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Gavin Newsom’s latest exposure isn’t a policy memo — it’s a business balance sheet. A recent deep-dive shows the California governor built a sprawling hospitality and winery network with help from wealthy insiders, and the optics of that empire are rotten for a man who lectures the country on fairness and “saving” the middle class.
The PlumpJack story began in 1992 as a San Francisco wine shop seeded by a family friend, billionaire Gordon Getty, and grew into wineries, restaurants, bars, inns and retail holdings across Napa and beyond. Forbes’ reporting notes the wineries alone are valued in the hundreds of millions, which means Newsom’s minority stakes could be worth tens of millions — hardly the profile of a public servant living on a governor’s salary.
When critics raised questions about conflicts, Newsom punted — he put assets into a blind trust and issued an executive order barring state executive branch agencies from doing business with PlumpJack — a defensive move that looks more like optics management than meaningful divestment. The order itself acknowledges the problem, but it doesn’t make his family’s continued control of the business disappear.
Worse, the PlumpJack network drew federal COVID relief — about $2.9 million in PPP loans went to companies tied to the group — a fact that ought to make every taxpayer uneasy when luxury wineries and innkeepers drew down big checks while Main Street businesses struggled. The law may have allowed the loans, but the appearance of government aid flowing to firms tied to a sitting governor is a scandal of poor judgment at best.
This isn’t a Silicon Valley garage story of risk and sweat equity; it’s old-money access, backroom financing and family hand-offs dressed up as entrepreneurship. Public records reviewed by reporters show sales to and buybacks from wealthy backers, family members running day-to-day operations, and a pattern where money and influence keep circling in the same elite orbit. Californians deserve to know whether policy decisions favor friends and funders.
For conservatives who believe in accountability, the lesson is simple: rhetoric about economic justice rings hollow when the speaker sits on a multimillion-dollar hospitality empire. If Newsom envisions a national run, voters outside California should demand full transparency, not PR adjustments or a blind trust that still leaves a visible trail of family control and billionaire connections.
If Washington and Sacramento are going to lecture hardworking Americans about sacrifice and shared burden, those lecturing must be held to the same standard. Call it common-sense oversight: sell the stakes, sever the special favors, and stop using the trappings of public office to shield private wealth. Until that happens, rank-and-file Americans should treat every moral sermon from Sacramento with a healthy dose of skepticism.
