Gavin Newsom finally ADMITS the pandemic shutdown was 'insane' while fly-fishing with Jake Tapper

Years after defending California's response to the coronavirus pandemic, Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom listed some of the mistakes made.

Newsom made the admissions in a bizarre interview with Jake Tapper of CNN where both appeared to be trying to fly-fish in a river in Montana.

'I regret that, obviously.'

Tapper asserted that there needed to be a commission to understand the pandemic and what responses worked and which did not work.

"Yeah, look, everyone's a genius in hindsight, so, you know, coulda woulda," Newsom responded.

"What would you do differently?" Tapper asked.

"I had a whole chapter just about Purell. We were running around doing price-gouging legislation against Purell, and everyone was thinking it was a Purell-based crisis," referring to his book.

"People were scrubbing their groceries," Tapper recalled.

"Yeah! I mean, [Republican Florida Gov. Ron] DeSantis was closing down his beaches before we closed ours. The idea that we closed beaches was insane. In hindsight," Newsom replied.

"Obviously the schools taking too long," he added. "A lot of districts were open, but the big ones weren't. L.A. refused. And I regret that, obviously."

Tapper noted that teachers said that reopening schools too soon would kill them. Then he pressed Newsom on the scandal when he was caught attending a dinner at a ritzy restaurant with little to no pandemic protections.

"What on earth were you thinking?" Tapper asked.

"Just a boneheaded decision, a stupid decision, I just ... dialing it in, we were exhausted, friend's birthday, it was a restaurant that was open the night before.

"And it was just against the spirit of the rules that I was promoting," he added.

"It was completely legit condemnation."

He said he had a mask when he walked in and when he walked out of the restaurant.

BlazeTV host Steve Deace lambasted the governor in comments to Blaze News.

"I don't think there's anything sincere about Gavin Newsom whatsoever except his political ambitions," said Deace. "So I suspect this is only being said as a means by which to triangulate as the Democrat nominee in 2028, when he'd likely be running against someone seen as an extension of Trump, who was president at the advent of the scamdemic."

RELATED: Gavin Newsom tries to dunk on Trump and gets obliterated with online ridicule

Newsom has admitted that he's looking at a possible campaign for the Democratic nomination for president in 2028.

The entire video of the fly-fishing interview can be viewed on CNN's YouTube channel.

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