On with Kara Swisher - Gavin Newsom on His Memoir, Trump, and Plans for 2028

Episode Date: March 2, 2026

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is the current front runner on the list of Democrats eyeing a 2028 White House run. While he hasn’t made his presidential ambitions official, he has a new memoir out, called “Young Man in A Hurry.” And his book tour conveniently has him passing through a lot of swing states and early primary states.  In a live interview recorded at San Francisco’s Golden Gate Theater on Saturday, Feb. 28, Kara and Gov. Newsom talk about his life growing up in the Bay Area, how he straddled the worlds of the working class and the ultra wealthy, and his early days in San Francisco politics. They also talk about his final year as governor, and what he’s planning to do next. And Kara wraps up by asking Newsom about recent news items, including the continuing fallout around the Epstein files and war with Iran. Questions? Comments? Email us at [e-mail] or find us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and Bluesky @onwithkaraswisher. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I like how you bring her wife here to try to get me to be nice. That's it. I know. I mean, we worked on that speech for, you know, the better part of the last week. Sadly, it's not going to work. Unbelievable. Hi, everyone from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is on with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher. My guest today is California Governor Gavin Newsom.

He's on the shortlist of Democrats expected to run for president in 2028, and he's arguably the frontrunner will probably be a very crowded field, at least at this point. While Newsom hasn't made his presidential ambitions officially yet, he's kind of telegraphing it all the time, and he's out with a new memoir that definitely makes it seem like he's running. He is running. Let's stop playing games. The book is called Young Man in a Hurry, and the promotional tour has him conveniently passing through some major swing states in early primary states like Georgia and South Carolina. But Newsom's tour and book have gotten mixed reviews, and the criticism speak to something Newsom has grappled with in his political life, his own identity and what it means. Is he the son of a single mom who held down three jobs to support her kids or the son of a top confident to one of the richest families in the world?

Is he the man who led the California resistance during President Trump's first term or the one who sat down with Steve Bannon for an episode of his podcast in the early days of Trump's second term? I have been a longtime California resident. I think a lot of Gavin Newsom, I think he's really interesting and complex. And I think it'll be really interesting to see how the public reacts to him. He's been very good about pressing back at President Trump What he did around gay marriage was incredibly heroic.

At the same time, some people think he's a little too malleable to whatever it takes to win and he's too ambitious. There's all kinds of things around Gavin Newsom, but it's okay to have a complex person running for president. It's probably a good thing. All right, let's get to my conversation with Gavin Newsom. Our expert question comes from Jennifer Welch, who co-host the Progressive Politics Podcast. I've had it. This conversation was taped in front of a live audience this past Saturday at San Francisco's Golden Gate theater, don't go anywhere.

When things get hard, how do you talk to yourself? I'm Robin Aerson, VP of Fitness Programming and Head Instructor at Peloton, and this week on my new podcast, Project Swagger, I'm sharing my strategies for how to build better self-talk. It's time to work on befriending yourself. Follow Project Swagger wherever you get your podcasts. Gavin Newsom, thanks for coming on on. There's lots to talk about. This is the last year's governor.

plans for what's next. So welcome Gavin Newsom, Governor Newsom. Thank you, thank you. Thank you, everybody for being here. Thank you. All right, we're going to start with your new memoir, Young Man in a Hurry. Good a title, excellent title, but one of the things... I mean, you like the title, honestly? What do you think? I thought you could have smiled more on the cover, but... Okay, all right. I'm teasing. I always tease men about that. And do you, were you able to pick up why it's called Young Man and A Hurry? Yes, why don't you tell people? I did. Go ahead. No, well, I mean, well, we can, Let's get into that in a moment, but it is interesting.

The actual title comes from The Economist magazine that did what I could objectively describe as a bit of a hit piece on me and said I was running. Gavin Newsom wants to be governor of California and then talked about this young man in a hurry. And I love the way they described it. And in so many ways, I connected with it,

not as a critique and external critique, but as self-critique, the more that I absorbed and look back when I had a chance to reread the article about 15 years later. It is a trope. It is a trope of a young man desperate to either come out to California or whatever. No, I mean, look, the whole book, and I appreciate the way Jen described it, it's not a politician's book.

If you came to get a book about politics, 10-point plan, how to restore the American Dreamer, and that's not what this is about. It's a book that really scrutinizes who I am, not sanitizes it, really sort of break through. and challenged my own assumptions of myself, my family, my relationship to a lot of issues that all of us here have a very intimate relationship to. And I tried to just sort of break the core of who I was

and stress test it in a way that ultimately led me to a subtitle called a memoir of discovery in the process of writing this. I learned about my parents, I learned about my grandparents, and I learned about myself in a way that his, you know, really shifted my mindset and radically altered my world. Yeah, myself, my relationship to my job as an elected official,

how I put a mask on, how I had a pose growing up, how I tried to become someone I wasn't, how my face started to grow into the mask, how, you know, I, you know, showed up even as a kid. I mean, I was wearing suits to high school. Exactly. This does not surprise me, but it doesn't surprise you. But, you know, it's all in an effort to overcompensate.

And so it's really a journey. It's about insecurity. It's about anxiety. It's about that insecure and anxiety that's still with me today. It's about constantly becoming a better person and a better man. It wasn't a memoir at first, right? Anne Goddough shifted it. It was more of a walkbook.

Just very briefly of the history of this, and God bless Anne. She literally passed on the day of the publication. And anyone who knows in the book world, she's a rock star. She's the Kara Swisher of publishing in so many ways. And she's tough beyond words. And so I submitted the book, and originally it was the first year I was in office,

and she asked, be interesting, she said, talk about Trump at the time, Trump 1.0 was still president. I was governor, and then COVID hit. And ultimately, I worked through the process of finishing the book about my first four years. And it was a relationship to Trump, was raised up to the Biden campaign and obviously to a lot of the challenges, Troviles in the state of California.

I submitted the book, never forget on Zoom, and baited breath. And I was absolutely convinced that if there was going to be a critique, I was really proud of it, that the critique would be this one chapter talking about my mother and my dad. And I remember she said, well, and you can just feel she was about to be. I said, I'm happy to take out that chapter. And she cuts me out, I says, that's the only good one. I thought, Jesus.

She says, that's the book I want. She said, I thought I knew you. And she said, the reason I did this is, you know, I thought I knew you. And I don't think I know you as well as I know. She thought I was some pampered prince trust fund kid. And she had no idea of, you know, that 19-year-old, as Jen described. Right. So she changed it.

So it became a memoir when it wasn't. Yeah. And so then I had to go back and write a whole other book. and the book became, that's, I mean, when I talk about this being a memoir of discovery, when you have to go back and you have to go back much deeper and you've got to understand, you know, things that, you know, that you can't sanitize in a one chapter bio of your entire life. And that has become just a, it's been a revelatory process for me. It had a feel of Obama's book like that.

