Newsom taking back seat for Democrats with Harris at helm

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) has retreated as a top Democratic surrogate for Vice President Kamala Harris after being one of President Joe Biden’s most ardent champions on the campaign trail.

“He was a uniquely good surrogate for Biden. Kamala doesn’t need the energy delivery as much right now,” Paul Mitchell, a Democratic consultant and California-based political data expert, told Politico this week.

In a flurry of interviews and battleground events for Biden before the president dropped his reelection bid in July, Newsom proved himself to be one of his chief champions. Whether in Michigan or Pennsylvania, on Fox News or CNN, the California Democrat expressed enthusiasm for keeping Biden in the White House. “I will never turn my back on President Biden,” he said just a few short weeks before the president’s historic campaign exit.

Newsom's devotion to the president even attracted criticism that his role as top Biden surrogate was hindering him from governing California.

"Our budget's upside down. We have businesses leaving California. You can't afford to live here, and so those are all things that obviously we need to work on here, and he's not here to work on those," Californian state Sen. Brian Dahle, who ran against Newsom during the special recall election in 2022, told Fox Digital last month.

After Harris’s swift ascent to the top of the Democratic ticket, Newsom might have more time to spend in his home state. The California governor appears to have taken a backseat in promoting his former colleague, despite claims that he's "totally focused the next 70 odd days on electing VP Harris," in comments to Politico.

A host of top Democrats delivered prime-time speeches in support of Harris during last week’s Democratic National Convention. Newsom was not one of them, making only brief remarks from the floor on the second evening of the event.

Newsom’s office said the governor had been approached with a prime-time slot but refused because of a previous commitment.

Meanwhile, his remarks during an interview last Friday, joking about the “inclusive process” Harris underwent to replace Biden, didn’t help speculation that the pair’s relationship lacks warmth.

Questioned on how he felt about “the switch” at the top of the Democratic ticket, Newsom quipped , “We went through a very open process, a very inclusive process. It was bottom-up. I don’t know if you know that.

“That’s what I’ve been told to say,” he laughed during comments to Pod Save America .

Newsom and Harris were Democratic colleagues in California for years. The two ran parallel careers in San Francisco, with Newsom becoming mayor and Harris district attorney, in 2003. In the following years, Newsom rose to prominence as the Golden State’s lieutenant governor and then governor, while Harris became California’s Democratic attorney general.

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While Newsom was widely rumored to hold presidential ambitions, he never said he would challenge Harris. A heartbeat away from the presidency, Harris easily emerged as the front-runner to become her party’s presidential nominee after Biden made his campaign exit.

While Newsom could be found anywhere and everywhere rooting for Biden, these days, Harris surrogates, such as Govs. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) and Andy Beshear (D-KY), have been the major players in supporting the vice president.