Newsom says Davos appearance was canceled under pressure from Trump | Gavin Newsom
The office of Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, said his participation in the World Economic Forum in Davos was canceled under pressure from the Trump administration.
Newsom was scheduled to sit down with Fortune at an event sponsored by USA House, the country’s official headquarters for the annual gathering of world and economic leaders. But before discussions began, his team says, the U.S. House of Representatives bowed to political pressure from the Trump administration and denied the governor entry.
“Under pressure from the White House and State Department, USA House (a church serving as the official United States lodge) is now denying entry to @CAGovernor Gavin Newsom to speak with the media after Fortune – the official media partner – invited him to speak,” the governor’s office said in a statement shared on its official account.
Newsom shared the statement on social media, adding: “How weak and pathetic do you have to be to be so afraid of a fireside chat?
According to Newsom’s office, the governor was invited by Fortune last week to participate in a “fireside chat” planned after Trump’s speech. On Monday, his office accepted the invitation.
Shortly before the event began, his office said, a USA House official informed Newsom’s team that they were canceling the Fortune event and that Newsom would not be allowed to speak with media onsite. The official said an elected official speaking did not fit into his agenda for the afternoon.
USA House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a statement, Fortune said, “Governor Newsom had been invited to participate in a Fortune conversation at the USA House in Davos. Subsequently, USA House determined that it would not be able to accommodate the governor’s participation and communicated this decision to Fortune.”
The global business magazine added that while it “schedules all editorial conversations independently,” the scheduling of such events “may be affected by logistical, security and other access considerations that involve multiple stakeholders and evolve over time.”
Newsom, widely considered a leading Democratic presidential candidate in 2028, used his three-day trip to the Swiss Alps to lambast the Trump administration — and challenge European allies who he says have failed to sufficiently stand up to the U.S. president.
“I can’t stand this complicity of people turning on each other,” Newsom told reporters in Davos on Tuesday. “I should have brought a bunch of knee pads for all the world leaders. I mean the handing out of crowns, Nobel prizes being handed out. It’s just pathetic. And I hope people understand how pathetic they look on the world stage.”
He added: “There is no diplomacy with Donald Trump: he is a T rex. You mate with him or he eats you.”
Newsom was present during Trump’s wide-ranging, invective-laden remarks to world leaders in Davos, during which the US president said he was “looking to negotiate immediately” to discuss the acquisition of Greenland and also pledged to “help the people of California”.
Name-checking the California governor, Trump said in his remarks: “I know Gavin was here. I got along great with Gavin when I was president. Gavin’s a good guy.” A camera panned to the governor, catching him smiling in response.
“Good seats. Bad speeches,” Newsom responded on X, sharing a photo of himself seated behind White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other senior administration officials.
His office had said he planned to use the fireside chat to present California as a counterweight to Trump’s policies, Politico reported.
In a statement, White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly attacked Newsom, using Trump’s derogatory nickname “Newscum,” but did not respond to a question about the administration’s involvement in the episode.
“No one in Davos knows who third-rate Governor Newscum is or why he is fooling around in Switzerland instead of fixing the many problems he has created in California,” Kelly said.
The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Newsom made a name for himself by excessively mocking Trump online — and his appearance at Davos did not go unnoticed by the administration. Speaking at an earlier event, Scott Bessent, the Treasury Secretary, called the governor “smug, self-centered” and perhaps “the only Californian who knows less about the economy than Kamala Harris.”
Bessent also alluded to Newsom’s planned appearance in Davos: “I’m told he’s been asked to give a speech on his signature policy, but he’s not speaking. »
