Gavin Newsom appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live to discuss his new book Young Man In a Hurry and his relationship with Donald Trump, giving host Jimmy Kimmel the opportunity to gift the California governor a trophy of his own.
At the end of the interview, Josh Meyers, dressed as Newsom, came on stage to bestow Newsom with the 2026 FIFA Skydance Paramount Netflix Warner Bros Big Ass Lipton Cup O Peace. “What is that made of?” Kimmel asked when the enormous trophy was revealed. “Plated with platinum that was ethically sourced from all my expired Amex cards,” Meyers revealed. “And it holds an entire magnum of this sick ass soft blanc [wine].”
“On this historic honour, governor, would you like to say a few words?” Kimmel asked. Newsom replied, “Look, this is long overdue. And I assume it comes with a third term?” He added, “Eat your heart out Donald!”
During his interview, Newsom spoke about his ongoing and very public feud with Trump, who received the inaugural (and made up) FIFA Peace Prize in December. “I think Trump secretly loves you,” Kimmel noted.
Newsom recounted how he’s had “many interesting calls” with Trump over the phone. “The last time I called him was right before he federalised the National Guard here,” Newsom said. “He sent 700 active duty Marines, not overseas but to the second-largest city in the United States of America. That happened last June. People should not forget that.”
He continued, “I had a conversation with him the night before where he alleged that he read me the riot act. Here’s how it went. It was about 10:30 my time, 1:30 his time. And he goes, ‘Hey, hey, Gav, Gav, what do you think of New Scum?’ It’s his nickname for me. I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ He said, ‘It’s pretty original, right?’ I said, ‘Actually, it’s not. There was an eighth grade bully that did that when I was a kid.’”
“These are the conversations with Trump,” Newsom added. “You can’t make this stuff up. And about 12 hours later he said he had read me the riot act and then moved forward with the federalisation of the Guard.”
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Elsewhere in the interview, Newsom reflected on the need for Democrats to stand up to Trump and the Republicans. “We’ve got to be tougher,” Newsom said. “We’ve got to be more aggressive and call this stuff out. We’ll lose our country.”
Newsom has been an outspoken critic of Trump, often parodying his bombastic style on social media. In September, Newsom explained on The Late Show that his social strategy came from both inspiration and desperation.
“Everything we were doing to try to break through wasn’t working any more,” he said. “And so we decided to do something, to your point, novel called humour. And, I gotta say, often times Democrats, we’re a little — we’re not as humorous as we should be. We can be a little stiff. And so we thought we’d have some fun with it. I never imagined it would break through like it has and get under the skin of the president of the United States.”
From Rolling Stone US
