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As wildfires rage across southern California, anger against Democrats’ mismanagement is burning brightly. Since last Tuesday, a series of fires mostly in Los Angeles County have destroyed over 12,300 buildings, according to Cal Fire, and claimed as many as 27 lives, according to the L.A. County Medical Examiner. Tens of thousands of L.A. County residents are also under mandatory evacuation orders, and over 40,000 acres have been burned.

The response of Democrats at the local, state, and even national levels has ignited outrage and anger. L.A. Mayor Karen Bass (D) has been roundly criticised for her failure to adequately prepare for fires, slashing the L.A. Fire Department’s budget and placing a higher premium on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives than on public safety. In response, nearly 120,000 L.A. residents have signed a petition demanding Bass resign from office.

“We, the undersigned residents of Los Angeles and concerned citizens, urgently call for the immediate recall of Mayor Karen Bass due to her gross mismanagement and failure to effectively respond to the devastating 2025 fires in and around the city of Los Angeles,” the petition states.

It continues, “In the wake of these catastrophic fires, our city has been left in crisis. Water supplies have been severely strained, billions of taxpayer dollars have been misallocated or left unaccounted for, and countless lives have been lost.”

The petition calls for Bass’s resignation and a full investigation “into the failures in disaster preparedness, response, and resource allocation that left our city vulnerable.” It also demands accountability “for the mismanagement of taxpayer funds intended for disaster relief and recovery” as well as a detailed plan for preventing and preparing for future disasters.

Insane Incompetence

Previously, Bass had slashed the LAFD’s budget by nearly $20 million for the 2024 to 2025 fiscal year, with over $10 million being stripped from the Department’s budget for operating supplies. According to a report from The City Journal, the budget cuts were enacted so that Bass could “reward city employees with rich contracts and benefits — even as [Bass] dismissed worries that the reductions would hurt services.”

City officials predicted that the mayor’s financial scheme would cost the city $3.5 billion over the course of five years, necessitating budget cuts in other areas. Bass was also missing in action when the fires broke out, visiting Ghana in Africa along with a handful of other Democrats.

In addition to mismanaging taxpayer dollars and emergency funds, city officials also allowed fire hydrants to run out of water. According to LAFD insiders cited by The Daily Mail, Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) chief Janisse Quiñones failed to fix broken fire hydrants — for a period of months — and “oversaw the shutdown and emptying of a reservoir in the Pacific Palisades during brushfire season.”

The Palisades fire has consumed nearly 24,000 acres so far, destroying nearly 1,300 buildings and killing at least eight individuals. Prior to joining LADWP, Quiñones was a senior vice president at Pacific Gas and Electric, a company with a history of fire hazards. Cal Fire determined that Pacific Gas and Electric was primarily responsible for both the Kincade fire in 2019 and the Camp fire in 2018, the deadliest fire in California’s history, claiming 85 lives. The company filed for bankruptcy shortly afterwards.

Wrong Priorities

California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) called for “an independent investigation into the loss of water pressure to local fire hydrants and the reported unavailability of water supplies from the Santa Ynez Reservoir.” He stated, “We need answers to ensure this does not happen again, and we have every resource available to fight these catastrophic fires.”

However, the Golden State governor has also borne the brunt of much criticism linked to his handling of the fires. California Republicans have blasted Newsom for focusing on opposing President-elect Donald Trump instead of the fires, noting that the governor called a special legislative session three days after the fires broke out, aimed not at public safety but at allotting the California Department of Justice $25 million to counter Trump’s policies, especially his planned mass deportations.

“It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Newsom is indulging his ideological fetishes at the expense of the people of California — he always has,” said Republican California Rep. Tom McClintock, according to the Daily Caller News Foundation. McClintock caustically suggested that Newsom “bring his lyre to the special session and serenade the legislature as Los Angeles burns.” GOP state representatives Vince Fong and Young Kim condemned Newsom’s priorities as “wildly out of touch” and “tone-deaf.”

