Watch: Scott Bessent Unleashes on Gavin Newsom at Davos, Gives Him a Painful New Nickname
Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom is “too economically illiterate to know anything,” Treasury secretary Scott Bessent said during a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
As he dismantled Newsom’s pretensions to be a 2028 presidential candidate, Bessent also gave Newsom a new nickname.
“I think it’s very, very ironic that Gov. Newsom, who strikes me as Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Ken, may be the only Californian who knows less about economics than Kamala Harris,” Bessent said in a video posted to social media platform X.
.@SecScottBessent in Davos: “I think it’s very, very ironic that Newsom — who strikes me as Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Ben — may be the only Californian who knows less about economics than Kamala Harris. He’s here this week with his billionaire sugar daddy, Alex Soros.” pic.twitter.com/9BmdpaebEd
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) January 21, 2026
“He’s here this week with his billionaire sugar daddy, Alex Soros, and Davos is the perfect place for a man who, when everyone else is on lockdown, when he was having people arrested for going to church, he was having $1,000-a-night meals at the French Laundry. And I’m sure the California people won’t forget that,” he said, noting the governor’s presence at the gathering.
“My message to Gov. Newsom is that the Trump administration is coming to California. We’re going to crack down on waste, fraud, and abuse,” Bessent said.
“I was told he was asked to give a speech on his signature policies, but he’s not speaking. Because what have his economic policies brought? Outward migration from California, a gigantic budget deficit, the largest homeless population in America, and the poor folks in the Palisades who had their homes burn down — he is here hobnobbing with the global elite while his California citizens are still homeless,” Bessent said.
“Shame on him. He is too smug, too self-absorbed, and too economically illiterate to know anything,” Bessent said.
Bessent, while at Davos, shrugged off reports of European investors pulling out of investments in U.S. treasury bonds.
“Denmark’s investment in U.S. Treasury bonds, like Denmark itself, is irrelevant,” he said, according to CNBC.
“That is less than $100 million. They’ve been selling Treasurys for years. I’m not concerned at all,” he said, adding that the U.S. has been having a “record foreign investment” in its Treasurys.
The “notion that Europeans would be selling U.S. assets came from a single analyst at Deutsche Bank,” which became red meat for “the fake news media,” Bessent said.
Bessent also touched on the need for the United States to acquire Greenland.
“We are asking our allies to understand that Greenland needs to be part of the United States,” Bessent said.
“President Trump has made it clear that we will not outsource our national security or our hemispheric security to any other countries,” Bessent said.
“Our partner, the U.K., is letting us down with the base on Diego Garcia, which we had shared together for many, many years, and they want to turn it over to Mauritius. So, President Trump is serious here,” he said.
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