That was sort of the conversion of that. No, and I, you know, impossible not to have loved that book. Of course, at the time, no one paid much attention. attention to that book. And then Obama became Obama and everyone went back to it and learned those motivations, those setbacks, and a little bit of more of who he was. Which was not an similar story. So in the beginning of the book, you were talking about the gold rush. You noted there's net, we've never really rid ourselves of its voracious impulse. Nice, nice pair of words together there. I like to start you asking what that meant and also how that manifests today and in your own ambitions.

Well, it's interesting. When I first became governor, I got to, sworn in and I was with a Native American community doing the first official apology in the state of California for the genocide against Native American people in our state. And I quoted the first, the first governor, Barnett, 18, I believe his first state of the state was in 1853, and he literally talked about the war of a war of a country. extermination. And they talked about bounties for scalps. And it was a celebrated speech at the time. And, you know, the book opens up with me sitting near the American River, a river that was very familiar to me in my youth because I was connected with my father. It was a fierce environmentalist.

And one connection I did have with my father when I was young was episodic. He had left us when I was relatively young. He had run for San Francisco supervisor lost, ran for state Senate and lost. And I didn't know. And thank God, his oral history was not lost. We found at the Bankcroft Library, he talked about those two races. He never talked to me about those two races. And it said that he was broke and broken. And that's the reason he left. He needed a change of scenery and went up to Lake Tahoe and left my mom with two young kids. Again, neither of them ever talked about why they got divorced. But I begin the book reflecting on the American River, our connection to Eureka, Eureka.

Try to paint a picture of this state. Veraciousness. Yeah. It's an unusual thing to pick at the beginning of your book. Because we have voracious appetites. Consumption, overconsumption, the sort of an unctuousness. And in so many ways, extractions, water, of course, marks so much of the consideration and consciousness around that. What would you say your voracious impulse was?

Well, I've had many, I imagine. And I think many of them are described in this book. Yeah, they are. I was, of course, describing the state, not my state of being, but the state's sort of history in relationship, go west, young man, go west, this notion of California being a state of dreamers, of doers, of entrepreneurs. But so much of our politics is defined by water policy,

defined by consumption, some cases overconsumption, defined by scarcity, not just abundance. And so there's notion of voraciousness. described in that slide. So I'm curious, so what prompted you to write the book aside from the obvious reasons of running for president? Now, let me say,

we're not going to be playing that game that they like to do on CNN. Now, reviews are mixed. Have you read the reviews? I literally have not. Oh, good. I can do that for you. Okay, God bless. These are kind of,

interesting. They just can't give you. I think it's beautifully written, I have to say. I liked it a lot. But he can be both irritatingly slick and refreshingly resolute. That was one of them. That was about the book or me? You. Well, the book. You in the, it's your memoir. It is you. This one I liked. It's like Hillbilly Elegy, but for middle class alcoholics in the Bay Area with close ties to petroleum magnets. Because when I think of you, I think of Jay Vance, I do not. You know, it's, no, I don't. I don't.

I don't. I don't. That was a joke. We'll get to him in a minute. So what prompted you to do that? Do you feel like you had to write a book? Oh, the opposite. I was writing a book about something else.

As I just described. And so that was the journey. And, you know, look, this book, you know, it's dedicated to my kids so they can continue the story. and the great thing is, you know, you don't have to like it. You don't have to like me. But I finally was able to tell my story and give you my perspective. I stress tested my own assumptions and tried to crack open, go a little bit deeper.

And I don't often see that. Maybe these reviewers do in other political books. And I just, I did it, you know, I didn't do it for the third thing. I didn't do it for the reviews. I didn't do it for the sales. I did it because I wish my parents had done something like this. I didn't know about my mom's relationship to what Jen was introducing a moment ago. The reason she didn't want me to run in so many ways is shaped by the fact that her marriage ended

because my father's ambitions in politics. She never told me. I didn't understand that. I always resented her for not wanting me to be in politics, never fully understanding that. I didn't understand her own struggles. There's a scene in the book where she, as a young girl, is thrown against the fireplace, by her father with a gun to her head and her sister's head. My grandfather, threatening to kill my mom and her sister.

My grandfather eventually committed suicide. He was a prisoner of war. I didn't understand how broken he became after that experience, the March in Corrigador. I didn't understand my grandmother's parents and how they were part of the whole red scare, how close my great-grandfather was to Oppenheimer in the Bay Area.

and we found all these old FBI files. And so the reason I wrote it is because it started to reveal itself. It wrote itself in all of these stories. Because your last book was more wonky, more... Yeah, the last book was a policy book. This is not a policy book. And it's not about me.

It's about the people that shaped me. It's about... It's a love letter to my mom. It's a love letter to single moms that are out there struggling every single day with kids. It's... You know... And it's a messy story.

It's life. And so I did not write this to sanitize anything. I didn't want to explain anything away. I just, you know, it's just like let it go. And I hope, and maybe to the extent, one second, just on this, because I think it's important. I hope you've seen in my politics generally this last year. I'm hardly being timid if you've seen my social media.

Yeah. You know, I just, I'm on the other side, honestly. And so the book's a reflection of that, my politics. And it's just, it's for the first time in my life, I'm taking a deep breath. So just for people that know, your parents, you're mentioning, thought your parents were divorced when you're young, your mom didn't come from money. Your dad was a state judge. He was also close confident to one of the wealthiest families in the world, the Gettys. And even though you weren't wealthy, you grew up around that wealth because of that.

Talk about how that shaped your worldview as a kid and moving between these two. worlds, one of the things you've long complained about is this Prince Gavin label that you get. You talk about it a lot in the book, and I don't know if it reinforces it, but you discuss it. I talk about how I played into it. Yeah. I talk about how I reinforced it through my own actions, how complicit I am. So talk a little bit about that, because is what you're called in the book supposedly privileged upbringing, right?

This image. Well, I'd be doing a disservice to my mom who had two, three jobs quite literally. almost her entire life up until the end when she was working for me, ironically, and small businesses I have. And, you know, the reason we are a foster family in many respects was just my mom's grit, hard work, just making ends. We had people living in the house, strangers. She lived in the living room for a good part of our life.

We kind of raised ourselves and sort of latchy kids in the language of the vernacular of the past. And it was just, you know, the struggles she had. raising us and the lack of support that I felt that I ever provided her. I talk about Hillary being the rock and being the rock star. And I relate that in a part of this book. You know, she died about 20 years ago and she died in this respect. Let me describe it. I pick up, get to the office and I get a voice message and it says, hi, honey, it's your mom. And I will be around through next Thursday. That will be the last day of my life.

