Claims about who owns California's water are spreading online. Here's what to know.
Erroneous accusations that a wealthy couple, Stewart and Lynda Resnick, have been hoarding water amid the Southern California wildfires have been spreading widely online.
No, most of California’s water isn’t owned by one billionaire couple
The owners of Wonderful Co., behind Fiji Water and other brands, use a lot of water, but it's only a fraction of California’s usage. No one entity owns the water.
No, Billionaire Couple Does Not 'Own Most of California's Water'
Since the beginning of the January 2025 fires around Los Angeles, claims circulated that one billionaire couple owned "most of California's water," with some people implying they were hoarding it from firefighting efforts.
California billionaire couple accused of hoarding water amid LA wildfires. But is it true?
Stewart and Lynda Resnick, an ultra-wealthy couple from California, are being accused of hoarding water when it is needed to fight the wildfires in California. The Resnicks own the Los Angeles-based Wonderful Company — which claims to be one of the largest food producers in the world.
Does a billionaire couple own almost all the water in California? Here’s why that’s False.
The couple’s company has a majority stake in a water bank in the San Joaquin Valley and uses vast amounts of water to manage its nearly 130,000-acre California agriculture operation. But the claim that the Resnicks own nearly all — or even a large portion — of California’s water is a massive exaggeration.
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