Los Angeles is battling through the worst fires in its history at least 24 people have tragically been killed more than 150,000 have been forced to flee their homes 10,000 structures have been completely destroyed including some of the country's most expensive real estate and when the fires broke out LA mayor Karen bass was in Africa and when she returned instead of answering critical questions from reporters she chose to just ignore those questions and stay silent do you owe citizens an apology for being absent while their homes were burning do you regret cutting the fire department budget
by millions of dollars Madame mayor have you nothing to say today back have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today Elon Musk says that you're utterly incompetent are you considering your position Madame mayor have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today here dealing with this disaster no apology for them do you think you should have been visiting Ghana while this was unfolding back home Karen bass had a choice in that moment instead inad of fronting up and showing leadership she ran away who else would like to know why she approved an
$8 million budget cut for the LA fire department why a major reservoir which holds 117 million gallons of water has been sitting empty for almost a year which meant that smaller tanks were quickly exhausted and fire hydrants were running dry as firefighters risked their lives trying to save homes and why did Karen bass have nothing to say as the people of Los Angeles were going through the most horrifying experience that was made worse because of the government's mismanagement well after ignoring reporters and showing no leadership at the start of this crisis Karen bass has posted
a bizarre video where she appears slightly upbeat and even smiling as she tells the people of La that she's seen the devastation angelinos we're still going through it and to any of you and all of you that have experienced a loss the grief the Ang anger the just utter shock I've seen the devastation it is unbelievable the amount of loss that people have experience but we have to get through this crisis and I know that we will I was at the silar command post today and I saw the work of our First Responders and how
they've been able to defeat the fires in certain areas we know we still have much more to go and we know the winds are going to kick up again but we got to stick together we got to stand strong and then we have to rebuild our city we're the nation's second largest city one of the greatest cities in the world is that helpful the people of La don't need to be told that she's seen the devastation they're all experiencing the Heartbreak and Devastation for themselves they also don't need to be told that La is the
nation's second largest city they need answers they need leadership and they need to know why decisions were made that meant that La was not prepared to fight these fires well there are calls for Karen bass to resign and those calls are getting louder almost 100,000 people have signed a change.org petition demanding that she steps down due to the gross mismanagement of the fires and Karen bass isn't the only one facing calls to resign president-elect Donald Trump is calling on the governor of California Gavin Nome to stand down writing on Truth social Governor Gavin nuum refused
to sign the water restoration declaration put before him he wanted to protect an essentially worthless fish called a smelt by giving it less water but didn't care about the people of California now the ultimate price is being paid now Trump has been criticizing new's Forest management for years back in 2019 he wrote I told him from the first day we met that he must clean his Forest floors regardless of his bosses the environmentalists demand of him they must also do burns Trump warned new to quote get his act together and to open the closed water
Lanes coming down fromont from the north but Gavin nuum now claims that he doesn't know what Trump is talking about and he also tries to claim that all of the reservoirs in California are full just look at this spin uh I don't know what he's referring to when he talks about the Delta smelt uh in reservoirs the reservoirs are completely full of the state reservoirs here in Southern California that Miss and disinformation I don't think advantages or Aids any of us uh responding to Donald Trump's insults uh we would spend another month uh I'm very
familiar with them every elected official that he disagrees with very familiar with them we do know though from reporting here locally that that one reservoir that serves the Palisades was not full and that's exactly what triggered my desire to get the investigation to understand what was happening with that local Reservoir that Gavin new is trying to do his own PR claiming that there's a lot of misinformation out there and posted on X a link for people to get the facts about the fires now that takes you to Gavin new.com Caln fira which ALS Al directs
people to donate to the California fire Foundation but that link that's on the top right hand corner doesn't take you to the California fire Foundation if you click on it what it actually takes you to is actblue.com slon slcfd em La fire 2025 act blue is a fundraising platform for the Democrat Party on that link it shows new's campaign for democracy and informs donor is that they'll be signed up for text updates from the political action committee Professor Joseph syracusa says that Gavin Nim can kiss the White House goodbye oh he's he's gone you know
he can kiss the White House goodbye uh this is a political disaster Americans uh expect their Governors and their Mayors and their police Chiefs and Fire Chiefs to get a handle on this and uh they were poorly uh uh poorly prepared for this and keep in mind there there are I think seven major water um facilities that were supposed to be built but they couldn't meet the ecosystems criteria as a result of nome's pushing on on this angle here so he's gonna have to bear the burden here and I do not think KLA Harris is
gonna rush in to replace his job because there's a lot of people there who are angry and with good reason Analise nson is on the ground in Los Angeles streets normally gridlocked with traffic are held clear for emergency workers while entire neighborhoods remain closed those both at risk and those already hit many residents don't know if their homes are still standing my parents' house they're 79 and 85 and U my Dad's sick and he's asking about his house cuz he spent his entire life you know wanting to live by the sea or having a house
by the Sea we found Cindy Salo with her bike trying to get around the the roadblocks trying to find out if our house is still standing you can't get past Sketty Villa it's a hard stop armed with an address and our press credentials we made our way past the police checks on the Pacific Coast Highway where house after house had burned to the ground so many in fact it was hard to tell where her father's home was even supposed to be I'm going to send you a photo I I don't know if we have good
news for you um so I'm I'm sorry okay okay I understand any news is is is something I'm grateful thank you so much it came in two oh yeah two you're yeah I think you're in the right spot I'm really sorry I was hoping this would be a good news story no yeah no I got information and now I know no but thank you it's at least now I have a little bit of I have closure while those living in this city under siege want answers for why government authorities weren't better prepared I want to
know why our water why we didn't have enough water for all the fire hydrants of course of course they cut the budget of course and like I say I want to emphasize more than anything how amazing our firefighters are and the First Responders none of this is on them we are immensely grateful for everything they did with the limited resources they had towards the end because they have not they we they went they went to every neighborhood that they could and like I said just the fact that they had the foresight to throw our flammables
into our pool so that our house wouldn't ignite and that they put out the fire on our hedge they were there at least do you know what I mean they they tried to do what they could and we're we can never repay them for their heroism or what they've done for us we just can't but I think the town everyone I'm talking to most of the people in this hotel are evacuees and they are angry and they want and they want answers and answers is still difficult to come by as authorities were dealt with another
blow new fronts broke out threatening new neighborhoods justce slower winds were supposed to give firefighters some reprieve what makes firefighting so difficult and dangerous in the canyon surrounding Los Angeles are tiny spot fires just like the one you can see here it is small but has the potential to climb quickly up the mountain side and we're just on the cusp of a highly populated area of Los Angeles that has already been evacuated at the same time firefighters are doing those water drops to try to put those small fires out but as the wind picks up
as you can see it is now it makes it more difficult for planes to drop that water and in an instant it can be out of control there's no end in sight to this catastrophe here in Santa Monica there's an eerie calm with many people who live here choosing to leave even if just to escape the smoke while the citizens of Los Angeles fight to survive another day
