What is Gavin Newsom doing?

Newsom campaigning for the Biden-Harris ticket in Michigan in 2024. Getty Images.

Following the successful passage of his redistricting referendum in California last November, California Gov. Gavin Newsom began the year as the frontrunner for the 2028 Democratic nomination. But polls suggest that he’s slumping. According to Race to the White House, Newsom’s support among prospective Democratic voters in 2028 has fallen from 25 percent in January to 15 percent today.

That's a fairly big shift, given that not all that much has happened. The California gubernatorial primary was kind of a mess, with Newsom not endorsing a candidate until Xavier Becerra was the lone Democrat left standing. Still, that’s local news and this is a national primary. And redistricting has remained a big story, even if it ended on a slightly bitter note for Democrats.

But these early polls do have some predictive power, believe it or not. Prediction markets have tracked with them, with Newsom’s probability of winning the nomination declining from 35.5 percent on Jan. 1 to 23.3 percent today.

No one opponent has emerged as the obvious alternative. Bettors see the field as wide open, with the top six candidates having less than a 60 percent combined probability of winning the nomination. But it’s worth noting where the biggest gains have come from: Kamala Harris and Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff. Each presents a challenge for Newsom. Harris, who might or might not be serious about running again, is from the same state, and it’s hard to find much daylight between her and Newsom on policy. And Ossoff, you could argue, mogs Newsom in the “good-looking white guy” category, only with youth on his side and the credential of actually having won elections in a swing state.

If you ask me, though, the reason for Newsom’s decline is simple: this is reversion to the mean. He doesn’t have a particularly persuasive argument for being the nominee, and his early support may reflect name recognition as much as a…