(Republican Leader) – For quite some time now, there’s been significant speculation that California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom would attempt to primary President Joe Biden in a bid for the White House. A lot of this came from his actions during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic where the man showcased his willingness to be a hypocritical tyrant, however, he didn’t stop there. He’s also been constantly getting into exchanges with Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is currently running for the GOP presidential nomination. The gauntlet was thrown down in a debate challenge from Newsom to DeSantis, which the Florida governor gleefully accepted.
News of this debate, however, is not going over well with advisers in the White House who are not thrilled with what the sudden elevated status of Newsom could mean for the reelection efforts of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. In other words, since Biden-Harris is so very unpopular, their people are super concerned that Newsom might catch on with voters, launch a campaign, and bye-bye Biden.
According to Kevin Haggerty of BizPac Review, “Earlier this year, the bravado of the Golden State executive was met head-on by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) who enthusiastically accepted a debate challenge. However, with the latter running in the GOP presidential primary and rumors swirling about the former’s own eye on the Oval Office, those close to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were reportedly voicing concern.”
Advisers working for top Democrats had a conversation with NBC News where they shared their worries about how this gubernatorial battle of the titans might appear to the general public and the negative impact it could have for the reputations of the current incumbent candidates.
“It’s disrespectful. Joe Biden is running with Kamala Harris. That’s the Democratic ticket,” an outside adviser to the vice president asserted during the interview while the outlet explained, “Some Biden advisers have complained privately that the planned debate, which Fox News host Sean Hannity would moderate, could make voters think Newsom is running a shadow 2024 campaign at a time when most Democrats say they’d prefer a different candidate at the top of the ticket.”
Seeing Harris and her team freaking out over the debate between Newsom and DeSantis is hardly what you’d call surprising. The vice president has been very, very defensive of her position within the administration. Lots of folks have suggested that the then-senator’s team had taken an abundance of extra measures to make sure she would be on the ticket with Biden during the 2020 election.
“‘Even Joe Biden wondered aloud: Was Harris’s team driving this?’ New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns stated in their book on the election about the scrutiny faced by then-Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.) and former national security adviser Susan Rice who were being considered for the role as well,” Haggerty wrote.
New book says Biden suspected Team Kamala of sabotaging other minority veep contenders https://t.co/VSiwQgdmPj pic.twitter.com/vcngcLLb9R
— BizPac Review (@BIZPACReview) April 26, 2022
Some of the members of the president’s team didn’t mind the debate, with NBC News reporting about DeSantis, “…White House advisers initially perceived [him] as a greater threat to Biden’s re-election hopes than the GOP front-runner, former President Donald Trump.”
One of the president’s advisers spoke about the California governor saying, “What he’s doing here is appropriate for a surrogate. It would not be appropriate for the president or the vice president.”
“We’re in close touch with him. This is the kind of thing we want surrogates to do,” the Biden adviser said concerning Newsom.
The question I have is whether or not Newsom was just puffing his chest, offering a bluff he didn’t think DeSantis would call him on in order to set himself up politically for a White House run. During an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, DeSantis enthusiastically took the challenge saying that Newsom just needed to tell him when and where the debate would be taking place and he’d be ready to go head-to-head on the issues. However, Newsom almost immediately started to sort of draw back from the idea, squabbling through one of his spokespersons about all of the problems with the proposed format of the debate.
In other words, he probably never had any intention of going against DeSantis, but wanted to crow loud and clear to jock for better political positioning on the national stage.
Gavin Newsom balks at Ron DeSantis ‘live audience’ proposal for debate, wants to set all the rules https://t.co/fCObGQStem via @BIZPACReview
— BPR based (@DumpstrFireNews) August 6, 2023
Kevin Munoz, a spokesman for Biden’s campaign, told NBC News, “Governor Newsom is a strong partner and surrogate for the Biden-Harris Campaign. We coordinate closely on campaigning, whether it’s fundraising or media. When he brought the debate idea to us, we endorsed it.”
As of now, both governors have agreed to a date in November, but it’s still up in the air whether or not the event will actually happen.
Personally, I wouldn’t count on it. Newsom is a coward. He made a move to try and better position himself and it backfired. The next few months will be spent spinning a narrative that will help him ditch the idea and look like a hero doing it.
Copyright 2023. RepublicanLeader.com
