Governor Gavin Newsom vs President Donald Trump: The Gloves Are Off

In a primetime address laced with fury and foreboding, California Governor Gavin Newsom accused President Trump of dragging America to the edge of authoritarian rule.

It was a stark message, delivered not from a campaign trail or party convention, but from a broadcast studio in Los Angeles, where Newsom spoke directly to Americans about what he called a “perilous moment” for democracy.

“California may be first, but it clearly won’t end here,” Newsom warned. “Democracy is next.”

The backdrop to this confrontation is as volatile as it is historic. After five consecutive days of protests in Los Angeles—sparked by sweeping federal immigration raids—President Trump deployed thousands of military personnel to the streets, including 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 U.S. Marines. While the administration insists the mobilization targets violent criminals, the governor paints a bleaker picture: that of a “military dragnet” arresting not gang leaders, but “dishwashers, gardeners, day laborers and seamstresses.”

To the president’s supporters, this is law and order. To Newsom and a growing chorus of critics, it is the kind of domestic militarisation that belongs in history books chronicling other fallen republics. And unlike earlier disputes over Covid restrictions or border fences, this one is playing out in real time, in federal courtrooms and city streets.

Newsom’s decision to challenge the federal deployment with an emergency lawsuit marks a rare and dangerous moment in U.S. politics: a governor suing a sitting president to stop what he sees as the unlawful seizure of state power. At stake is not merely control over California’s National Guard—but the principle that America’s military should not be used as a tool of domestic political enforcement.

The Trump administration’s decision to bypass state consent recalls some of the darkest chapters in post-war American history. Not since the 1960s has a president sent troops into a state without the governor’s support, and then it was in defence of civil rights—not in suppression of peaceful protest. That Trump now orders the military onto California’s streets, against the will of its elected leader, is not merely provocative—it is incendiary.

Yet for all his righteous indignation, Newsom is not without baggage. Republicans have been quick to recall his pandemic-era hypocrisy—most notably, his now-infamous dinner at Napa Valley’s French Laundry while ordinary Californians were told to stay home. James Gallagher, the GOP leader in California’s Assembly, called him “the ultimate authoritarian,” deriding Newsom’s pivot from lockdown enforcer to democracy’s last guardian.

But the stakes have now outgrown the usual partisan jabs. Newsom’s Tuesday night speech, titled Democracy at a Crossroads, had a tone more presidential than gubernatorial. Indeed, the governor’s emergence as a national figure—his name increasingly floated for the 2028 Democratic nomination—has been hastened by his head-on collision with Trump.

For Newsom, the matter is not just about immigration enforcement. It is about a deeper erosion of American political norms. He accused Trump of taking a “wrecking ball” to checks and balances, blaming Congress for its silence and singling out Speaker Mike Johnson for “abdication.” The language was not abstract: “The rule of law has increasingly been given way to the rule of Don.”

Perhaps most striking were the historical allusions. Newsom drew parallels between Trump’s behaviour and that of dictators past—highlighting the grotesque symbolism of a military parade scheduled for the president’s birthday. “He’s ordering our American heroes, the United States military, and forcing them to put on a vulgar display to celebrate his birthday, just as other failed dictators have done,” Newsom said.

This rhetorical escalation is as bold as it is risky. By invoking authoritarianism so directly, Newsom raises the temperature of an already incendiary national debate. But in doing so, he taps into a fear that many Americans—particularly younger, urban, and immigrant voters—are beginning to articulate: that Trumpism, left unchecked, no longer respects democratic boundaries.

Still, Newsom was careful to call for calm. He condemned violence, urged peaceful protest, and acknowledged the 370 arrests made so far. But his core message was unmistakable: Trump’s actions in California are not an outlier—they are a test run.

Whether one sees Gavin Newsom as a principled defender of democracy or an ambitious opportunist, the political and constitutional questions he raises are real. When a president can unilaterally deploy military force inside a U.S. state over the objections of its governor, the republic treads dangerous ground.

California may be first. But if Newsom is right, it won’t be the last.