CHICAGO – Gov. Gavin Newsom said in the four weeks since Vice President Kamala Harris replaced President Biden at the top of the Democratic Party’s 2024 ticket, “everyone and their mother is jumping on to help.”
Harris has been riding a wave of momentum as she has enjoyed a surge in polling and fundraising after Biden’s blockbuster announcement that he was ending his re-election bid for a second term in the White House.
Biden’s disastrous performance against former President Trump in their late June debate fueled questions over whether the 81-year-old president had the physical and mental abilities to handle another four years in the White House and sparked a chorus of calls from within his own party to end his 2024 campaign.
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Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris clasps her hand in the air with President Biden at the Democratic National Convention on Monday, Aug. 19, 2024 in Chicago. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Biden eventually caved to the pressure, announcing the suspension of his re-election campaign three days after the Republican National Convention ended with a solidified GOP ticket of Trump and running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance.
Until Biden dropped out of the race, Newsom had been one of the president’s top surrogates.
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When asked if he would be as voracious for Harris on the campaign trail as he was for Biden, the two-term California governor pointed to his longtime friendship and working relationship with the vice president, who also hails from the Golden State.
“We knew each other a decade before we both got into politics. One of my oldest friends. So it’s a no brainier,” Newsom told Fox News Digital on Monday during the first night of the Democratic National Convention at Chicago’s United Center arena.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom poses for a selfie photo with supporters at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Aug. 19, 2024. (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)
“But here’s the difference,” Newsom said. “I’m a solution in search of a problem. Everyone and their mother is jumping on to help. So, I’m as needed. But obviously all in.”
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However, Newsom, who is thought to have long harbored national ambitions of his own, added that he may not be asked by the Harris campaign to hit the trail on behalf of the vice president.
“We’ll see. Because everybody’s out there. Everybody’s doing everything,” the governor said.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a top surrogate for President Biden, speaks with voters during a stop at a highway rest area in Hooksett, New Hampshire, on July 8, 2024. (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)
Pointing to his campaign travels across the country on behalf of Biden this summer before the president ended his 2024 bid, Newsom told this reporter “you were with me in New Hampshire. There wasn’t many of us. Everything about that was very different. Right now, everybody is out there for Kamala.”
“Everybody’s sort of jumping over each other to be out there on the campaign trail.”
Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
Paul Steinhauser is a politics reporter based in New Hampshire.
