CNN anchor Dana Bash expressed her surprise on Thursday that California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) did not push back on Steve Bannon’s 2020 election denial in their recent sit down interview.
“We got to talk about Gavin Newsom and his new podcast. And the most recent MAGA guest that he had on his podcast is Steve Bannon. Let’s roll some of that conversation,” Bash began, before playing a clip from Newsom’s podcast with Bannon:
BANNON: I think that’s a lesson that we learned after President Trump. And look, you know, we disagree on this, but President Trump won the 2020 election. And we were kind of shattered as a movement when he left Washington, D.C. And we had to go back to basics to say, you know, it can’t be somebody else do something. You know, we had to do something. And that’s where we went back to really a pure populist movement to go with the grassroots, the precinct strategy, and kind of rebuild ourselves from there.
NEWSOM: But and I appreciate the notion of agency that we’re not bystanders in the world. It’s decisions, not conditions, that determine our fate and future.
“I listened to the whole thing. It was very substantive, a really interesting conversation. When Steve Bannon says the election was stolen and the governor, the Democratic governor of California, the fifth largest economy in the world, does not correct him on that. That surprised me,” Bash added.
CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez jumped in, saying, “And add it to the list. Right? I mean, he has there’s that moment. And then there were his comments about transgender athletes as well.”
“With Charlie Kirk,” Bash added.
“Right. And then in addition, I mean, even in addition to all of that, just reverse a little bit. Rewind, I should say. And he was also one of the Democrats who was going to the border and were critical of what the administration was doing. So this has been some time coming, but it’s at a point now with characters now that we weren’t expecting,” Alvarez argued.
“Right? And to be fair, Democrats have been trying to get into the conservative ecosystem to reach those voters. That is clearly what he’s trying to do. He’s got a very, very specific idea here. Charlie Kirk, who was on his show, said, ‘One thing I learned in my podcast experience that the California governor isn’t a joke. He has a shark’s instincts, and he’s hoping that voters will have a goldfish memory,’” Bash continued, later noting that Newsom still has “to get through the Democratic primary” if he wants to be president.
Watch the clip above via CNN.
