It’s a PR war, boys and girls: Strap on a helmet and report to duty.
Our first battlefield is the People’s Republic of Los Angeles. (Alas, beautiful, glamorous Tinseltown has gone from swimming pools and movie stars to foreign flags and public defecation. Pro Tip: If you see any “bubblin’ crude” on the streets of L.A., for God’s sake, please don’t touch it.)
But Los Angeles won’t be the last battlefield. These protests are gonna be like acne on a teenager’s face: They’ll be poppin’ up all over the place.
And that part of the news cycle is (largely) out of our hands. Whenever you’re dealing with mass protests, mob violence, and nationalized vigilantism, there’s an element of unpredictability. All it takes is the “right” martyr — on the right platform — and the storyline will morph into something we cannot anticipate.
It could happen at any moment.
That’s dangerous, because PR experts are MUCH better day two, day three, and day four thinkers. Nine times out of 10, the quality of our thoughts dramatically improves when we have more time to consider all the angles. (It’s something I’ve told clients repeatedly: If you wanna know my thoughts on day one, I’ll certainly tell you — but the more time I have to think about something, the more likely it’ll be that I’ll come up with something better.)
This means that if the dominoes start falling in rapid succession, neither side will wait for a thoughtful, measured PR response. Instead, emotions will take over. The loudest, most passionate voices will prevail.
That exponentially increases the probability of unforced PR errors.
This is a high-risk, high-reward gamble for both sides. It’s blackjack at the Bellagio with cranberries.
For Gov. Gavin Newsom, the well-coifed Californian with presidential aspirations, the L.A. riots are his audition tape. He has the most to lose — but also the most to gain. Finally, after patiently awaiting his turn, he’s exactly where he wanted to be: At the tip of the political spear.
There’s a leadership vacuum in the Democratic Party, and I’m not just talking about that cute little catfight at the DNC. Too many bigwigs blew their credibility over Joe Biden’s now-obvious mental decline. Guys like Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) can’t lead the masses because the masses no longer believe them. The closer you were to Biden, the worse it was for your credibility.
It’s why Kamala Harris is adrift in the wilderness.
But Newsom was all the way in California. He’s ideally suited to close the (coloring) book on Biden, rebrand the Democratic Party, and slap a coat of fresh paint on American liberalism.
At least, that’s his sales pitch.
Even before the riots, Newsom was selling himself as the solution to the Democratic Party’s “manhood problem.” As we noted about his podcast strategy:
Typically, when a Democrat has presidential aspirations, you’d expect him to book podcast guests with liberal thought leaders — people such as Obama, Oprah, Nancy Pelosi, Bernie Sanders, or Rachel Maddow. That would be the smartest, fastest way to not only communicate to your base that you’re “one of them,” but to also let them know that all the top thought-leaders believe in you, too.
But that’s not at all what Newsom is doing. Instead, his first three guests were Charlie Kirk, Michael Savage, and Steve Bannon!
And in the process, he’s making a novel argument to the Democratic base: we can’t beat MAGA unless we have a candidate who can talk to their side, and I’m the only MAN who can do it.
He’s not running on representation; he’s running on persuasion. He’s not saying he “looks like America”; he’s saying he can persuade the rest of America.
Most specifically, the Americans that the Democrats have left behind: men.
Gavin Newsom has cast himself as the de facto liberal alternative to President Donald Trump. This is his big moment: He needs to nationalize the protests.
The bigger they get and the more they spread, the better it is for his presidential aspirations.
It can’t just be an L.A. thing. It’s gotta go national ASAP: New York City, Washington, Chicago, Boston, and every other liberal stronghold. For the Democratic Party, it’s a “get out the vote” dress rehearsal.
Newsom wants to grease the wheels, goading Trump into an overreaction. It’s why he’s daring Trump to arrest him: For his purposes, it would be a PR home run.
Meanwhile, Trump doesn’t give a damn about placating liberal voters or positioning himself for the 2028 primaries. He’s about the here and now. And he knows that immigration is his best issue.
Trump wins by turning the protests into a series of binary questions: Who do you trust to stop illegal immigration? Who do you trust to protect you from these violent thugs waving foreign flags?
The scarier the images of the rioters, the better it is for Trump. And the more “foreign” they appear, the greater the blowback. (Y’know, before their next protest, someone in the GOP oughta ship ‘em a box of Mexican flags: Here you go, mi amigo. ¡Pásalo bien!)
Sadly, this creates a dynamic where both sides are incentivized to play the brinksmanship game. Neither side wins by backing down.
This means that things are gonna get way worse before they get better.
And it’ll likely reach a crescendo on Saturday.
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