California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is back in the news, and he's got a lot to talk about. He's been in office for a little over a year and a half, and in that time, he's been governor of California for the past four years. And he's had a lot of time to reflect on his time in office.
00:00:42.900Thank God he didn't listen to me, right?0.99
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00:01:02.500What if there's an alternate universe show where you guys are incredibly popular?
00:01:07.520Well, and they could travel up the land doing meet and greets.
00:02:11.160You're talking to the guy who's built the largest service corps in the United States of America, significantly larger than the Peace Corps.
00:02:17.800Someone that has, without going out of my way, been critical of what we try to do on student debt in the last administration without asking for anything in return.
00:02:28.980I'll give you an example, Scott, because I know you care about higher education, UC system, which, by the way, we've invested since I've been governor, 46 percent increase in investments in the UCs.
00:02:38.76040,000 more California residents have gotten into the UC system, a 55% increase in dual enrollment,
00:02:48.180and 65% of people coming out of the UC and CSU still graduate debt-free. I don't know. There's
00:02:54.660many systems as large, and we still have work to do. I'm not naive about some of your critiques,
00:03:00.560But one of the things I'm proud of is we provide $10,000 grants for service in return for 450 hours of service contribution.
00:12:36.560talk about after school for all, summer school for all.
00:12:38.240We can talk about everything done on community schools.
00:12:40.240We can talk about the healthcare expansions,
00:12:41.860the work we've done on the environment, the work we've done on our jobs plans, this amazing
00:12:46.400regional plan strategy. I can go on and on, but service, people, mentorship, leadership,
00:12:53.580addressing this crisis of men and boys, which you've been just next level on, is something I'm
00:12:59.460proud of, perhaps as much more than others. Backing up, forgive the long-windedness on,
00:13:05.200we're all geniuses in hindsight. And I think about those early days in COVID when, you know,
00:13:11.220Ron DeSantis was shutting down the beaches, not just Gavin Newsom in California.
00:13:15.820We lost a lot of trust during COVID, and we haven't gotten that back.
00:13:23.020And I think we've under-indexed how so much has changed since COVID.
00:13:27.880And I was a little slow at understanding how much had changed.
00:13:31.700And so it's not a specific action per se, but it's, I think, just broader tonal appreciation that everything had changed, but I hadn't changed to the degree that I should as a leader of the fourth largest economy in the world.
00:13:48.640I have begun to address that in much more robust ways, but I think that would be something I would reflect on as a point of critique and consideration.
00:13:58.560so a lot of young men listen to the podcast you're a father and a husband four kids is that
00:14:05.620right governor yeah four two boys two girls what advice or what learnings what what do you think
00:14:10.600you got right and wrong and what are your learnings and advice you would give to a young
00:14:15.000man who's thinking about trying to be a good partner and a good father just you you were i
00:14:19.800i'm so influenced i don't want to brag all over you man but i'm so influenced by what you've
00:14:25.400written what you talk about in this place. You talk about kindness. Oh, come on. Superpower.
00:14:31.020Empathy, care, compassion. It's not about power, dominance, and aggression. That said, I do think
00:14:37.220the notion of, you know, be a man is important. I'm not trying to feminize the frame. But this
00:14:45.060notion of empathy, I talk to my kids all the time about it. Man, when your friends laugh because
00:14:50.740someone's accent or how they're talking. Every time my kid does something like that, I literally
00:14:55.680looked, I grabbed them and look them in the face. You don't talk like that, man. Don't talk like
00:14:59.400that. It's not who you are. And I create an indelible thing. It's not who you are and talk
00:15:04.880in those terms. That's not who I think you are. No, it's not who you are. And you want to be a
00:15:09.880man? You have the back of that kid that's being bullied. You have the back of the kid that's
00:15:14.560being chastised. That's what masculinity looks like. That's what a leader does. And so
00:15:20.440to me, that's the superpower I want them to have. And that's, to me, the most important
00:15:27.260character test. Where I've failed is I struggle with this. You ask about Iran, you talk about
00:15:33.920Israel, you talk about two years from now. I've just not been as present as I need to be.
00:15:39.840And this is, you know, I'm not making an excuse, but this is the price of these positions. And
00:15:47.700I really think about that going forward. My son, he's not all into this stuff. And he's at that
00:15:54.620critical age. And I don't want to be on that rocking chair. I would have, could have, should
00:15:58.860have. And so I just think I need to be more present. And it's not what we say, it's what we
00:16:06.620do. It's how we, you know, he's watching how I treat my wife. He's watching not what I say,
00:16:12.540what I do and if I'm there for her and I'm around. And so I think about that as a shortcoming.
