Politics
Gavin Newsom, during his speech at the Vatican on climate change, accuses Trump of 'open corruption'
Gov. Gavin Newsom accused former President Trump of “open corruption” in a speech Thursday at a climate summit of Catholic officials and international leaders, elevating his criticism of the Republican leader in the hallowed halls of the Vatican.
The California governor referenced news stories alleging that Trump recently solicited campaign donations from oil executives and at the same event vowed to walk back climate protections if elected in the 2024 presidential contest.
“He openly asked them for $1 billion to roll back the environmental progress of the Biden administration, environmental progress that we’ve made over the course of the last half century,” Newsom said. “Open corruption. A billion dollars to pollute our states, to pollute our country, and to pollute this planet and roll back progress.”
The governor spoke at a three-day “From Climate Crisis to Climate Resilience” summit organized by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
Newsom said he decided to call out Trump by name at the international gathering of governors, mayors and policy experts because he felt stories about Trump’s meeting with oil executives didn’t get enough attention.
“It’s an expression of my sincerity about how serious I take this moment and how consequential it is,” the governor said about the possible negative effects on climate change if Trump returns to the White House.
His comments were also strategic. Climate change isn’t necessarily driving American Catholics to the polls, but drawing attention to an accusation of pay-to-play political corruption might resonate more with Pope Francis’ supporters in the U.S. More than 50 million Americans identify as Catholic.
Newsom’s appearance is likely to elevate his position as a climate leader on a world stage.
Gov. Gavin Newsom attends the “From Climate Crisis to Climate Resilience” summit.
(Gregorio Borgia / Associated Press)
With temperatures and carbon emissions rising worldwide, the aim of the conference is for local and state governments to share best practices about fighting climate change and adapting to hotter temperatures, rising seas and a more volatile environment.
Parts of Newsom’s talk matched the tenor of a critique of the oil industry he delivered last fall at the United Nations Climate Ambition Summit in New York.
“It’s because of the burning of gas, the burning of coal, the burning of oil,” Newsom said at the Vatican. “We have the tools. We have the technology. We have the capacity to address the issue at a global scale and they’ve been fighting every single advancement and we have got to call that out.”
Bob Salladay, Newsom’s top communications advisor, said his candid assessment earlier in New York of the industry, which he said was playing everyone for fools, caught the attention of the Vatican and is one of the reasons he was invited to speak at the climate summit.
The setting of his speech, in a carpeted auditorium at the Vatican that typically houses gatherings of bishops, drew a stark contrast to the marbled floors and renaissance murals that lined the walls and ceilings of Clementine Hall, where Newsom spoke with Pope Francis on Thursday morning.
In an address to government leaders and climate scientists in Clementine Hall, Pope Francis cast the destruction of the environment as an offense against God.
“This is the question: Are we working for a culture of life or for a culture of death?” Pope Francis said.
Newsom and his wife, First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom, sat in the second row of the audience in an Apostolic Palace near St. Peter’s Basilica.
A pope’s body is placed in the hall for private visitation upon his death. It’s also the same room that former President Obama visited in 2009.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul greets Pope Francis on Thursday in Vatican City.
(Riccardo De Luca / Associated Press)
Pope Francis called the refusal to protect the most vulnerable who are exposed to climate change caused by human activity a “grave violation of human rights.”
He said around 1 billion people in wealthier nations “produce more than half the heat trapping pollutants” of the world. Poorer people, he said, contribute less than 10% and suffer 75% of the resulting damage.
Pope Francis also took a shot at fossil fuel companies.
“An orderly progress is being held back by the greedy pursuit of short-term gains by polluting industries and by the spread of disinformation, which generates confusion and obstructs collective efforts for a change in course,” Francis said.
The governor called the pope’s address “remarkable.”
“I knew what I was going to say already, but he said it before I said it,” Newsom said.
After Francis’ speech, Newsom and Siebel Newsom walked along an aisle of ornate stone tiles to the front of the room, where the governor briefly spoke with the leader of the Catholic Church. The governor said the pope commended his administration’s work on the death penalty.
The governor said he was struck by the pope’s support for what Newsom described as a difficult decision to issue a moratorium on the death penalty and close California’s execution chambers in 2019.
At the time, more than 700 people were on death row. Newsom met with families of some of the victims who had been killed by the inmates.
“It was nice that he brought up the issue and thanked California for the direction we’re going,” Newsom said.
Newsom’s action ran counter to the expressed will of California voters, who over the previous six years had rejected two statewide ballot measures to repeal the death penalty.
A procession of attendees also greeted the pope, who took time to shake hands with every person in the room.
The pope signed a planetary compact after his speech, which Newsom and other government leaders also signed Thursday.
Wade Crowfoot, California’s Natural Resources secretary, described the compact as an unprecedented agreement among international governors, mayors, Indigenous leaders and scientists to work together to confront climate change with a focus on resiliency and equity.
