Gavin Newsom Ignores Drought in ‘State of the State’ Address

California Governor Gavin Newsom made no mention of the state’s ongoing drought in his annual “State of the State” address on Tuesday evening, ignoring water issues that critics say have become an urgent necessity after years of neglect.

In his speech, delivered at the State Capitol in Sacramento, Newsom touted the state’s progress in fighting the coronavirus pandemic, and proposed a pause (amounting to a paltry three cents per gallon, Calmatters noted) in the state’s rising gas tax. He also noted his new proposal to create a “Care Court” to make it easier to move mentally ill homeless people off the street.

But his only mention of the word “drought” was to warn that drilling for more oil and gas in the fossil fuel-rich state would cause more droughts in future. “But at a time, when we’ve been heating and burning up,” Newsom said, “one thing we cannot do is repeat the mistakes of the past by embracing polluters. Drilling even more oil, which only leads to even more extreme weather, more extreme drought, more wildfire.” He made no mention of investments in water infrastructure.

The ongoing drought is now in its third year, following the wet years of 2017-18 and 2018-19, which themselves came at the end of a historic drought. Weather.com noted a month ago:

The current drought in California started in early 2020. By the end of that year, nearly 75% of the state was in severe drought conditions or worse, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. By mid-August 2021, nearly half the state was in exceptional drought conditions, the worst category of drought.

Conditions began to improve significantly in October and December 2021, when a series of atmospheric rivers brought heavy rain and snow. The percentage of the state in exceptional drought conditions dropped from nearly 30% on Dec. 7 to less than 1% by Jan. 4.

As of Feb. 1, most of the state now falls under severe and moderate drought conditions, with no exceptional drought conditions and less than 2% of the state in an extreme drought.

It has been the driest start to the year on record for places like Fresno, San Jose and Reno, Nevada. These locations haven’t picked up any measurable precipitation since Dec. 29. Other cities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles have experienced one of its five driest starts to the year. So the drought could worsen again in these areas and elsewhere if the current dry spell continues.

Last month, federal authorities announced that irrigation districts in the Central Valley would receive 0% of their annual water allocation, and that cities using water from the Central Valley Project would receive only 25%.

Newsom, who shut down houses of worship in the state during the coronavirus pandemic, while hobnobbing maskless with lobbyists at the elite French Laundry restaurant, also warned about rising “[a]uthoritarian and illiberal impulses.” He was referring to Republican-led states that are passing laws to increase ballot integrity through measures such as voter ID.

He also attacked Texas and Florida, repeating a false claim that Florida wants to criminalize saying the very word “gay.”

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.