Elon Musk’s interventions continue to irritate many politicians around the world, with California governor Gavin Newsom the latest to retaliate against the Twitter/X owner and tech billionaire following his criticism of the official’s handling of the Los Angeles wildfires.
It came after Musk shared a video from another Twitter/X account on Saturday (January 11), in which Newsom is seen saying there is a “zero tolerance for looting” in the aftermath of the disaster.
The poster claimed that “Newsom and California Democrats literally decriminalized looting” by “preventing [sic] police from arresting and prosecutors from prosecuting them,” and Musk reposted it with a clown and world emoji.
Newsom quickly dismissed Musk’s support for the claims, urging the billionaire to “stop encouraging looting” by “lying and telling people it’s decriminalized.”
“It is not. It is illegal, as it always has been. “Bad actors will be arrested and prosecuted,” he declared.
Both proposed Community Notes on Newsom’s tweet and several responses cite California’s Proposition 47 from 2014, which reclassified shoplifting as a misdemeanour (a less serious crime) if the goods stolen totaled less than $950 (£778), as ‘evidence’ of looting’s ‘decriminalisation’.
That is despite the fact that many dictionaries define decriminalization as no longer considering a specific action to be illegal, while a misdemeanour remains a crime.
Following a public vote in November 2024, shoplifting was reinstated as a felony for repeat offenders under Proposition 36.
Hours after responding to Musk, Newsom announced the creation of a website called ‘California Fire Facts’ to “ensure the public has access to fact-based data” about the wildfires in Southern California.
“The TRUTH: California did not reduce our firefighting budget. We have nearly doubled the size of our firefighting force and constructed the world’s largest aerial firefighting fleet.
“CA has increased forest management tenfold since we took office. California will not tolerate looting,” he wrote.
