Newsom blasts Trump over Iran strikes: 'Weakness masquerading as strength'
Source: Politico
02/28/2026 11:45 PM EST
SAN FRANCISCO — Gavin Newsom lit into Donald Trump over the strikes in Iran, casting the attack as a sign of ‘weakness’ and meant to distract from the president’s abysmal poll numbers. “It stems from weakness masquerading as strength,” Newsom told a San Francisco audience during a Saturday night event to promote his new memoir. “It stems from the complete failure of this administration, this president who’s historically unpopular.”
The California governor, a likely 2028 Democratic presidential contender, said Trump is trying to distract voters from his failures “across the spectrum” and accused Trump of “doubling down on stupid” during his State of the Union speech earlier this week.
In his remarks, Newsom joined his party’s harshest critics of the strikes, even as some battleground Democrats on Saturday took a more cautious tone.
California is home to more than half of the nearly 400,000 Iranian immigrants in the United States. The West Los Angeles neighborhood known as Tehrangeles had erupted earlier Saturday in celebration amid reports Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been killed. Many Iranian Americans hope it will mean the fall of the Islamic Republic’s regime.
Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/28/newsom-blasts-trump-over-iran-strikes-weakness-masquerading-as-strength-00806178
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