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Newsom on Trump’s Threat to Cut Wildfire Funding: 'What He Wants is the Headline, This Distraction'

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California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a news conference at the California Justice Department on Sept. 18, 2019, in Sacramento.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a news conference at the California Justice Department on Sept. 18, 2019 in Sacramento. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

President Trump threatened Sunday to cut federal aid to California for wildfires that have burned across the state this fall. Trump cited state forest mismanagement as a reason for threatening to pull funding, though most of California’s forests are actually controlled by the federal government.

Trump tweeted Sunday that Gov. Gavin Newsom has done a “terrible job of forest management.” He tweeted that when fires rage, the governor comes to the federal government for help. “No more,” Trump tweeted.

“Get your act together Governor. You don’t see close to the level of burn in other states…But our teams are working well together in…putting these massive, and many, fires out,” Trump continued on Twitter.

Newsom responded on Twitter: “You don’t believe in climate change. You are excused from this conversation.”

Trump has criticized state management of wildfires before — accusing California of “gross mismanagement” of forests and threatening to withhold aid after the fires that devastated Malibu and Paradise.

In late 2018, he accused the state of diverting water from firefighting efforts — something experts said was not the case.

At the time Newsom defended California’s wildfire prevention efforts while criticizing the federal government for not doing enough to help protect the state.

This isn’t the first time the administration has threatened to cut off federal funding. Since he was elected, Trump has attacked California issues, from sanctuary cities to high-speed rail to wildfire aid.

KQED’s Mina Kim spoke with Newsom on Monday regarding Trump’s threat to cut funding to California.

The following interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

How concerned are you that the president will follow through on his threat to withhold federal aid even if his facts don’t add up?

We’re always concerned about that, but this is a golden oldie, as you suggest, not the first time. He did this during the [Gov.] Brown years. He’s done this as it relates to sanctuary policy, trying to take public safety money away. He not only has threatened Ukraine from foreign support, but he’s threatening his own states with federal support, including just two weeks ago threatening transportation funding in the state of California. So not a week goes by, respectfully, not a month goes by where he’s not threatening some form of retaliation, economically or otherwise, against the American people that just happen to live in blue states, but particularly California.

He did, though, withhold some money, some reimbursement money for California battling wildfires, right?

Yeah, but we were successful and this is the secret weapon: Speaker Nancy Pelosi. I cannot impress upon you how important she is in this equation. The appropriations have to eventually go through the speaker of the House and the majority there. … Democrats that have our backs. And this is typical Trump. What he wants is the headline. What he wants is to gin up the kind of conversation we’re having, while he moves on to the next. … and often, unfortunately, has no capacity to follow through because he forgets what he does hour to hour or was never even fully aware of what he did in that previous hour. And that of course is advantageous from our perspective. And number two, the courts are ultimately the biggest advantage we have. The Constitution, the law of which on the vast majority of cases, we have prevailed, if indeed we get into the more difficult issues, the more stubborn and gray area issues as we have on so many occasions.

It sounds, then, governor, that you were aware that engaging in this way with the president could play into his game of potentially drawing attention away from his own troubles in Washington, namely impeachment, for example.

I tried my best last week. And in fact, I got some criticism from some friends and supporters that said, ‘Why are you being so generous to Donald Trump? He hasn’t even returned your phone call in the middle of all these fires,’ which he didn’t. But I said ‘Look, we have to rise above this. We have to work together, in the final analysis.’ People want to see that, and they deserve that. I praised his administration for their eight FMAG declarations. That’s the Fire Management Assistance Grant declarations of which we were afforded. But that was his administration, and I separate that from Donald Trump himself.

He, himself, to your point and my broader point, he’s had a tough week. He’s been booed at two major events because he’s gone outside of the realm of his own base in the rallies. He obviously has lost a major lawsuit today on his tax returns. And he’s facing the inevitable, which is impeachment, maybe removal from office. So I cut him a break in that respect.

But what I don’t give him is any slack for attacking people of this state and attacking the extraordinary heroism of our firefighters and others that are still battling fires as we speak. And yet he still can’t help himself, but to threaten their support with money that goes directly to those firefighters to support suppression and recovery efforts. It’s a rather remarkable moment in American history we’re living in.

Many have voiced frustration at the president’s lack of acknowledgement and empathy for fire victims and firefighters. What do you make of that?

It’s a political vendetta. I’m not a psychologist, but, you know, this is someone who hasn’t matured and he’s struggling in his position and role, and it doesn’t look like he has the capacity to mature into it. I respect the presidency. I hope one day he does as well. But until then, he is the devil we know. And we have to work with him. And I will continue to try to find ways where we can work together.

Emergency preparedness, emergency management has been, despite these tweets and this back and forth, an area where we have found some common ground. I hope he got what he wanted, which was all the headlines, conversations like the one we’re having, and this distraction, and then ultimately we get back to the hard work of protecting people from these power shutoffs, protecting people from these wildfires, and doing justice to what people elected us to do in the first place — and that’s to keep them safe.

Reporting from the Associated Press was used in this post.

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