Trump tells Calif. there is no drought
Clinton, Sanders also campaign ahead of June 7 primary
SAN DIEGO — Donald Trump waded into California’s perennial water wars Friday, taking the side of agriculture and vowing to boost the state’s farmers even if it means cutting back environmental protections.
“If I win, believe me, we’re going to start opening up the water so that you can have your farmers survive, so that your job market will get better,” Mr. Trump told a few thousand cheering supporters at a sports arena in Fresno.
After a private half-hour meeting with farmers, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee said the group told him there was no drought in California, but rather a failure to preserve and wisely use the water the state has on tap.
“You have a water problem that is so insane,” he said. “It is so ridiculous, where they’re taking the water and shoving it out to sea.”
He mocked environmentalists for “trying to protect a certain kind of 3-inch fish,” repeating an apparent reference to the delta smelt, a fish on the verge of extinction that is regarded by scientists as a barometer of California’s environmental health.
It marked a day when — for a few hours at least — California enjoyed a flurry of candidate activity more typically seen in such early voting states as Iowa and New Hampshire. The state’s primary is June 7.
While Mr. Trump staged rallies in Fresno and San Diego, Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton met with community activists in Oakland and her rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, hopscotched between stops in the Los Angeles area.
Lester Snow, executive director of the California Water Foundation, a nonprofit group that supports research and other projects, said Mr. Trump’s comments oversimplify the situation.
“Playing off ‘farmers versus fish’ is a sound bite but isn’t a solution to any real-world problems,” he said.
“It’s just an old, tired bumper-sticker way of talking about California’s water problems.”
Much of Mr. Trump’s hourlong speech consisted of stock lines, though he made a boastful vow to put heavily Democratic California in play in November.
“If I don’t win, they are gonna spend one hell of a fortune fighting me off.”
He bashed Ms. Clinton for using a private email server as secretary of state and recalled the Whitewater real estate scandal dating from her husband’s years as Arkansas governor. “She’s always skirted the edge,” Mr. Trump said.
His Fresno appearance drew about 200 peaceful demonstrators. In San Diego, several hundred protesters gathered in the downtown Gaslamp District, their access to the convention center blocked by dozens of police officers.
As Trump supporters left after the event, protesters clashed, with 18 people needing medical attention. Police made 10 arrests. Inside, Mr. Trump had nodded to the region’s large military presence, inviting veterans to join him on stage. A crowd of thousands sprawled across the vast convention floor cheered wildly as he denounced illegal immigration and trade deficits with China, Mexico and Japan.
Ms. Clinton, by contrast, held a low-key meeting with supporters in Oakland.
Welcoming her to the Home of Chicken and Waffles, a local soul food institution, Mayor Libby Schaaf alluded to Mr. Trump’s recent description of the city as one of the most dangerous in the world.
“We are incredibly proud to have Secretary Clinton here in Oakland today,” Ms. Schaaf said. “Despite what some people say about the level of safety in this city, Oakland has made incredible gains … . We have become a tremendously safer city.”
The lengthy discussion that followed was more policy-oriented than overtly political — though Ms. Clinton implicitly hit on a recurring theme that Mr. Trump is a divider rather than uniter.
Mr. Sanders made several stops across Southern California, starting with a morning rally in San Pedro, where he delivered a fiery rebuke of both major political parties.
“It is too late for establishment politics, establishment economics — we need a political revolution,” said Mr. Sanders, with the towering cranes at the Port of Los Angeles as his backdrop. “We are tired of politicians in both parties hustling money from the wealthy and the powerful.”
Meanwhile, cable television producers’ daydreams of a Sanders- Trump debate were dashed Friday afternoon when Mr. Trump finally pulled out of what he called an “easy payday.”
For days, the two had publicly weighed such an unusual spectacle after Mr. Trump mentioned the possibility during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show.
Mr. Trump blamed his withdrawal on “the fact that the Democratic nominating process is totally rigged and crooked Hillary Clinton and (Democratic National Committee chair) Deborah Wasserman Schultz will not allow Bernie Sanders to win.”
Mr. Trump added that it would be “inappropriate that I would debate the second-place finisher.”
“I hope that he changes his mind,” Mr. Sanders said at a campaign stop.
Cable television producers’ daydreams of a Bernie Sanders-Donald Trump debate were dashed Friday when Mr. Trump finally pulled out.