Gavin Newsom Admits Democrats Took Woke Politics Too Far

California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom admitted his party needs to spend less time on woke politics in an interview with CNN that aired Monday.

Newsom told CNN’s Dana Bash that Democrats need to be “more focused on tabletop issues,” including electricity, childcare and housing costs. He argued that, from a “tactical perspective,” Democrats need to be more “culturally normal” in their politics.

“From the prism of purely politics, there’s no doubt that the Democratic party needs to be, dare I say, more culturally normal,” Newsom said. “I believe that.” He made a similar argument in a December 2025 interview during The New York Times Dealbook Summit in New York.

“Less prone to spending disproportionate amount of time on pronouns, identity politics, more focused on tabletop issues, things that really matter—the stacking of stress in terms of the electricity bills and childcare costs and health care and obviously housing costs, and how easily we get trapped in that,” the Democrat said.

Newsom famously issued over 4,000 same-sex marriage licenses in 2004 as mayor of San Francisco, a stint some refer to as the “Winter of Love,” to show defiance of state and federal laws banning gay marriage. The move caused then-Senator Barack Obama to distance himself from the California governor.

Now Newsom says Democrats will “lose a lot of people” if the party holds onto “identity politics.”

“Here I was, way out front on marriage equality, so I understand this from the receiving end of this and on the front end of this leading the pack, so I think there has to be some consideration of that,” Newsom stated. “But I think if you can’t hold the line on competitive sports—again, sports, there’s some nuance in the larger conversation—but competitive, medal sports. If we can’t find that nuance, I think we’re gonna lose a lot of people.”