If you're interested, you may want to drop by before then, which is a hell of a voicemail. I did what anyone would do. I immediately called my sister and like what's going on. And she read me the right act, said, you know what's going on is you're not paying attention. You're just some young,

you're just focused on yourself. You're grinding away, doing your thing. You're not paying attention to your mom. My mom's breast cancer had come back, I'd frankly take it for granted that she'll be fine the second time. Sure. And so she did an assisted suicide. And it was illegal at the time, which is interesting.

And by the way, pretty profound for me. And I've struggled with it all my life. I mean, the family was there together. Everyone said their goodbyes. I'd spent a few days with her before. She was struggling in deep pain. We had a courageous doctor who was willing to lose his license to support this. And my responsibility was just to give.

give her two pills before the doctor came, just to relax her a little bit before he did the actual cocktail. And she was in there and she had a book and she really waited for just Hillary and I to be there as a last people with her. And I want to talk with my sister right here, a little out of school, but it was very intense as the doctor left. And it was a process and unfolded over five, ten minutes. And my mother coming in and out of state talking about our childhood, looking at these photos. And Hillary looked at me, and I looked at her, I said, it's okay. And we were both crying, and she just ran out.

And then I was sort of stuck, and I didn't know if I should leave. I didn't know what to do. And I was with her for those last minutes. And there was no, you know, the credits didn't roll. It wasn't some wonderful romantic ending. It was deep breaths and struggle. And I remember holding her hand, and then I remember putting my head down, on her chest for 10 minutes, just crying,

and saying things to her that I didn't have the guts to say five minutes before when she was alive, and feeling tremendous shame. And I struggle with that for years and years and years, and it's only through the process, through the process of writing this, that again, I started to let it go. To me, she's the center character in the book.

She's a center character, and she's, you know, and that's what Jen described is the grit and the rock, and that's the relationship. in the book, impenetrable. And you recall when she told you, quote, it's okay to be average when you were struggling with dyslexia, too. There was a lot of hard truths. Well, the big part of the book as well is talking about, yeah,

something's familiar and I met someone in the back. And thank you. A beautiful young girl who said, thank me for being honest about my learning disability because she's struggling with it as well. And a big part of this book is that relationship to my own academic challenges, my own insecurity that that marks,

my own anxiety, and the fact that I'm still that guy. You don't over, you know, it doesn't go away. You have this sort of work around it. It's the reason I talk about not reading speeches because it's not because I don't want to have someone write a speech and then I'll look at the paper and read it. It's that I can't.

I can do teleprompters, that's it, and that's not easy, and I can't stand doing them. And so it's, you know, that's the guy in the back. That's the guy with the sweaty hands and, you know, the pounding heart beat. But it's also the heart of the story with my mom because I never appreciated how hard it was for her

to have to raise a kid that was always trying to quit, that literally was running out of schools. I talk a lot about that, being faking, being sick, going to school to school to school. That's why we ended up in Marin, because I bounced around schools in San Francisco and she couldn't take it anymore. And in the relationship with that,

I had with my own kids that were struggling with reading, And it was like a moment you're like, oh, God, it wasn't just about me. It's about my mom and not to have her back where I can just thank her for all those sacrifice and how that was. So I hated her to your point when she said it's okay to be average. Yeah. And it took 15 years until I sat there with my kids struggling and realized waiters that she was just saying it's okay to be you.

And in her own exhaustion, it was just like you don't have to be. be someone else. And so, again, this notion is let it go and this cathartic nature of this whole process of writing. The idea of letting this mask go that you talked about, one of the things, you know, your mother didn't want you to go into politics. She told you, quote, get out before it's too late. I think it's too late. But your father's dream, of course, was to be a politician's, as you mentioned. How did you reconcile these competing dreams your parents had for you? Because and you fell into your dad's footsteps in many ways. I'll never get the day of the recall qualified.

I was like, Mom was right, you know. Yeah. And there's plenty of those moments. I mean, this is, you know, my God. I mean, this has been a hell of a run here. And by the way, I can't believe it's taking me this long, all because of one person who's sitting here today, Willie Brown. Willie is literally the reason.

I'm sitting up here today, period, full stop. Would not have happened without him. And, you know, we could talk. There's some funny stories, I think, about getting schooled in a different way by Willie Brown about how politics works. But, yeah, no, I've always tried to reconcile this. My mom just wanted to be happy.

And she struggled with that all her life. She self-medicated, and, you know, I talk about jugs of Safeway wine. She tried to go to bed early because she would wake up early and just hard work and hard enough, just raising us on her own. Again, came from no money, no wealth. And my father was distant when we were growing up, and so money was always an issue. It was a stress.

And it was always stressful for her to your Christian earlier, the relationship I had to him, which was one of adventure. And it was always connected, yes, to the Getty family. Once a year we would go on these unbelievable vacations. and I described many of them in the book. But I would always go back home to a mom who would open the door and go, hi, honey, hope you had a wonderful trip. Good night.

And we'll never talk about it again. And so I write about that and that sort of struggle of not being an imposter necessarily, but also never feeling comfortable. And I never forget there's a story in here when I was a teenager and we went to Spain and some fancy party, King Wong. This is the coming out party for the princess of Spain. It was one of these just over the time. Yeah, I went to that too, but go ahead.

Yeah. I remember you. Fondly. Yeah. As if. And those high heels that you were walking around in. Oh, God. Another life.

There was, I'll never begin with Anne and Gordon, San Francisco. go. All right, we're in Spain. Keep going. But no, with their four kids. And I was walking around the four kids, and I was sort of the fifth. I was the same age as Andrew became a roommate years later. But Andrew

and I were walking around, and we were there, and I just remember this couple, this very fancy couple, go, oh, the Getty boys, it's so wonderful to have you here in Spain. And the whole thing, fabulous Californians, and said, which one are you to me? And I went, I'm

Gavin Newsom, not one of the voice. And immediately, physically, she sifted. And had no interest whatsoever in engaging with me. And it was a moment where you just immediately knew who you were and who you weren't. And again, it's that identity that I talk about it a lot because it shapes a lot. Those privileges were absolutely real. Those doors opened that would never have opened without that. But the relationship to that and the relationship to the truth of who I was,

and where I went back home. And it just is never, for me, I struggled to tell that story. And as I say, my mom deserves the truth. And that is part of why I wrote this book as well. Though you seemed, most people think of you that way, seeming very fancy Prince Gavin, right? And yeah, no, I get it.

And you put gel in your hair, and I talk about that. You do. I finally found out your secret. The blue suits, the whole thing. I mean, you know, look, I'm not naive. You know, I even talk about the way I give speeches, move my hands, you know, using words like IRIV and all this stuff, yeah. And all that mock 24-7, it just is what it is.