Crowfoot and Lauren Sanchez, Newsom’s top climate advisor, also participated in hours of meetings at the conference on Wednesday.
Newsom is hosting a state climate summit in Southern California this fall as a continuation of the work at the Vatican conference. The state will be inviting local leaders and experts from California.
“We’re taking the torch of subnational leadership back to California, where it belongs, to convene scientists, local governments and leaders to tackle the climate threat that is the existential crisis of our time,” Sanchez said.
Some environmentalists in California said Newsom’s rhetoric on the global stage is not entirely matched by his actions at home. Though Newsom has championed many environmental measures and has waged a battle with oil companies as governor, he proposed cutting $3.6 billion for climate-related programs to help address the state budget deficit.
Susan Stephenson, executive director of a religious environmental advocacy organization called Interfaith Power and Light, took issue with a recent decision by Newsom’s appointees on the California Public Utilities Commission that she said would slow the use of rooftop solar power.
“He’s saying a lot of the right things,” Stephenson said. “And it is not matched by the urgency of action that we need as climate change is worsening.”
Newsom has also received criticism from some Republicans for traveling abroad instead of staying home to focus exclusively on California’s problems.
That was not the sentiment of a Democratic couple from Riverside who saw Newsom and his wife on a tour of the Roman Forum after the speech. They said they were surprised to see the governor in Rome.
Walter and Susan Davis said they believe in climate change and support the governor coming to deliver the speech, which they called “a real reason.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” Walter Davis said.
Times Sacramento Bureau Chief Laurel Rosenhall contributed to this report.
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For decades, American families have gathered to watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” on Christmas Eve.
The 1946 Frank Capra movie, about a man who on one of the worst days of his life discovers how he has positively impacted his hometown of Bedford Falls, is beloved for extolling selflessness, community and the little guy taking on rapacious capitalists. Take those values, add in powerful acting and the promise of light in the darkest of hours, and it’s the only movie that makes me cry.
No less a figure of goodwill than Pope Leo XIV revealed last month that it’s one of his favorite movies. But as with anything holy in this nation, President Trump and his followers are trying to hijack the holiday classic.
Last weekend, the Department of Homeland Security posted two videos celebrating its mass deportation campaign. One, titled “It’s a Wonderful Flight,” re-creates the scene where George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart in one of his best performances) contemplates taking his own life by jumping off a snowy bridge. But the protagonist is a Latino man crying over the film’s despairing score that he’ll “do anything” to return to his wife and kids and “live again.”
Cut to the same man now mugging for the camera on a plane ride out of the United States. The scene ends with a plug for an app that allows undocumented immigrants to take up Homeland Security’s offer of a free self-deportation flight and a $1,000 bonus — $3,000 if they take the one-way trip during the holidays.
The other DHS clip is a montage of Yuletide cheer — Santa, elves, stockings, dancing — over a sped-up electro-trash remake of Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You.” In one split-second image, Bedford Falls residents sing “Auld Lang Syne,” just after they’ve saved George Bailey from financial ruin and an arrest warrant.
“This Christmas,” the caption reads, “our hearts grow as our illegal population shrinks.”
“It’s a Wonderful Life” has long served as a political Rorschach test. Conservatives once thought Capra’s masterpiece was so anti-American for its vilification of big-time bankers that they accused him of sneaking in pro-Communist propaganda. In fact, the director was a Republican who paused his career during World War II to make short documentaries for the Department of War. Progressives tend to loathe the film’s patriotism, its sappiness, its relegation of Black people to the background and its depiction of urban life as downright demonic.
Then came Trump’s rise to power. His similarity to the film’s villain, Mr. Potter — a wealthy, nasty slumlord who names everything he takes control of after himself — was easier to point out than spots on a cheetah. Left-leaning essayists quickly made the facile comparison, and a 2018 “Saturday Night Live” parody imagining a country without Trump as president so infuriated him that he threatened to sue.
But in recent years, Trumpworld has claimed that the film is actually a parable about their dear leader.
Trump is a modern day George Bailey, the argument goes, a secular saint walking away from sure riches to try to save the “rabble” that Mr. Potter — who in their minds somehow represents the liberal elite — sneers at. A speaker at the 2020 Republican National Convention explicitly made the comparison, and the recent Homeland Security videos warping “It’s a Wonderful Life” imply it too — except now, it’s unchecked immigration that threatens Bedford Falls.
The Trump administration’s take on “It’s a Wonderful Life” is that it reflects a simpler, better, whiter time. But that’s a conscious misinterpretation of this most American of movies, whose foundation is strengthened by immigrant dreams.
