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Embattled LA Mayor Karen Bass Removes Fire Chief Amid Continued Blowback Over Wildfires

After uncontrolled blazes torched much of the Los Angeles area earlier this year, Americans of all political stripes began calling out officials at the local and state level for seemingly ignoring the warning signs and even making things worse though the implementation of various leftist policies.

Democrat L.A. Mayor Karen Bass received a significant amount of the backlash, particularly since she was touring Africa as conditioned worsened and the first wildfires broke out:

Since then, she has seemed eager to pass the responsibility on to others at every opportunity.

This week, Bass announced her decision to remove L.A. Fire Chief Kristen Crowley from duty, as Breitbart reported:

Bass has appointed retired former Chief Deputy Ronnie Villanueva to act as interim head of the L.A. Fire Department, pending a national search for a replacement candidate.

Earlier this week, Bass claimed that Chief Crowley did not give her adequate warning about the risk of a major fire, though Bass herself had posted on social media about the risk. Bass was overseas in Ghana at the time of the fire.

Several days after the fire on January 7, Crowley blamed budget cuts for her department’s struggle to contain the fire. Bass had cut nearly $20 million from the city fire budget, especially on operational supplies and overtime expenses.

The firing marks the first time any public official has been held accountable for the blaze, which burned nearly 24,000 acres and destroyed nearly 7,000 structures. However, Bass herself has refused to resign or apologize.

The move was seen as too little, too late by many of her constituents, including former political rival Rick Caruso:

Here’s a sampling of the latest social media response:

Crowley’s pink slip came just days after Bass claimed during an interview that she was unaware of the extent of the dangers prior to the recent wildfires.

As the National Review reported:

Although the National Weather Service warned that intense Santa Ana winds were due to hit L.A. two days before Bass left the city for Ghana, she ignored advice that the city was at high risk of wildfires, and instead chose to attend the inauguration of Ghanaian president John Dramani Mahama. Bass claimed in an interview that she was not aware of the wildfire risk when she flew to Africa.

“We need to look at everything about the preparation and all of that for the fires . . . I think when we evaluate that, we will find that although there were warnings, that I frankly wasn’t aware of,” Bass told Fox 11.“That level of preparation didn’t happen. If it had, I wouldn’t have even gone to San Diego, let alone leave the country.”

“From the city, from the county, that level of preparation didn’t happen. So it didn’t reach that level to me, to say, ‘Something terrible could happen and maybe you shouldn’t have gone on the trip,’” she added.

When the Palisades Fire broke out around 10:30 a.m. local time Tuesday, January 7, Bass was in Ghana. The Eaton Fire started to burn in Altadena around 6:30 p.m. the same day, and the Hurst Fire broke out just northwest of downtown L.A. around 10:30 p.m. 

Here’s some additional coverage of Bass’ decision to fire Crowley:


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