And so one of the things I, again, maybe it took me 58, whatever years, I now realize you can't control what you can't control. Right. You know? And all my life I've been trying to control all this, control the narrative, control how people think about me, and I've struggled with it. And again, in the process of writing this book, let it go.

And I'm serious. I hope everyone here writes their own story. And for no other reason, just to find grace. The word for me, grace, there's humility, a lot of humility in this book. But just to find that and let it go. We'll be back in a minute. Support for On with Carousisher comes from Grooons. If you're looking for a health goal that you can actually stick to,

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Kara K-A-R-U-N-S-C-O. Support for On with Carous Fisher comes from the 2027 Chevy Bolt. As you all know from listening to me, I love my Chevy Bolt. It's one of my favorite things. I almost like it as much as my kids. Anyway, that's right. The Chevy Bolt is back and better than ever. Now with 2.5 times faster charging with DC public fast charging,

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Without them, we'd just be living in a giant strip mall with all the same stores and restaurants. Where's the fun in that? I use Square all the time. I go to a lot of farmers markets in Washington, D.C., and also in San Francisco. And I think I use Square four to six times every time I go there because everybody has it.

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make decisions about how to run your business. With Square, you get all the tools to run your businesses with none of the contracts or complexity. Right now, you can get up to $200 off square hardware at square.com slash go slash on with Kara. That's SQU-A-R-E.com slash go-with-K-A-R-A. Run your business smarter with Square. Get started today. As mayor, you were best known for making San Francisco the first city to issue marriage is licensed to same-sex couples. I got married during that time here in San Francisco was a great benefit at the time

it was against state and federal law and only about a third of Californians supported it now history is on your side here and one of the interesting things I had an encounter with a very well-known politician who was saying Gavin's finished I remember and they said and I'll never forget this,

said, Americans aren't ready for gay marriage. This is a very well-known politician. And for some reason, I stopped being a reporter, and I said it's called leadership, which, and they were like, and I was like, sorry, that doesn't matter if people are ready. But, you know, there is, what you did was really forward. And there's an uncomfortable peril to Trump in a weird way that he's a raft of executive orders also defying the law.

Talk about it's okay when, a leader defies the law and that's leadership and when it's not okay. I love the question. You know, I see Steve Kama's here and some many couples that were part of that winter of love. 4,036 couples, 46 states, six countries came here in February to just say two magical words. They weren't even that remarkable. There's magical. I do.

And, you know, I talk a lot about that story. Paul Pelosi is here and how, Paul, I took your seat at when Nancy, Madam Speaker, was kind enough to invite me. I was a newly minted mayor. I went back to meet with congressional delegation, and coincidentally, it was the same day that President Bush was given his state of the union. And I was going to leave. We had a reception in the Capitol, and the speaker asked,

would you interested in sticking around for the event? I said, I don't have a ticket. She goes, I don't think Paul's going to go. And so I took his ticket, went back up on the rafters, and sat there. And I'll never forget, after the end of the speech, and you can go back to the speech, it was a re-election speech, and it ended with it. We need a constitutional amendment to make marriage between a man and a woman

and people standing ovation, the whole thing. But we're walking back, and no one could bring cell phones in. So you're waiting in line for the cell phones. And I'll never forget, true story. As I'm standing there waiting in line, the couple behind me was just talking about the speech and how proud they were the president. And one of them said, I'm just, and said the words,

I'm just so sick and tired of the homosexual agenda. And it was the way they said homosexual, that I literally turned around. And I was about to introduce myself as a mayor of San Francisco. I didn't have the guts or courage. And I meekly turned, got my phone, and instead of going back down to see Nancy

and the congressional delegation after speech, I walked in the opposite direction outside of the Capitol. And I'll never forget, the door locked, and I couldn't get back in. And it was a cold night, and I called Steve Kava, was my chief of staff. And I said, did you hear the speech? He goes, yes, sir.

I said, well, we need to do something about it. None of us knew what we're going to do. Came back, fast forward this. A few days later, and we decided that we were going to marry one couple, Phyllis Lyon at Del Martin. They've been together some 47 years. And we were going to file a lawsuit. But word got out that we were going to do this,

and the federal courts were right across the street, and they said that they were going to get a temporary restraining order. They were going to stop us from moving. And then we realized, I think Daniel Lurie is here as well. It's good to be mayor, Daniel. I realized I was mayor, and I can open city hall up earlier than nine. And so we called Phyllis and we said, get here at eight and we got to get this done by nine o'clock because they're likely to shut us down

and they got married i wasn't there i was up in the office ironically because i didn't want to make it political um and that's when we had a few other couples uh that were there i said oh what about us and, you know, after that, all hell broke loose. So, so you just... And it was... And I remember, I say that we would love Arnold's like, you know, it's chaos, you know, in the United States, Francisco. And people were critical, but the most critical part,

I want to get to specific your question, it was a great question, I'll get to it. Okay. But some of the people I admire most in political life, the ones that all told me just three weeks prior, you know, the one universal advice, just do what you think is right. It goes by in a flash.

You know, you're a new, just do what you think is right. Those same folks were some of the most critical. And the party was, you may not recall this, I was hardly favored nation status at the DNC. They were like, you don't really have to go to Boston, for the convention. You know, it's all good. You're new mayor.

You should really focus on homelessness. And, you know. And so... Yeah, they didn't want you. You were... I went through that process of trying to figure... The question you just asked, I was asking myself,

I was being condemned by people I admired. People I really revered. Including leaders in the LGBTQ community that were like, who the hell is this guy to do this? So do you regret it at all, even today? No, because I said in that, and this is what I'm describing in the book,

I got into it and I got frustrated and flustered and I was at the bowel book I'll never forget it's in the book and Joe really pushed me a fierce lawyer amazing advocate and he goes he really pushed me tell me why why the hell are you doing this I said Joe because it's the right thing to do and I remember saying that and Joe literally turned around to my uncle

Brennan and my dad said boys it's the right thing to do and he'll be doing it tomorrow morning And so that's, I was struggling with that. You know, and I started struggling. I was, you know, being condemned, having second doubts. And figuring out, you know, yeah, we broke the law. But when the court said stop, we stopped. It wasn't a, you know, speed bump.

It was a stop sign. The rule of law applied. And that's what we did. We applied the law. We pushed the envelope. we use not just our formal authority, but our moral authority. That's the frame of my response to your question. And that is one thing Donald Trump is incapable of.

He doesn't understand the difference between formal authority and moral authority. And that's the dissent. All right. Thank you for that answer. So I'm going to move on to some other topics. You recently scored a huge win with redistricting California. And Democrats, Democrats are picking up five-house seats.

