California Governor Gavin Newsom is once again at the center of controversy, this time over a nearly $100,000 bronze bust of himself that now sits inside San Francisco City Hall. The issue? A new book claims Newsom secretly helped fund the tribute using so-called behested payments, a practice where politicians direct donors to contribute to causes on their behalf. Newsom, however, has flatly denied any personal involvement, calling the accusation “categorically false.”
His office wasted no time pushing back. In a statement to Fox News Digital, a spokesperson said, “To imply the Governor personally funded or proposed this effort is categorically false. As is customary in the city, the effort was independently proposed by a nonprofit and funded by private donors — not taxpayers.”
But the newly released book Fool’s Gold: The Radicals, Con Artists, and Traitors Who Killed the California Dream and Now Threaten Us All by Susan Crabtree and Jedd McFatter tells a different story. The authors claim businesses tied to Newsom contributed around $10,000 toward the project, and that he used his influence to help raise additional funds.
Newsom’s office countered that the donations were public knowledge and were part of a broader private fundraising effort. But the governor himself once seemed a bit uncomfortable with the idea. Back in 2015, when the project was first revealed, Newsom told SFGate, “I’m just awkward about it… But now the word is out.”
Still, the facts remain: Newsom sat multiple times for sculptor Bruce Wolfe, the bust was finished in 2018, and it now stands among those of former mayors Willie Brown, Dianne Feinstein, and George Moscone inside City Hall. The plaque below the bust even includes a philosophical Newsom quote about life’s greatest need being “to love and be loved.”
Yet, despite the official explanations, the internet had plenty to say—most of it unflattering. Critics took to social media to blast what they saw as yet another example of Newsom’s self-importance.
“Who commissions a bust of themself? Gavin Newsom who clearly thinks very highly of himself,” one X user wrote.
“Gavin Newsom’s new bust is the perfect symbol of his time as governor—expensive and ultimately useless for the people of California,” another quipped.
Even the book’s co-author, Susan Crabtree, fired back at Newsom’s attempts to discredit the reporting, stating that Fool’s Gold is backed by “more than forty-five pages of endnotes containing more than 1,000 open-source reputable and verifiable citations.”
