Put A Fork In Gavin Newsom’s Presidential Aspirations – They’re Well Done

Tuesday, June 16, 2026

It has been no secret for a long time now that Gavin Newsom wants to run for president.  So naked is his ambition that as soon as Trump got elected the second time, Newsom inelegantly and unmasterfully tried to position himself as a reach-across-the-aisle moderate with a quickly failed podcast.  It was so disingenuous that it fell flat on its face in a matter of weeks.  Since, he has only been able to find traction in being an ardent Trump troll.  But if you want to be president you need more than simply, “He’s awful and I’m not him.”

Newsom took a massive hit over the weekend and has responded by crying foul, trolling again, concerning a completely justified investigation conducted by the DOJ.  Let’s start with the hit

Long time CNN commentator Fareed Zakaria aired a piece over the weekend about the state of California.  It is devastating.  Considering the source, it is nuclear weapon devastating.  It is a statistical, economic nightmare of a piece that paints California as “a case study in how a rich society can spend more and more while producing less and less.”  The piece is like a jackhammer of fact…fact…fact driving nails in the coffin of California’s once vibrant reality.  If there is a shortcoming in the piece it is that it does not address manufacturing, once a staple of the California economy and long since driven into inconsequence by a regulatory burden that comes dangerously close to making the EU seem inviting.  The piece has gone viral and I have seen it more from Democratic sources than Republican ones.  It is too long to be an ad, but if I were running against Newsom, in a primary or the general, I might just buy the time to run it – over and over again.  The piece is a six-minute utter disqualification of Gavin Newsom for the job of POTUS, and Zakaria never mentions Newsom by name.

So, yesterday, Newsom had to do something.  What did he do?  Well, this:

Today, my wife & I joined Donald Trump’s hit list. He has directed his Department of Justice to investigate us. They have not found a crime – they are simply trying to find one.

He isn’t coming after me because of mean tweets, but because I am considering running for President.

He hates that I consistently call him out. He is simply the most corrupt President in American history.

I’m sorry, but that is just lame – not to mention the fact that it is a complete misrepresentation of what is actually happening.  Newsom gets gut-punched with a pile driver and all he has as a counterpunch is “Orange Man bad.”  Seriously?  Why didn’t he just melodically recite, “I’m rubber you’re glue…” and end it by sticking his tongue out?

Gavin Newsom’s record as California Governor is an abomination.  What Zakaria demonstrates in his piece is Newsom’s complete inability to actually govern – complete inability.  During Newsom’s far too long tenure in the California Governor’s mansion California has has not merely slid, but rocketed, towards oblivion.  So bad is Newsom at the job, that when I still lived in California he made me long for Jerry Brown.

He has been taken seriously as a presidential contender to date because he seems pretty good at running.  I have long thought his record would catch up and it did over the weekend.  But his response indicates he is not near as good at the whole running thing as the conventional “wisdom” once held.  He does not have to beat Trump in the next election – the Constitution has seen to that.  He needs to put something positive on the table.  But it sure looks like he does not have it.