Gavin Newsom stumps for South Carolina Democrats — and a possible 2028 bid

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The hair gel mostly withstood the Low Country’s sticky sweat.

Between events in South Carolina, now fully enshrined as Democrats’ first presidential primary state, Gavin Newsom acknowledged last week’s trip was indeed part of feeling out a campaign.

“Obviously, it’s an early calendar state, but, you know, my state of mind was here before,” the California governor told CNN during an interview in the staff kitchen of a cultural center after his session with voters here. “I’d be lying,” he admitted, if he denied 2028 was a factor in the visit but insisted it was further down the list of motivations for his fourth trip to the state in as many years.

South Carolina Democrats are in such rough shape that their big aspiration is just winning enough statehouse seats to break the GOP supermajority. But Newsom said he’s truly committed to the state, explaining that he chose to come back to where he campaigned for both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and traveled on his book tour, because of the relationships he’s cultivated with state party leadership. Chair Christale Spain, for example, chose to celebrate her 50th birthday on Thursday by driving in a van ahead of Newsom’s small motorcade to introduce him at events and touted the $370,000 he’s raised as having literally helped them keep the lights on at party headquarters. (Newsom arrived with a present of a tiara and a birthday sash for her at one stop, and boxing gloves at another.)

As staffers set up extra chairs and the temperature rose in rooms not used to that kind of turnout, there was clearly interest in a very California governor in this very different part of the country. But even before this trip, Newsom’s team already knew that he would have work to do connecting with Black voters — who tend to make up over half of the Democratic primary electorate in South Carolina — if he goes forward with a presidential run (or, what some aides have taken to calling “the next thing”).

He says that’s part of why he started his Southern swing touring the racial injustice Legacy Museum in Alabama, just down the street from the state capitol where Jefferson Davis was sworn in as president of the Confederacy. It’s the kind of poetic juxtaposition that tends to grab the 58-year-old.

“If you’re a Democrat, you’ve got to come back to the South, you’ve got to connect with what’s going on in this country,” he said.

For a party in a never-ending neurotic twist over whether they’re talking too much about what the president is doing or not talking about him enough, Newsom is trying to straddle the continental divide: by segueing from recounting how he fought back against Trump through California’s retaliatory redistricting ballot proposition into how that showed him Democrats need to fight differently now.

In front of crowds of over a hundred mostly retirees, peppered with California transplants, each in Hardeeville and St. Helena Island, in Summerville and West Columbia — all spots picked by state Democratic Party leaders because they’re trying to scratch out wins far from the traditional Democratic population centers — Newsom delivered a confrontation call to action against the “invasive species” of Trump.

In a free-associating stump riff that carried aspirational notes in the style of Bill Clinton or Barack Obama, he told a story of a country battered but resilient. Democrats, and really most Americans, he said, need a hug, giving one to a younger woman in one audience who held a bright yellow “HOLD ME” sign for Newsom to see. He described Trump’s crackdown on diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives as anti-Black and how “capitalism as we know it isn’t working,” but mostly focused on ticking through detailed breakdowns of how he said Americans are paying the price for Trump’s crypto-coin profits and upgrades to the Qatari-gifted jet and more, often eliciting gasps from audiences.

But who was and wasn’t in those crowds was hard to miss at Aiken’s Center for African American History, Art and Culture, in a building constructed in the late 1800s to educate Black children, but where the audience for Newsom was predominantly older and White.

“I was saying to my wife—where are we? Are we not part of the Democratic Party anymore?” said Bradley Taylor, recently retired from the Savannah River nuclear waste site, looking around for other Black attendees ahead of Newsom’s remarks. Taylor said he wasn’t convinced about Newsom but has his eyes on former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg for his “human connection.”

Pete Buttigieg returns to first-in-the-nation South Carolina with a fresh appeal to Black voters

His wife Jacqueline Taylor, a registered nurse, was more open to the California governor: “Watching him troll Trump — that kind of turns me on.”

