Gavin Newsom’s California dreaming is being haunted by J.D. Vance.
The Golden State’s governor, already waging an as-yet-unannounced presidential campaign for 2028, already had reason to worry about President Donald Trump’s veep as a potential Republican opponent in two years.
But after Trump’s State of the Union speech on Tuesday, Newsom’s fears got much worse.
During the speech, Trump announced Vance would spearhead a White House “war on fraud,” targeting the kind of scams linked to Somali immigrants in Minnesota that have soaked American taxpayers for as much as $9 billion, and possibly more.
“He’ll get it done,” Trump said.
But Minnesota wasn’t the only state Trump called out.
“And California, Massachusetts, Maine, and many other states are even worse,” he said.
Don’t think that didn’t get attention at Gavin Central.
In a podcast interview with former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki (who has no love for Vance herself) Newsom all but admitted the vice president gives him nightmares.
Naturally, he couched it in anti-Trump rhetoric, and even managed to camouflage it with an insult. But the message came through clearer than Newsom ever could have intended.
Newsom is done if he ever shares a stage with JD Vance. He’ll look old, tired, creepy, greasy. Vance is taller and more robust than Newsom and has better hair potential. He’ll be 43 for most of 2028, the same age as JFK in his election year. https://t.co/XAef0SfXDC
— Chris (@chriswithans) February 26, 2026
It came as he was fielding a softball question from Psaki about potential Republican successors to Trump — specifically naming Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Do you think they can carry on the MAGA flame here?” she asked.
“No,” Newsom said. “But Vance, for whatever reason, scares me. Almost more than Trump,” he admitted.
“Talk about a guy who put a mask on and his face grew into it.”
Newsom was referring to Vance’s previous criticisms of Trump, which are no secret and which Vance has also expressed regret for.
And in June of last year, during the height of Trump’s well-publicized rift with mega-billionaire Ellon Musk, Vance left no doubt in the public mind about where he stood, with a post on the social media platform X that stated, “President Trump has done more than any person in my lifetime to earn the trust of the movement he leads. I’m proud to stand beside him.”
President Trump has done more than any person in my lifetime to earn the trust of the movement he leads. I’m proud to stand beside him.
— JD Vance (@JDVance) June 6, 2025
Newsom was making a smoke-and-mirrors argument anyway — just like his later smoke-and-mirrors argument that Trump could seriously be planning a run for a third term as president in the face of the explicit constitutional prohibition on it contained in the 22nd Amendment.
(Keeping the specter of a new Trump presidential run alive is great for Democratic fundraising emails.)
What Newsom really has to fear is not Vance’s past statements, but his future power — that Vance could soon be in a position to do real harm to Newsom’s political hopes by exposing the real extent of fraud in California’s use of federal dollars.
In January, Trump announced the state is under federal scrutiny for its spending practices.
Early this month, the Small Business Administration announced the uncovering of $8.6 billion in fraud tied to small business loans in California.
Only last week, the Labor Department announced an anti-fraud “strike force” was targeting California over the state’s unemployment insurance programs.
And in Tuesday night’s State of the Union, as if to cap all of that off, Trump essentially named Vance as the administration’s point man for investigating exactly that kind of theft from taxpayers nationwide.
Let’s just say Newsom’s fears aren’t exactly a coincidence.
In his comments on “The Briefing with Jen Psaki,” Newsom tried to brand Vance as a “unique fraud and phony.”
But Americans who’ve been paying attention know well by now the symptoms of Democratic projection — that when a Democrat accuses an opponent of misbehavior or hidden motives, the Democrat is invariably guilty of exactly the same.
In the case of Newsom, whose sincerity is as deep as his hair gel, and whose reeking hypocrisy is a matter of public record (see the French Laundry Incident, the NFC Championship Incident, the Mexican Thanksgiving Incident), an accusation of fraud doesn’t just ring false, it ricochets right back.
As the leading contender for the Democratic nomination in 2028, Newsom already had an obvious political reason to fear one of the Republicans best positioned to be seen as Trump’s successor.
As the leader of a state mired in the kind of fraud that Vance now has an avenue to pursue, Newsom might have a good deal more to worry about.
His dreams of the White House might be turning into a nightmare already — courtesy of J.D. Vance.
This couldn’t happen to a more deserving governor.
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