In Visits to NC and CA, Trump Continually Blames Everything But Climate Change

Locked into his dogma that increasingly destructive natural disasters are unrelated to climate change, Trump blamed unrelated policies and politicized disaster relief while touring disaster zones from east to west.

In California, he visited one of the areas devastated by massive wildfires, where he is threatening to condition disaster relief aid to wildfire victims on the state’s changing completely unrelated policies—like requiring voter photo identification. This came after his false claims that state and local firefighting teams (operating with international support, including firefighters from Mexico) did nothing to fight the fires. 

Trump also specifically lied about the source of a problem with some Los Angeles fire hydrants running dry earlier during the firefighting efforts. He falsely claimed that water ran out because it was being diverted to fish conservation efforts. In fact, there was no shortage of overall water supply, and the difficulty with those hydrants was related to local system stress factors. 

Climate scientists have concluded that historic levels of drought, affected by climate change, underlie the increasing incidence and scope of wildfires in California.

Trump Pushes False Claims in NC

In North Carolina, Trump said that he was putting the current chair of the Republican National Committee in charge of disaster relief for the flood-ravaged mountain communities. Trump ignores climate scientists’ findings that climate changes increased the rainfall dumped by Hurricane Helene and magnified the disaster in Western North Carolina.

In both areas, he continued his campaign of false claims against the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and his threats to abolish FEMA and the federal relief efforts it coordinates. Instead, he suggests leaving states to sink or swim with only their own resources–plus, of course, any politically targeted aid that the one-party-controlled Congress and President specifically approve.

Flood of Misinformation

Hurricane Donald is flooding the public with falsehoods and threatening to burn out the very idea of non-political and reality-based natural disaster prevention and relief. Typical of his approach to all issues, he seeks to replace FEMA with a system in which disaster victims are dependent on the political party to which they belong.

Our country not only deserves a system that does not discriminate when providing disaster relief, but a system that will address climate change. Donald Trump clearly does not offer a path to that system change, but with your help, we can push back on his extreme agenda and pave the way to make progress here in North Carolina.

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