The tech billionaire has blamed the massive loss of homes in the LA wildfires on bad governance and a shortage of water
California Governor Gavin Newsom has lashed out at Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk over his “lies,” after the billionaire businessman blasted the US state’s response to raging wildfires that destroyed swathes of residential Los Angeles.
In a series of posts on X, Musk – a longtime critic of the Democrat politician – blamed the scale of damage in LA on “bad governance at a state and local level that resulted in a shortage of water” and retweeted a post calling on the governor to resign.
Musk’s claim comes as LA mayor Karen Bass admitted that around 20% of the city’s fire hydrants ran dry last week, with Newsom calling for an independent investigation into the issue on Friday.
Responding to Musk on Monday, however, Newsom posted a video clip showing the business mogul asking a firefighter if water availability was an issue.
The firefighter explained that there was water in “several reservoirs,” but the problem is that they are “flowing an amount of water that the system couldn’t bear,” which is why water trucks are being brought in to compensate as “mobile hydrants.”
“(Musk) exposed by firefighters for his own lies,” Newsom wrote.
According to former chief engineer at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, Marty Adams, the scale of the wildfires has created a situation that is “just completely not part of any domestic water system design.”
There needs to be “some new thinking about how systems are designed,” he told the New York Times.
Wildfire and water expert Faith Kearns told National Geographic that the current situation “was like a worst-case scenario.”
“But I think we should be planning for those worst-case scenarios…I do think this is where we’re headed,” she said.
Musk and Newsom have also sparred on X over the issue of looting amid reports that criminals were raiding areas where people had been forced to evacuate their homes.
Newsom accused Musk of “encouraging looting by lying” after the tech CEO claimed that California Democrats had “decriminalized looting.”
“It’s illegal – as it always has been,” Newsom wrote, adding that “bad actors will be arrested and prosecuted.”
US President-elect Donald Trump has also taken aim at Newsom, with Trump accusing the governor of refusing to sign a “water restoration declaration” which Newsom said does not exist. Musk, a close Trump ally, has been appointed to co-lead the president-elect’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) advisory board.
The devastating LA wildfires have killed at least 24 people so far and displaced thousands more. Fierce winds are expected to pick up this week, making the blazes more difficult to control.