It might not be enough to overcome Republican gerrymanders. There's a threat of obviously illegal executive orders to stop or at least slow voting. Talk about what Democrats need to do now to avoid getting shut out of power. Speaking of someone who uses as authority and executive orders. I've been a little critical of my party, and this is not a knock at any individual.

The party is many parts, and one body, but it's many parts. that we constantly on the receiving end of, you know, CRT, DEI, ESG, we're constantly being shape-shift, we're not shifting the conversation, we're on the defense so often. That's why I started showing up on Fox, and that's why, you know, I debated Ron DeSantis a few years ago and Sean Hannity, both and the same time. And just to try to lean in, just to take responsibility.

Again, by the way, it's in the process of writing this book, where it was just like, for things to change, I've got to change. And I've got to own up to my own complicity at the moment, my own timidity, my own anxieties, my own insecurities. You know, don't just preach practice. And so it was all shape-shifting at the same time.

And I started leaning in and started getting a little bit more aggressive. It came after Dobbs. And I was really worried. I was like, what the hell's wrong? They're part of the surround sound, the propaganda networks and, you know, the bullshit, the illusion rules, not facts of Fox and Newsmax and One American News

and the right wing echo chamber and how we were constantly on the defense. And so over the course the last few years, I've been iterating. But after that recall, you know, where there was finality, talk about humility, I was like, this weaponization,

I experienced it in a different way, the RNC, Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, all these guys trying to take us out. And so it began the process of shifting. The fires in L.A., and this is, let me get to the redistricting. The fires in L.A. Set it back again.

You know, I was down there within a couple hours, and Trump was, I was there with Biden, the President of the United States and the governor down there within a few hours of this fire. And Trump is just blowing us up, saying it was because we didn't turn on the waters faucet from Northern California, the sprinklers weren't working. And you think this, but you, like,

But I started turning on, I'm watching Fox. I'm working on the next recall. And I'm getting friends saying, why didn't you send the water down? I'm like, you're kidding. Elon Musk is doubling down. I'm like, this is the middle of the fire. And I'm like, holy shit, we are not prepared for this. And that's when our social media began to shift a little.

We put a California Facts website up. We started to take it to the next level. But it was June of last year. when Donald Trump federalized 4,000 National Guard and sent 700 active duty Marines, not overseas, but the second largest city in the United States of America, that everything shifted. That was the red line.

And that's when we began the process of drawing a line and said, you know what? We've got to significantly shift our tone and returner. And I'll just remind you, and I know this long winter, but I want to remind everybody, Donald Trump called Greg Abbott demanding five seats. He said he was quote unquote entitled.

The President of the United States said he was entitled to five seats in a mid-decade redistricting to rig the 26th November of this year election because he knows he's going to get crushed. He's going to be shellacked in this election. He knows he's going to lose. So he's trying to rig the election. But what the difference was, and I talked to Nancy Pelosi and Zolofgren and other, I never expected what they were able to achieve

in a five-day period, which was consensus. And few folks expected, they expected us as Democrats, maybe to try to win the argument. Maybe we just try to show how right we are and how wrong Trump is. And maybe we can get an op-ed in the New York Times. And instead,

we fought fire with fire. We punched a bully back in the map, and we put that map, back on the ballot. And we won and we kicked their ass and Donald Trump lost and the Republican Party lost and that shows what we're capable of

when we fight fire with fire. Conviction, the problem with the Democratic Party so often is we appear weak and we've got to be stronger and we've got to be more assertive. And so that's, you know, it's the spirit a little bit of marriage equality. It's the spirit I think that is required

of this moment. The question would be which I think a lot of people are worried about is becoming too much like them, right? every episode we get a question from an outside expert. Here's yours. Hi, I'm Jennifer Welch, co-host of I've Had a podcast, and the big question I want to ask you is you recently said that Democrats need to be more culturally normal. And, Governor, I think that's a very dangerous statement because me, a very mouthy woman in a Bible Belt state, if I were culturally normal here, I would have to submit

to my husband, and I wouldn't be able to have a podcast wherein I could critique every little thing you say. Governor Newsom, do you think this is dangerous language for you to use to an electorate that should be embracing diversity across the board? Diversity should be normal. Well, I mean, diversity should be normal. I mean, who's been the biggest champion of diversity? No, I get that. We've been, hold on, no, but I just don't accept the frame of the question. No, but let me answer the question. I don't accept that frame at all. All right. Diversity, that's our greatest strength.

We don't tolerate our diversity. We celebrate our diversity. We live in the most diverse state, in the world's most diverse democracy. 27% of this state's foreign-born. We practice pluralism. That's a point of pride. That's a core value.

She should know that. When it comes to the issue of forensics of understanding how we gain power and get back in the majority, not just this year, but get back on our feet, and win not just the House, but the Senate,

and win back the White House, I think it's right to reflect on the past and distress test it. And there's been a lot of forensics, but not, I think, the kind of autopsy that would ultimately illuminate, what are our strengths, what are our weaknesses. So in that context, it's part of that larger discovery. I've talked about this on my podcast,

on multiple occasions. I'm not making this up. 27 pages of my own autopsy on what the hell happened last November in the election. trying to understand the contours. Was it incumbency? Was it interest rates? Was it inflation scars?

Was it 107 days versus 119 days? Across the spectrum. And so I'm trying to have conversations publicly in that respect. That's what I'm doing on the podcast. That's why I'm inviting people in that I know are uncomfortable because I'm trying to understand the contours of the other side. So we have ability then to compete. And that goes to why I agree.

with the frame that set up that question. And that is, no, I get it. You know, I'm, we're putting a mirror up to Donald Trump, unquestionably. And the day we did that, Trump wasn't complaining about some of those all-cap tweets. It was all the folks on Fox that seemed to be so offended. And they were saying, boy, where's his wife?

She should wash his mouth out with soap. this is so unbecoming of a governor to talk like this. Lacking any situational awareness, they haven't said a damn word about Donald Trump dressing up as the Pope or Superman or putting his face on Mount Rushmore. They didn't say a damn word. They've counted us that forever.

So I understand that instinct. And part of me at first was like, do we really want to do this? But we need to do it. We need to put that mirror up to Trump and Trumpism. It's not because none of this is normal. And my whole point is this, we will lose our country. We will lose our republic.

This guy is not screwing around. It wasn't just the federalization of the National Guard, which we said in June was a preview of things to come. And you saw that in D.C. You saw that in Chicago. You've seen it in Minnesota. We said it when we kicked off the campaign for Prop 50. You may recall it the Democracy Center.

