Governor Gavin Newsom has gone viral for stealing from Target. Kind of.
In reality, the governor did not steal anything. But as he tells it, he witnessed someone brazenly walking out of a Sacramento-area store with a bunch of stolen stuff, presumably right in front of his own intimidating-looking security team. And when Newsom asked why no one was taking action, the staffer told him it was the governor's fault.
Newsom has made stealing too easy, he said the employee told him, before realizing who it was and freaking out.
Newsom, who was Christmas shopping with one of his children at the time, said he was outraged. It's just not true, he said he told the employee. California has the tenth strictest retail theft law in the country, he lectured, in a way that must have seemed super strange until she deduced her identity.
“I said, 'Why didn't you stop him?' Newsom said he asked the employee.
“She says, 'Oh, the governor,'” he broke off, “I swear to God, true story, on my mother's grave.” She added that the official had the audacity to tell her: “The governor lowered the threshold, there is no accountability. … We are not stopping them because of the governor.”
Newsom told the story this week to a group of mayors from across the state who had gathered on Zoom for a news conference about his mental health initiative, Proposition 1. He and the mayors chatted among themselves as they waited for London Breed and Saint Francis of San Francisco. Todd Gloria from Diego to log in. After telling the anecdote, the governor added that he hoped the two mayors were not the only ones who had not yet registered for Zoom. “Hopefully, not all the journalists were present,” he said.
Too late. The exchange, published in X (formerly known as Twitter) and then picked up by television and print media around the state, quickly went viral: catnip in the heated debate over retail theft and Proposition 47, which reduced some thefts and related crimes with drugs to minor crimes to reduce mass incarceration. Some critics have blamed Proposition 47 for the rise in robberies.
Newsom himself came out last month calling for legislation to crack down on “professional thieves” without amending Proposition 47, noting that one of the wine stores he owns in San Francisco was robbed at least three times in 2021. He noted that Texas' threshold for crimes serious theft is among those which is higher than that of California.
But those points did little to quell the viral story. State Republican Party Chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson quickly came to the fore, writing in X: “Thank you to this store clerk for saying to the governor's face what every Californian has wanted to say: that he and his radical @CA_Dem Friends are to blame for the increase in crime in CA. Unfortunately, Newsom still didn't seem to take the hint.”
Newsom's office declined to identify which Target the encounter occurred at, to prevent the media from raiding the store. They said the encounter took place in the Sacramento area around Christmas time while the governor was shopping with one of his children.
The exchange, the governor said, ended with an attempt to take a photo.
As the governor explained how strict California's laws against retail theft really are, the employee, he said, “looks at me twice. She gets scared. She calls everyone and she wants to take photos.”
“I said no, I'm not taking a photo,” Newsom said. “We are having a conversation. Where is your manager? How do you blame the governor?
He added: “Why am I spending $380? Everyone can leave immediately.