00:16:20.040You're in a constant attack as are other political leaders and as is your wife,
00:16:26.360the first partner. Does that inject stress into your relationship? And if so, how do you deal
00:16:30.800with it? Yeah, it's brutal. I mean, no holds barred. I mean, you become a caricature. You
00:16:37.920You become a, you know, I might, come on, turn on Fox.
00:16:40.340I've, you know, I'm getting the full Hillary Clinton treatment or Pelosi treatment.
00:17:06.340forgive me, I now, I don't know why I'm getting emotional. I was so proud of her just, you know,
00:17:11.780in terms of being, you know, a dad. I talked about my sons, about being men, but I was so proud when
00:17:16.840she gave a speech and I just said, look over my head because then it'll look like, and she looked
00:17:22.420up and she said, dad, did you see? I never looked down when I gave my graduation speech. It was in
00:17:26.980front of seven of us. That was the front of the family, her brothers, sisters. And I was just so
00:17:31.100proud of her, but I was also so upset with myself that she didn't have the experience.
00:17:36.340being there with her classmates because of some of the stuff related to her dad.
00:17:41.020And that was the middle of my recall at the time. And so, yeah, when, you know, I remember
00:17:46.120reaching out to Ted Cruz when someone went after his daughter, you know, and Ted and I, trust me,
00:17:50.680don't agree on much. But man, we agree on that. Just that's not right. And, you know, people's
00:17:57.060wise, I guess some cases when, you know, fair game and other cases, it's just hard. So forgive
00:18:02.980the long one. No one cares. You know, hearing me say this, but as human beings, I just, you know,
00:18:09.840I know we love to hate politicians, but at the end of the day, it's still parents and they still
00:18:14.980are husbands, wives, human beings. And, you know, that's why I don't, that's why I have Republicans
00:18:19.440on my podcast. It's why, man, I, you know, divorce is not an option in life. And that's why service
00:18:25.620is so important. And we're just going to have to figure all this shit out. And last thing,0.99
00:18:30.460Governor, in your book, you were very, quite raw and pretty authentic about your failings as a son
00:18:36.840towards the end of your mother's life. Can you talk a little bit about that and advice you would
00:18:41.400have for sons as with aging parents? Well, I just, I called the book Young Man in a Hurry.
00:18:49.060You know, it was all about me and I was just dealing with my own insecurities, my own anxieties,
00:18:54.900put a mask on, and tried to be what I thought it needed to be. But my face was starting to grow
00:19:01.700into it. I was becoming someone I wasn't. And I wasn't present. I wasn't there for my mom.
00:19:06.300I wasn't there for my sister and the people that mattered most. And it took a phone call from my
00:19:12.740mom, which you're referring to in a book, where she left a voice message that says everything.
00:19:17.700Talk about a young man in hurry was never around. She had to leave a voice message
00:19:20.900saying that her last day in life was a few days later on a Thursday where she was going to do
00:19:27.220assisted suicide. She was in so much pain because of advanced cancer. And she just left the message
00:19:33.660saying, well, if you want to see me before then, it will be my last day. And it was such a wake-up
00:19:38.960call. And, you know, you don't get it over. There are no do-overs here, man. You know,
00:19:44.780don't dream of it back to dream or regret. I don't want to dream regretting. And, you know,
00:19:48.520I sat there with her last breath and, you know, it was a tough moment being there with her,
00:19:52.940holding her hands until she took her last breath. And, you know, I still didn't have the courage
00:19:59.180to say what I said to her after she passed away. And I stood there 30 minutes, sitting there with
00:20:05.300my head on her stomach, just saying all the things that I wish I could have said and had
00:20:10.260the courage and guts to say before she passed. And, you know, I don't wish that on anybody.
00:20:16.280And so you want to be a man, you want to be a son, you want to be a leader, then, you know, man up, be a partner, be a caregiver, be other people oriented.
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00:22:48.280I'm Michelle McPhee, and I've been unraveling the strangest criminal alliance I've ever reported on.0.92
00:22:55.480A Mormon polygamist and an Armenian businessman.0.98
00:22:59.540Multi-million dollar house, Ferraris and Lamborghinis, private jets, a billion dollar fraud.0.95