And there was a guy out there with dozen masked men trying to intimidate people. trying to intimidate people from walking in the event by the name of Greg Bovino dressed up as if he just got off the set of a 1930s movie if you catch my drift. And we said he is a preview of things to come. And it's exactly what's happened.

You've seen Rivino all across the country. You saw him on Election Day, the Bortak teams, right there in front of the Dodger Stadium trying to intimidate our diverse communities on Election Day. These guys are not screwing around. I was just in Fulton County. Let me finish because this is important. I want you to answer her question.

Because it's important. This, he, wake up. He's in Fulton County. We met with the head of their elections commission. He's trying to take over the election in Fulton County, a critical county in this state. He's trying to federalize the voting. 15 states, minimum, he said, at least.

The SAVE Act, that's not about voter ID. It's about who. can vote. It's about voter registration. This guy is not screwing around, the most corrupt president in American history. And we will lose our country if we don't fight back and push back. So yes, I cringe sometimes at my social media as well. But I think it's important in this environment that we call out the bullshit that we're seeing 24-7. But you were talking about I think she was addressing Democrats, how they, I don't, when you said culturally normal, I didn't know what that meant. And you know what?

For me, I was stuck on some of the issues within the prisons. I was, and those are hard to explain. Culturally, normal, it doesn't mean right or wrong. Right. It means how people feel about certain issues that sometimes are difficult issues to explain. And, you know, respectfully, there are some difficult issues. there are. That are difficult to explain.

And in terms of winning elections, how we navigate that's important. And let's go back to marriage equality. It's in the book. There are a number of elected officials that blame me for the outcome of the election that November. So I don't think it's an unfair thing to talk about how we win elections

in a sensitivity on the basis of my own relationship to that in understanding the relationship to how we look at the large elections. your map in this country. Although some might say that's putting on a mask that you're not really, you know, you talk about masks. I'm not, I'm not suggesting you don't speak your truth. Right. I'm not suggesting any of that. It's what you, what you emphasize, what you disproportionately focus on, and how you navigate a world where they're again trying to shape shift and we are on the defense. Again, that's why I went on the offense as it relates to the banning

bids and the cultural purge that the right wing is doing. And that's why we are iterating in that respect. We'll be back in a minute. What are the main takeaways of the foreign policy section from Donald Trump's State of the Union address? I do think they've made a decision to elevate domestic issues as we head towards the midterms. We'll see if that sticks because he keeps getting drawn back to the foreign policy issues. I'm John Feiner. And I'm Jake Sullivan. And we're the hosts of The Long Game, a weekly national security podcast. This week will react to President Trump's State of the Union address. the situation with Iran, and the eruption of violence involving cartels in Mexico.

The episode's out now. Search for and follow the long game wherever you get your podcasts. Let's go through some issues. You have less than a year in office. One of the most high-profile fights you're in right now is overproposed one-time tax for billionaires. A big labor union is trying to get the measure on the upcoming ballot. You've said you're going to fight it. This is one of these issues to fighting Democrats at the time when voters are worried about affordability.

talk a little bit about that fights an interesting fight because it also dovetails into the idea of the entire tech industry losing its fucking mind and shifting hard to the right should you try to woo back these people is that what's happening like Mark Zuckerberg

Mark Andreessen and Jeff Bezos or do speaking of standing up do voters want a leader that stands up to this may not be the way the billionaire tax may not be the method There's two things, yes. Four issues there. I'm doubling. I mean, I think there are four issues.

I mean, we can get into, you know, what's going on with those three individuals you represent. We could talk about what's going on with tech more broadly. Well, we need some psychologists for that. Losing their mind. We could talk about taxation, which I did extensively in my state of the state a few weeks ago. I promoted, I wasn't defending. I actually made the case for California's progressive tax system. And I'll remind folks, 16 states tax their poorest residents,

more than California taxes its richest. Who's the high-tax state? You look at the most regressive taxes in America. That's Texas. That's Florida. Who are the high-tax states? Yes, we have a progressive tax policy. And that means we disproportionately rely on a few taxpayers

relative to the overall population. And that has benefited us greatly. It's why we have universal preschool. That's why we have universal health care, regardless of pre-existing conditions, ability to pay. That's why we've been able to do 379, almost 380,000 child care slots and subsidies. That's why we've been able to do a lot of the things we're doing. As it relates to this specific tax, do we need to have a tax policy in this country and go back to the old tax rates and consider new tax rates for the ultra-wealthy?

Absolutely. And I've been advocating for that, and I believe that. but at a state basis, the challenge is Pilly's ability people to move. And you've seen that. It's not anecdotal now. The number of people who have moved out of the state and how easy that is. So I'm concerned about that on the basis of the volatility of our taxes and how that can impact the progressivity of our taxes

and impact our existing tax structure in a deleterious way. Final thing on that, that tax doesn't go to teachers. it doesn't support firefighters. That tax doesn't go to child care workers. That tax doesn't allow us to do, that tax is for one particular purpose, one time, and doesn't benefit. So there's also issues I have with the details of it.

With the way it's deployed, so if you were, say, president, you might do a tax system. That's a very different conversation. Different conversation. But at a stay level, yeah. So you have to recognize and reconcile that reality. And it's a real reality, it just is. as is the reality that many but not all.

We haven't had this conversation, and I should be asking you. I don't know that tech has moved to the right. I think a few loud mouths have. That's correct. You look at the vast majority of folks that work in these companies. They're still voting, and from my perspective, an enlightened way.

And a lot of those folks that have moved to the right we're kind of dabbling in that space already. And I just, I think that's a component part of this. That said, man, you know, I was quoting Plutarch the other day, none in doubt, Plutarch, Blutarch. But he was a historian, which is fascinating, about 50 AD. He was warning the Athenians that the imbalance between the rich and the poor is the oldest and most fatal ailments of all republics.

2,000 years ago, warning about this imbalance. I mean, we're talking about the first trillionaires this country. 10% of folks own two-thirds of all the wealth in this country. This is not sustainable. We have got to democratize our economy so we can save democracy.

And so there is fundamental restructuring of our economy that needs to take shape. And that's among the debates, and the last time we did spit roll. And that's going to be part of the debate moving forward as it relates to stabilizing the volatility in our tax structure as well.

But that's, I think, a legit critique as it relates to how these guys, to your point, have reacted to this tax that conflates other aspects of it. Yeah, they're very hurt. Too bad. I always say they're so poor. All they have is money.

So, speaking of where? because that would be a federal thing. This is your last year as governor. Why you said that three damn times? I'm sorry. All right, let's not do the exhausting coy thing. No, but it's three times. All right, I think everyone assumes you're running for president.

