It’s now been over a year since the catastrophic wildfires that burned down entire neighborhoods in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena areas of Los Angeles. The planning for such an eventuality and the Keystone Cops response to it have drawn blistering criticism from everyone from Donald Trump to billionaire developer Rick Caruso to actor Spencer Pratt, who lost his house in the conflagration and is now running to replace Karen Bass as LA mayor.
Some of the harshest words, however, came Wednesday from someone who presumably knows a thing or two about fires: Redondo Beach Fire Chief Patrick Butler. Redondo Beach is in Los Angeles County, about 20 miles from downtown LA.
Speaking at a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing, the chief didn’t mince words:
‘’During the critical preparedness period, the mayor was out of the country despite knowledge of the forecasted life-threatening conditions,” Butler said, referencing Bass’s controversial trip to Ghana Africa before the fires.
”Responsibility for continuity of leadership and citywide coordination rests with the mayor, and in this case, that responsibility was not met.”
”This was not a failure of effort by firefighters,” Butler added. ”It was a failure of leadership above them.”
Watch:
“When leaders delay, defer, and minimize risk, disasters are MANUFACTURED. The fire was not caused by weather alone, it was caused by leadership decisions.”
—FIRE CHIEF Patrick Butler, 36 yrs in service 🔥EVISCERATES 🔥 Mayor Bass and CA Leadership“What I observed, wasn’t… pic.twitter.com/tbZ2BfiQuO
— Heatherheather007 (@LibertyValkyrie) January 29, 2026
What I observed, wasn’t simply a difficult fire under extreme conditions, it was a PREDICTABLE OUTCOME of a break down in leadership, preparedness, and command discipline.
MORE: Trump Tired of California Failure Theater, Issues Order for Administration to Take Over LA Fire Rebuild
Newsom’s Nightmare: Interim Report Documenting FireAid Fraud Drops on Eve of Palisades Fire Anniversary
The January fires destroyed over 16,000 homes and caused at least 31 official deaths (although some studies claim that hundreds more were “attributable” to the disaster). Bass and Gov. Gavin Newsom have been rightfully ripped for empty reservoirs, fire personnel obsessed with DEI instead of preparedness, an edict from California State Parks that prevented firefighters from fully extinguishing the initial outbreak, and now, a recovery effort that is mired in red tape, bureaucracy, and regulations.
As I’ve written, it is perhaps the signature symbol of what you get when you let progressive leadership run wild, which is exactly what’s happened in the Golden State.
Too bad you didn’t help your fellow Americans during the California fires your policies were responsible for. https://t.co/uBGYKxUtQH
— 🇺🇸 Beer30 🇺🇸 (@bblBeer30) January 30, 2026
Meanwhile, another man with firefighting experience told the committee that the state’s leaders should have prepared for situations like this:
…Rick Crawford, a retired battalion chief with the Los Angeles Fire Department, described the Palisades Fire as a ”case study” in how government leadership can bungle a wildfire into a deadly catastrophe, stressing that the inferno was not ”unforeseeable”.
”Wildfires are not disasters at ignition,” Crawford said. ”They become disasters when warnings are recognized but fail to trigger executive action.”
Gavin Newsom, not one known for taking responsibility for anything that happens under his watch, claimed the hearing was just to score political points, saying it was “another opportunity for MAGA Republicans to try to spin a false narrative about these disasters.”
Which part of the narrative is false, Mr. Newsom?
I had dinner Thursday night with a couple that lost their home in the Palisades. They are soldiering on, but their hearts hurt. Do you want to explain to them, Karen Bass and Gavin Newsom, about what a great job you guys did? I don’t think anyone but your union donors is buying that horse manure.
You failed them, you failed Los Angeles, and you failed California.
Editor’s Note: Gavin Newsom, Karen Bass, and the “progressives” are ruining California.
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