Gavin Newsom has threatened to “punch” Donald Trump in the mouth as the California Governor defended his online trolling strategy and vowed to push ahead with redistricting in his state.
The metaphorical threat was made as Newsom, a potential future presidential contender, warned that America was on the brink of authoritarianism and that “nothing about this is normal.”
“It’s not about whether we play hardball anymore - it’s about how we play hardball,” he said of Trump on Wednesday.
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“We are going to fight back and we’re going to punch this bully in the mouth.”
Tensions between the White House and the California governor have escalated in recent weeks, after Trump, eager to stave off a midterm defeat, called on Texas Republicans to change their Congressional maps to create five new potential GOP seats.
In turn, Newsom moved to also redraw California’s congressional districts and add up to five left-leaning seats in his heavily blue state.
But it’s his relentless online mocking of Trump, in which Newsom mimics the president’s signature all-caps style and parodies Trump’s rants, that has elevated the Democrat’s status and dominated social media algorithms.
“TINY HANDS IS OUT HERE COPYING ME — BUT WITHOUT THE STAMINA (SAD), AND CERTAINLY WITHOUT THE “LOOKS.” TOTAL BETA!,” he wrote in one post, with a black and white photo of himself and the president.
The posts, which are managed through Newsom’s office, have amused Democrats and social media users, but enraged MAGA acolytes and conservative TV networks.
Among them is Fox News, whose presenters have variously described him as “childish,” “foolish,” and, in one case, even resulted in host Dana Perino calling on Newsom’s wife to intervene.
But speaking on a press call with the Daily Beast and other reporters on Wednesday, Newsom defended his MAGA-parody strategy, saying that “if nothing else, we’ve called out the absurdity of the normalization of Donald Trump.”
“You can’t make it up, and when Fox is sitting there, oh so concerned about these Tweets and all caps, they’ve missed the entire point, haven’t they?
“We’re pushing back, and people are paying a bit more attention… Maybe they should be paying a bit more attention to what the President of the United States is modeling every single day. Nothing about this is normal, and it needs to be called out.”
The comments came as Texas House Republicans were set on Wednesday to approve the partisan redistricting that Trump had called for.
The California legislature is expected to vote for their congressional map changes on Thursday, although this would eventually have to be approved by the state’s voters.
The issue is contentious because it sets up a redistricting arms race ahead of the midterms, which critics fear will undermine democracy and result in U.S. elections being further manipulated for political purposes.
But Democratic National Committee chair Ken Martin said the party could no longer afford to “roll over while Republicans break the rules and try to rig the game.”
“Governor Newsom didn’t care whether folks would clutch their pearls when he decided to fight fire with fire and level the playing field against this craven, power hungry White House,” Martin said.
“His fight is a game changer, a national moment for Democrats to show up for all voters.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House for comment.
However, Trump has also previously defended the redistricting push in Texas, posting on Truth Social: “I call on all of my Republican friends in the Legislature to work as fast as they can to get THIS MAP to Governor Greg Abbott’s desk, ASAP.”
In relation to Newsom’s social media trolling, Trump’s Communications Director Steven Cheung has previously rage-posted about the governor’s account, while Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson said the posts were “very weird and not very funny at all.”