After listening to Newsom’s 20-minute routine, Taylor told CNN she felt inspired hearing about California’s redistricting effort, and the way he tied it to Democrats more broadly needing to “draw the line” in what they’ll allow Republicans to do.

“I am so thankful for him. If you want to gerrymander and cheat… you’ve got to fight fire with fire,” Taylor said.

She said Newsom made her think of what could be done to help her grandchildren: a truck driver trying to make a living with diesel costs high, another in the Army.

Listening, her husband amended his initial reaction — “He pretty much said everything I already knew”— to say his wife convinced him.

“He’s just saying things that touch us,” said Bill Clyburn, the 85-year-old longtime state representative and a cousin of the state’s power broker congressman, Jim, who helped deliver the Black vote in South Carolina for Biden in 2020. If Newsom runs for president, Clyburn added, “He can do about as well as expected.”

Asked what, in fact, would be expected of Newsom’s performance in the state, Clyburn left his comment at a small chuckle.

An hour away on Friday afternoon, 25-year-old congressional candidate Zyon Khalifa listened to Newsom’s rundown in West Columbia, liking the feel of a younger politician energetically working a room, and the way he talked explicitly about Black people being targeted.

“You don’t hear him trying to code-switch,” Khalifa said. “Instead of trying to sugarcoat it, say it in some way that all audiences would be OK with, he’s just saying what’s happening.”

Khalifa, like the Taylors and Clyburn, took a photo with Newsom. Asked if he would use that in his campaign against Republican Rep. Joe Wilson, he scrunched up his face and admitted, “probably not.”

Jermaine Johnson, the Democratic nominee for governor, made the opposite calculation, having Newsom headline a fundraiser for him on Thursday evening and then join him for a fireside chat at the historically Black Allen University in Columbia on Friday afternoon. By Newsom’s last event on Friday in Lancaster, a higher proportion of Black faces were in the seats.

“I don’t need big crowds, I don’t need to give a speech. I love this connection, I love the human connection, I love the granularity. I like reading between the lines, I like these small groups of people that we’re meeting,” Newsom told CNN. “I learn a lot.”

Ben Hendren/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Sen. Jon Ossoff almost didn’t run for reelection. Now some Democrats want to draft him for 2028

The strength of Newsom’s appeal to Black voters is already driving some internal deliberations, advisers say, as they look at Black support among potential primary opponents ranging from Harris to Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff , whose reelection ads often get played on airwaves over the state border.

Newsom said he wasn’t worried about the crowd makeup this visit, explaining that he’d been told that was the downside of scheduling events while many people are working.

“You come on the weekends, completely different,” he said. “By the way, last time we were here was almost exclusively African-American audience.”

When a traffic accident Thursday afternoon delayed Newsom’s remarks in a country hall reception room by an hour, Spain, the state party chair, vamping for time, asked people to shout out which other politicians they’d like to see come through. Ossoff and Buttigieg, who was in South Carolina last month, followed by Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, who’s been through and is spending part of Labor Day weekend campaigning in New Hampshire. When another suggested Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro , she said she’d been told he wouldn’t come until January. Another mentioned Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who’ll be in the state in early October for his book tour.

Sarah Silbiger for CNN

Josh Shapiro couldn’t avoid the questions about him. He decided he doesn’t want to

But they waited for Newsom, and lined up for photos after, some in the $5 “Newsom 2028” buttons and $30 “Gavin 2028” hats sold by bootleg vendors who followed him around to every stop.

“Of course I’d look at all the options, but I think he’s viable,” said Keri Whitaker, a recent retiree, after posing for a photo with Newsom in one of the bright blue caps bearing his name and the California bear.

Most potential 2028 candidates will have a day job during the run-up to the election. But Newsom — like Buttigieg — is an exception: Come January, he’ll be out of office for the first time in a 30-year run from San Francisco supervisor to mayor to lieutenant governor to governor. While that means, as he noted to CNN, that he’s had to start figuring out health insurance for his family, it also could allow him to fill his weeks with events like these —building connections beyond core Democrats who already know him from TV or his social media team’s endless mockery of Trump.

