Comedian Joe Rogan sent a question to California Gov. Gavin Newsom pressing him on his pandemic record. (Getty Images)
"Second to that, do you feel any remorse for that draconian decision that was obviously heavily influenced by the pharmaceutical companies’ desire for maximum profit?"
Newsom denied that he caved to the pharmaceutical industry, saying he’s passed "some of the most progressive laws" against Big Pharma in the nation.
He also defended his record on the pandemic, arguing California worked closely with the Trump administration and moved aggressively to mitigate damage from the virus, "like many states, red states included."
"I mean, Florida shut down their bars and restaurants before California. The question was, when did we start to unwind some of those restrictions? California was more restrictive and we were certainly aggressive at scale," he said.
The governor claimed his team was compiling an "objective review" of the good and bad outcomes of these policies and comparing them to what other states did.
Regarding vaccines, Newsom declared they "save lives" but that he respected Rogan's question. He explained that he received "a lot of feedback" from independent advisors regarding their safety.
"I took their advice, not as a doctor, but as a governor. So, with humility —seriously —humility and grace, I've asked them to have that report done. It's going to be done next month. And it'll be the only state that I know of that is putting out a truly objective review of what went right and what went wrong," he added.
Hundreds gather at the pier and Pacific Coast Highway to protest a state-mandated curfew of 10 pm in November 2020. ((Robert Gauthier/ Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
"I know everyone’s a Godd--- genius now in hindsight," Newsom declared. "But at the time, none of us knew what we were up against, including the President of the United States, who I worked very closely with."
Newsom appeared to shift some of the scrutiny of his leadership onto President Donald Trump, claiming he worked closer with Trump than any other Democratic governor during the pandemic.
"And I say that with the kind of humility he deserves as well —grace that he deserves in terms of the decisions he made early on. We were all up against something none of us had any experience on," he said.
When asked if he had made any mistakes during the pandemic, Newsom named the closures of outdoor spaces like beaches as something he would've done differently.
