Musk v Newsom_01132025_1
California Gov. Gavin Newsom called out Elon Musk for spreading misinformation about the wildfires. Getty Images

After Elon Musk was accused of being one of many social media users spreading misinformation about the California wildfires, one of his claims was invalidated on his own livestream.

Two days after the fire started in Pacific Palisades, Musk quoted a post on X that blamed "the inept far leftist response," further asserting that "bad governance" led to a water shortage in the area.

"Exactly. Climate change risk is real, just much slower than alarmists claim. The immense loss of homes in LA is primarily due to: 1. Nonsensical overregulation that prevented creating fire breaks and doing brush clearing. 2. Bad governance at the state and local level that resulted in a shortage of water," Musk wrote in a post, which now has more than 36 million views.

California's governor, Gavin Newsom, criticized Musk on Sunday for spreading misinformation about the water shortage, pointing to a clip from Musk's livestream.

"@ElonMusk exposed by firefighters for his own lies," Newsom wrote.

"My understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, in Malibu, along the coast, there was no shortage of water. In the Palisades, there was a shortage of water at some point, or is that not accurate," Musk asked the fire command team for the Palisades fire.

"We were flowing an amount of water that the system couldn't—it was overbearing just because of how much water these firefighters were utilizing," a fire official corrected.

Musk then promptly ended the livestream.

As of Monday, the wildfires were not contained and conditions are expected to worsen. A red flag warning, meaning conditions are ideal for rapid fire growth, will be in place starting at 4 a.m. Tuesday through noon Wednesday, the Washington Post reported.

The number of confirmed deaths has reached 25, per the Los Angeles Times, and is expected to climb.

Originally published by Latin Times

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