Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) is reportedly staying in the National Governors Association after threatening to leave the group if it did not condemn the Trump administration’s inter-state National Guard deployments.
In early October, Newsom and Gov. JB Pritzker (D-IL) each sent individual letters to the bipartisan group of governors asking it to denounce President Donald Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops between states. The request came after Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) agreed to send Texas National Guard troops to Illinois without Pritzker’s request.
The two blue-state governors, who are possible contenders for the 2028 Democratic presidential nominee, threatened to pull their state’s membership from the organization if it did not take a stand. Chairman of the association, Gov. Kevin Stitt (R-OK), denounced the deployment of the Texas National Guard to Illinois several days after their letter, but the group as a whole did not condemn the action.
Newsom said Tuesday he would, in fact, be staying in the organization, but would not pay dues, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
“California will remain part of the National Governors Association, but we will no longer cover the costs for states like Texas and Florida that refuse to pay their dues,” Izzy Gardon, spokesman for Newsom, wrote in a statement to the outlet.
Gardon said the decision follows the NGA’s inability to “issue even the most routine, nonpartisan statements.”
“Our decision comes after the NGA has been unable to issue even the most routine, nonpartisan statements – including on deployment authority for the National Guard and illegal federal funding cuts that affect all our constituents,” Gardon told the outlet in a statement.
California stopped paying its over $180,000 in dues to the NGA in August, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
The Washington Examiner has reached out to the NGA about the change.
In mid-October, Stitt told the New York Times that he believes in the “federalist system” and “state’s rights,” saying, “Oklahomans would lose their mind if Pritzker in Illinois sent troops down to Oklahoma during the Biden administration.”
Stitt maintained his support for Trump’s law and order agenda, but criticized the inter-state deployments of the National Guard against the will of the affected state’s sitting governor.
“I was surprised that Gov. Abbott sent troops from Texas to Illinois,” Stitt said in October. “Abbott and I sued the Biden administration when the shoe was on the other foot, and the Biden administration was trying to force us to vaccinate all of our soldiers and force masks across the country.”
Stitt’s criticism fell in line with Newsom’s October letter request. Newsom asked his fellow governors to denounce what he called an “infringement of state sovereignty.”
STITT DISAGREES WITH TEXAS NATIONAL GUARD DEPLOYMENT TO CHICAGO
“It should not be difficult for state leaders, regardless of partisan affiliation, to agree that politicizing our states’ National Guard and deploying the Guard from one state into another, over the objections of the home-state Governor, harms the interests of states,” Newsom wrote in October.
Newsom’s office did not respond to the Washington Examiner‘s requests for comment.
