Gov. Gavin Newsom holds a press conference at East Los Angeles College on Wednesday, February 26, 2025. Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom on his new podcast, “This is Gavin Newsom,” said that transgender athletes competing in girls’ and women’s sports was “deeply unfair.”

Why it matters: Newsom had been a strong advocate for LGBTQ+ rights over the years but has vetoed several bills to bolster protections for transgender children and adults. Now he’s breaking with many Democrats on the issue of trans people in sports.

• President Trump made attacks on transgender people central to the closing weeks of his campaign, and he’s used executive actions to remove protections from transgender Americans in the military, in sports and on government documents.

Driving the news: In the conversation with right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk, Kirk asked Newsom to speak on the issue, specifically about a transgender high school track athlete in California.

• “I think it’s an issue of fairness. I completely agree with you on that,” Newsom said to Kirk.

By the numbers: 66% of U.S. adults favor or strongly favor laws that require trans athletes to participate on teams that match their sex assigned at birth, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center.

• But 56% of adults express support for protecting trans people from discrimination.

Catch up quick: In the friendly interview with Kirk, Newsom also distanced himself from the phrase “Latinx” saying no one in his office has ever used the term.

• They also discussed the impact influencers like Kirk have on Newsom’s 13-year-old son, book bans, “wokeism” and pronouns.
• Newsom also said there were “issues” with leadership of the Black Lives Matter organization and said pushes to defund the police were “lunacy.”

The bottom line: The Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ+ advocacy organization, says the attack on trans athletes has been a “non-issue” with athletic governing bodies balancing fairness and inclusion without difficulty.

• “Longstanding anti-equality activists manufactured a misinformed conversation about elite, adult athletes to justify passing extreme, discriminatory legislation targeting transgender youth in schools,” the organization wrote in a fact sheet about trans sports bans.