When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and California Gov. Gavin Newsom met to debate on Fox News on Thursday, Newsom was in a precarious position. At the start of November, the University of California, Berkeley, released a poll showing that the...
The post Governor or Showman? ‘Red State vs. Blue State Debate’ Exposes Newsom. appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.
When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and California Gov. Gavin Newsom met to debate on Fox News on Thursday, Newsom was in a precarious position. At the start of November, the University of California, Berkeley, released a poll showing that the California governor’s approval rating had fallen to its lowest level on record, registering an 11-percentage-point decline from when the same poll was conducted in February 2023. Newsom’s approval rating, 44 percent, was even lower than his ratings following the French Laundry scandal, when the recall movement against him was booming.
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The reason for Newsom’s all-time-low poll numbers? The governor has been dallying around on the national stage while paying little heed to the numerous crises afflicting California. These crises include the state’s exodus of residents, shoplifting epidemic, rapidly rising energy prices, homeless population of 171,500, poor educational outcomes, exorbitantly high rents, open-air drug use, and mass departure of corporations. That’s not to mention the fact that California has one of the nation’s highest unemployment rates and the highest cost-adjusted poverty rate in the country.
When the damning poll was released in early November, Mark DiCamillo, director of the poll, pointed to Newsom’s efforts to raise his profile on a national level. “He’s kind of taking on a new persona,” DiCamillo told the Los Angeles Times. “He’s no longer just the governor of California. He’s a spokesperson for the national party and basically voters are being asked to react to that.”
The poll speaks for itself. Californians are not happy with Newsom’s subordination of the state’s numerous issues to his own self-aggrandizement. Newsom’s assertions that he is not running for president offer little solace to Californians who are witnessing their governor channel all of his energies into portraying himself as the nation’s foremost progressive warrior. In this atmosphere of dissatisfaction, Newsom’s debate with DeSantis has only served to bolster the perception that his primary concern is cultivating his personal image.
In the debate, Newsom did not level with Californians on the many issues they face and commit to remedying those challenges. Rather, Newsom dismissed the problems through redirection, cherry-picked statistics, charms, and smiles. When confronted over and over on California’s crises by Sean Hannity, Newsom simply refused to address any of them. He instead defaulted to his go-to playbook of slamming DeSantis for not walking in lockstep with the progressive agenda. Newsom was only there to generate headlines that would portray him as the standard-bearer for left-wing America.
Newsom’s strategy of redirection was on display from the beginning of the debate. Hannity began by asking the governors to account for the exodus of Californians. DeSantis answered that high crime rates, high taxes, the homelessness epidemic, Newsom’s extreme COVID lockdown, and high gas prices were to blame, while Newsom gave no answer. He instead pointed out that California’s large number of Nobel Prize winners and tech industry were impressive features of the state. After asking Newsom three times to address the exodus out of California, Hannity relented. “I have asked you why Californians are leaving,” he told Newsom. “You don’t want to answer, so we’ll move on.”
Newsom’s strategy of refusing to answer for any of California’s problems persisted. When DeSantis held up a map displaying the human feces that infest San Francisco’s streets, Newsom responded by saying, “Don’t insult a great American city.” He added, “It’s an interesting campaign strategy for Ron DeSantis to be bashing the state of 40 million Americans.” When Hannity confronted Newsom over the fact that his strictest-in-the-nation lockdown resulted in mortality outcomes equivalent to Florida’s, Newsom simply denied the reality. And when Hannity raised the issue of California’s poor educational outcomes, Newsom diverted the conversation to DeSantis’ “book-banning binge.”
Even the friendly Los Angeles Times concluded that Newsom had spent the entire time redirecting and distracting: “Newsom responded by ignoring or reframing many of the questions as the two men repeatedly spoke over one another in a chaotic back-and-forth.”
In a California facing numerous crises, Newsom’s evident disinterest in addressing and advocating for solutions played poorly. A disillusioned voter, Ralph Jones from Riverside, California, expressed his disappointment to the Los Angeles Times, saying: “I voted for our governor but consider his performance Thursday night to have been shameless. He managed to out-stink DeSantis by a landslide. The debate was a master’s course in incivility and chaos.”
Newsom’s decision to prioritize a superficial, unsubstantial performance in a Fox News debate serves as a clear indicator of his priorities. And it all looks even worse when juxtaposed with his recent actions in San Francisco.
In preparation for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference, which took place Nov.11, 2023, to Nov. 17, 2023, and drew world leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Joe Biden, to San Francisco, Newsom deployed intensive efforts to clean up the city. A giant homelessness encampment was totally cleaned out, piles of garbage were hauled off, and human feces were washed away. The cleanup sparked outrage among residents who questioned why such actions had only been undertaken for the sake of appearances to outsiders when they suffered daily from the city’s dirtiness and decay.
Newsom openly admitted that the cleanup was driven by a desire to enhance appearances. “I know a lot of folks are saying they are cleaning up this place because of those fancy leaders are coming into town,” Newsom said. “And that’s true, because it’s true.” Evidently, the governor only cared for cleaning up San Francisco when it directly lent itself to burnishing his public image.
Newsom’s debate performance also follows backlash over his efforts to raise his profile in red states. After Newsom embarked on a tour of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, and Mississippi in April 2023 to spread his gospel of progressivism on a national level, Californians voiced their discontent with his self-centric approach. The San Francisco Chronicle editorial board wrote, “Newsom needs to get back to work in California — and focus on nitty-gritty policy details as much as flashy headlines.” The Atlantic published an op-ed that read, “Leading California is more than a full-time job — and neglecting it to do PR stunts in red states is frivolous and irresponsible.” Newsom dismissed the arguments that he was taking his focus off of governing as “lazy.”
The “Great Red State vs. Blue State Debate” has yet again shown Newsom to be more concerned with optics and self-promotion than with substantive governance. He better run back to California and look as though he’s governing before his approval rating plummets even lower.
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