Multiple wildfires continue to burn through Southern California Friday, with the Palisades Fire being the most destructive, having burned over 19,000 acres and destroyed thousands of structures. The fires have resulted in at least six deaths and forced the evacuation of over 360,000 people, with officials struggling to contain the blazes amid strong winds and dry conditions.
The Palisades Fire has burned over 19,000 acres, with 6% containment, and has destroyed more than 5,300 structures, making it the largest fire on record for January in California.
The Eaton Fire has burned over 10,600 acres, with 0% containment, and has resulted in five deaths, with thousands of structures damaged or destroyed.
The Kenneth Fire, which Los Angeles Police Department(LAPD) on Friday comfirmed was intentionally started on Thursday, has burned over 800 acres and has triggered mandatory evacuations in the West Hills neighborhood. The suspect which was citizen-arrested has been handed over to the police.
Governor Gavin Newsom has deployed the California National Guard to support law enforcement efforts and President Joe Biden has authorized additional assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to support firefighting efforts.
Mayor Karen Bass has announced that all Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) schools and offices will be closed due to the fires, and has urged residents to heed evacuation orders and follow the instructions of local authorities.
Bass and Newsom are facing criticisms over their response to the fires, with some accusing them of gross incompetence.
As flames tore through Pacific Palisades, Bass was in Africa, communicating with key city agencies from afar. She left town on Saturday as part of a presidential delegation to Ghana, just as the National Weather Service began ratcheting up its warnings about the coming windstorm. On Tuesday, she attended the inauguration of Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama, leaving City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson as L.A.’s acting mayor when the Palisades fire broke out.
Bass faced some brutal assessments of the city’s handling of the fires as she returned to the U.S.. In a viral video at one airport, she stood silently as a Sky News reporter peppered her with questions about her decision to go to Africa. The mayor mostly avoided eye contact as the reporter pressed her on whether she needed to apologize to Angelenos, and whether she regretted reducing the Fire Department budget earlier this year.
“Madam Mayor, have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today who are dealing with this disaster?” the reporter asked. Bass did not reply to any of his questions.
As the Palisades fire exploded in size on Tuesday and new blazes broke out in Sylmar and elsewhere, Harris-Dawson, not Bass, served as the city’s top elected official at news conferences. And with Bass away from the cameras, real estate developer Rick Caruso — her opponent in the 2022 mayoral election — swept in to fill the information gap, blasting the city’s handling of the disaster on multiple news outlets.
Caruso, whose daughter lost her home in the wildfires, voiced outrage over the lack of water pressure that hampered firefighters in Pacific Palisades. On Fox11, he criticized Bass over her absence, saying that “we’ve got a mayor that’s out of the country, and we’ve got a city that’s burning.”
“We have a mayor who seems to be more concerned about being at some party, wherever the hell that is,” Caruso said in an interview with The Times. “We have terrible leadership resulting in billions of dollars in damage because she wasn’t here and didn’t know what she was doing.”
Asked about the low pressure afflicting city fire hydrants, officials with the Department of Water and Power said earlier in the day that there had been “a tremendous demand” on the water system, which had been pushed “to the extreme.” The system received four times the typical demand for 15 hours straight, lowering the overall water pressure, DWP General Manager Janisse Quiñones said at a Wednesday morning news conference.
Meanwhile Governor Newsom has faced even harsher criticism for his handling of the fires.
"Governor Gavin Newscum refused to sign the water restoration declaration put before him that would have allowed millions of gallons of water, from excess rain and snow melt from the North, to flow daily into many parts of California, including the areas that are currently burning in a virtually apocalyptic way," President-elect Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social. "He is the blame for this."
The President-elect added in other posts, "I will demand that this incompetent governor allow beautiful, clean, fresh water to FLOW INTO CALIFORNIA!"
"The Governor of California, @GavinNewsom, has done a terrible job of forest management. I told him from the first day we met that he must 'clean' his forest floors regardless of what his bosses, the environmentalists, DEMAND of him. Must also do burns and cut fire stoppers."
Trump also demanded, "Governor Gavin Newscum should resign. This is all his fault!!!"
Tesla chief Elon Musk also piled on. "These fires are easily avoidable, but nonsense regulations in California prevent action being taken, so year after year homes burn down and more people die."
"DEI means people DIE," Musk declared referring to the left's woke 'diversity, equity and inclusion' programs which put race and so-called intersectionalism propaganda over merit.
