Gavin Newsom's press office posted a series of photos on X this Thursday featuring prominent Democratic figures, each paired with a flattering superlative. Barack Obama got "a functioning brain." Kamala Harris got "respected around the world." Joe Biden got "empathy."
That's it. That's the tell.
The posts invited users to retweet if they missed having a president or vice president with the listed quality. Obama's read: "RT if you miss having a President with a functioning brain." Biden's: "RT if you miss having a President with empathy." The internet did what the internet does and drew the obvious conclusion: even Newsom's own team couldn't bring itself to attribute cognitive sharpness to the 83-year-old former president.
Whether the juxtaposition was intentional remains an open question. What isn't open is the reaction. According to the Daily Mail, one X user put it simply: "The implication here is so funny I can't even think of a joke." Another was more direct: "They knew what they were doing."
When the GOP reposted the content, Newsom's press office responded with the breezy confidence of a team that either didn't see the problem or didn't care:
"Yes. Thank you for reposting some of our best tweets?"
Not exactly a denial. Not exactly an explanation. The kind of non-answer that confirms what everyone already suspected.
This wasn't even the first time Newsom's account drew the contrast. An earlier post showed Biden riding a bicycle with the caption: "Happy birthday, President @JoeBiden! We miss having a president who has physical stamina - and a functioning brain." That post attributed both physical and mental fitness to Biden, which is a generous reading of a man who was often seen tripping up the steps of Air Force One and suffering multiple senior moments on stage during his presidency.
The Democratic establishment spent the better part of two years insisting Joe Biden was sharp, engaged, and fully capable of serving as commander-in-chief. Then came the June 2024 debate with Donald Trump, where Biden repeatedly lost his train of thought on national television. That performance effectively ended his reelection campaign.
The timeline matters:
Newsom, described as a close confidante to Biden, was part of the apparatus that propped up this fiction for as long as it was politically useful. Now his office is out here sorting Democrats by superlative and quietly slotting Biden into the "feelings" category while Obama gets the brain. The revisionism isn't subtle. It's just late.
A clumsy social media post from a governor's press shop isn't, by itself, a major political event. What makes it worth noting is what it reveals about where the Democratic Party has landed on Biden.
They can't defend the record, so they're sanitizing it. Biden becomes the president of "empathy," a word that demands nothing and concedes everything. It's the participation trophy of presidential legacies. You give someone credit for empathy when you can't give them credit for competence.
The same press office also called George W. Bush the "smartest Republican President of the new millennium," a transparent shot at President Trump dressed up as a compliment to a man Democrats spent eight years calling a war criminal. The consistency of principle is breathtaking. Bush was a dangerous idiot when he held power. Now he's a useful prop when the target changes.
This is how the left operates. Every Republican is the worst person alive until a newer Republican needs to be attacked, at which point the old one gets rehabilitated just enough to serve as a cudgel. The cycle never breaks because it was never about principle. It's about utility.
Newsom himself has offered no direct comment on the posts. His office hasn't clarified. No correction has been issued, and no explanation has been offered beyond that glib reply to the GOP account.
The silence is the strategy. If you deny it, you draw more attention. If you explain it, you admit the implication exists. So you play it off as a joke, let the news cycle move on, and hope nobody screenshots the receipts.
But the receipts exist. The Democratic Party told the American public that Joe Biden was fit to lead the free world while evidence mounted that he was not. His own doctor wouldn't administer a cognitive test. His debate performance was a national embarrassment that his own party used as justification to push him aside. And now the governor of California, one of Biden's allies, can't even assign him "a functioning brain" in a social media game.
They don't have to say the quiet part. They already posted it.