Trump arrives in Los Angeles to tour wildfire damage

LOS ANGELES (KTLA) – President Donald Trump arrived in Los Angeles on Friday afternoon to tour the devastation left by several deadly wildfires that broke out earlier this month.

Air Force One touched down at LAX around 2:55 p.m. with a delegation that included his wife, first lady Melania Trump.

The president will travel to the Pacific Palisades region to tour the destruction left by the Palisades Fire before meeting with local legislators at a Los Angeles Fire Department station.

Trump is returning to California to tour the wildfire damage in the midst of an ongoing war of words with Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has pushed back on the president's assertions that the state's fires were mishandled or that California leaders hamstrung firefighting efforts.

Prior to arriving in California Friday, Trump told reporters in North Carolina that the federal government would not provide aid to Los Angeles recovery efforts unless new voter ID laws were passed and changes were made to the state's water management system.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that California could have provided more water to firefighters battling the Palisades and Eaton fires by simply turning a valve, a notion that Newsom and water management experts have said is not true.

“Maybe the president just doesn’t know that there’s not a spigot that can be turned to solve all the water problems that he alleges exist, that don’t exist, as it relates to the state water system here in Southern California,” Newsom said of those claims.

Newsom has also pushed back on accusations that California has mismanaged its forests, emphasizing that the state oversees only about 3% of its forestland, while the majority is under federal management.