In the ongoing feud between California Governor Gavin Newsom and President Donald Trump, it may come as no surprise that Kimmel is fiercely on Team Newsom.
“Trump wants it to seem like anarchy,“ Kimmel said about the Los Angeles ICE protests, ”So he goes around our governor, and he calls in 4,000 troops from the National Guard and 700 active-duty Marines.“
Kimmel argued, “You know, when we had the wildfires that devastated big chunks of our city, he did absolutely nothing. Now that we’re in the middle of a non-emergency, send in the National Guard.”
Kimmel showed a recent press conference clip of Trump claiming that Newsom is “doing a bad job, causing a lot of death and a lot potential death.” Trump also claimed, “If we didn’t send out the National Guard … Los Angeles would be burning right now.”
“No, it would be calm and sunny and 70 degrees, just like it is right now,” Kimmel said.
Kimmel also defended Los Angeles from the narrative that the city is engulfed in total chaos:
“Los Angelinos have been gathering to demonstrate, with very few exceptions, peacefully demonstrate, to voice their opposition to this disgusting and unnecessary abuse of power instigated by our mentally ill president, who is dead set on exacerbating this,” Kimmel said.
“[Trump] actually wants conflict,” Kimmel argued. “He was intentionally inflaming and lying to make it seem like there’s a war going on here.”
This isn’t the first time Kimmel defended Los Angeles’ reputation from Trump’s attacks in a time of crisis. In January this year, as Los Angeles suffered one of its worst wildfires in history, Kimmel had angrily ripped into Trump’s “vile” claims about his suffering hometown.
Kimmel brought up the January wildfires again Tuesday, saying of Trump, “What a hero. You know, he’s always saving our city from burning.”
“Last time we were burning back in January, you remember he had them turn on that great big faucet that put all the fires out,” Kimmel said.
He played a clip of Trump repeating his January claim that he’d saved L.A. by simply turning the water back on.
“Does anyone believe this?” Kimmel asked. “That did not happen. He so desperately wants to be the hero, putting out fires.”
Bringing it back to Trump’s response to the current L.A. protests, Kimmel concluded, “Putting out a fire you purposely started doesn’t make you a firefighter. It makes you an arsonist with a hose.”
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