of how the spectacle of arresting Trump only strengthened his position in the polls — appeared eager to entertain.
From the White House, aides to Trump took the address seriously. Spokespersons Steven Cheung and Deputy Alex Pfeiffer both condemned Newsom on social media for his address, as did Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.
The president’s rapid response account also wrote that Newsom claimed Trump was “traumatizing” communities “by taking criminal illegal immigrant killers, rapists, gangbangers, drug dealers, human traffickers, and domestic abusers off the streets.”
The next chapter of the state-federal fight may be California’s funding. Trump now appears to be considering cutting federal education funds to Newsom’s state, per Politico, and terminating its nation-leading vehicle emissions standards.
