Republicans push back on Trump’s threat to withhold California funding amid wildfire

GOP Sens. Cory Gardner (Colo.) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) pushed back Sunday against President Trump’s threat to revoke federal funding if California does not better prevent wildfires. 

“I don’t think it’s appropriate to threaten funding,” said Gardner, whose state has also suffered wildfires, on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday.

“That’s not going to happen,” he added. “Funding will be available. It always is available to our people wherever they are, whatever disaster they are facing.”

{mosads}Earlier on Sunday, Trump tweeted that “proper Forest Management … can stop the devastation constantly going on in California” due to wildfires.

“There is no reason for these massive, deadly and costly forest fires in California except that forest management is so poor,” Trump first wrote on Saturday. “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!”

There is no reason for these massive, deadly and costly forest fires in California except that forest management is so poor. 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!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 10, 2018

Graham also opposed the president’s remarks on CBS’s “Face the Nation” Sunday.

“We do have a forest management problem all over the country that we need to address but California will receive the money they need,” Graham said, adding that “going forward we need to look at some of the underlying causes of these fires.”

“And it’s just not California,” he said. “We need to look at better forest management in federal lands all over the country.”

“Now’s not the time to talk about cutting off funding,” he said. “We’re going to help our friends in California. With all due respect, they need help.”

.@LindseyGrahamSC talks about the California wildfires: Now is not the time to talk about cutting off money. pic.twitter.com/WMwLNd77en

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) November 11, 2018

The deadly Camp Fire in California had a death toll of 25 by Saturday. 

Gardner said on “Meet the Press” Sunday that the Senate has solved any funding issues for wildfire fighting.

“This year we came up with a strong bipartisan success in fixing the wildfire funding issue that had kind of paralyzed our ability to go out and fight fires and suppress fires and mitigate next year’s forest fires,” he said. “So one of the great bipartisan accomplishments of this past Congress was actually in the area of forest fires and finding a solution for funding.”