The disastrous fires that swept through the Pacific Palisades and Altadena neighborhoods of Los Angeles are still very much on our minds here in the Golden State. We live in LA, and right now our friends whose houses burned down are saying this is the hardest time of the year — instead of spending Thanksgiving and Christmas at home, they’re in some rental (if they’re lucky) or have had to move elsewhere entirely, daunted by the prospect of a long, expensive rebuild with faceless bureaucrats standing in the way.

We reported here at length on the many missteps made by both the local and state authorities, from empty reservoirs, a mayor who was overseas despite being warned of severe fire danger, a woke LA Fire Department, state park officials prioritizing plants over people, a governor who’s too busy running a shadow campaign for president to care… the list goes on.

But Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass have mostly stood by their decisions, both past and present. Unfortunately for Karen, though, what she said in a podcast taped in November is going to haunt them both. Both sides, she admitted, “botched” the response.

Talk about a hot mic:

The recording session inside the library at Getty House, the official mayor’s residence, lasted an hour. Once it ended, the two shook hands and the room broke into applause.

Then, the mayor kept talking — and let it rip.

Bass gave a blunt assessment of the emergency response to the Palisades and Eaton fires. “Both sides botched it,” she said.

She didn’t offer specifics on the Palisades. But on the Eaton fire, she pointed to the lack of evacuation alerts in west Altadena, where all but one of the 19 deaths occurred.

“They didn’t tell people they were on fire,” she said to Matt Welch, host of “The Fifth Column” podcast.

Gavin Newsom is sure to be hardest hit because, in his obsession with his national image, he’s telling anyone who will listen around the country that the climate change boogeyman is to blame. That little talking point just took a major punch to the face.

Karen Bass wants to spread the blame.
That’s not how leadership works.
She was the mayor. She was in charge.
The response failed, and it failed on her watch. https://t.co/6045k3W58h

— California Republican Party (@CAGOP) December 17, 2025

DON’T LET THEM FORGET: Exposed: Newsom's Burn-It-Out Policy Behind LA Firestorm

Palisades Resident Destroys LA Mayor Bass' Narrative, Describes 'Bureaucratic Hell' Following Wildfire

Frequent California observer Kevin Dalton had thoughts:

In a brief moment of honesty when she thought an interview was over, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said “Both sides botched it.” during her assessment of the emergency response to the apocalyptic Palisades and Eaton wildfires.

Naturally, her staff had that removed from the… pic.twitter.com/7aiUtcOPqT

— Kevin Dalton (@TheKevinDalton) December 17, 2025       

Naturally, her staff had that removed from the podcast

Yup, Dalton is right — the story gets worse. When Bass realized her comments had been recorded, she asked the host to bury them, which he clearly was only too happy to do, seeing as they do not appear in the video uploaded to YouTube. When asked about it, the host clammed up:

Welch declined to say whether Bass asked for the end of the video to be cut. He had no comment on why the final four minutes can’t be found on the YouTube version of the podcast.

“We’re not going to be talking about any of that right now,” he told The Times before hanging up.

MORE: Fire Damage in LA Reaches Biblical Proportions—Is This What They Wanted? And Could It Be Their Demise? (VIP)

LAFD Whistleblowers Destroy Official Narrative on Palisades Fire Cause

Bass’ team confirmed she asked for it not to be included. “The interview had clearly ended, and they acknowledged that when they took it down,” they said in an email to the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday. But Bass also admitted to the outlet that things should have been done better:

In the case of the city, Bass said, the fire department failed to pre-deploy to the Palisades and require firefighters to stay for an extra shift, as The Times first reported in January. In Altadena, she said, residents did not receive timely notices to evacuate.

“The city and the county did a lot of things that we would look back at and say was very unfortunate,” she told The Times.

I’ll say. Bass has announced a run for reelection, and is in a strong position to win, since Los Angeles voters — like a majority of Golden State voters, judging by the people they put in office — are clearly not playing with a full deck. Newsom, on the other hand, should he jump into the presidential race, is going to have a lot to answer for.

Bass just gave his future opponents a cheat sheet for any future debates.

Gavin Newsom, Karen Bass, and the “progressives” are ruining California. 

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