State Sen. Margie Bright Matthews said seeing him in person has already surprised her.

“I thought he was just a tall glass of sweet tea,” she told the crowd in a church meeting room in Jasper County. “I realized he’s more than just a good-looking face. He’s got moxie.”

Taking on Trump over the immigration crackdown, federalizing the National Guard and redistricting is what put Newsom on the minds of so many of the Democrats who turned out to see him. Sitting in South Carolina, he previewed how he’s going to keep that going once his time as governor is up.

That effort was on display as he delved back into his late-night June 2025 phone call with the president as immigration enforcement officers faced off with protesters in Los Angeles.

Newsom has called the president a liar for claiming to have berated him in the conversation, and he retold his version of the story several times in South Carolina, most extensively in Aiken.

The call began with Trump bringing up the 2024 race against Harris, Newsom said, claiming to have won their debate and arguing that “it was a four against one” set-up with the hosts, cameramen and Harris set against Trump.

Presented with this account, White House communications director Steven Cheung did not directly dispute it, but told CNN via email: “The only liar here is Gavin who continues to fail his state and gaslight the public instead of helping his state that is suffering under his radical policies. The president called Gavin Newsom to tell him to get his ass in gear, but Gavin decided to disgustingly side with the violent rioters instead of protecting Californians. He is a loser of the highest order and continues to beclown himself on a daily basis.”

Newsom, anticipating such a response, said that he has already submitted his contemporaneous notes of the call to House Oversight Committee chair Rep. Jim Comer of Kentucky, and they’re also part of his defamation lawsuit against Fox News, now entering the discovery phase, regarding the outlet’s coverage of the phone call. Fox has denied wrongdoing and vowed to fight the allegations.

“I’m in this for the long haul,” Newsom said. “They can say whatever they want. These facts are well established in the court of law and in Congress, and not a word has been said to refute those assertions and facts. And I’ve done them on the penalty of perjury.”

An aide to the governor declined to provide a copy of the notes to CNN. Comer did not respond to a request for comment.

But he kept his focus on South Carolina, even as a few protesters showed up at some of the stops to lackadaisically hold up signs like “Barking up the Wrong Palmetto Tree” and “Bless Your Heart, Gavin,” or GOP gubernatorial nominee Alan Wilson posting “Don’t California My South Carolina” ahead of his arrival.

Pressed by CNN to respond, Newsom tried to weave his record as governor and attacking Trump together with some of what will likely be his more specific, forward-looking pitch if he’s back in South Carolina for the next phase of a campaign.

“Minimum wage, universal health care, subsidized childcare, lowering cost of prescription drugs, making sure families are supported or getting Medicaid — I imagine those are not popular, according to (Wilson), which is kind of remarkable,” he said sarcastically.

CNN’s Annie Grayer contributed to this report.

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发胶基本经受住了低地地区黏腻的汗水考验。

在南卡罗来纳州（现已完全确立为民主党首个总统初选州）的活动间隙，加文·纽森承认，上周的行程确实是试探竞选的一部分。

“显然，现在距离大选还有一段时间，但你知道，我之前就来过这里，”加州州长在与选民会面后，在一家文化中心的员工厨房接受CNN采访时说道。“如果我否认2028年大选是此次访问的因素，那我就撒谎了，”他承认道，但他坚持认为，2028年大选在他连续第四年访问加州的动机中排名靠后。

