California Governor Gavin Newsom has delivered a masterclass in political shade, deploying a perfectly timed meme to eviscerate a challenge from Donald Trump's campaign spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt.
The digital skirmish began when Leavitt, seemingly attempting to goad the Democratic governor, publicly needled Newsom for not being selected as President Joe Biden's stand-in for the upcoming CNN presidential debate. "Poor Gavin Newsom didn’t get the call to be Biden’s debate stool pigeon," she posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Rather than issuing a lengthy, traditional rebuttal, Newsom opted for a weapon of modern political warfare: the meme. His response was a widely recognised image from the film Happy Gilmore, featuring a bewildered man being told, "You will go now." The implication was crystal clear – Leavitt's comment was so irrelevant it wasn't even worthy of a verbal response.
The internet quickly sided with Newsom, with his post racking up millions of views and vast engagement, dwarfing Leavitt's original provocation. The exchange highlights the increasingly meme-centric nature of political discourse, where a well-chosen image can often speak louder than a prepared statement.
This is not the first time Newsom has been floated as a potential replacement for Biden on the debate stage, a notion the governor himself has repeatedly shut down. His loyalty to President Biden remains his public stance, even as he continues to be a prominent and media-savvy surrogate for the campaign.
The incident underscores the high-stakes, often petty nature of the pre-debate manoeuvring, where every tweet and post is a potential soundbite in the relentless 2024 election news cycle.
