California governor Gavin Newsom stopped by “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Tuesday night, and he’s pretty sure he knows why his strategy of mocking President Trump on social media via mimicry is upsetting so many Fox News hosts.
To kick off his interview with the governor, Colbert first applauded Newsom for taking a different approach.
“You’ve got this new communication strategy — or at least, new for a Democrat — it’s called, I hope I’m pronouncing this correctly, ‘being interesting,’” Colbert joked. “When did it occur to you? When did the lightning bulb go on over your head that perhaps you should do something that was kind of funny and make a point?”
Newsom then explained that it was the product of both “desperation” and “inspiration,” and argued that Democrats rarely use humor as they should.
“I never imagined it would break through like it has,” Newsom admitted. “And get under the skin of the President of the United States, and some of my friends.”
At that, Colbert wondered exactly who those friends are, prompting Newsom to joke that some of them work at “Pravda,” Fox News. For those unfamiliar, Pravda is a Russian newspaper owned by the Communist party (Fox itself is not actually Russian-owned). Colbert cracked up, and brought up a clip of Dana Perino slamming Newsom’s social media tactics on-air.
“It wasn’t even Dana, it was Hannity, all these guys!” Newsom said. “Outraged, offended, disgusted. Because we put a mirror up to Trump and the absurdity of what’s going on in this country. The absurdity of Donald Trump, the absurdity!”
You can watch the discussion in the video above.
