Gavin Newsom blames Trump for housing costs using chart showing massive increase under Biden
California Governor Gavin Newsom Faces Twitter Backlash After Questioning Trump’s Role in Housing Affordability
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. – California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, sparked a wave of criticism on the social‑media platform X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday after posting a chart that linked the U.S. housing market’s steepest rise in unaffordability to President Donald Trump. The post, which praised Trump with a simple “Great work, @realDonaldTrump!”, also asserted that U.S. homes are “now the most unaffordable in history.”
The graph Newsom shared shows the income needed to qualify for a median‑priced home in the United States from 2005 through 2026. While the chart reaches its peak during the second Trump administration, a closer look reveals a sharp jump in the income threshold between 2021 and 2024 – the period when former President Joe Biden was in office. This discrepancy prompted several X users to call out Newsom for misreading the data.
One user, an account called Libs of TikTok, asked, “Hey @GavinNewsom, who was president during the biggest uptick in home unaffordability?” Meteorologist Chris Martz replied, “Evidently, @GavinNewsom doesn’t know how to read graphs. Housing prices skyrocketed under Joe Biden’s presidency.” Actor Doug Davidson added, “Gavin, I guess you can’t read a graph. The biggest spike was before DJT took office.”
The backlash extended beyond individual comments. Opinion writers and political analysts weighed in. OutKick writer Ian Miller noted that California is already the country’s most expensive state to buy a house and that the problem has worsened since Newsom took office, while California Post editor Joel Pollak criticized the lack of state‑level data. Author Jens Heycke mocked Newsom’s “numeric and economic illiteracy” as a disqualifying trait for a future presidential run.
The governor’s post came amid a broader national conversation about the housing market. Newsom has been an active player in California’s affordability agenda, signing a 2025 housing package that exempts certain projects from the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and streamlines environmental reviews for qualifying housing and infrastructure developments. In July, he further signed reforms aimed at simplifying affordable‑housing financing and project reviews.
The White House has taken a sharply different stance. Spokesperson Davis Ingle responded to the controversy by praising President Trump’s supposed “laser‑focused” approach to housing. “Unlike incompetent Governor Gavin Newscum, President Trump has been laser‑focused on making housing more affordable,” Ingle said. He cited executive actions that ban large Wall Street firms from buying single‑family homes, direct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to purchase $200 billion in mortgage bonds to lower rates, and cut red tape to boost supply and reduce construction costs.
Newsom’s office has yet to reply to Fox News Digital’s request for comment. The governor’s post and the ensuing debate illustrate the complex, often partisan, narratives that shape the national housing discourse.
The incident also mirrors a previous episode in which the Democratic Party’s official X account posted a chart claiming grocery prices hit record highs in 2025, while the data actually showed a surge in 2021 under Biden. Users pointed out that the spike had leveled off by the end of 2024 when Trump was re‑elected, further fueling concerns over how political messaging can misrepresent economic data.
As the 2028 election cycle begins to take shape, Newsom’s attempt to link the housing crisis to Trump may backfire, highlighting the importance of accurate data presentation in policy debates. Whether the governor will address the misreading of his own chart remains to be seen, but the incident has already added a new chapter to the ongoing debate over affordability and presidential responsibility.