President Trump versus the mismanagement of California
You have to say this for the Trump administration. It’s not boring.
On Monday night at 11:12 p.m. Eastern Time, President Donald Trump announced in a post on Truth Social, “The United States Military just entered the Great State of California and, under Emergency Powers, TURNED ON THE WATER flowing abundantly from the Pacific Northwest, and beyond. The days of putting a Fake Environmental argument, over the PEOPLE, are OVER. Enjoy the water, California!!!”
Two hours later, the California Department of Water Resources responded, “The military did not enter California. The federal government restarted federal water pumps after they were offline for maintenance for three days. State water supplies in Southern California remain plentiful.”
If it’s not clear that California was “entered” by the U.S. military on Monday night, it’s also not clear that state water supplies in Southern California remain “plentiful.” Maybe it’s true if you’re a cactus, but certainly not if you’re an LADWP customer living under “Save the Drop” conservation directives.
Californians pay ridiculously high utility bills compared to people living in other states. Electricity rates are high and going higher to pay for an endless investment into the “energy transition,” which is a delusion. Electricity in California is generated largely with natural gas, hydroelectric dams and nuclear energy, supplemented by electricity imported from other states.
Water rates in Southern California have been rising, too, in part to pay for costly water recycling and reclamation infrastructure to compensate for the reductions in water exports from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Those cuts have been mandated by regulators as a result of state and federal policy, lawsuits and settlements over endangered species, and political pressure.
Water in California has been allocated to comply with policies such as the “Bay Delta Conservation Plan,” which aimed to achieve the “co-equal goals of Ecosystem Restoration and Water Supply Reliability.” That’s why regulators flush roughly half of the state’s available fresh water out to the ocean while farms are starved of water for food production and city residents are told to take dribbling showers and drink recycled toilet water.
There are two major water projects that were built on the Delta to pump water south to farms and cities. The federal government built the Central Valley Project in the 1930s, and the state built the State Water Project in the 1960s. On January 24, President Trump issued an executive order directing federal agencies, including the Department of the Interior, the Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, “to provide Southern California with necessary water resources, notwithstanding actively harmful State or local policies” and to “override existing activities that unduly burden efforts to maximize water deliveries.”
Specifically, Trump ordered the Departments of Interior and Commerce to consider actions “consistent with the ‘No Action Alternative’ in the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) issued November 15, 2024, by the Bureau of Reclamation on Long-term Operation of the Central Valley Project and State Water Project.”
Here’s what that means: The EIS stated that it will “voluntarily reconcile” the Central Valley Project’s operating criteria with the State Water Project under the California Endangered Species Act, pursuant to President Biden’s Executive Order 13990 on January 20, 2021, to “tackle” the “climate crisis.” By implementing the “No Action Alternative” in the EIS, it appears that Trump will be unlinking the federal government’s water exports from state limits.
Trump ordered the Bureau of Reclamation to “operate the CVP to deliver more water and produce additional hydropower, including by increasing storage and conveyance.” He ordered a speeded-up process for proposed exemptions to the Endangered Species Act of 1973, and told federal agencies to suspend or revise regulations that “unduly burden” water supply and storage projects.
Under the heading of “Ending the subsidization of California’s mismanagement,” Trump ordered a full review of all federal “programs, projects and activities” related to land management, water and disasters in the state. That’s a threat to withdraw certain federal funding if things don’t change.
For fire victims, Trump ordered his government to expedite “options for housing relief” and “bulk removal of contaminated and general debris.”
It may not be a military invasion to turn on the water, but it’s close enough for government work.
Write Susan@SusanShelley.com and follow her on X @Susan_Shelley