Trump Loosens Water Restrictions, California Sues

Call: On Wednesday, President Trump authorized an Interior Department order that allows farmers in California’s Central Valley to pump more water than they’d previously been allowed.

Response: On Thursday, California officials filed a lawsuit claiming the order would cause several fish species to go extinct.

The backstory: When California’s brutal, yearslong drought began, state and federal programs imposed severe restrictions on the amount of water CA farmers could use. The limits were meant to protect fish species like smelt and salmon.

• Some farmers turned to alternatives like digging wells, shelling out for pricey private-market water, and even letting fields go fallow.
• Those obviously aren’t ideal. So farmers have been working for years to get the restrictions lifted.

Naturally, those farmers cheered Trump’s choice—literally, at a campaign event in Bakersfield, CA. But state officials and environmentalists say the administration didn’t sufficiently evaluate the effect the order would have on wildlife habitats.

Zoom out: U.S. farmers are not fond of Trump’s trade war with China—it knocked out almost two-thirds of their exports to the country. This pro-agriculture positioning on water could help him earn a bit of good will in the industry.