Who Is Gavin Newsom’s Wife? All About Jennifer Siebel Newsom

California Gov. Gavin Newsom met his wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom on a blind date in 2006

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has grown a large family with wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom.

The California politician first crossed paths with the actress and producer in 2006, shortly after his divorce from ex Kimberly Guilfoyle was finalized. The couple were introduced on a blind date set up by a mutual friend during a gala in San Francisco, where Gavin was serving as mayor. Although they weathered public controversy at times early on in their relationship, Gavin and Jennifer wed in July 2008.

Since then, the couple have welcomed four children. When Gavin was elected governor of California in 2018, Jennifer took on duties as the first partner of California, a term she coined instead of first lady as a sign of inclusivity and to stress the importance of partnership in a relationship.

“All of us got to, or are getting to, where we are, yes, through our own hard work and grit, and resilience and determination — and through partnership, where someone’s holding us and making life easier for us, so that we can shine and be our best self,” she told the Nob Hill Gazette in March 2024.

So who is Gavin Newsom’s wife? Here’s everything to know about Jennifer Siebel Newsom.

Jennifer was born and raised in Northern California

Jennifer was born on June 19, 1974, in San Francisco. She lived in the Northern California city with her parents, Ken and Judy, and her older sister, Stacey, until they moved to the nearby suburb of Ross. In the years that followed, the family went on to welcome three more daughters: Melissa, Jessica and Brooke.

The sisters’ early life was marred by tragedy when Stacey was killed in an accident involving a golf cart. During a family vacation to Hawaii, Jennifer was present when the golf cart backed into Stacey, killing her. Jennifer has said the incident caused her to carry feelings of blame and guilt for years.

“I tried to be two people, be perfect, because I didn’t feel like I was enough,” she told the Marin Independent Journal in 2007, adding that the accident made her want to be “the nurturer, the protector, the giver who wants to help the less fortunate.”

Jennifer went on to attend the Branson School, where she was a top student who excelled in sports and academics. She told the Los Angeles Times that her sister’s death inspired her to push herself in school — going on to become president of her junior class and playing varsity tennis, soccer and basketball.

She graduated from Stanford University

After graduating from high school, Jennifer was recruited to join Stanford’s soccer team. The summer before beginning her freshman year, she played on the junior national soccer team. A leg injury during a game against France sidelined her athletic career.

“I was this driven, overachieving perfectionist who excelled in sports,” she shared with the Marin Independent Journal. “I had to find myself again.”

At Stanford, Jennifer graduated with honors, earning a degree in Latin American studies with a minor in human biology. She later went on to enroll at Stanford Business School, where she graduated with her master's in business administration. Looking back, she says working towards her MBA was partially to please her family but also because she had become interested in one day leading a global environmental organization.

Jennifer traveled the world with a global environmental coalition

Jennifer was still a preteen when she says a trip to Africa changed her life. At age 12, her family visited Kenya and Tanzania, where she quickly realized she had grown up in “a very beautiful, magical bubble” compared to the rest of the world, she told the Marin Independent Journal. It inspired her to spend a summer working in the rain forests of Costa Rica as a high school student and return to Africa when she was 18.

After receiving her undergraduate degree, Jennifer worked at a hospital in Quito, Ecuador, per the Marin Independent Journal. She initially thought she might become a doctor in a developing nation, but she instead began working with Conservation International, a nonprofit environmental organization on which her father was a member of the board. Over the next year, Jennifer worked for the organization in Washington, D.C., Latin America, Africa and Europe, helping women start their own environmentally sustainable enterprises.

“I was working with bushmen, and women, in particular, helping them create micro-enterprises. Then I was working with governments in South Africa and Namibia and Botswana to create peace parks so wildlife could roam from South Africa into Botswana and Namibia without going through a city, or on a freeway,” Jennifer later told the Nob Hill Gazette.

Looking back, she says it was “one of the most enriching years” of her life.

She has worked as an actress and director

Jennifer turned her aspirations towards acting while working on her MBA at Stanford. She began taking classes at the American Conservatory Theater in order to improve her public speaking skills and participated in a play as part of Stanford’s drama department.

“I thought, ‘Maybe I’ll go into the entertainment industry because the media has so much power to effect cultural change and to move hearts and minds,’ ” she explained to the Nob Hill Gazette.

After completing her MBA, she moved to Hollywood and began landing small roles in films and television series. During that time, Jennifer formed her own production company, Girls Club Entertainment.

Jennifer has now written, directed and produced numerous documentaries including Miss Representation, which explores sexism in mainstream media, and The Mask You Live In, which discusses how the media’s portrayal of femininity and masculinity affects viewers. She also produced The Great American Lie, The Hunting Ground, Fair Play and On the Record as well as the Oscar-nominated film The Invisible War.

“I’ve always tried to champion [sisterhood], and through my work through Miss Representation, for example, to show girls what’s possible and inspire girls to not just imagine, but create,” Jennifer told the Los Angeles Times. “The gender hierarchy is the oldest form of oppression. It’s the roots of oppression and it’s the template for all other oppression.”

