Happy Friday Slatesters. It's another round of What Next Plus. This is the special bonus show where we talk to some of the hardworking writers of Slate.com about their biggest swings and hottest takes. This week, we're talking about a controversial figure. Our guest is not controversial, but his topic of choice is, because Gavin Newsom,

the long, long time political from California, who's rolled out a new, I don't know what you'd

call this, Ben Mathis Lilley. Would you call this a publicity stunt, political messaging? What's

going on with Gavin Newsom? Why is he what we are talking about this week?

It's a new persona. A new persona. Whoa. Yeah. He has adopted, for those who have not been keeping

up with it, adopted Donald Trump's mannerisms on social media with all capital letters and the praising himself and the repeating

other people's praise of him and saying things. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Exactly. He finishes with the initials now actually, GCN. And this is kind of was launched.

So it is political messaging because it was launched in conjunction with his push to get

California congressional redistricting on the ballot for this fall, aka gerrymandering.

Yeah, let me just interrupt you here for a second, Ben.

Because I have not fully introduced

you.

Ben Mathis Lilley, you are filling in for Jim Newell who is on paternity leave, doing the

surge, Jim's weekly email newsletter, which is fantastic.

Everyone should subscribe to it.

Ben is also fantastic.

You should read everything he writes.

Okay. Let's go back to explaining this.

Sure. Gavin Newsom. So Gavin Newsom, I've been following the fact that he was in this redistricting mess. After Texas decided we're going to redistrict to get five more seats for Donald Trump, then California's like, hold it. What about us?

Exactly. Lots of Democrats out there.

Lots of chances to turn the districts into an even more favorable setup for the Democratic Party, if you so choose.

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