Donald Trump and Gavin Newsom put on a united front on the tarmac of Los Angeles International Airport on Friday, as the president arrived in California for a visit to survey the devastation caused by the wildfires.
Despite previous online acrimony between the men, the California governor smiled as he shook hands with Trump and proceeded to give the First Lady a kiss on the cheek.
In short remarks to the press at LAX, the president thanked Newsom for meeting him off the plane and promised to do everything he could to get the problems “permanently fixed.”
“I appreciate the governor coming out… we’ll be talking a lot and we want to get it fixed,” he said.
The surprisingly pleasant exchange comes just hours after Trump appeared to snub Newsom by not including him on his official schedule during the trip, despite arranging a meeting with LA mayor Karen Bass while in the city.
Newsom fulfilled his promise to wait for the president on the tarmac. Speaking to reporters alongside the Governor, Trump remarked that Los Angeles looked “like you got hit by a bomb.”
"Thank you for being here, it means a great deal a lot to all of us... we’re gonna need your support, we’re gonna need your help,” Newsom replied.
“You were there for us in Covid, I don’t forget that and I have all the expectations that we’ll be able to work together to make this speedy recovery.”
"We’re gonna get it done,” Trump said. “A tremendous number of lives have been affected and a lot of real estate has been affected… nobody has probably ever seen anything like, you can almost probably say since before the second world war if you think about it.
“We’ll get it permanently fixed so it won’t happen again."
Trump and Newsom have a long history of sparring online, with the president consistently referring to the governor as “Gavin Newscum.”
The president has continued to blame Newsom for the fires in recent weeks, claiming they “could have been put out if they let the water flow but they didn’t let the water flow and they still haven’t, for whatever reason.”
The president nonetheless continued his magnanimous tone during a public discussion at a firehouse later that day.
He described his shock taking an aerial and then a walking tour of the the damage from the Palisades Fire, which destroyed nearly 7,000 structures and damaged nearly 1,000 more.
“I don’t think you can really realize how rough this is, how devastating it is, until you really see it,” Trump told gathered officials, including Bass.
“It’s incredible,” Trump continued. “It’s really an incineration. Even some of the chimneys came down.”
The president also said he would stand behind California “100 percent.”
“We’re going to be with you,” Trump said. “Your governor met us at the plane. We had a good talk, very positive talk. We have to work together to get this really worked out.”
At the same time, Trump had said just hours earlier he might abolish the Federal Emergency Management Agency. He also suggested he would withold future wildfire aid to California until it agreed to an unrelated voter ID law that’s a conservative priority.
There were other moments of tension.
Rep. Brad Sherman told Trump at the firehouse that while he disagrees with other states’ policies on issues like guns and abortion, he would never try to hold back disaster aid from them, urging Trump to take a similar approach to California.
“I’m hoping that we can get these funds and that we don’t punish individuals for the policies of their state,” Sheman said. “You can disagree with them. I think you’ve got some ideas. I look forward to us listening.”
Sherman and Trump later sparred over the FEMA plan, with the congressman arguing the federal agency was needed to rapidly deploy aid workers in natural disaster zones, especially in smaller states without the resources of places like California, while Trump claimed “people that think like you” are why the agency is ineffective.
Trump also didn’t mince words talking about his predecessor, claiming Biden wouldn’t have been able to rebuild Los Angeles.
“We had another president. This took place during the life of another president, not me,” Trump told the event. “I’m going to be the president that’s going to help you fix it, because he would not have been able to help you fix it, okay? We’ll take care of it.”
Going forward, Trump said he would seek to eliminate virtually all federal permitting requirements that might impact the rebuilding process, while vowing to override state agencies like the California Coastal Comission if they stood in his way and urging local leaders to speed things up.
