Caitlyn Jenner stops by the show to give an account of the devastating fires in Los Angeles plus reacts to the possibility of a Kamala Harris run for Governor. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Sean, if you want to be a part of the program, let me start because we're going to talk a little bit about the poor forest management in California and how preventable these wildfires are out there if only common sense measures were adopted.
But that does not negate the human toll that has gone on out there.
It is one of the saddest things, and I've had this happen to friends of mine, and I'm sure most of you have too.
If somebody works so hard their entire life, they have a dream, they want a house for themselves and their family.
It is it is so built into the American psyche that that that is a a huge achievement in one's life to be able to get their own home and.
And it means so much to everybody and all the family memories that are in there, et cetera.
And you're watching hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of homes burned down.
I don't want to forget the human component of all of this and let the people of California that are living through this know that our thoughts, our prayers, our love are all sent to all of you.
I'm sure it's not exactly heartwarming to hear that.
Well, you'll be able to rebuild, blah, blah.
It just it is.
It will upturn turn up your life.
It will just change things around.
The entire trajectory of your life now is in a whole different direction.
There is so much that we're learning that to me is infuriating and just angers me.
I saw Joe Biden out there with Gavin Newsom.
Gavin Newsom, probably his biggest booster in the entire country, and and he stuck with them to the end.
And it's nice that Joe went out there.
It's appropriate that he went out there.
Uh where was Joe when Hurricane Helene destroyed, you know, parts of Georgia and especially the northwestern part and the mountain part of mountain, mountainous part of North Carolina.
I mean, they still have not caught up with helping the people that desperately need help there.
Uh where were they in East Palestine after that train wreck happened?
They were nowhere to be found.
Joe couldn't bother, didn't take the time to go out and meet with the people there.
And, you know, as we look at uh some of the background here, you know, there is something called the science of forest management, and it is a science.
And interestingly, you can go back and one person that predicted all of this.
Let's go back to 2018, and this is Donald Trump, the president with Gavin Newsom talking about forest management.
Listen.
Cleaned out and protected.
We've got to take care of the floors, you know, the floors of the forests.
Very important.
You look at other countries where they do it differently, and and it's uh whole different story.
I was with the president of Finland, and he said we have uh much different.
We're a forest nation.
He called it a forest nation.
And they spent a lot of time on ranking and cleaning and doing things, and they don't have any problem.
And when it is, it's a very small problem.
So uh I know everybody's looking at that to that end, and uh it's gonna work out.
I mean, that was him in 2018.
And just four months ago, Donald Trump spoke about the need for California to send more water, and this will become very relevant in a minute when I tell you what's actually going on out there uh to downstate to prevent these fires.
Now, I lived in California for five years.
Hope sound was an area of very affluent area of of Santa Barbara.
I went back there a couple of years after I had left, and the whole the whole the whole community was burned to the ground.
This has been happening now for decades.
And we know that they have these long droughts in California.
When I had been out in in California, desalinization was a big topic of discussion because they needed fresh water.
Water was always a problem.
But this is Donald Trump talking about four months ago the need for California to send more water downstate to help prepare for firefighters, and I'll explain why this is relevant in a second.
You have so much water and all those fields that are right now barren, the farmers would have all the water they needed.
And you could revert water up into the hills where you have all the dead forests where the forests are so brittle.
Because no no places like California.
I go to Austria.
The head of Austria tells me, you know, we have trees that are much more flammable than what you have in California.
We never have forest floors because they maintain their forests.
And you have all that water that could be used to as water what they call water flow, where the war war, you know, where the land would be damp.
And you'd stop many of these horrible fires that are costing billions and billions of dollars by the federal government, etc.
So one thing I'm going to do for California, vote for me, California.
I'm going to give you safety.
I'm going to give you a great border, and I'm going to give you more water than almost anybody has.
They don't because of environmental extremism.
They it is difficult, if not impossible, and the state should be responsible for it.
They don't engage in controlled burns.
You know, they don't clear out the dry brush, which should be done regularly, which is the kindling for fires such as what we're watching unfold in the Pacific Palisades and beyond.
A lot of a lot of the state rules protecting endangered species, you know, is the rationale limiting the science of forestry from being practiced out there and the limiting the amount of water that gets sent from Northern California, which makes absolutely positively no sense.
You know, it is it is completely preventable if they they put the time, energy, money, and resources into it.
