Gavin Newsom hasn’t officially launched his all-but-certain campaign for the White House yet, but the California Governor has already lost Halle Berry‘s vote.
“Back in my great state of California, my very own governor, Gavin Newsom, has vetoed our menopause bill, not one but two years in a row,” the Oscar winner told the New York Times’ DealBook conference this morning. “But that’s okay, because he’s not going to be governor forever,” Berry continued in a very personal and passionate speech that focused on the prejudice against women aging, health concerns and role in society.
Standing before the well-heeled Lincoln Center crowd and with Newsom himself on the schedule later Wednesday, Berry put an uncomfortable national spotlight on the smooth operator governor. “And with the way he’s overlooked women, half the population, by devaluing us in midlife, he probably should not be our next president either,” she put out there on the Newsom 2028 bid that many Democrats crave.
Usually a rapid response machine in constant motion, the governor and his team have not said anything yet about Berry’s comments.
Whether or not Newsom addresses Berry’s remarks later today on the DealBook stage remains to be seen. However, as much as Hollywood donors are already starting to line up with the Golden State Golden Boy, there is no question that the term-limited politician left the bipartisan supported Menopause Care Equity Act unsigned and hence DOA in October.
At the time, after a campaign by Berry to get his signature on the Act, the ambitious and Donald Trump-bashing Newsom said in a letter to legislators: “Last year, I vetoed a substantially similar bill, stating that it would limit the ability of health plans to engage in practices that have been shown to ensure appropriate care while limiting unnecessary costs. That is still the case with this bill – despite my call for a more tailored solution. This bill’s expansive coverage mandate, in conjunction with a prohibition on UM, is too far-reaching.”
Last month, Respin Health founder and medical advocate Berry, who is 58, took 59-year-old Newsom on over killing the bill in a column she penned for Time. Insisting, based on third party analysis that the groundbreaking “law would have had negligible impact on insurance premiums,” Berry said the “veto represents a failure of Gov. Newsom’s commitment to women.”
“That neglect has real consequences …We can and must take practical, achievable steps to close this gap—and policymakers like Gov. Newsom need to step up,” Berry noted of the lack of menopause training in medical schools and in the medical industry. Today in NYC, like in her column, the John Wick franchise star pointed out the tens of millions of women dealing with menopause, how it is not a “disease” and how it affects everyone.
“I need every woman in this country to fight with me,” she said towards the end of her just over 15-minute talk, before host Andrew Ross Sorkin chatted via video with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu.
Speaking so truth to a lot of power and with Newsom set to talk with Sorkin in the next hour or so, Berry declared: “But the truth is, the fight isn’t just for us women. We need men too. We need all of the leaders, every single one of you in this room, this fight needs you. We need you to stay curious. We need you to ask questions. We need you to care even when the topic feels unfamiliar and uncomfortable. We need you to have the conversation anyway, because when women are struggling silently through perimenopause and menopause, trying to hold their families, careers, relationships and communities together, it doesn’t just affect women. It affects every household. It affects the workplace. It affects the economy.”
“I’m encouraging women be bold, be loud. Ladies refuse to be diminished during one of the most important seasons of your life, the days of outliving men but doing it in poor health are over. Why? Because we simply deserve better – We are half the population.”
“Because at this stage of my life, I have zero fucks left to give,” she concluded to applause.