On Tuesday, California Governor Gavin Newsom delivered his annual State of the State address. Of course, saying he "delivered" the speech is a bit of a stretch. He actually recorded it in advance and then released it to his social media accounts and the press. For much of the speech, he put on his Biden campaign surrogate hat and defended the President, while accusing Donald Trump of being a Nazi and all of the trolling we've come to expect from these people. The one item of interest from the speech came when he attempted to push back on criticism from conservatives regarding how badly Newsom's policies have run the state into the ground. He referred to "delusional California bashers" and claimed that everything is going swimmingly in the Golden State, despite what you may be witnessing with your own eyes. Most incredibly, he claimed that they are making great inroads in combatting crime because in California, "we take public safety seriously." You really can't make this stuff up. (Washington Times)

The political tone of Newsom’s speech was not surprising given his role as one of the Biden campaign’s top surrogates, which has made him a target of Republicans who have repeatedly held up California as an example of Democrats’ mismanagement. They have pointed to the state’s $46.8 billion budget deficit, high tax rates, large homeless population and the proliferation of property crimes in its largest cities - acts which have been captured in viral social media clips.

Much of Newsom’s speech was devoted to pushing back against that narrative, referring to “delusional California bashers” whose “success depends on our failure.” He noted California’s violent crime rate is about half of what it was at its peak in 1992. He said property crime in San Francisco has fallen as has the overall crime rate across the bay in Oakland - where Newsom recently deployed 120 California Highway Patrol officers.

“That’s because in California, we take public safety seriously - a problem to solve, not just to flog on cable news,” he said.

Newsom is always very careful with his words. He would like to "suggest" that crime is down across the board, but that's obviously not accurate. It's true that some types of violent crime - including murder - are down a bit from their recent high levels, which is a good thing to be sure. But property crime is through the roof, particularly when it comes to retail theft and also carjackings. Crimes involving illegal migrants are also on the rise and showing up on the evening news regularly.

A state that "takes public safety seriously" wouldn't release the vast majority of criminals back onto the streets without bail. Such a state also wouldn't reduce serious crimes such as high-value property theft from felonies to misdemeanors. But all of these things have happened in California under Gavin Newsom's tenure. If things are going so well, why are so many people fleeing the state? California is still ranked number one as the state that the most people are moving away from. 

Newsom went on from there to defend his decision to jack up the minimum wage so high, particularly for fast food workers. He completely ignored the fact that fast food is now so expensive that most people can't afford it and literally dozens of businesses have shut down and/or moved out of the state since the law took effect. He bragged about "four of the seven most valuable companies in the world" being based in California. But he's talking about the tech sector that is largely immune to most of these problems. Even then, some of them are moving out or talking about it, including Tesla, which relocated to Texas.

So why did Newsom do a prerecorded speech rather than a live one? For one thing, he has a constitutional obligation to deliver a State of the State address, but it's not mandatory that it be given live. Also, a less frequently reported fact about Newsom is that he suffers from dyslexia and has difficulty reading from a prompter. I suppose none of us should be shocked that he would include so many blatantly untrue things in his remarks. If he were being honest, he would have told California residents that the state of their state is largely a dumpster fire.

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