So, and you're well practiced. You're well practiced in dodging the will you. I hate that question. Anyway, you did say one of your sons told you recently that he doesn't want you to run what would compel you to run in spite of the request from your son? Nice. Well done. Thank you. That's why I'm paid the big bucks.

Montana's here. Sorry, Montana. I'll lay you out a little bit. My oldest, who's 16. And she's got, she says this. I think it was, I haven't seen it, but she told me, and it may not be true. She says, I have a calendar, dad, counting down the days until you're no longer government. And I think she's calling it her version of Liberation Day.

So she's, you know, 16-year-old, if you get my drift. So she can finally be free. And so I've got that. She's almost 17. She's almost, as she told us today. Yeah, she did. Later in the calendar year. But she'll always be sweet 16 to me.

And then my 14-year-old boy, though, he saw some headline that misrepresented a little bit of the facts where it said, Newsome poised to run. for, you know, whatever. And he goes, text to me. He texts me. And he goes, Dad, are you running?

Are you running for, I said, no, I'm not. He goes, I would never do. And I literally texted him. I said, I would never do that without you. He goes, good. And he says, 14-year-old boy. And he goes, good, dad, because we're too young and you need to spend more time with us.

Oh. And I literally, no BS, screenshot of that. I have that. And my wife reminds me. of that all the time. And so does this book. Because, you know, Jen, she never said it, but she had to think it,

what kind of husband are you going to be? What kind of father are you going to be? She's got a rock star dad. We just celebrated his 85th birthday last night for extraordinary daughters. He's the man of us. You want, I mean, like central casting. mom and dad coached the girls teams basically retired relatively young age to be there for his daughters

and now he's there like he was with his daughters for our grant for my kids his grandkids an extraordinary person and that shaped her consciousness of life and here i am talking about my dad and my mom and in my relationship of my dad when i was young which is again very distant as a father and I can only imagine what was going through her head when we first had our kids. And so in everyone, she mentioned Mimi Silbert, who's, you know,

one of my heroes and saved my life in so many ways and how she really cracked me open. And I don't want to make those mistakes, and I'm not going to make those mistakes. So you ask a direct question. Yeah. They all have veto power. And if any one of them say,

no chance, I won't even give it a second thought. I'm not going to screw up my marriage to this rock star woman, this extraordinary person, my wife. And I'm not going to, I'm not going to screw up my time with my kids, period, full stop. That's actually a very good answer. So I'm going to go through, we've only a few minutes, we want to go through some new stuff because there's a lot going on.

This is the boxer and brief part by the very quick one. These are a couple of news stories, and they have to do with California too, on Friday, Trump ordered the government to stop using Anthropics AI models called, he called Anthropical, quote, radical left AI company because it wanted to prevent the Pentagon from using the products for domestic surveillance or powering autonomous weapons without human involvement. A few hours later, Open AIA announced a deal with Pentagon with, I'm not sure it has similar guardrails.

I'll question that. Talk about that. We're seeing pushback here from tech, as you noted. You just said. They're not as... I can tell you through the prism of my subjectivity. Dario has been a real leader. He's the CEO of Anthropic.

And so it does not surprise me because he's a person of character. He helped shape the nation's first AI frontier model, large language model regulations in the state of California, which I was proud to be part of. And he was a fierce advocate for going further and constantly pushing us to do more to address the peril,

not just the promise of AI. eye. And so he had a red line and it had the courage to hold that line in a way that so few CEOs do. That's why I have a patriot sight with knee pads to give to our universities and law firms and media and CEOs that are selling out to Donald Trump. And Anthropic did not. And he deserves our praise and he deserves our support. All right. Next one. We're taping this on Saturday night about 24 hours ago, President Trump joined Israel and attacking Iran. The New York Times editorial board wrote that Trump's decision is reckless and ill-defined. On X, you linked to one of Trump's old tweets where he criticized Obama for striking Libya because of bad poll numbers.

But you also wrote that Iranian leadership needs to go. Apparently, the Ayatollah has been killed. There'll be another Ayatollah, by the way. Are you worried about this move, and what do you think it stems from? I think we all, well, it stems from weakness, masquerading his strength. It stems from his complete failure of this administration, this historic president, who's historically unpopular, that is trying to distract from his failures across the spectrum. He doubled down on stupid during the state of the union.

No course correction at all. And you're absolutely right. In 2011, he needs to say it once, he did videos condemning, criticizing President Obama, suggesting somehow he was going to do this, and it was a desperate attempt for his re-election. But you had Tulsi Gabbard out there saying, regime change is wrong. You had J.D. Vance said,

they lied to you. He lied to you. So reckless is the only way to describe this. He didn't describe to the American people what the end game is here. He didn't describe the existential threat of the moment, the immediacy of the crisis at hand. There wasn't one.

He manufactured it. And now we're manufacturing a crisis of outcomes unknown and the uncertainty it marks at this moment. And that's Donald Trump, the chaos president, this wrecking ball president, across the board.

Destruction is not strength. And once again, we've seen him destroy not our allies in relationship to the rest of the world, but we're seeing him destroy any capacity to explain fundamentally what the core American interest is at this moment to declare war, to go to war with the regime.

And all of this is playing out in real time. And we just pray for our troops. We pray for our allies. And we pray that Donald Trump is temporary and his time is up in just three years. So are you worried that it's linked to the midterms? Obviously, that has come up. He is an executive order ready to do all manner of nonsense

around the midterm elections and elections. So what I just described, Again, this guy is not screwing around. What more evidence do you need? He tried to wreck this country and light democracy on fire on January 6th. He called that same Fulton County folks, look in Secretary of State for 11,000, 12,000 votes. He tried to rig the midterm elections as it relates to redistricting,

and he's going about with these mass men and these Bortac teams, and these are acts of authoritarianism. He's not hiding it, nor is he hiding his disdain for any kind of independent thinking. What is his attack? All these institutions have one thing in common, his attack is on independent thinking. And you're seeing, my biggest concern now is what's happening with media. And this concentration in the hands of just a few folks,

he's deciding the prime time lineup, these places. The impact, by the way, of this deal in California will be outsized in terms of layoffs and creativity. Yeah. Yeah, so this is all happening in real time. Forgive me again, you know, back to washing my mouth, you know, with soap. That's why we have to be more aggressive. That's why we have to be more vigilant.

