Newly inaugurated President Donald Trump will come to Los Angeles on Friday to see first hand the devastation wrought by this month’s wildfires.
Details of Trump’s visit have not been announced, including whether he will tour both Eaton and the Palisades Fires, but local officials said they expect the experience to impact the President.
Supervisor Kathryn Barger said that the first person accounts from survivors are deeply moving and should help reiterate the need for assistance at all levels.
“Specifics are still being worked out, but there's no question in my mind to take the politics out of it,” she said. “This is about people, and I know that when I go and talk to the residents in my district, they don't care whether you're Republican or Democrat. All they want is to know that the government they believe in, that they've been a part of, that they've paid taxes into, are going to be there for them in their time.”
Trump says the first trip of his second administration will include hurricane-hit parts of western North Carolina before going to Los Angeles and then Nevada.
The new president vowed federal assistance for the people of Los Angeles after the fires, and said that government funding will continue to flow to North Carolina -- a state he said Democrats “have abandoned.”
He said he’d then visit Nevada to “thank them for the big vote.” Trump noted that the state usually votes Democratic in presidential races, and he wanted to mark his November victory there.
Trump has been critical of the fire response in Los Angeles but also said after meeting Tuesday with Republican congressional leaders that the Los Angeles wildfires will make budget talks easier with Democrats.
Trump said the budget talks have in some ways been “made simpler by Los Angeles because they’re going to need a lot of money. And generally speaking, I think you’ll find that a lot of Democrats are going to be asking for help.”
The president met Tuesday afternoon with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D.
“We have a good situation now,” Trump says on spending plans.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
