Topline
The former aide to then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom who had an affair with him while she was married to one of his top staffers accused Newsom downplayed the seriousness of their relationship—and Kamala Harris gave her some of the best advice she received at the time, she wrote for Vanity Fair on Tuesday.
Governor Gavin Newsom speaks during a press conference for a bill signing of housing affordability reforms event in Oakland, California, United States on July 13, 2026. (Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Anadolu via Getty Images
Key Facts
Ruby Rippey, speaking publicly for the first time about her affair with Newsom, disputed Newsom’s characterization of their relationship as “the stupidest and also briefest of affairs,” which he made in his new memoir published earlier this year.
Rippey, recounting the relationship that occurred in late 2005, wrote “we meet and we drink. There is sex, but it isn’t the point. The point is proximitiy—to power, to being chosen . . . it isn’t love. It isn’t romance. It’s intoxication.”
For Newsom, she wrote, the relationship “is a footnote in a longer arc of ascent,” but for her, “it is the fracture that split my life into before and after.”
She also said Newsom’s claim that “he was the one who ‘came clean’ to” her husband at the time, “reads—to me, at least—as a version of events that gives him credit for something I had already done. Technically defensible, perhaps, but one that leaves the unmistakable impression that he, not I, was the one who told Alex the truth.”
Rippey said the “best advice” she received at the time was from then-San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris, whom she knew from working in former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown Jr.’s administration, who advised her not to speak publicly about the affair after a publisher offered her an advance for a memoir.
Tangent
Harris reportedly dated Brown in the 1990s after his separation from his wife and while he was state assembly speaker and she was assistant district attorney, and critics of Harris have claimed she used the relationship to boost her career. Brown acknowledged they dated and that he helped her career, along with those of other California Democrats, in a 2019 San Francisco Chronicle column titled, “Sure, I dated Kamala Harris. So what?” Harris has sought to distance herself from Brown, describing him as an “albatross hanging around my neck . . . let’s please move on” to SF Weekly in 2003, when she was running for San Francisco district attorney.
Crucial Quote
A spokesperson for Newsom, Izzy Gardon, told multiple outlets in response to Rippey’s essay, “The governor acknowledged his role and publicly apologized for his conduct nearly two decades ago when he was still mayor. In the time since, he met his wife, started a family and has focused on serving Californians. He addressed this chapter of his life, including in his memoir, and out of respect for everyone involved, does not have anything further to add.”
What To Watch For
Newsom and Harris are both considered possible candidates for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination. Harris said in April she “might” run and is “thinking about it.” Newsom has also acknowledged he’s considering it, but said earlier this month, “fate will determine that.” He said in March he would reassess a potential run after this year’s midterm elections.
Key Background
Rippey, marking 20 years of sobriety, detailed how the affair ruined her marriage but ultimately forced her into rehab for her alcoholism. Newsom admitted the affair publicly after Rippey’s then-husband, Newsom’s campaign manager and friend Alex Tourk, confronted Newsom shortly after Rippey, Newsom’s appointments secretary, confessed to the affair. Newsom, who was in the middle of a divorce with his first wife, Kimberly Guilfoyle, at the time, held a press conference in which he discussed the affair, telling reporters, “everything you’ve heard and read is true . . . I’ve hurt someone I care deeply about, Alex Tourk, and that is something I have to live with.” Rippey, who was 33 at the time, wrote that she was too drunk to remember some of her encounters with Newsom, then 38, but that they were consensual and typically initiated by her. She said the Me Too movement co-opted her story and made her out to be a victim, but made her realize that although she was not coerced, there was a power dynamic at play: “Power does not need to coerce,” she wrote. “It only needs to exist. The responsibility to hold the line belongs to the one who holds it. That didn’t happen.” Newsom married his current wife, Jennifer Siebel, in 2008. Rippey is also remarried.
further reading
Aide Who Had Affair With Newsom 20 Years Ago Details Her Experience (New York Times)
Former Newsom aide challenges his version of their affair (Politico)
Kamala Harris Says She’d ‘Possibly’ Run For President Again: ‘I Am Not Done’ (Forbes)