That's why we have to be stronger and much more aggressive in this moment. So last two questions. I will know that Epic Fury has the same initials as Epstein files. What a coincidence. The fallout, it keeps ballooning, though, and the number of high-profile resignations in the wake of their release. we learned this week the files didn't include some records related to very

heinous allegations unproven against Donald Trump. This is an issue I thought had real legs. Scott and I argued about it many months ago. I thought it was critically important this issue. How do you look at what's unfolding with the Epstein

files? Many people think the attack was related to getting... Well, there's got to be something he's hiding. I mean, give me a break. No one has worked so hard. hard at making this go away than Pam Bondi on behalf of Donald Trump and the FBI. And by the way, that same DOJ, he's demanding $230 million of money. The IRS, he's demanding $10 billion. Please, I hope you saw that. He's demanding a settlement of $10 billion. He says he's going to negotiate

with himself. And he may because he's, you know, he's a man of character that may give it to charity. This is the guy that got not just a $400 million plane because he called guitars and I want $400 million plane, but got close to a billion dollars to retrofit the plane. The Trump story is a story of corruption. It's a corruption story, the Whitkoff family, the Trump family, world financial literary. The tariffs are a corruption story.

Why do you think he was weeping around the loss of the terror? Because that was about his personal portfolio. is much or more than anything else. So you ask about the Epstein file. It's all in that same place and shape. I was with John Ossoff the other day down in Georgia, and I love what you played, this notion of the Epstein class.

It's all shaped in that. All of these trips overseas, you know, they have one thing in common. The family goes out first to get the deal done, the UAE. Get the $2 billion for the crypto. In return, you get, high-valued computer chips. Same thing that happened on the tariffs.

26% reduction as it relates to Vietnam. They got the golf course, the Trump family. Fast-track, a billion and a half dollars. All happening in open sight, but there's clearly things in the Epstein files that Donald Trump doesn't want you to know. And my biggest fear on this, said it the other day, I really, I really fear this.

And I hope this is not the case. And that's why it's absolutely critical that the gavel is in the hands. of Speaker Jeffries this November. It is foundational. But even with that, there's a scenario where I can see Trump starting to pardon key members of his administration. There's scenarios where it's not about redaction. These things are deleted and disappear. That's how critical this moment is of vigilance. That's why I'm very proud of, you know, so many of these Californian, leaders in Congress and Robert Garcia being a leader, a particular leader in this space,

that have been very aggressive. And again, it's just about maintaining vigilant and not, you know, in the spirit of the wag of the dog, not continue to take our eye. We cannot take our eye off the ball. We can't allow this to be normalized. We can't allow, don't ever, please don't use the phrase. This is just trump being Trump. Those are deadly words. That's what he wants. It's the shock and awe. He wants to break us down. He wants to exhaust us. And that's why this is not easy.

And I know our time's up, but I just want to say thank you to all of you, not just for being here tonight, not just being here in the relationship to this book and for yourselves, but for each other. Thank you for showing up. San Francisco always shows up. No kings rallies. This is a spirit of this city. And thank you for not giving it into the cynicism and all the anxiety and fear out there.

And it's hard. I know it's hard. It's exhausting. This is exhausting. So my last question, then, what is your best case scenario? And what is the one that worries you? You told Emmis now,

and in some ways, Jady Vance scares you more than Trump, in a lot of ways, obviously. Well, I think time of light. What's your best case scenario? What's your worst case scenario? Start with worst. Because then we end on a I know. You get that?

See, otherwise? Well, look, I'm painting a picture, and I said this before. I mean, you know, we're celebrating the 250th anniversary of the founding fathers, the best of the Roman Republic, Greek democracy, co-equal branches of government, something Trump had to deal with with the Supreme Court decision the other day, had to reconcile that. The rule of law, not the rule of dawn.

And if it's not dawning on all of us what we're up against in the existential nature, that will reflect the worst-case scenario, that we lose grip with the insidiousness of this moment. and how vicious these guys are on the other side. And how complicit Murdoch Inc. is at this moment. In the prime time lineup at Fox and Sean Hannity and Laura Ingram and all the rest. And by the way, Laura Ingram, who's in business with Donald Trump Jr. And Chamath, whose partner on his podcast is David Sachs.

You want corruption in open sight connecting the dots to our media. The whole thing. we don't call this out, that's the worst case there. Because we won't celebrate the best, this historic project of our founding fathers in the 251st anniversary. We can lose this country. We can lose our republic. The best case scenario is you keep showing up. You don't give in the cynicism, that fear and the anxiety, because you recognize you have agency. You can shape the future. You're the antidote to that. And so that's the power. It's, you know, Brandeis said it. In a democracy, the most important office is not governor or president.

It's office of citizen, active, not inert citizenship. So maintain that vigilant, maintain that energy and that daring and keeps showing up. And if we do that, Donald Trump's presidency, as we know it, will end this November. It will end as we know it this November. So then, very last question, what's the name of the sequel to this? Old man in a walker? I'm getting there. I'm getting there.

What is the sequel? That happens. What is this? I don't know what the sequel is, but I will say this. And let me end on this, because I appreciate it. I appreciate here talking about the book. And thank you. I hope some of you read it.

Don't just read the, you know, some of you are just going to look in the index to see if your name appears. And I get that. By the way, I've written some personal notes in the index to say, gotcha, found you. but I hope people will see aspects of their own lives and their own journey in here. And I hope people will see, you know, there may not be a sequel.

And I get that to the point is, I don't, you talk about myself by date. You know, I'm serious, that little anxiety inducing for me. Because I've always been that young man in a hurry. I've, you know, been in this process, you know, since Willie Brown appointed me, the parking and traffic commission, you know. that was like, you know, what's this guy doing next? The whole thing. And so if there's nothing next, I'm just, you know,

I would finally be able to put my version of events out there. I was able to tell my mom how much I loved her, even if she's not around, but I was able to say that, and I was able to describe that. I was able to reflect on my own journey, my own relationship with my wife and my kids and how important they are to me and how important all of you have been to me.

and how important the city has been to me and how it shaped me. And I'll close on this. My dad starts in the book, he says he didn't know what came first, the Irish cop or San Francisco. And it was a way of connecting my history to this city with his great-grandfather, who was that Irish cop. My kid's sixth-generation San Franciscans. And how special and proud I am of this city

and how proud I am to have been born in this city and how lucky we all are to be in this precious and beautiful place at this remarkable time in American history. Thank you guys, all of you. Gavin, very, very much for being here today. Thank you for joining us. I'm sorry about my voice, but you thank you very much. We appreciate it.

Everybody, Gavin is so much for coming out. Today's show was produced by Christian Castro Roussel, Michelle Alloy, and Catherine Millsop, Megan Bernie, and Kaelin Lynch. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Special thanks to Eric Litke and Madeline LaPlante Duby. Our engineers are Fernando Aruna and Rick Kwan, and our theme music is by Trackademics. Go wherever you listen to podcast, search for On with Carous Swisher, and hit follow. Thanks for listening to On With Carous Swisher from Podium Media, New York Magazine, the Vox Media

Podcast Network, and us. We'll be back on Thursday with more.