Fox’s Ingraham claims 'investing in renewables' caused the Maui wildfire

Fox News host Laura Ingraham on Thursday's edition of The Ingraham Angle claimed that the Maui, Hawaii wildfire that virtually obliterated the city of Lāhainā this week was caused by "focusing on investing in renewables." But experts have suggested that the blaze was likely sparked by a variety of factors.

"One possibility was that active power lines that fell in high winds" ignited the inferno, Adeel Hassan reported in The New York Times on Wednesday. "The fires on the islands were stoked by a combination of low humidity and strong mountain winds, brought by Hurricane Dora, a Category 4 storm hundreds of miles to the south in the Pacific Ocean. Worsening drought conditions in recent weeks probably also contributed. Nearly 16 percent of Maui County was in a severe drought a week ago, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor."

Similarly, on Tuesday, The Washington Post's Brianna Sacks explained that "officials have not announced a cause, though power lines likely caused the first reported fire. The spread of flammable nonnative grasses combined with hurricane-stoked winds could have been factors alongside the indirect influence of climate change."

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NBC News' Phil McCausland, Lewis Kamb, and Daniel Arkin exclusively noted on Wednesday that Hawaii Electric is being sued for not implementing adequate safety protocols.

"Hawaiian Electric is not just responsible and they weren't just negligent," Mikal Watts, a lead attorney on the case, told NBC. "They were grossly negligent by making conscious decisions to delay grid modernization projects that would have prevented this very tragedy."

Nonetheless, Ingraham implied that President Joe Biden personally "failed" to prevent the disaster.

"No, nothing to say about this trip to Hawaii where the deadliest wildfire in American history has now claimed 111 lives, including children," Ingraham said. "And while the man the media heralded as 'Mr. Empathy' is tight-lipped about his travel plans, Deputy Chief of Staff John Podesta was more than happy to fill the messaging void left by the president because yesterday he spent three minutes at the White House explaining how the Inflation Reduction Act is actually just a massive piece of climate legislation."

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Ingraham rolled footage of Podesta saying:

The toll of extreme weather fueled by climate change is being felt across the country.

All of us have watched in horror as the Maui fires have claimed over a hundred lives.

To stop these disasters from getting worse, we have to cut the carbon pollution that is driving the climate crisis. And that's what the Inflation Reduction Act is all about.

According to Ingraham, "That's a lie. What likely caused the fires in Maui was Hawaiian Electric's failure to clear flammable grasses from right around the electric wires because, look, it was focusing on and investing in renewables. Of course, all of this is about obscuring all their other failures. This is Biden's Katrina and no one's calling him on it. But, you almost have to tip your hat to the left, right? Because Katrina was reputationally ruinous for George Bush. Hawaii should be the same for Biden."

PBS News correspondent William Brangham published this analysis hours before Ingraham's show aired:

Despite its title, this law is the single biggest U.S. investment in addressing climate change and driving a transition to clean energy. It steers billions in subsidies into everything from battery manufacturing to climate adaptation. It contains tax incentives for people to buy electric cars and cleaner technologies in their homes, and it directs large investments to fight pollution in underserved communities.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency also drew the same conclusion after Biden signed the IRA into law:

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 is the most significant climate legislation in U.S. history, offering funding, programs, and incentives to accelerate the transition to a clean energy economy and will likely drive significant deployment of new clean electricity resources. Most provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 became effective 1/1/2023.

The Inflation Reduction Act incentives reduce renewable energy costs for organizations like Green Power Partners – businesses, nonprofits, educational institutions, and state, local, and tribal organizations. Taking advantage of Inflation Reduction Act incentives, such as tax credits, is key to lowering GHG emission footprints and accelerating the clean energy transition.

Watch below via Media Matters for America or at this link.

READ MORE: 'Maui is my home — you don’t speak for me': Lauren Boebert slammed over Hawaii fires attack on Biden

Click here to view Hassan's complete analysis and here for Sacks'(subscriptions required for both). Brangham's report is here. McCausland's, Kamb's, and Arkin's piece is here.