If Europe’s leaders had a say in the next US presidential election, Gavin Newsom would be the frontrunner. A month after making a spectacle of himself in Davos, California’s governor seemed like a veteran in Munich. Add in the red carpet treatment Newsom got from China’s Xi Jinping last October and his presence at the global climate summit in Brazil (partly filling the void of America’s absence) and he could be leading the world primary too. “Donald Trump is temporary,” Newsom keeps saying. “He will be gone in three years.”
America’s Democratic voters will be a much tougher sell than foreigners. But Newsom has two early edges in what promises to be a crowded field. The first is that he can throw a punch. Trump loathes Newsom and vice versa. At a time when Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill seem to be perfecting the art of strongly worded letters, Newsom has been America’s nearest thing to leader of the opposition. He has found ways of messing with Trump’s head. The “Newsom knee pads” — his accessory for US chief executives and allied leaders who kneel in obeisance to Trump — are selling well.
Newsom’s other plus is that he knows how to campaign. In contrast to his fellow Californian Kamala Harris, who lost to Trump in 2024, Newsom is more than willing to take on the Democratic left. Bill Clinton’s attack on the black rap activist Sister Souljah in 1992 is the model. Newsom embarked on a series of mini Sister Souljah moments last year by hosting the since murdered Maga activist Charlie Kirk on his podcast. Newsom told Kirk that it was “deeply unfair” for transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports. The cultural left now hates him. Harris should have courted their enmity in 2024.