Hollywood celebrities have also lashed out at Newsom in recent days. Veteran actor and director Mel Gibson, a conservative Catholic, told Fox News that he lost his home — and several “irreplaceable” items such as paintings, photographs, and centuries-old books — in the fires.

“One always suspects that this might happen, but one thinks that the resources and the capabilities of the men and women who will be on standby — that they’ll be able to cope with any situation that comes up, but apparently, some people were asleep on the job, mainly our leaders there,” Gibson said.

He noted that Democratic leaders and city officials will have to “live with” their failures, adding, “Someone should answer for it. We’ll see. I think we know who the culprits are.” Gibson said that he was “not a big admirer of either” Newsom or Bass and advised the governor to focus on running California and “spend less on hair gel.”

Rhea Durham, wife of actor and former rapper Mark Wahlberg, torched Newsom for “standing around laughing like [he’s] at a tailgate” in a since-deleted Instagram post sharing a photo of the governor socialising with first responders to the Palisades fire. Robert Davi, an actor and singer best known for appearing in “Die Hard,” called for Newsom to “be thrown out of office.” He demanded that influential Hollywood celebrities hold politicians like Newsom accountable for their executive failures.

Actor James Woods also lambasted Newsom’s lack of leadership. “If it is true that things were handled this way, if it is true that Gavin Newsom is the absolute blithering idiot that I believe he is in the way he has handled fire management in this state again and again and again and again, this isn’t a wake-up call,” Woods said in an interview. He continued, “This is the kind of thing they have tribunals for, where they try people and say, you had an oath of office to perform certain duties.”

The Blame Game

Newsom had previously disregarded reports that fire hydrants had run out of water, shifting responsibility for the issue to “the local folks.” According to a report from Newsweek, Newsom also slashed over $100 million from the state’s wildfire prevention budget for the fiscal year 2024 to 2025. Nearly $30 million was cut from a program funding wildfire prevention, and $12 million was cut from a program designed to make houses more resilient to wildfires, in addition to numerous other cuts.

Meanwhile, the governor has blamed criticism of his administration on “misinformation”, even asking outgoing President Joe Biden to intervene and “deal with” the criticism. “I ask you, we’ve got to deal with this misinformation. There were hurricane-force winds of mis- and dis-information — lies,” Newsom said in a video conference with Biden. He continued, “People want to divide this country, and we’re gonna have to address that as well.”

In a podcast appearance, Newsom faulted Trump for spreading “misinformation”. He said, “It’s words. It’s a salad. It’s the form and substance of fog. It’s made up. It’s delusional, and it’s a consistent mantra from Trump going back years and years and years, and it’s reinforced over and over and over within the right wing.”

Newsom repeated his claims in a subsequent NBC interview. “That mis- and disinformation I don’t think advantages or aids any of us. Responding to Donald Trump’s insults, we would spend another month. I’m very familiar with them,” he said.

Other Democrats have shifted their focus to “climate change” in response to the fires. Addressing the fires, Biden’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) director Deanne Criswell, who previously came under fire over allegations that Trump voters were denied aid in the wake of Hurricanes Milton and Irene, stated in an interview, “We’re seeing the change coming from climate change, and we’re seeing more significant severe weather events. That’s what we’re seeing here in California.”

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) posted a video to X (formerly Twitter) of winds spreading a fire outside a Los Angeles-area McDonald’s. She added the caption, “Corporations got us into this mess, but even they can’t escape the devastating reality of climate change.”

Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) blamed the fires on both “climate change” and Trump, in a series of X posts. “Trump has been bought for $1 billion by Big Oil,” Markey wrote. He added, “We know what will happen. More fires, more climate disasters, more death. The LA fires are a preview of coming atrocities.” In a separate post, Markey wrote, “Los Angeles is on fire. Donald Trump says drill baby drill and stop wind and solar. He will add fuel to the fire.”