President Trump to Gov. Newsom: We’re Putting People over Fish

Gavin Newsom has seen the light! He’s cutting the state’s business-killing, business-prevention regulations. Hallelujah!

“Goodbye red tape. Goodbye bureaucratic nonsense. We’re taking urgent action to speed up debris removal and prevent any further damage to communities that have been impacted by LA fires,” California Governor Gavin Newsom posted to X Tuesday.

It’s an interesting choice of words by the Governor, because if “red tape and bureaucratic nonsense” can be so easily rescinded for fire recovery, it’s pretty obvious to everyone these regulations were never necessary, and in fact are a very expensive pediment to getting anything done in California.

The next obvious thought is if the “red tape and bureaucratic nonsense” regulations can so easily be chucked out the door, then why wouldn’t Newsom toss the “red tape and bureaucratic nonsense” eternally?

That move would not only radically improve just about any development or infrastructure project in California, everything would cost less.

The hypocrisy of Governor Newsom is not lost on most Californians, as he is the Bureaucrat-in-Chief who has continued to support all of the “red tape and bureaucratic nonsense” until his legacy and presidential future is threatened, and then attempts to claim hero-status for removing it.

Newsom’s deceit and dishonesty is just cruel.

One of the Executive Actions signed by President Trump: “Putting People Over Fish: Stopping Radical Environmentalism to Provide Water to Southern California” is a thumb in Gov. Newsom’s eye, and should be an embarrassment if he had any humility.

Trump’s Executive Order: Putting People Over Fish

January 20, 2025

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF COMMERCE

THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR

Putting People over Fish:  Stopping Radical

Environmentalism to Provide Water to Southern

California

I hereby direct the Secretary of Commerce and Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the heads of other departments and agencies of the United States as necessary, to immediately restart the work from my first Administration by the National Marine Fisheries Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Reclamation, and other agencies to route more water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to other parts of the state for use by the people there who desperately need a reliable water supply.

During my first term, the State of California, at the direction of its Governor, filed a lawsuit to stop my Administration from implementing improvements to California’s water infrastructure.  My Administration’s plan would have allowed enormous amounts of water to flow from the snow melt and rainwater in rivers in Northern California to beneficial use in the Central Valley and Southern California.  This catastrophic halt was allegedly in protection of the Delta smelt and other species of fish.  Today, this enormous water supply flows wastefully into the Pacific Ocean.

The recent deadly and historically destructive wildfires in Southern California underscore why the State of California needs a reliable water supply and sound vegetation management practices in order to provide water desperately needed there, and why this plan must immediately be reimplemented.

Within 90 days of the date of this memorandum, the Secretary of Commerce and Secretary of the Interior shall report to me regarding the progress made in implementing the policies in this memorandum and provide any recommendations regarding future implementation.

In 2021, I wrote an article at the Globe asking, “Why Do Californians Have to Choose Between Food, Agriculture, and Fish?”

Following a very wet winter, “Reservoirs were full to the top in 2019, with enough water to supply to all users for at least five years of drought, but no longer.”

California’s water crisis is created by politicians and state government which allows the unelected, appointed and permanent bureaucrats at the State Water Resources Control Board to fulfill state water policy so politicians’ fingerprints aren’t on it. And, politicians and officials who adhere to radical environmental policies, have been killing off California agriculture lands by denying water, sending 80% of California’s water to the ocean in unimpaired flows for “environmental” purposes, resulting in entire Central Valley towns without water, farms drying up, and threats of rationing to urban water users.

California’s drought conditions are actually historically normal, and just as California’s last drought was billed as the “driest period in the state’s recorded rainfall history,” droughts are now called Rare Mega-Droughts.”

So why did Gov. Newsom authorize the break up of clean energy hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River? Why does he continue to let much-needed water rush to the sea for Delta Smelt and Coho salmon instead? …unless turning California into a wasteland is the goal, as California Globe reported.

The ongoing Pacific Palisades and Los Angeles fires continue to burn because fire hydrants ran dry and were emptied. The Santa Ynez reservoir in Pacific Palisades, built to provide additional water supply and for firefighting purposes on the south slope of the Santa Monica mountains was empty, drained for a year for repairs to the cover.

This is unmitigated incompetence. This is horrific “leadership.”

Yet Gov. Newsom doubled-down on stupid with this tweet:

As I replied on X:

Propagandist Politifact? Seriously? What about the empty Santa Ynez reservoir in Pacific Palisades, built to provide additional water supply and for firefighting purposes on the south slope of the Santa Monica mountains?

As California Assemblyman Bill Essayli (R-Riverside) just announced:

Today I introduced a wildfire legislative package which will cut bureaucratic red tape to help FIREPROOF our state. These are 3 common sense proposals that will protect our communities and the environment from future wildfires.

There will be a legislative committee hearing Wednesday morning to discuss Democrats’ latest budget proposal on fire. This should be interesting. Given that Gov. Newsom and legislative Democrats have already allocated $50 million that the state doesn’t have on “Trump-proofing” California, any additional money for fire prevention is a delusion.

Let’s never forget that California farms and businesses are starved of water year after year. Household water users are ordered to conserve, despite that it’s only 4.5% of total water use in the state. Lawmakers and federal environmental regulators have annually authorized billion gallons of water to flow out to the ocean, instead of being used for human consumption.

This is environmental extremism at its worst, and it is killing California agriculture.

And Gavin is trying to save his flailing political career… he’s epitomizes everything wrong with California.