Gov. Gavin Newsom, Former NFL Star Marshawn Lynch Announce New Podcast

In a surprise announcement on Wednesday, iHeart Radio unveiled a new podcast with Governor Gavin Newsom, former NFL star Marshawn Lynch, and his agent Doug Hendrickson as hosts.

The new podcast, called “Politickin” will reportedly not be political, and instead focus on “delivering a deeper understanding of what it takes to excel in their respective fields.” According to promos for the podcast, it is “Politickin’ with no politics”, with Newsom “like you’ve never heard him.” The podcast, which is set to begin on July 15th, will also have the “the conversations that need to be had”, despite them promising no politics being involved.

“What does ‘Politickin” even mean?” asked Newsom in the promo for the show.

“So, this how ‘Politickin’ work out right? There’s bridge and gaps you sit down, come to the round table, you need to figure it out. I need to figure out where you coming from, right? But you need to figure out where he coming from,” explained Lynch. “Your ‘Politickin’ might be a little bit different. You handle yours a different way. We bring each side our walks of life, like how we’re doing right now, and we figure out what we got going on. And what I’m going to call that is ‘Politickin.’ Not because he a politician, but because that’s just what we do, complete.”

“With no politics,” clarified Newsom.

All three hosts all have media experience. Governor Newsom has had high-profile media appearances for decades, including a major debate last November with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. In terms of hosting, he had also previously hosted a Current TV talk show, “The Gavin Newsom Show” while serving as Lt. Governor. Lynch, an Oakland native who won a Super Bowl in 2014 with the Seattle Seahawks, has appeared in a number of TV shows and movies since 2015, with the frequency going up since his retirement in 2019.

Heavy questions surround new Newsom podcast

The three have also known each other for well over a decade, despite iHeart Radio calling the trio’s matchup “unexpected.” Hendrickson has been Lynch’s agent since his NFL days and has been friends with Newsom for decades. Meanwhile, Lynch and Newsom have also been friends since being introduced by Hendrickson, with Newsom even serving as a character witness for Lynch in court following his DUI arrest in 2013. Lynch, in turn, also contacted Newsom over a number of state issues before when they affected him. Most recently in October 2023, Lynch, a spokesman for Skittles, contacted Newsom about the “Skittles ban” bill with Newsom having to reassure him that Skittles would not be banned in California.

While Newsom’s advisors have said that the podcast has been in the works for the past six months, many questioned the timing of Newsom suddenly gaining an entirely new platform. Even more, the announcement of the podcast led to a largely negative reaction on Wednesday, with much of the frustration being leveraged against Newsom for starting a podcast instead of doing his job as Governor, and Lynch weighing in on California issues despite living in Las Vegas.

“This guy will do anything except his job for the people of California,” said one X user on Wednesday.

Others in the media weighed in on Wednesday as well.

“Newsom is a surrogate for Biden right now, he’s Governor, and he’s been known to talk politics with the other two guys. And he’s claiming not to want to talk about politics,” explained media analyst Lydia Hart to the Globe on Wednesday. “You just know that they are going to fall back into politics the closer the election comes, giving Newsom essentially his own platform. They all knew that this was going to be a tight election year, so they got their own podcast together.

“But putting aside that, a lot of people are disappointed in Newsom for starting a podcast in the middle of his second term as Governor. Politicians speak on podcasts all the time. Fine. But Newsom is hosting one in the middle of it all. That is just inviting criticism, and as we saw on X and Instagram today, a lot of people tend to agree with that sentiment, including many Democrats.

“Newsom should have just limited himself to guest appearances like other politicians do, not start out his podcast career mid-term as Governor. To many, it looks like he has the political version of Senioritis. First it was him moving out to Marin County, now this.”

‘Politickin’ is expected to unveil their first episode on July 15th.