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Brit Hume Sizes Up How Media Would Treat Republican Who Spoke Newsom’s Words In Atlanta

Brit Hume Sizes Up How Media Would Treat Republican Who Uttered Newsom's Words In Atlanta (Screenshot/Fox News)

Fox News chief political analyst Brit Hume said Monday that the media would have reacted far more harshly if a Republican made the same remarks that Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom delivered in Atlanta.

Newsom told Democratic Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens that he related to him because he scored a 960 on his SATs and struggles to read due to dyslexia. Because he was speaking to a black mayor, these words were deemed inappropriate.

“Obviously, we looked through the prism of possible presidential candidates, and if this was a Republican, how would that have been treated in response to that? It probably would be a little bit different,” host Bret Baier said on “Special Report with Bret Baier.”

“Oh my, oh Bret you know it too,” Hume said. “If I were a Republican who said that it would be denounced as racist, and I bet everything else awful you could say about it because in the media Republicans don’t get a pass on something like that.”

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In October, Newsom said on CBS that he would consider seeking his party’s presidential nomination in 2028 after the 2026 midterms. During an interview on “Sunday Morning,” correspondent Robert Costa pointed to Newsom’s South Carolina tour and said the governor acted like someone positioning himself for a White House run.

Hume said Newsom’s remarks came off as a gaffe that made it seem as though Newsom was calling himself “kind of dumb” in a way that unintentionally lumped in the people he was addressing.

“That speech was in Atlanta,” Baier said. “It wasn’t, as portrayed, a predominantly black crowd. It was a kind of mixed-race crowd, but he made those comments. The criticism was that it was pointed to his interviewer and the people down in Atlanta.”

“Yeah, it sounded that way, Bret. It was kind of a gaffe in the sense that it sounded like he was saying that ‘I’m kind of dumb. I’m just a regular guy, just like you dumb guys are.’ I don’t think that’s what he meant, obviously, and part in part, he was talking about dyslexia, which is something that I guess he’s dealt with his whole life and has managed to a great extent, it appears, to overcome,” Hume said.

“That’s why he was talking about when he can’t read a speech, it’s difficult for him, which is understandable. But it was kind of a blunder and then, of course, his office is now out saying that people are misconstruing it and attacking him and so forth. I think if he had it to do over again, he would have said that differently for sure.”

Newsom’s office pushed back against the backlash, saying critics deliberately twisted his remarks about dyslexia and his SAT score for political gain.

“First MAGA mocked his dyslexia, and now they’re calling him racist for talking about his low SAT scores. This is MAGA-manufactured outrage,” Newsom spokesperson Izzy Gardon told Fox News Digital.

(Featured Image Media Credit: Screenshot/Fox News)