Gavin Newsom Throws Trans People to the Wolves in the Name of Political Ambition
On the way home from the gym this evening, my 15-year-old son asked me what I thought about transgender women participating in certain sports. He gave an example of a bodybuilder assigned male at birth who was now competing in and winning women’s bodybuilding competitions.
“Honestly, son,” I said. “I don’t care.”
I explained that the arguments about transgender women in sports (never about transgender men in sports) were not happening in good faith. That the end goal of the many anti-trans arguments is not about “saving” women’s sports — or keeping women safe in public restrooms or protecting children from drag queens for that matter. The goal is to remove trans people from public life by portraying them as menacing, duplicitous and perverted in order to strip them of any legal recognition or civil rights protections and to make it unsafe for trans people to show their faces anywhere.
And so, I told him, I don’t entertain these arguments because I will not participate in the dehumanization of transgender people.
Unlike, of course, Republicans as a whole. Trans eradication is something they are wholly committed to.
As are some Democrats, unfortunately. The most prominent is California Gov. Gavin Newsom who invited Charlie Kirk, described by the New Republic as “Donald Trump's weird, fascist little sidekick,” onto the first episode of his new podcast, creatively titled "This is Gavin Newsom."
Newsom and Kirk talked about trans athletes. Kirk asked Newsom, “Would you say no men in female sports?”
“I think it’s an issue of fairness,” Newsom responded. “I completely agree with you on that. It is an issue of fairness. It’s deeply unfair.”
“I completely agree with you on that,” Newsom says to a person who does not believe that transgender people are fully human.
Newsom, of course, is weighing a run for president in 2028. And apparently thinks that it will benefit him to sacrifice trans people on the altar of political ambition.
SFGATE published a scathing take down of Newsom’s foray into podcasting.
“If the first episode is any indication, he plans to spend it sucking up to right-wing influencers and making digs at his own political party,” writes Stephen Council, who adds that he was surprised at “how embarrassingly Newsom performed.”
"The governor came across as unprepared, malleable and strangely self-effacing,” Council writes, accusing Newsom of “rambling about the political difficulty” of trans athletes.
As Council points out, it doesn’t have to be a political issue.“The reason it’s a political issue at all is that people like Kirk are successfully making it one,” Council writes.
The day after the interview, “dozens of headlines about the podcast’s debut pointed specifically to Newsom’s comments about trans athletes. That’s the news cycle this episode launched, and the one that will lead off the governor’s new messaging venture. In the entire episode, the governor never really went on offense.”Sadly, this is the kind of spinelessness we’ve been seeing far too much from Democrats ever since Trump took office and began moving at warp speed toward fascism.
“The Democrat Party supports everything that God hates,” Kirk said at a 2024 Trump campaign event, claiming that Democrats are “espousing the death of the unborn” and “the mutilation of our teenage kids.”This is the guy that Newsom invited onto his podcast. In the name of “civil debate.”
“Worse than having no message of his own, Newsom fell into the trap of spreading Kirk’s,” Council writes. “The new podcast gives Newsom a clear opportunity to grab the reins of discourse and talk about things that actually matter. Instead, he spent its first 70 minutes finding ways to acquiesce to the unpleasant worldview of a right-wing conspiracist.”
Not surprisingly, Newsom has really pissed off a lot of people that he really shouldn’t piss off if he wants to be President Newsom.“I will never vote for Gavin Newsom for anything. President. Vice president. Dog catcher. Nothing,” journalist Parker Molloy posted to Bluesky. “And this will also be true of any other Democrat who throws trans people under the bus. No support for trans people = no vote from me. It's that simple.”
bsky.appThe Human Rights Campaign posted on Bluesky, “Californians — and ALL Americans — need leaders who have courage in their convictions, and who will show up for them, in the faces of people who want to see us all back in the closet.”bsky.app
That person is clearly not Gavin Newsom. GTFO, Governor.
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