California Gov. Gavin Newsom may have to fill another senate vacancy, and if he does, the governor intends to appoint a black woman.
The California governor told MSNBC’s Joy Reid in an interview on Monday that he already has a couple of ideas of whom he could appoint to fill a seat in the event Sen. Dianne Feinstein, 87, chooses to retire before her term is up in 2025.
“I have multiple names in mind. We have multiple names in mind — and the answer is yes,” he said in response to Reid’s question about if he’d nominate a black woman.
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Newsom recently appointed Sen. Alex Padilla to fill the vacancy left by Kamala Harris, who went on to assume the vice presidency following the November election.
“I am honored and humbled by the trust placed in me by Governor Newsom, and I intend to work each and every day to honor that trust and deliver for all Californians,” Padilla said in a statement at the time Newsom announced the appointment. “From those struggling to make ends meet to the small businesses fighting to keep their doors open to the health care workers looking for relief, please know that I am going to the Senate to fight for you. We will get through this pandemic together and rebuild our economy in a way that doesn’t leave working families behind.”
Newsom, at the time, faced pressure to pick either a black woman, because Harris was the only black woman in the Senate and now there aren’t any, or someone who is Latino, given the state’s large Latino population and the fact that they’ve never had a Latino senator.
Feinstein, who has served in the Senate for nearly three decades, has faced numerous questions about her mental state given her advanced age.
Notably, she garnered criticism from her own party for praising Republican senator and then-Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham for how he conducted Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearing. As a consequence of this blowback, Feinstein opted not to seek the chairmanship of the Judiciary Committee for the current legislative session.
Currently, the California governor is attempting to fend off a recall effort.
On Monday, Newsom pushed back on the effort, encouraging people to donate to his campaign and claiming that the recall efforts are being led by “a partisan, Republican coalition of national Republicans, anti-vaxxers, Q-Anon conspiracy theorists, and anti-immigrant Trump supporters.”
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Many of those supporting the recall effort say they are largely driven by Newsom’s coronavirus restrictions and handling of the pandemic. Last week, the recall campaign surpassed more than 2 million signatures, though most still need to be verified by the secretary of state’s office before an October recall election can be triggered. The deadline to submit the petition to recall Newsom is March 17.