南卡罗来纳州民主党处境艰难，他们最大的愿望仅仅是赢得足够多的州议会席位，打破共和党的绝对多数地位。但纽森表示，他真心致力于南卡罗来纳州的发展。他解释说，之所以选择回到他曾为乔·拜登和卡马拉·哈里斯助选、并进行新书巡回宣传的地方，是因为他与该州民主党领导层建立了良好的关系。例如，主席克里斯塔尔·斯佩恩选择在周四庆祝她的50岁生日，她特意乘坐一辆面包车走在纽森的小型车队前面，在各种活动中为他做介绍。她还称赞纽森筹集的37万美元资金确实帮助他们维持了党总部的正常运转。（纽森在其中一站送给她一顶皇冠和一条生日绶带，在另一站则送给她一副拳击手套。）

随着工作人员增设座椅，房间里的温度也因人潮涌动而升高，显然，在这个截然不同的地区，人们对这位极具加州特色的州长表现出了浓厚的兴趣。但即便在这次访问之前，纽森的团队就已经意识到，如果他决定竞选总统（或者用一些助手的话来说，是“下一步计划”），他将需要努力与黑人选民建立联系——黑人选民往往占南卡罗来纳州民主党初选选民的一半以上。

他说，这正是他南方之行的开端，他首先参观了位于阿拉巴马州的种族不公正遗产博物馆，该博物馆距离州议会大厦仅几步之遥，杰斐逊·戴维斯正是在那里宣誓就任南方邦联总统。这种充满诗意的并置往往能深深打动这位58岁的老人。

他说：“如果你是一名民主党人，你就必须回到南方，你必须了解这个国家正在发生的事情。”

对于一个永远纠结于是否对总统的所作所为谈论过多或谈论过少的政党来说，纽森正试图跨越这道鸿沟：他先是回顾了自己如何通过加州报复性的选区重划投票提案来反击特朗普，然后又转而讲述了这件事如何让他意识到民主党人现在需要改变斗争方式。

在哈迪维尔、圣海伦娜岛、萨默维尔和西哥伦比亚，分别有一百多名主要为退休人员、零星分布着加州移民的人群——所有这些地点都是州民主党领导人挑选的，因为他们试图在远离传统民主党人口中心的地方取得胜利——纽森向民众发出对抗特朗普这一“入侵物种”的行动号召。

他以自由联想式的即兴演讲，风格颇似比尔·克林顿或巴拉克·奥巴马，讲述了一个饱受摧残却依然坚韧不拔的国家的故事。他说，民主党人，以及大多数美国人，都需要一个拥抱。随后，他拥抱了一位年轻女性，这位女性在台下举着一块醒目的黄色“抱抱我”牌子，让纽森州长看到。他将特朗普打压多元化、公平和包容性举措的行为描述为反黑人，并指出“我们所知的资本主义已经失效”。但他主要着重分析了美国人如何为特朗普的加密货币暴利、卡塔尔赠送的私人飞机升级等行为付出代价，这常常引起听众的阵阵惊叹。

但在艾肯非裔美国人历史、艺术和文化中心，人群中究竟有哪些人，哪些人没有，却很容易分辨出来。该中心建于 19 世纪末，旨在教育黑人儿童，但纽瑟姆的听众却主要是年纪较大的白人。

“我当时就问我妻子——我们现在在哪儿？我们是不是已经不再是民主党的一员了？”布拉德利·泰勒说道。他最近刚从萨凡纳河核废料处理场退休，在纽森发表讲话前，他环顾四周，寻找其他在场的黑人。泰勒表示，他对纽森并不看好，但他更关注前交通部长皮特·布蒂吉格，因为他“更有人情味”。

皮特·布蒂吉格重返全国首个初选州南卡罗来纳州，再次向黑人选民发出呼吁。

他的妻子杰奎琳·泰勒是一名注册护士，她对这位加州州长更加开放：“看他戏弄特朗普——这让我很兴奋。”

在听完纽森 20 分钟的讲话后，泰勒告诉 CNN，她深受鼓舞，因为她听到了关于加州重新划分选区的努力，以及他如何将此事与民主党人更广泛地“划清界限”以限制共和党人可以做的事情联系起来。

