Gwyneth Paltrow Attempts To Explain Her Political Views, Makes the Water Goopier

What has Gwyneth Paltrow been up to following her starring role in Josh Safdie’s Marty Supreme? Well, how much time do you have?

Fresh off a Today Show appearance promoting Goop Kitchen—where she suggested Savannah Guthrie use arugula as a dairy substitute in her turkey meatballs—and having exhausted the possibilities of her lifestyle-wellness-skincare-yoga-green smoothie empire, Paltrow appears to be reaching the last possible stage of late-capitalist grift: Venture capitalism. On last week’s episode of The Goop Podcast, Paltrow interviewed Trae Stephens, co-founder of Anduril Industries, a Palantir-esque AI defense contractor and surveillance tech company, which describes itself as “not your typical defense contractor.” Stephens is also a partner at Founders Fund, a venture capital firm that Paltrow called “the best.” Right off the bat, Paltrow tells Stephens that she’s been wanting to get him “on the pod” for a while, and that they are “probably aligned on a lot of things.” Classic VC speak.

However, the episode is now generating bad PR for Paltrow after an attempt mid-podcast to “clarify” some of her political beliefs. In the span of thirty seconds, Paltrow said her progressive husband thought she was a Republican, referred to herself as “pretty centrist,” then “completely independent,” then “I don’t feel anything right now.” And to make matters murkier, dare I say goopier, Paltrow was interviewing a defense contractor, so I have several questions:

How does Gwyneth define “pretty centrist,” exactly?

What does Gwyneth “not feel anything” about? Trump? ICE? Barrel jeans?

And most top-of-mind…is Paltrow’s lifestyle and wellness company, Goop, pivoting to AI defense and surveillance manufacturing?

About 10 minutes into the podcast, we get Paltrow’s lackluster description of her politics. Here is the full quote of uninterrupted speech:

“I notice with my own husband—who’s the best person ever in the world—He’s so progressive, like, he has such a sweet heart, and he wants to make sure everybody’s looked after. And I think in this climate, sometimes I’m like, can you just listen to this? It is very triggering for people, like they’ve become—It’s become so binary, I think. I am trying, in my journey through being an American right now, to sort of weave together lots of different points of view and also to get out of that place of righteousness and anger and fear. And I mean, I’m pretty centrist, and my husband thinks I’m a Republican, which I’m not a Republican. I mean, I don’t feel anything right now, to be totally honest with you. I feel like I’m completely an independent.”

She goes on for like 30 more seconds, and I wish I could tell you what point she was trying to arrive at here, something along the lines of: we can have political differences and still like each other and listen to bluegrass together…I think. 

Unfortunately, all of my burning questions go unanswered, as the rest of the podcast is just more VC-speak and politically vague dribble. Paltrow has historically aligned herself with Democratic politics, like hosting a fundraiser for the DNC in 2014 and later for Pete Buttigieg in 2019, but a lot can change over the years—especially when your lifestyle-wellness-skincare-yoga-green-smoothie empire is out of ideas, Marvel stopped writing checks, and you still have to get your Apple Martin through acting school.

Perhaps the next Goop brand activation will be a surveilling yoga robot, or an AI salad spinner, or a bomb.