Gavin Newsom Pleads For Trump To Tour Wildfires With Him In Psaki Interview: ‘You Will Be Elevated, Mr. President’

Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA) told MSNBC host and former Biden White House press secretary Jen Psaki he wants President-elect Donald Trump to tour wildfire devastation, and directly addressed Trump to tell him “You will be elevated, Mr. President.”

The wildfires devastating the Los Angeles area have continued to dominate the news this week, and have turned into a political feud. Trump has been attacking Governor Newsom and spreading misinformation about the fires, while Democratic officials have been criticized over preparedness and the response to fires that were spurred on by high Santa Ana winds.

On Tuesday night’s edition of MSNBC’s All In with Chris Hayes, Psaki rolled out a preview clip of an interview that will air on Sunday’s edition of MSNBC’s Inside With Jen Psaki in which she asked Newsom about wildfire misinformation.

Newsom began by thanking President Joe Biden and decrying the “wild-eyed fantasies” spouted by people like Trump and Elon Musk

He concluded by “desperately pleading” with them to “Come out here, help us, and we will help you”:

PSAKI: I’m more interested from you in how damaging it is when you have somebody with that type of a platform…

NEWSOM: Yes.

PSAKI: … who is next week going to be the president of the United States, is injecting inaccurate information about a — the worst wildfires in American history.

NEWSOM: Let me answer that by thanking President of the United States Joe Biden, who within 36 hours supported a major disaster declaration by text, within a few minutes later committed 100. He could have just committed 75 percent, 90. He said 100 percent of all the costs for disaster recovery, that took the time to meet with first responders, was here on the ground.

I want to thank President Joe Biden. And then I want to offer that as an example to the incoming president of presidential leadership, a president of the United States of America being here for the American citizen. He didn’t ask me, is this a conservative part of California, Altadena? Did they vote for me? What — he didn’t ask for his staff to look at the last election and see how many were for Kamala or how many were for Donald Trump.

He said: “Pal, you got it. We have their backs,” expressed empathy. I had firefighters that went up to him and they had tears in his eyes after meeting Joe Biden, who was consoling them. I think that’s an example for the incoming president.

What’s not, I think, helpful or beneficial is the string of consciousness, these wild-eyed fantasies that somehow the state water project — we have reservoirs that are at or near historic highs, full, completely full, that somehow there’s a magical spigot in California, in Northern California, that just can be turned on and all of a sudden there will be rain or water flowing everywhere.

It’s not helpful. It’s damaging to the very foundation of the notion of what are facts, what are truths. And the fact of that asymmetry, that’s profound and consequential, amplified by people like, let’s be candid, Elon Musk and others. And that one-two punch is real. And it’s not just about this fire.

And that’s hurricane-force winds of mis- and dis-information that can divide a country on a myriad of issues. This is serious. And I get it. They want to take us — I get it. I’m not naive. I get the California derangement syndrome. I have been living with that for years and years, “Newscum,” the same seventh grade — I remember the guy on Baltimore Avenue that called me “Newscum.”

I was in seventh grade. I can handle that. We will leave that aside.

I understand what they’re trying to do. I want to work with them. It’s not about me. It’s about people that we both represent, he represents and I represent. And I’m honored and proud to represent these folks. And I desperately plead with them.

Come out here, help us, and we will help you. You will be elevated, Mr. President. At the end of the day, you will be the one we all will go to and say, thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you for living up to the values of this country. Thank you for having the backs of these families and these kids.

I met a kid the other day literally was driving away. Their house was on fire in the Palisades, and the young daughter said: “Dad, did you get my bunny?” And he said: “I didn’t get your bunny. I got four kids.”

That’s what I hope that the president of the United States, President Trump, has an opportunity to meet with that family.

Watch above via MSNBC’s Inside With Jen Psaki.