“我非常感谢他。如果你想操纵选区划分和作弊……你就必须以牙还牙，”泰勒说道。

她说，纽森让她思考如何帮助她的孙辈：一个是柴油价格高企、努力维持生计的卡车司机，另一个是在军队服役的。

听完之后，她丈夫修改了他最初的反应——“他说的几乎都是我已经知道的”——说他的妻子说服了他。

“他说的这些话很能打动我们，”85岁的比尔·克莱伯恩说道。他是南卡罗来纳州资深州议员，也是该州颇具影响力的国会议员吉姆·克莱伯恩的堂兄。吉姆·克莱伯恩曾在2020年帮助拜登在南卡罗来纳州赢得了黑人选票。克莱伯恩补充说，如果纽森竞选总统，“他的表现应该和预期差不多。”

当被问及人们对纽森在该州的表现究竟有何期待时，克莱伯恩只是轻笑了一声，便结束了他的评论。

周五下午，在距离纽森一个小时车程的西哥伦比亚，25 岁​​的国会候选人 Zyon Khalifa 听了纽森的竞选纲领。他很喜欢年轻政治家充满活力地与听众互动，以及他直言不讳地谈论黑人成为攻击目标的方式。

“你听不到他试图切换语调，”哈利法说。“他没有试图粉饰太平，也没有用所有听众都能接受的方式表达，他只是如实陈述事实。”

哈利法和泰勒一家、克莱伯恩一样，都和纽森合影了。当被问及是否会在竞选对抗共和党众议员乔·威尔逊时使用这张照片时，他皱起眉头承认：“可能不会。”

民主党州长候选人杰梅因·约翰逊则采取了截然相反的策略，他邀请纽森周四晚间出席他的筹款活动，随后又于周五下午在哥伦比亚市历史悠久的黑人大学艾伦大学与他进行炉边谈话。到了周五纽森在兰开斯特的最后一场活动时，现场黑人的比例明显更高。

“我不需要人山人海，也不需要发表长篇大论。我喜欢这种人与人之间的联系，喜欢这种细致入微的交流。我喜欢揣摩言外之意，喜欢和我们这些小团体见面，”纽森告诉CNN。“我能学到很多东西。”

Ben Hendren/Bloomberg/Getty Images

参议员乔恩·奥索夫差点就没竞选连任。现在一些民主党人想让他参加2028年的总统大选。

顾问们表示，纽森对黑人选民的强大吸引力已经引发了一些内部讨论，他们正在考察潜在的初选对手（从哈里斯到佐治亚州参议员乔恩·奥索夫）的黑人支持情况，奥索夫的竞选连任广告经常在州界另一侧的广播中播放。

纽森表示，他并不担心此次访问的人群构成，并解释说，有人告诉他，在许多人工作的时候安排活动，这就是不利之处。

“周末来的时候，感觉完全不一样，”他说。“顺便一提，我们上次来的时候，观众几乎全是非裔美国人。”

周四下午，一场交通事故导致纽森州长在乡村礼堂接待室的讲话推迟了一个小时。为了争取时间，州党主席斯佩恩请大家大声说出他们希望看到哪些其他政治人物前来。奥索夫和布蒂吉格（他上个月刚到过南卡罗来纳州）被提及，随后是亚利桑那州参议员马克·凯利，他刚刚结束竞选活动，并将利用劳动节周末的部分时间在新罕布什尔州进行竞选活动。当有人提议邀请宾夕法尼亚州州长乔什·夏皮罗时，斯佩恩说她听说夏皮罗要到一月份才会来。还有人提到了肯塔基州州长安迪·贝希尔，他将于十月初到肯塔基州进行新书巡回宣传。

