by Althea Legaspi
Rolling Stone
October 12, 2024
Donald Trump during a rally at Calhoun Ranch in Coachella on Oct. 12, 2024. Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Many of us think of Coachella and envision solid lineup draws and killer musical performances, but on Saturday a very different headliner took the stage: GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump. And he delivered a buzzkill message for the state, threatening to withhold wildfire aid to California.
He made the threat while delivering a long, meandering diatribe during his rally, where he claimed he’d bring “revitalization of our country” and railed on Governor Gavin Newsom (who he refers to as Newscum) about water conservation. Trump promised he’d somehow change the water issues in California without actually proposing how he’d manage to solve the problem other than to say, “We’re going to take care of your situation, and will force it down his throat. And we’ll say, Gavin, if you don’t do it, we’re not giving any of that fire money that we send you all the time for all the fire, forest fires that you have. It’s not hard to do.”
It’s not the first time Trump publicly pledged to block wildfire aid to California. Last month, he said at a press conference in Los Angeles that he might not give Newsom “money to put out all his fires.” His latest threat to withhold wildfire money for California came just days after Politico reported that, as president, he actually did this. According to the outlet, in 2018, Trump initially deliberately withheld disaster aid for the state following historic, deadly wildfires, because it votes blue. He reportedly only relented after an adviser informed him that Orange County, which was damaged by the wildfires, generally leans Republican.
His explanation for having not taken care of the state’s water issues when he was in office was that “I was working on two Russia hoaxes. I was working on impeachments. I was working on indictments” — in other words, he was dealing with the shit he brought upon himself. But even if he wasn’t, his assertion that farmers have allegedly told him, “We have so much water, we don’t know what do with it, but they won’t let the water come down” is absurd.
Climate change has driven much of the state’s water woes. According to the California Department of Water Resources, the wild and extreme weather swings, which included the hottest summer on record, has set the state up for both dry conditions and flood risks. Meanwhile, drought conditions continue to fuel wildfires, which also impact water quality well beyond California. But for a candidate whose environmental agenda is basically “drill, baby, drill” and who ignores the climate crisis, threatening to withhold disaster aid to a state unless it bends to his whims is literally par for the course.
Tomorrow, Trump ventures to rally in another state poised for water challenges, Arizona, which faces Colorado River water cuts of 18 percent, more than 500 thousand acre-feet next year.