She met Gavin after being set up on a blind date

In October 2006, Gavin and Jennifer met when they were set up on a blind date by their mutual friend Kathy Wilsey. At the time, Jennifer admitted she knew very little about Gavin, despite the fact that he was the mayor of San Francisco. On their first date, the couple attended the annual Artists Ball at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, per SFGate.

“We had so much in common, we were blown away — from our love for Africa to our interests in political issues to art and the wine business and college sports,” Jennifer later told the San Francisco Chronicle.

They faced controversy early in their relationship

Shortly after meeting, the couple faced their fair share of controversy. Just days after their first date, Gavin made headlines for being romantically linked to a 20-year-old woman. Although he had reportedly been seen with the woman, who was more than 15 years his junior, Gavin said he never dated her.

“He told me, ‘You’re not going to want to talk to me after tomorrow. There’s a thing in the paper coming out about me and my 20-year-old girlfriend. I never dated her,’ ” Jennifer told SFGate. “The whole first month we were dating, everyone thought I was her and were saying, ‘We need to card you.’ You just have to have a sense of humor about those things.”

Then, several months later, news surfaced that Gavin had previously had an affair with his appointment secretary, Ruby Rippey-Tourk, who also happened to be the wife of his campaign director, Alex Tourk. Jennifer didn’t know Gavin at the time of the affair and stood by his side as he made a public apology.

Jennifer and Gavin got married on a ranch in Montana

In late 2007, after just over a year of dating, Gavin reportedly proposed to Jennifer while the couple were on vacation in Hawaii. The couple officially said “I do” in a ceremony in Stevensville, Mont. on July 26, 2008.

In 2009, Gavin and Jennifer welcomed their first child, a daughter named Montana. They have since welcomed three more children: daughter Brooklynn and sons Hunter and Dutch.

She was one of Harvey Weinstein’s accusers

In 2017, Jennifer publicly came forward as an alleged victim of Harvey Weinstein in an essay for HuffPost. In the piece, she detailed her encounters with Weinstein as a young actress and called for action to be taken against not only the disgraced film producer but also other men in power like him.

“I was naive, new to the industry, and didn’t know how to deal with his aggressive advances ― work invitations with a friend late-night at The Toronto Film Festival, and later an invitation to meet with him about a role in The Peninsula Hotel, where staff were present and then all of a sudden disappeared like clockwork, leaving me alone with this extremely powerful and intimidating Hollywood legend,” she wrote in the essay.

Jennifer later testified in court against Weinstein in Los Angeles, where he faced 11 counts of sexual assault. On the stand, Jennifer alleged that weeks after meeting Weinstein at TIFF in 2005, the producer sexually assaulted her in a Beverly Hills hotel room.

“I was so violated and I don’t know how that happened,” she said during the trial, according to ABC News. “I didn’t see the clues and I didn’t know how to escape.”

Meanwhile, Weinstein maintained his innocence and said that their encounter was consensual. When the trial concluded, the jury was unable to reach a verdict in Jennifer’s accusations but they did find him guilty on three counts pertaining a woman identified as Jane Doe #1. Weinstein was sentenced to 16 more years behind bars in addition to the 23 years in prison he was already serving after being found guilty of first-degree criminal sexual act in New York. (Weinstein's 2020 convictions in New York State for rape and sexual assault were overturned in April 2024.)

Following the trial’s conclusion, Jennifer said that the ordeal was excruciatingly traumatic, per the Los Angeles Times. “It was a horrific experience. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,” she later told the outlet.

She is an active first partner of California

Since Gavin was sworn in as governor of California in January 2019, Jennifer has stepped into her role as first partner of California. She has become an advocate for women, children, families and gender equality, helping to bring forth programs and legislation that benefit those in need.

In 2019, she launched the California Equal Pay Pledge in the hopes of turning the “strongest equal pay laws in the nation into the smallest pay gap in the nation.” The following year, she helped launch “Advance SEL in California,” a campaign to help educators and families better understand children’s social and emotional learning needs.

Jennifer also teamed up with the California Department of Food and Agriculture to launch a grant program, which expands access to local farm fresh meals in school cafeterias. When it comes to schools, Jennifer has also advocated for California’s universal school meals program which has led to schools now offering two free meals a day to children, regardless of their family’s income.

As first partner of California, Jennifer also serves as honorary chair of the California Volunteers Commission and helped co-found the California Partner’s Project, a nonprofit “dedicated to promoting gender equality and child wellbeing.”

“There’s so much opportunity to champion women and children in California and anchor our public policy priorities around uplifting women and children,” she told the Nob Hill Gazette. “We know the family is the backbone of the community, and women are the backbone of families, so I feel like our work is really having an impact.”

She continued, “As a parent, the governor also sees the value in the work we do. He’s been very supportive of letting me lead where I can contribute and bringing me in on things that are important to him as well, that impact women and children.”

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