{"id":579176,"date":"2021-07-01T17:50:54","date_gmt":"2021-07-01T21:50:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=579176"},"modified":"2021-07-01T17:50:56","modified_gmt":"2021-07-01T21:50:56","slug":"republican-governors-excluded-from-white-house-wildfire-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/republican-governors-excluded-from-white-house-wildfire-meeting\/","title":{"rendered":"Republican Governors Excluded From White House Wildfire Meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Frepublican-governors-excluded-from-white-house-wildfire-meeting%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=579176&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/GettyImages-1233734321_736x514.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">As wildfires rage across the western United States, Republican governors representing states with some of the largest fires were frozen out of a White House meeting to plan the federal government&#8217;s response.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">President Joe Biden hosted several western governors for a virtual summit to plan for the start of wildfire season. Left off the White House&#8217;s invite list were Republican governors of Idaho, Montana, and Arizona\u2014three states currently suffering from wildfires. In fact, 6 of the 10 largest fires currently raging in the United States are in states unrepresented at the meeting, according to the government&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/inciweb.nwcg.gov\/accessible-view\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-saferedirecturl=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?q=https:\/\/inciweb.nwcg.gov\/accessible-view\/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1625242318624000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHKIOlgpEKV8oeXdHOoZUbZ7lOVYw\" data-mt-detrack-inspected=\"true\">wildfire tracking database<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Governors Greg Gianforte of Montana and Brad Little of Idaho wrote a joint letter to Biden on Wednesday noting the slight. &#8220;While we are encouraged to learn you will meet with eight western governors to discuss the federal government&#8217;s response to wildfires, we were disappointed to learn not all western states who face a harsh wildfire season will be at the table,&#8221; the governors wrote. &#8220;It is critical to engage governors fully and directly to have a productive discussion about how the federal government can improve its wildfire response and prevention efforts.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Present at the meeting were five Democratic governors\u2014representing California, Oregon, New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada\u2014along with just two Republicans, from Wyoming and Utah. At least one additional Democratic governor, Washington&#8217;s Jay Inslee, was invited to the meeting but did not attend. Inslee, a former chair of the Democratic Governors Association, scored an invite that was not extended to Arizona governor Doug Ducey, who chairs the Republican Governors Association.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden wanted to &#8220;engage directly&#8221; with stakeholders to learn how the federal government can be &#8220;better partners&#8221; of western states fighting wildfires. The White House did not respond to requests for comment on how invites were determined.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The wildfire preparedness meeting is not the first instance of Biden&#8217;s White House freezing out the political opposition. Alaska&#8217;s Republican governor Mike Dunleavy, also not invited to the meeting despite a high prevalence of wildfires in the state, told the <em>Free Beacon<\/em> he hasn&#8217;t heard from the White House since Biden&#8217;s inauguration, aside from a five-minute conversation with the State Department to plan the March 18 summit with Chinese officials in Anchorage.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The lack of communication comes as the federal government takes major action that impacts Alaska, including the suspension of all drilling leases in its massive Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. &#8220;We don&#8217;t exist to Biden,&#8221; Dunleavy said.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">South Dakota&#8217;s Republican governor Kristi Noem says she was blindsided by the administration&#8217;s decision to cancel the Fourth of July celebration at Mount Rushmore, which came with no warning from the White House. Noem says she attended Biden&#8217;s inauguration in a gesture of bipartisan goodwill, but that &#8220;there has been no willingness to have a conversation back.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Nebraska&#8217;s Republican governor Pete Ricketts told the <em>Free Beacon<\/em> the White House set up a liaison for his state, but that &#8220;they don&#8217;t seem to pick up their phones.&#8221; Ricketts says his state&#8217;s only communication with the administration comes through White House coronavirus briefings.<\/p>\n<p>Gianforte and Little told the White House in their letter that their states possess &#8220;extensive experience and expertise in fighting wildfires, preventing them, and managing our forests.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Please know our states stand ready to help other states and the federal government as we confront wildfire season,&#8221; the governors wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As wildfires rage across the western United States, Republican governors representing states with some of the largest fires were frozen out of a White House meeting to plan the federal &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":2313877,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/GettyImages-1233734321_736x514.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"Republican Governors Excluded From White House Wildfire Meeting","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-579176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/GettyImages-1233734321_736x514.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"Republican Governors Excluded From White House Wildfire Meeting","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579176\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2313877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}