Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) on Friday sounded off about his “problem” with California’s policies as he threatened to withhold disaster relief aid amid the devastating Los Angeles wildfires.
“If they want the money, then there should be consequences where they have to change their policies,” said Davidson in an interview with Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo.
He later added, “I mean, we support the people that are plagued by disaster but we have to put pressure on the California government to change course here.”
Davidson, moments earlier, declared that officials “need to address” the fires before taking issue with the state’s forest management.
“All these things that they’re doing are making it far easier for fires to grow and spread and be huge,” he claimed of the blazes in Los Angeles that have killed at least 16 people and burned over 12,000 structures with about 57,000 more still at risk.
Right-wing media figures have recently pushed misleading claims that California’s “bad forest management” is to blame for the fires while ignoring how climate change impacts measures to prevent the spread of fires, Media Matters for America reported.
The bad forest management talk marks an apparent regurgitation of right-wing claims from 2018 when then-President Donald Trump blamed California’s Camp Fire — the most destructive and deadliest in the state’s history — on “poor” policy.
“Billions of dollars are given each year, with so many lives lost, all because of gross mismanagement of the forests. Remedy now, or no more Fed payments!” Trump wrote on social media at the time.
Trump’s comments would later get the approval of Fox News hosts, Media Mattersnoted.
In 2020, he’d again blame forest management for fires in the state and, not long after, he got love from personalities at the conservative network.
Davidson’s policy “problem” adds to a right-wing blame game for the recent Los Angeles fires which includes everything from diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives to — in Trump’s case — California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) wanting to protect an “essentially worthless fish” species, the delta smelt.
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Newsom, in an effort to fight back against “misinformation” on Saturday, launched a page on his website to address a “lie” that the fires are caused by “mismanagement of forest lands.”
He claimed that the budget for forest management “is now TEN TIMES larger” than it was when he took office in 2019.