“I was out there, kind of raising myself, turning on the TV started… with the, you know, the Wonder Bread…”
California Governor Gavin Newsom is reportedly considering a run for president in 2028, which would pit him against Vice President JD Vance. As such, he's making the podcast rounds to tell his story of growing up poor with a single mother in Marin County, the 8th richest county in the country and the third richest in the state.
In 1991, Newsom was featured in the San Francisco Chronicle as a "society kid" alongside Paul Mohen, Andrew Getty and Billy Getty as they opened up a wine shop. Newsom was 24, a graduate of Santa Clara University, and said that the entrepreneurs felt they were "doing their families, who are wine collectors, a favor."
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On the All the Smoke podcast with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson, both former NBA players for the Golden State Warriors, Newsom spoke about his early years, saying that he was raised by a single, divorced mom, who worked multiple jobs to make ends meet. His father had blown all his cash on a failed 1968 run for Senate and the two divorced a few years after Newsom was born.
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"I was out there, kind of raising myself, turning on the TV started, you know, just getting obsessed, you know, sitting there with the, you know, the Wonder Bread and five stacks of... the macaroni and cheese," he said, joking with the fellas.
"My mom was 19, pregnant and divorced a few years later, with two kids," he said. "Came from no money and just hustled. You know, worked hard, grinding every single day. Two and a half jobs, no bullsh*t.
"We had roommates all the time because she couldn’t afford the rent," he went on. "…It was also about paying the bills, man. It was just like hustling."
Newsom's father, a lawyer for the Getty Trust, ran for Senate in 1968 and said that he blew lots of money in the process, limiting his ability to support his family. "I made a foolish mistake of putting my own money in it and losing," he said.
"I had a huge deficit when it was over. I lost my law practice in the process. Things were unraveling. It took me quite a while to pull myself out financially. Tessa was working a number of jobs. Gavin had jobs after school." He claimed that he "was around people of wealth, but I never had any money, nor did Gavin."
Newsom has taken aim at Vance previously, sharing a photo match-up of the two in their different high school lives. Newsom, a child of Marin County, reading a newspaper while wearing a wool, plaid scarf, alongside Vance in a t-shirt with two girls joking in a boys' bathroom.
A spokesperson for Newsom told the New York Post "Anyone with more than an inch of curiosity would know that Governor Newsom was raised by his mother after her divorce from his father when he was 3 years old. He has talked about moving between two different worlds, but he was raised by a mother who worked three jobs at one point — secretary, waitress, and paralegal." Vance was raised by his grandmother after his drug addicted mother was unable to care for him. His father was absent and he joined the Marines, later funding his education with the GI Bill. His parents also divorced when he was young, but his father did not come back around with society influence and support.
Perhaps America will end up bearing witness to two men on the presidential campaign trail in 2028 competing for who had a worse childhood.
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