Potential '28 Presidential Candidate Gavin Newsom Continues to Backtrack on Trans Sports Debate
The 2028 general election is still more than two years away, but on-the-fence voters may have gotten a glimpse into the Democratic playbook for that election cycle courtesy of California’s governor.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom — a staunch progressive by virtually any meaningful metric — has been on something of a media tour lately, promoting his upcoming memoirs.
Much in the same way that parts of the media blitz has had mixed reviews, Newsom’s sit-down interview with CNN’s Dana Bash has also raised some eyebrows.
And the main snippet of that interview garnering attention had to do with Newsom’s suggestion that Democrats need to be more “culturally normal” when it comes to certain transgender issues, including sports.
“From a tactical perspective, from the prism of purely politics, there’s no doubt that the Democratic Party needs to be, dare I say, more culturally normal,” Newsome told Bash, per Fox News.
He added, “I believe that — less prone to spending a disproportionate amount of time on pronouns, identity, politics, more focused on tabletop issues, things that really matter, the stacking of stress in terms of electricity bills and childcare costs and healthcare and obviously housing costs and how easily we get trapped in that, how I’ve fallen prey to that.”
Furthermore, Newsom appeared to have specific concerns about not getting “invited to a larger conversation” if the left continues to insist that men can play in women’s sports.
“But I think if you can’t hold the line on competitive sports — again, sports, there’s some nuance in this larger conversation,” Newsom said. “But competitive medal sports, if we can’t find that nuance, I think we’re going to lose a lot of people that aren’t — we’re not going to get invited to a larger conversation.
“So I do think we have to be more sensitive in that respect.”
This “culturally normal” line of thinking would make sense for a Democratic Party that was caught wholly unprepared for President Donald Trump’s “Trump is for you, Kamala is for they/them” attacks in the lead-up to the 2024 general election.
And this isn’t the first time Newsom has hinted at this seemingly new Democratic strategy.
When late Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk appeared on Newsom’s podcast in March 2025, the two covered a wide range of topics.
One of those topics? Transgender athletes in sports.
“So, like, you right now should come out and be like, ‘You know what? The young man who’s about to win the state championship in the long jump — in female sports — that shouldn’t happen… Would you say no men in female sports?” Kirk asked Newsom.
“Well, I think it’s an issue of fairness. I completely agree with you on that. So that’s easy to call out — the unfairness of that,” Newsom answered.
Gov. Newsom says allowing trans athletes in women’s sports is ‘an issue of fairness’ https://t.co/5GwGBG7xT3 pic.twitter.com/w7w8kNoIwt
— New York Post (@nypost) March 6, 2025
Additionally, Newsom similarly caused waves among the left when he vetoed a bill that would have forced parents to affirm their child’s “gender identity.”
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