The Memo: Trump-Newsom feud ramps up as Los Angeles fires rage on

The feud between President-elect Trump and California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is hitting new peaks of intensity as wildfires rage on in Los Angeles.

Trump has called on Newsom to resign, while the governor has hit back at Trump for politicizing the disaster.

Given the stakes for both men — and the fact that neither is prone to backing down from a fight — the argument seems sure to rumble on.

Trump has continued to refer to Newsom by a derogatory nickname, writing Wednesday evening on social media: “One of the best and most beautiful parts of the United States of America is burning down to the ground. Its ashes, and Gavin Newscum should resign. This is all his fault!!!”

Newsom, speaking to Anderson Cooper of CNN, also on Wednesday evening, condemned Trump for his belligerent rhetoric.

“People are literally fleeing. People have lost their lives. Kids lost their schools. Families completely torn asunder. Churches burned down,” Newsom began, before adding in reference to Trump, “This guy wanted to politicize it.”

Newsom also unfavorably compared Trump’s approach with that of President Biden.

“I stood next to the President of the United States of America today, and I was proud to be with Joe Biden. And he had the backs of every single person in this community. He didn’t play politics,” Newsom said.

Biden has canceled a planned trip to Italy to help direct the federal response to the unfolding disaster in the Los Angeles area.

On Thursday afternoon, Biden held a briefing on the wildfires, with Vice President Harris in attendance.

Biden, addressing residents of California, said, “We are with you. We are not going anywhere.”

The president, who was in Los Angeles for reasons initially unrelated to the wildfires on Wednesday, has already approved a Major Disaster Declaration, which helps expedite aid.

On Thursday, he announced the federal government would financially support California’s efforts to fight the wildfires for 180 days — a measure that Trump will either be obligated to follow or find some rationale to break when he takes office on Jan. 20.

“We’re doing literally everything we can at a federal level,” Biden said.

His administration had also provided five large air tankers, 10 firefighting helicopters and “dozens” of fire engines to help battle the blazes, according to a fact sheet provided by the White House.

In his remarks on Thursday, Biden addressed one of the most frequently voiced criticisms of the response to the fires — that there were water shortages causing some fire hydrants to run dry.

Trump and other Republicans have variously held Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D) culpable on this point.

Biden said a big part of the problem was caused by utility companies shutting off power in a bid to avoid igniting additional fires, which, in turn, cut the ability to pump water to hydrants.

Previously, authorities in Los Angeles had outlined an additional factor: Wildfires are most effectively fought from the air, with aircraft dousing the flames by dropping huge quantities of water or fire retardant. But high winds have grounded aircraft at crucial times, resulting in an enormous demand for water from fire hydrants instead.

The ultimate sources of that water — three tanks each with a capacity of roughly 1 million gallons — were filled as a preparatory measure before the fires broke out, city authorities say.

Los Angeles County Public Works Director Mark Pestrella noted at one news conference this week that “a firefight with multiple fire hydrants drawing water from the system for several hours is unsustainable. This is a known fact.”

Trump has gone after Newsom over the water shortages, writing on social media Thursday that he should “immediately go to Northern California and open up the water main.”

In a post the previous day, Trump had contended that Newsom had “refused to sign the water restoration declaration put before him that would have allowed millions of gallons of water, from excess rain and snow melt from the North, to flow daily into many parts of California.”

Some experts are highly skeptical of Trump’s claims, however. Kurt Schwabe, a professor of environmental economics and policy at University of California, Riverside, told The Hill’s Sharon Udasin that the idea of bringing water from Northern California to the Los Angeles region would not “have made any significant difference” in the disaster.

Newsom’s office declared Trump’s other reference to a “water restoration declaration” to be “pure fiction.”

The broader claim appears to refer to water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. But most of Los Angeles’s water comes from other sources.

The bigger political context may be the most salient factor behind the Trump-Newsom feud.

The two have clashed repeatedly over the years. Newsom, who is a serious contender for the 2028 Democratic nomination, in December asked the California Legislature for an extra $25 million in funding to help the state’s agencies fight Trump’s second term agenda in the courts.

Against that backdrop, their battles are sure to rage on.

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.

Additional reporting by Sharon Udasin and Alex Gangitano.