Exclusive | Gavin Newsoms new campaign play: Slide into your group chats

Gov.Gavin Newsom is courting supporters for his likely 2028 presidential campaign with an amorous new message: “Are you up for trying something new?”That frisky email subject line landed in inboxes Wednesday from Newsom’s federal political action committee, Campaign for Democracy, just days before the governor heads to Michigan to piggyback on Democrat Abdul El-Sayed’s victory in the state’s closely watched U.S.

Senate primary.Newsom’s email lays out a new “digital” political operation his PAC is launching to help elect Democrats — and spread the gospel of Newsom — by training supporters to implant Newsom’s talking points into family text chains, alumni Facebook groups and other online communities, where politics isn’t typically discussed.“A lot of those spaces aren’t political at all,” the email says.“That’s the point.”Instead of hoping campaign ads or official social media posts reach persuadable voters, Newsom’s PAC — which raised $250,000 after announcing he and his wife are under FBI investigation — will be holding training sessions every Tuesday for the next eight weeks to teach people to digest Newsom’s messaging and regurgitate it to friends, family and associates in their own words.“So the task isn’t forwarding talking points or propaganda,” the email says.

“It’s taking what we send you and translating it for people you understand better than we do.”The email adds, “The person already in that room is the only one who can get a message in, and the only one who knows how to say it so it doesn’t feel out of place.”Volunteers who sign up are invited to weekly virtual training sessions where they’ll learn how to become what the PAC calls a “Messenger” and use a web app called Echo to distribute campaign-approved content through their existing online networks.“The left has this preoccupation of making everything political and this is carrying it to another extreme,” Matthew Klink, a Los Ang...