Proving himself once again to be a monstrous excuse for a human being, Donald Trump vaguely threatened to offer “no more” federal funding to aid California’s fire recovery.
In a truly remarkable display of forest management knowledge (at least, for someone who has likely never visited the National Parks in his life, except, perhaps, as an uncomfortable campaign stop), Trump took advantage of the latest round of horrific fires in southern California to take political potshots on Twitter at California Governor Gavin Newsom.
Here are those tweets:
As ABC News points out, drought maps indicate that California is not experiencing severe water shortages this year, nor are droughts playing a role in fueling these fires.
For his part, Gov. Newsom gave Trump’s criticisms all of the consideration they merited. In response, he tweeted:
Although predicting Trump’s behavior is never a safe bet, the best assumption seems to be that he is simply lying about his threat to withhold aid. Trump made the same threat this January, claiming he had ordered FEMA to stop all emergency aid to California. Later it was determined that he had made no such order.
The real purpose of this particular brand of Trump malevolence seems to be to reinforce his voting base’s perceptions of California, which are largely based on Fox News and tabloid sensationalism. Because California voters have had the good sense to regularly vote blue, the state (which boasts the sixth-largest economy in the world) is a perennial target for right-wing propaganda and misinformation. The presence of Hollywood and the film industry also makes for routine bashing on Fox News and other Republican outrage outlets, because so many actors thoroughly despise the GOP and all it represents.
Trump’s threat is particularly hollow when one considers the fact that over half of California’s forest acreage is under federal control.
As reported at ABC News:
Although the president has a history of casting blame on California officials, most of California's forests are owned and managed by federal agencies. Federal agencies manage 57 percent of the approximately 33 million acres of forest in the state, according to research done by the University of California.
So any negligence or poor handling of the fire situation in California is, for the most part, Trump’s own fault.
Trump’s threat to deny emergency funding for fighting these killer fires is really a threat against the lives of all Californians, regardless of their political persuasion. Since few Republican voices—and apparently none outside the state itself—seem to consider this malicious singling out of California as conduct worthy of condemnation, it would appear that the citizens of California made a very wise decision in eradicating the Republican Party from most positions of power within the state.