Gov. Newsom cut fire budget by $100M months before lethal California fires

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Officials somehow found a way to make the fire situation worse: Watters

‘The Five’ panelists discuss the wildfires that continue to decimate Los Angeles County for a fourth day.

A review of last year's California state budget shows California Gov. Gavin Newsom cut funding for wildfire and forest resilience by more than $100 million.

The budget, signed in June and covering the 2024-25 fiscal year, eliminated $101 million from seven "wildfire and forest resilience" programs, according to a report from Newsweek.

The California fires, responsible for destroying more than 10,000 buildings in the Los Angeles area, are still not contained.

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Fire crews battle the Kenneth Fire in the West Hills section of Los Angeles Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025.  (Ethan Swope/AP)

Cal Fire had a $5 million reduction in spending on fuel reduction teams, including funds used to pay for vegetation management work by the California National Guard, the report noted.

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Other changes:

• $28 million cut from multiple state conservancies that expand wildfire resilience
• $12 million cut from a "home hardening" experiment that would protect homes from wildfires
• $8 million cut from monitoring and research spending, mostly dedicated to Cal Fire and state universities
• $4 million cut from the forest legacy program, which encourages landowners to manage their properties
• $3 million cut from funding for an inter-agency forest data hub

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, right, surveys damage in Pacific Palisades with Cal Fire's Nick Schuler Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025, in Pacific Palisades, Calif. (Jeff Gritchen/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)

Newsom's director of communications, Izzy Gardon, called the budget cuts a "ridiculous lie," in a statement to Fox News Digital Friday night.

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"The governor has doubled the size of our firefighting army, built the world’s largest aerial firefighting fleet and the state has increased the forest management ten-fold since he took office," she wrote. "Facts matter."

The devastation of the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles Friday, Jan. 10, 2025.  (AP Photo/John Locher)

His office attached statistics that refer to the overall increase in spending and personnel over a number of years since he took office in 2019, as opposed to commenting on the most recent cuts.

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Cal Fire did not immediately respond to a request for comment as of 8 p.m. Friday.