Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) on Tuesday made attacking the Trump administration a running theme of his 2025 State of the State address, reviewing California’s record this year.
In a written address, Newsom highlighted his administration’s response to affordability, housing, homelessness and the deadly Los Angeles fires. He argued that California has “built an economic foundation that supports everyone in our state,” pointing to efforts to remove regulatory barriers and to use “climate investments” and education to create a “green economy” and “millions” of jobs.
However, it was a focus on President Donald Trump that emerged as the common thread in Newsom’s letter to California lawmakers. The governor specifically condemned the White House for seeking to roll back the state’s environmental regulations, rescinding hundreds of millions in federal funding to the University of California Los Angeles over concerns the prestigious institution failed to take adequate measures to protect Jewish students from antisemitism, and sending the National Guard to Los Angeles in June to protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations to deport illegal immigrants.
In response, Newsom highlighted 41 lawsuits he said California has filed against the Trump administration, “to challenge federal actions that threaten to drive up prices, force layoffs, and inflict economic ruin.” As speculation mounts that the governor plans to run for president in 2028, Newsom on Tuesday painted himself as the savior of sanity in the face of the Trump administration, which he accused of seeking to undermine the foundations of democracy.
“California is menaced by a federal administration that dismantles public services, punishes allies across the globe, and sweeps the rule of law into the gutter,” Newsom wrote. “But California, this uniquely blessed state, is standing up.”
“The state of the state is strong, fully committed to defending democracy, and resolved to never bend,” he continued. “Through the courts — and the raised voices of everyday people — California has resisted this dangerous and un-American assault on our values. We are committed to protecting the men and women who make this state stronger through their hard work and entrepreneurial spirit.”
Republicans responded to Newsom’s letter with derision, accusing him of creating California’s multi-billion-dollar budget deficit after the state enjoyed a $97 billion surplus in 2022, and falling miserably short of solving the affordability, housing, and homelessness crises. Newsom was also targeted by Republican Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher for declining to include funding in the state budget to implement Prop. 36, an anti-crime ballot initiative passed by voters last November.
“We’ve just spent money on a new special election, $250 million, but he didn’t have enough money to fully fund Prop. 36 and keep you safe from criminals on our streets,” Gallagher said.
“He announces another special task force to clean up encampments, but we’ve heard that before, and yet the encampments are still there,” he continued. “We see this governor who refuses to really do anything when it comes to our affordability crisis reducing any costs. Have our utility costs gone down? No. Have our gas prices gone down? No, all these things the governor continues to ignore. Why? Because he’s running for president. His ambitions are more than his ability to govern this state.”
Gallagher’s criticism of Newsom comes as the split between the governor and the GOP has widened in recent months as Sacramento engages in a war of worldviews with Washington.
A governor who refuses to show up and face his Legislature is a governor who won’t show up for the people he’s failing.
That’s why we did.
Watch our official Republican response to Gavin C. Newsom’s pre-scripted #CASOTS #CA175 spin. pic.twitter.com/TvMH7LdLyi
— California Assembly Republicans (@AsmRepublicans) September 9, 2025
Trump has gone after California on a litany of issues, from environmental regulations he says are strangling economic development and transgender policies he believes put biological females at risk for discrimination, to educational systems the White House believes have allowed Jews to suffer from antisemitic attacks on campus, and immigration policies it says have put citizens second to those in the country illegally.
The president’s actions have sparked defiant reactions from Newsom’s administration.
In June, Trump triggered a lawsuit from California Attorney General Rob Bonta when he signed three measures to “rescue the U.S. auto industry from destruction” that blocked the Golden State’s environmental mandates to phase out gas-powered cars and regulate diesel trucks with ramped-up zero-emissions standards. The president’s Congressional Review Act or CRA resolutions came weeks before Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency targeted California’s regulations on heavy-duty vehicles.
The Trump administration’s move to rescind millions in federal funding from UCLA, one of the most acclaimed universities in the U.S., has likewise triggered lawsuits from Bonta, as the Newsom administration bickers with the White House over whether the state allowed antisemitism to fester on campuses of federally funded schools.
One of Newsom’s most high-profile conflicts with the Trump administration, however, was the president’s move to deploy federal troops to Los Angeles over the summer amid protests and riots against ICE operations targeting suspected illegal immigrants in the state. Washington recently extended the National Guard’s stay in the city until the beginning of November.
Trump has defended the controversial move, saying it was warranted to quell violence, stop crime, and provide protection to ICE agents carrying out immigration operations. Newsom said the city’s militarization was unlawful, arguing that Trump is illegally attempting to use the military as a domestic police force. The disagreement continues to play out in a court battle.
Other battles include whether California should be able to continue gender identity policies that allow biological males who identify as the opposite sex to use private female spaces, including in schools, and compete in female sports.
On Tuesday, Gallagher, one of the most powerful Republican lawmakers in California, suggested Newsom delivered his second-to-last State of the State address by letter instead of the decades-long tradition of giving an in-person speech to lawmakers at the Sacramento capital because he was “too afraid to come and actually talk about what the state of the state actually is.”
CRIME IN US CITIES AS TRUMP AIMS TO EXPAND CRACKDOWN: LATEST COVERAGE
“His ambitions are more than his ability to govern this state,” Gallagher said, referencing the governor’s rumored aspirations to run for president. “And here is another symbol of that, not showing up to talk about what is actually going on in the state and how we can actually come together to get things done.”
Newsom has been criticized for abandoning the traditional method, as his address this week marked the fifth year in a row the governor has declined to give the annual speech in person to lawmakers at the state Capitol. In 2021, Newsom, who shuns reading from a teleprompter due to his dyslexia, gave the speech at an empty Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles amid the pandemic. In 2022, the address was made in the auditorium of the California Natural Resources Agency. In 2023, he used a four-day policy tour across California to send his message, as well as a letter to legislators similar to this year’s. In 2024, the governor posted the speech as a pre-recorded message to his social media channels.