Actress Rose McGowan participated in a campaign event for Republican gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder over the weekend in which she made claims about Jennifer Siebel Newsom calling her on behalf of Harvey Weinstein's lawyer.
McGowan announced earlier this year that she had moved permanently to Mexico, saying that she knew it was "going to get really bad in America" and decided to leave after her lease was up in New York. But now the former Charmed star is participating in California politics and expressing her disdain for the Democratic Party as well as the Newsoms specifically, making claims that the Newsoms say are lies.
In a Sunday Twitter thread titled "The Newsom Weinstein Connection," McGowan says that Jennifer Siebel Newsom called her on the phone in December 2017, a few months before the New York Times published its bombshell piece about all the assault accusations against Weinstein. McGowan reprinted an email she claims Siebel Newsom sent to a group of Weinstein victims, discussing her distant connection to David Boies, the high-powered attorney who represented Al Gore in Bush v. Gore, and also has represented Theranos and sat on its board of directors. Boies's firm allegedly directed the corporate intelligence firm Black Cube to spy on Weinstein victims in an effort to suppress the story the Times was working on.
McGowan claims that Siebel Newsom called her and said, "David Boies wants to know what it would take to make you happy."
At Sunday's campaign event, Elder took to the podium and called McGowan's claim "a bombshell."
In response, a spokesperson for Siebel Newsom called the claim "a complete fabrication."
"It's disappointing but not surprising to see political opponents launch these false attacks just days before the election," the spokesperson said in a statement. "Their limited correspondence has been strictly as fellow survivors of sexual assault and in Jennifer's former capacity leading the Representation Project, an organization that fights limiting gender stereotypes and norms."
🧵The Newsom Weinstein Connection 🧵 PART 4 - After Weinstein was exposed publicly, Jennifer Siebel Newsom got into a Weinstein victims only group. In the email she admits to having made the phone call to Rose but changes ‘happy’ to ‘heal’. Can you spot the manipulation? pic.twitter.com/HqCQC7J2qn
— Rose✨McGowan (@rosemcgowan) September 12, 2021
Gavin Newsom commented Sunday calling the McGowan claim a "last-minute classic hit piece" on behalf of Elder and his supporters, and he told the Associated Press it "just shows you how low things go in campaigns these days."
Given's Elder's stance on abortion (he's against it), and the abuse allegations made against Elder by a former fiancee, detailed in a police report, it's a truly bizarre twist for this already strange election to have McGowan now endorsing him and saying he's a "better candidate and a better man" than Newsom. Also, if McGowan is now a permanent resident of Mexico, what does she care about the California governor's race? Is she even registered to vote here given her recent residency in New York?
We know that McGowan despises the Democratic Party — she made comments earlier this year about how Democrats are "a cult" like the one she grew up in — but supporting a man who has dismissed the notion of systemic racism and wants to do away with the minimum wage, as well as abortion rights and vaccine mandates, is kind of next level.
Also, McGowan defended Elder and slammed the Black Lives Matter movement in the process, saying, "They want to hear that the more we micro-label each other, the better we'll be. The reality is, today, I challenge this state, I challenge these voters, I challenge the media, to back up. Be human first, vote for humanity."
This "October surprise" for the recall does not seem likely to change too many votes this late in the game, but how odd!
A recent UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll, cosponsored by the Los Angeles Times, finds that 60% of likely voters say they are voting against the recall.
Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images