Director Frank Capra
(Handout)
In his 1971 autobiography “The Name Above the Title,” Capra revealed that his “dirty, hollowed-out immigrant family” left Sicily for Los Angeles in the 1900s to reunite with an older brother who “jumped the ship” to enter the U.S. years before. Young Frank grew up in the “sleazy Sicilian ghetto” of Lincoln Heights, finding kinship at Manual Arts High with the “riff-raff” of immigrant and working-class white kids “other schools discarded” and earning U.S. citizenship only after serving in the first World War. Hard times wouldn’t stop Capra and his peers from achieving success.
The director captured that sentiment in “It’s a Wonderful Life” through the character of Giuseppe Martini, an Italian immigrant who runs a bar. His heavily accented English is heard early in the film as one of many Bedford Falls residents praying for Bailey. In a flashback, Martini is seen leaving his shabby Potter-owned apartment with a goat and a troop of kids for a suburban tract home that Bailey developed and sold to him.
Today, Trumpworld would cast the Martinis as swarthy invaders destroying the American way of life. In “It’s a Wonderful Life,” they’re America itself.
When an angry husband punches Bailey at Martini’s bar for insulting his wife, the immigrant kicks out the man for assaulting his “best friend.” And when Bedford Falls gathers at the end of the film to raise funds and save Bailey, it’s Martini who arrives with the night’s profits from his business, as well as wine for everyone to celebrate.
Immigrants are so key to the good life in this country, the film argues, that in the alternate reality if George Bailey had never lived, Martini is nowhere to be heard.
Capra long stated that “It’s a Wonderful Life” was his favorite of his own movies, adding in his memoir that it was a love letter “for the Magdalenes stoned by hypocrites and the afflicted Lazaruses with only dogs to lick their sores.”
I’ve tried to catch at least the ending every Christmas Eve to warm my spirits, no matter how bad things may be. But after Homeland Security’s hijacking of Capra’s message, I made time to watch the entire film, which I’ve seen at least 10 times, before its customary airing on NBC.
I shook my head, feeling the deja vu, as Bailey’s father sighed, “In this town, there’s no place for any man unless they crawl to Potter.”
I cheered as Bailey told Potter years later, “You think the whole world revolves around you and your money. Well, it doesn’t.” I wondered why more people haven’t said that to Trump.
When Potter ridiculed Bailey as someone “trapped into frittering his life away playing nursemaid to a lot of garlic eaters,” I was reminded of the right-wingers who portray those of us who stand up to Trump’s cruelty as stupid and even treasonous.
And as the famous conclusion came, all I thought about was immigrants.
People giving Bailey whatever money they could spare reminded me of how regular folks have done a far better job standing up to Trump’s deportation Leviathan than the rich and mighty have.
As the film ends, with Bailey and his family looking on in awe at how many people came to help out, I remembered my own immigrant elders, who also forsook dreams and careers so their children could achieve their own — the only reward to a lifetime of silent sacrifice.
The tears flowed as always, this time prompted by a new takeaway that was always there — “Solo el pueblo salva el pueblo,” or “Only we can save ourselves,” a phrase adopted by pro-immigrant activists in Southern California this year as a mantra of comfort and resistance.
It’s the heart of “It’s a Wonderful Life” and the opposite of Trump’s push to make us all dependent on his mercy. He and his fellow Potters can’t do anything to change that truth.
Case 1:25-cv-04480 Document 1 Filed 12/22/25
Page 1 of 18
JOYCE BEATTY,¹
V.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Plaintiff,
DONALD J. TRUMP, RICHARD GRENELL, JENNIFER FISCHER, SERGIO GOR, JOHN FALCONETTI, BRIAN D. BALLARD, MARIA BARTIROMO, PAMELA BONDI, MARY HELEN BOWERS, HANNAH F. BUCHAN, ROBERT CASTELLANI, ELAINE CHAO, PAMELLA ROLAND DEVOS, PATRICIA DUGGAN, EMILIA MAY FANJUL, LYNETTE FRIESS, PAMELA GROSS, LEE GREENWOOD, KATE ADAMSON HASELWOOD, LAURA INGRAHAM, MICHELE KESSLER, DANA KRAFT, MINDY LEVINE, LYNDA LOMANGINO, BARBARA LONG, ALLISON LUTNICK, DOUGLAS MANCHESTER, CATHERINE B. REYNOLDS, DENISE SAUL, DAN SCAVINO, CHERI SUMMERALL, USHA VANCE, SUSIE WILES, ANDREA WYNN, PAOLO ZAMPOLLI, ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR., MARCO RUBIO, LINDA MCMAHON, MIKE JOHNSON, SAM GRAVES, JULIA LETLOW, MIKE MCCAUL, JOHN THUNE, SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, SUSAN COLLINS, TRUSTEES OF THE JOHN F. KENNEDY CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS, JOHN F. KENNEDY CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS,
Defendants.
No. 25-CV-
1 Pursuant to Local Civil Rule 5.1(c)(1), the Plaintiff’s residential address is being filed under seal with the Court in a separate Notice of Filing.
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