Photo: Étienne Laurent/AFP/Getty Images
If there is anything likely to appeal to the latent nonpartisan instincts and caring feelings of federal policymakers, it is the sights and sounds of widespread suffering caused by natural disasters, such as the California wildfires. That’s why federal disaster relief, which is triggered by a presidential declaration from funds ultimately controlled by Congress, is generally uncontroversial. Indeed, such funding is generally considered must-have legislation and therefore often becomes the vehicle for initiatives that might otherwise run into problems.
But today, among congressional Republicans, there is widespread talk of making disaster aid to California conditional on state policy changes of all kinds. Most of the proposed conditions stem from a Republican mythology that the fires were caused by Democratic water and forest management practices that exposed Los Angeles to deadly fires or made them more difficult to fight, as has suggested House Speaker Mike Johnson.
“Clearly there have been mistakes in the management of water resources and forests, and all kinds of problems. And it comes down to leadership and it seems to us that state leaders and local leaders have failed in their duty in many ways,” Johnson told reporters: by The United States today. “So that’s something that needs to be taken into account.” I think there should probably be conditions on this aid. This is my personal point of view.
It turns out that this “personal view” echoes the arguments and threats of Johnson’s boss. Donald Trump has carried out for years, notably at a California Rally shortly before the 2024 elections.
“We’re going to take care of your water situation, and we’re going to force this down his throat,” Trump said of California Gov. Gavin Newsom. by Washington Job. “And we’ll say: Gavin, if you don’t do it, we’re not going to give you any of this fire money that we send you all the time for all the fires, the wildfires that you have.”
Trump confused a dispute over water rights demanded by big Central Valley agribusinesses with water needed in Los Angeles and other Southern California cities; in fact, the tanks supplying the firefighters are almost at capacity. Trump’s parallel attacks on California’s (and the federal government’s) forest management practices are not particularly relevant to urban fires like those currently raging in densely populated areas. But part of the problem is that Republicans are threatening to hold disaster aid hostage for all kinds of things they don’t like about California’s Democratic-led public policies, whether they are whether or not related to current or future disasters, including state disaster. comprehensive approach to environmental protection. Additionally, conservative hostility toward California could affect the willingness of a Republican-led Congress to approve aid without any sort of political or fiscal concessions, because it quote Writing in The Hill, House Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman suggests, “We need to get a pound of flesh for every dollar spent in California, in my opinion.” »
It should be remembered that under the first Trump administration, the then 45th president decided to withhold criminal justice grants states and cities that refused to cooperate with his immigration control policies, a measure that was still being debated in the courts when Trump left office. By now, you can imagine we’re one post from Trump’s Social Truth demanding immigration policy concessions from states like California as a condition for disaster aid.
Congressional Democrats are warning of the risk of ever-increasing partisan warfare over disaster funds:
This situation may just be a coincidence of bad timing, with a major disaster occurring in the midst of a perpetual legal battle between California and Trump that resumes after Biden’s four years in office. It is significant that the Los Angeles fires broke out at the same time that California’s Democratic legislature was holding a special session to make funds available to “Trump-proof the state” via a storm of lawsuits against potential administration executive orders. But even though this is a particularly volatile situation, the Republicans currently running the federal government should be wary of the precedent they would set if disaster aid becomes a regular lever for political warfare with States under the control of another party.