From Davos To Munich To Brazil To London, Governor Newsom Is Chasing Global Applause While Problems Mount At Home

With Nearly A Year Left On His Gubernatorial Obligations, Newsom is Cosplaying as President - Giving Us The Blind Eye While He Rides The London Eye!

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⏱️ 6 min read

Global Stagecraft, Local Neglect

If you only watched the international clips, you might think Gavin Newsom runs a country.

Davos. Munich. London. Newsom signs a so-called ‘clean energy pact’ with the UK, using every foreign stage to draw a line between himself and the President. He even stopped at the UN climate conference in Brazil (where he actually told people that our state’s draconian climate taxes and regulations make our state more affordable). The pattern isn’t subtle.

This isn’t routine outreach. It’s a world tour.

And even the President noticed.

After Newsom’s U.K. announcement, President Trump blasted the arrangement as inappropriate and warned foreign leaders against treating a state governor as an alternative to the federal government. The message was blunt: foreign policy is conducted from Washington, not Sacramento.

Of course, the White House noticed. Play diplomat overseas, and you’re asking for a slap down.

The U.K. “Pact” — Theater, Not Substance

Strip away the glossy language, and the London agreement is a non-binding memorandum of understanding. It does not change statutory law. It does not appropriate funds. It does not lower electricity rates. It does not fix the grid. It does not address California’s insurance collapse.

What it really offers is cover.

Cover to keep jetting overseas. Cover to keep staging climate ceremonies. Cover to keep playing President while California’s real problems pile up.

It’s Nero fiddling, but the violin is a climate pact, and the stage is London. Except in California, the fires are real. Last year, wildfires tore through Los Angeles, burning homes and exposing the same failures in forest management, infrastructure, and insurance.

While families fought insurers and rebuilt from the ashes, their governor was busy collecting climate credentials abroad.

Meanwhile, His House Is On Fire, and Then Some

Back here, the budget is bleeding. California’s shortfall is in the tens of billions. The state that once bragged about surpluses is now scrambling to plug holes.

At the same time, California expanded publicly funded healthcare to include illegal immigrants — a policy choice with a multi-billion-dollar annual price tag — even as budget pressures intensified. It is controversial and expensive, and it is occurring during a structural deficit.

Then there’s the high-speed rail fiasco. Promised as a sleek San Francisco-to-Los Angeles line, billions upon billions have been spent, and not a piece of track laid. It stands as a monument to broken promises.

Add to that fraud investigations across public programs—pandemic relief, benefits, you name it. Taxpayers were promised accountability. Instead, they get headlines about lost money and lax oversight.

Electricity rates: sky-high. Gas prices: highest in the nation. Insurance market: unstable. Housing: out of reach for the middle class. Homelessness: everywhere.

These aren’t minor glitches. They’re failures at the heart of governance, and they demand real attention.

Trolling The President On Foreign Soil

Instead, the governor has chosen international platforms to jab at the President, telling foreign audiences that the administration in Washington is “temporary” and positioning California as the steadier global partner.

Governors and presidents disagree. But using foreign stages to take shots at the White House while signing empty climate deals is something else.

Davos. Munich. Brazil. London. Where will Newsom jet off to next?

This isn’t the calendar of a governor fixing budgets, reforming rail, rooting out fraud, or fighting wildfires. It’s the itinerary of someone focused on a dream job while ignoring the one he has.

California isn’t a country. The governor wasn’t elected to play diplomat or audition for the Oval Office. Dressing up non-binding deals as real pacts might win applause overseas, but it doesn’t fix anything at home.

So, Does It Matter?

This matters because leadership is about priorities—what gets done, and what gets ignored.

California faces real fiscal pain, crumbling infrastructure, affordability crises, and a trust deficit. Fixing them takes discipline, focus, and a governor willing to do the hard work.

Instead, we get climate photo-ops in London and presidential jabs in Munich.

When the budget bleeds, rail lines stall, fraud festers, and wildfires scar communities, as Californians, we deserve more than global theater. We deserve a governor who acts like one.

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