Jerry Brown: California Drought Shows 'Climate Change Is Not a Hoax'

 The debate has not yet dried up, even if California has. 

Two months after members of the U.S. Senate took jabs at one another on the subject of whether man made global warming was actually occurring, California Governor Jerry Brown said that the unprecedented drought and newly enacted water restrictions in his state show that "climate change is not a hoax." 

The implications for the rest of the country, which relies on California for a substantial portion of its food, could be profound, Brown said. 

"Well, there is a global market in—in many food commodities and that will tend to set the price," Brown said. "But remember, the weather that's happening in California, that weather will be reflect and show up in other parts of the world. And I can tell you, from California, climate change is not a hoax. We're dealing with it and it's damn serious."

Cities and towns in California must now reduce water usage by 25 percent, and residents who do not comply could face fines.

"The idea of your nice little green grass getting lots of water every day, that’s going to be a thing of the past,” Brown said on Thursday when announcing the new restrictions. 

Asked how the state planned to enforce the new restrictions, Brown told This Week that the mechanism was already in place. 

"Each water district that actually delivers waters—water to homes and businesses, they carry it out. We have a state water board that oversees the relationship with all these local districts. There are hundreds of them," Brown said. "And so if they don't comply, people can be fined $500 a day. The districts can go to court and get a cease and desist order. There's—the enforcement mechanism is powerful in a drought of this magnitude, you have to change that behavior and you have to change it substantially."

Last month, Brown lashed out at those who question the science of global warming, including Texas Senator Ted Cruz, saying that opposition to President Obama's efforts to curb carbon emissions “borders on the immoral.”