President Donald Trump completed his humanitarian visit to Western North Carolina on Friday, extending a listening ear and compassion to the victims ravaged by Hurricane Helene and letting them know that real help and massive change are on the way. This region of the country had been neglected and mistreated by the Biden-Harris administration, completely stalling any efforts to rebuild or restore. As my colleague Sister Toldjah reported, Trump alluded to big changes to FEMA before making his way back to Air Force One to fly across the country to California. 

Unlike Western North Carolina, the damage from the wildfires that have plagued Southern California and destroyed the iconic and historic communities of Pacific Palisades, Malibu, and Altadena have been, in many respects, a result of malfeasance and mismanagement from the Governor of California, all the way down to the Mayor of Los Angeles. So, while Trump will come to the state to extend care and compassion for the victims who have lost everything, Trump plans to lay down the law to Governor Gavin Newsom, and it's past time. 

While on the airport tarmac about to depart, Trump responded to a reporter's question about whether he would halt relief aid to California because of their sanctuary city policies.

WATCH: 

Trump lays out two demands in exchange for federal disaster money for the wildfires in Los Angeles:

The state must adopt voter ID

The state must submit to his demands on shipping water from Northern California to Central Valley farmers and then south

pic.twitter.com/p4XCIWSIyx

— Christopher Cadelago (@ccadelago) January 24, 2025

REPORTER: Do you plan to halt funding to Los Angeles because of its sanctuary city policy?

TRUMP: I want to see two things in Los Angeles: Voter ID, so that the people have a chance to vote. And I want to see the water be released and come down into Los Angeles and throughout the state. Those are the two things. After that, I will be the greatest President that California has ever seen. 

I want the water to come down and come down to Los Angeles and also go out to the farmland that's barren and dry. You know they have land that they say is the equivalent of the land in Iowa which is about as good as there is anywhere on Earth. The problem is, it's artificial because they artificially stop the water from going on to the land. 

So, I want two things: I want Voter ID for the people of California, and they all want it. Right now, you don't have Voter ID. People want to have voter identification, you want to have proof of citizenship, ideally you have one day voting. But I just want, Voter ID is a start, and I want the water to be released. And they're going to get a lot of help from the U.S.

This echoes Speaker Mike Johnson's words on January 16 that any funding for the state be conditioned on certain premises. Trump simply laid out exactly what those premises would be.

Instead of taking the "L," Newsom continued to double down on his own delusions. His office posted on X and responded with a fact-check.  

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) office responded to Trump’s comments with a fact-check about its voting laws, noting several other states do not require voter ID. Newsom’s office also said it is currently able to pump as much water as it could under Trump’s first-term policies.

“Conditioning aid for American citizens is wrong,” the governor’s office posted on social media.

Conditioning aid for American citizens is wrong.

FACT: Under current CA law you must be a CA resident and US citizen (and attest to being one under penalty of perjury) AND provide a form of ID such as driver’s license or passport that has been approved by the Secretary of State… https://t.co/obwSGH74Eb

— Governor Newsom Press Office (@GovPressOffice) January 24, 2025

Someone needs to tell Newsom that the conditions are not on American citizens—they're on him. His perpetual claims that California is flush with water and that climate change is to blame for California's woes go up in smoke with each new fire.

Newsom's claims on Voter ID are also blatant falsehoods. In 2023, a city councilman was arrested for voter fraud when he registered 70 ineligible voters. A microcosmic example of a state-wide voter fraud problem. Months before the 2024 election, Newsom signed a bill into law that restricts California counties from requiring Voter ID. So, tell us again how safe and secure California elections really are.

NEWS: California enacts law banning voter ID requirements

Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill into law that bars local governments from enacting laws to require residents to show a valid form of identification in order to vote.https://t.co/j0ZCFpNUHH pic.twitter.com/Faof2ttwIP

— ALEX (@ajtourville) September 30, 2024

Both conditions posed by Trump are neither beyond the pale nor unreasonable; they are of the utmost necessity if California will ever be able to thrive again. During Trump's first term as president in 2017, he offered at least one of these conditions: to redirect the water back to Southern California, and Newsom rejected it. The year 2018 saw the most catastrophic series of fires in the state's history: the Paradise Fire, the Camp Fire, and the Woolsey Fire among the most destructive among them. It is 2025, and California started the year with five catastrophic fires, and new ones seem to keep developing. Millions have lost their lives and their property and desperately need assistance. It would behoove Newsom to lay off the politics and gaslighting and accept conditions that will not only help those who most need it, but reverse the state's decline.