萨拉·西尔比格为CNN撰稿

乔什·夏皮罗无法回避有关他的问题。他决定不回答。

但他们还是等着纽森，之后排队拍照，有些人还戴着售价 5 美元的“纽森 2028”徽章和 30 美元的“加文 2028”帽子，这些都是盗版商贩在他每站都跟着卖的。

“我当然会考虑所有选项，但我认为他（纽森）是可行的，”最近退休的凯瑞·惠特克说道。她戴着一顶印有纽森名字和加州熊图案的亮蓝色帽子，与纽森合影留念。

大多数潜在的2028年总统候选人在竞选期间都会有一份日常工作。但纽森——就像布蒂吉格一样——是个例外：明年一月，他将结束长达30年的政治生涯，从旧金山监事、市长、副州长到州长，这将是他首次卸任。正如他向CNN所说，这意味着他不得不开始为家人安排医疗保险，但这也可能让他有更多时间参加此类活动——与那些已经通过电视或他的社交媒体团队对特朗普的无休止嘲讽而认识他的核心民主党人之外的更多人建立联系。

州参议员玛吉·布莱特·马修斯表示，见到他本人已经让她感到惊讶。

“我原以为他只是个长相俊美、气质高挑的帅哥，”她在贾斯珀县一间教堂的会议室里对众人说道，“后来我才意识到，他不仅仅是长得好看，他还很有魄力。”

纽森在移民政策打击、国民警卫队联邦化和选区重划等问题上与特朗普针锋相对，正是这些立场让众多前来支持他的民主党人印象深刻。在南卡罗来纳州，他预告了卸任州长后将如何继续推行这些政策。

当他重新审视 2025 年 6 月深夜与总统的通话时，他展现出了这种努力，当时移民执法人员正在洛杉矶与抗议者对峙。

纽森称总统撒谎，因为总统声称在谈话中斥责了他。纽森在南卡罗来纳州多次重述了他的版本，其中在艾肯的讲述最为详尽。

纽森说，通话一开始，特朗普就提到了与哈里斯的 2024 年竞选，声称自己赢得了辩论，并辩称这是一场“四对一”的辩论，主持人、摄像师和哈里斯都站在特朗普对面。

面对这一说法，白宫通讯主任史蒂文·张并未直接反驳，而是通过电子邮件告诉CNN：“这里唯一的骗子是加文·纽森，他不仅没有帮助加州人民，反而继续辜负加州人民，还蒙蔽公众。加州人民正遭受他激进政策的折磨。总统曾致电加文·纽森，敦促他尽快采取行动，但加文却令人作呕地选择与暴力暴徒沆瀣一气，而不是保护加州人民。他是个彻头彻尾的失败者，每天都在自取其辱。”

纽森预料到会有这样的反应，表示他已将通话时的笔记提交给了众议院监督委员会主席、肯塔基州众议员吉姆·科默。这些笔记也是他起诉福克斯新闻诽谤的证据之一，该诉讼目前已进入取证阶段，指控福克斯新闻对该通话的报道存在不当行为。福克斯新闻否认有任何不当行为，并誓言要反击这些指控。

“我打算长期坚持下去，”纽森说。“他们想说什么就说什么吧。这些事实在法庭和国会都已得到充分证实，没有人提出任何反驳这些说法和事实的言论。而且，我是在作伪证的惩罚下做出这些陈述的。”

州长的一位助手拒绝向CNN提供笔记副本。科默没有回应置评请求。

但他始终将注意力集中在南卡罗来纳州，尽管一些抗议者出现在他的一些竞选站点，漫不经心地举着“找错棕榈树”和“祝你好运，加文”之类的标语，或者共和党州长候选人艾伦·威尔逊在他抵达之前发布了“别让我的南卡罗来纳州变成加州”之类的标语。

在 CNN 的追问下，纽森试图将他作为州长的政绩和对特朗普的抨击与他如果回到南卡罗来纳州参加下一阶段竞选活动时可能会提出的更具体、更具前瞻性的竞选纲领结合起来。

“最低工资、全民医疗保健、托儿补贴、降低处方药价格、确保家庭获得支持或医疗补助——我想这些措施并不受欢迎，（威尔逊）对此感到有些惊讶，”他讽刺地说。

CNN的安妮·格雷尔对本报道亦有贡献。