President Donald Trump is expected to travel to Southern California on Friday to see firsthand the devastation caused by wildfires that have rippled through Los Angeles County over the past two-and-a-half weeks.
As of Thursday afternoon, details of the president’s visit remain scant. What we do know is that the trip will come during Trump’s first week back in office.
And it appears to be a short trip. Trump will first stop in Asheville, North Carolina, which is still rebounding from the devastation brought by Hurricane Helene in the fall. The president is then expected to head to Southern California before he is slated to travel to Las Vegas later Friday.
Officials in North Carolina estimated that the hurricane left behind at least $53 billion in damages and recovery needs. North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper called it the “deadliest and most damaging storm ever” to hit the state.
While campaigning, Trump criticized then-President Joe Biden and his administration’s response to that disaster.
“They’ve let those people suffer unjustly,” Trump once said about the residents of North Carolina. And during his inauguration speech on Monday, Trump referred to the “wonderful people of North Carolina, who’ve been treated so badly.”
It’s unclear whether the Republican president will meet with Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom upon arriving in California.
“I don’t know. I haven’t even thought about it,” Trump said about a potential meeting during an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on Wednesday.
Newsom said Thursday afternoon that he still had not “had contact with the White House” but planned to be on the tarmac to greet the president when he arrives.
“I’m grateful that he appears to be coming out,” Newsom said.
It’s no secret that Trump and Newsom have frequently feuded. But during the early days of the Southern California wildfires, Newsom invited Trump to visit Los Angeles to witness the devastation and urged the president not to politicize the catastrophe.
Still, Trump has repeatedly criticized both Newsom and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass for their handling of the fires.
Zach Seidl, a spokesperson for Bass, said in a statement Thursday that the mayor had spoken with members of Trump’s administration and “is continuing to have conversations with federal partners about how we can work together to mount the most monumental post-disaster recovery effort in American history.”
During his interview with Fox News, Trump suggested once again that the federal government should withhold disaster aid to California unless the state changes its water policy.
“I don’t think we should give California anything until they let water flow down” from the northern part of the state to the south, Trump said.
Before he was reelected, Trump had suggested that if he were president again, he’d withhold federal disaster aid to California in the event of future wildfires if Newsom would not agree to divert more water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to farmers in the Central Valley.
The president has also made inaccurate claims about the role that California’s water policy played in firefighters’ ability to put out the wildfires in L.A. County. One of Trump’s first actions after being sworn into office on Monday was to call for routing more water from northern parts of the state to areas further south.