Uh we now see big just think of what Donald Trump just said that uh there, you know, scores of we're now finding out LA firefighters that are at their wit's end because they're finding all of these broken fire hydrants that are preventing them from doing their jobs, which they want to do, and they're struggling to gain control of one of the worst wildfires in in LA's history.
And I just wonder how many brand new fire hydrants could have been bought with the 17 million dollars that the Democratic mayor, Karen Bass cut from the firefighting budget, because that's exactly what she did just months ago.
The LA Fire Department had their budget cut by a staggering 17.6 million dollars this financial year, according to records, and this drastic decrease in funding for the fire department was the second largest cut to come out of Los Angeles and Mayor Karen Bass's fiscal budget according to city figures, and she initially even wanted to cut more money than that.
And by the way, if you're wondering where the mayor of Los Angeles is in all of this, well, she's 7,400 miles away in Africa on a political trip as this, you know, Los Angeles is like in this apocalyptic hellscape right now.
Uh there are people posting on X from LA saying, resign while you're in Ghana, one person commenting.
Anyway, she traveled with three other people to Ghana for the inauguration of the president there who was elected last year.
Uh hey, Karen, quote, how's Ghana?
Another person asking.
LA, you ask.
Yeah, it's burning to the effing ground, but it's better you're not here anyways because you're useless.
Others demanding that she resign from her post.
You're a disgrace or an embarrassment.
I mean, there is no no excuse.
Why is she not on the first plane home as soon as this became a problem?
Now, the problem even gets worse than that.
Now, if you're not going to practice, you know the science of of forestry, and you're not going to have hydrants that have water in them, and you're not going to clear out the kindling and the brush because of environmental extremist agendas, and you're not going to have controlled burns, again, uh another huge mistake.
Then, you know, this this is entirely preventable and predictable, what is happening here.
If you're going to put endangered species above the lives and the livelihoods and and the homes of the people In your state, you know, you have to ask why.
Why would you do that?
And here's where it even gets worse than that.
Because I don't know if you've ever noticed while Mayor Bass was busy cutting off the fire department's budget to the bone.
He somehow did manage to find hundreds of millions of dollars for green energy conversion for the port of Los Angeles.
This ought to make everybody in the Southland in LA pretty pissed off.
But here's the headline from a website, the Port of Los Angeles website, Port of Los Angeles, awarded $112 million and a grant from the U.S. EPA for zero emissions trans for zero emissions transformation.
Thank you, EPA administrator, Michael Regan for your support of our vision, a zero emissions future, said Karen Bass with this funding, the nation's busiest port will be able to continue to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve air quality.
Well, how's the air quality out there today?
I don't think it's doing too well in LA today.
Together in partnership with the federal government, industry, labor, environmental justice groups, we are building a greener, healthier LA.
Doesn't look like it to me.
The port and its private sector partners will match the EPA grant with an additional $236 million, bringing the total new investment in zero emissions programs at the Port of Los Angeles to $644 million, and provide $50 million for community-led zero emissions grant program workforce development and related engagement activities.
Well, I mean, I don't see anything in there about the money to fix the broken fire hydrants and or any monies to hire the firefighters that she laid off.
But according to the press release, in addition to the EPA grant, you know, there were still gazillions left over in her budget for green energy conversion.
In August, LA launched their first 100% electric full-size street sweeper in the U.S. The city itself installed nearly a hundred level two chargers and twelve fast chargers for electric vehicles throughout the city.
And meanwhile, they're not taking care of the basic predictable safety needs of homeowners in California.
I'm going to tell you what this is going to result in.
It's going to result in more of a mass exodus.
I mean, the U-Haul Index came out, and once again, leading the way with the lowest net population gain and people leaving the state is California.
Then you have South Carolina, Texas, Florida, Tennessee.
Once again, you know, people are just moving in droves.
And the same thing with New York, Kathy Holkell wants to run for governor again.
The one thing that would help New York financially, have this big congestion tax in New York City.
If you go in on the lower level of the 59th Street bridge from Queens into Manhattan, you know, it's going to be $15 on the lower level because they'll force you onto First Avenue in New York City.
I know this may be a little technical, but then you will automatically be charged, even if you're not heading in that direction.
I mean, that's how desperately they want money.
And they don't care about the poor and the middle class and working men and women that are going to be paying the bill as they try to get to work every day.
But but this is now environmental environmental radicalism gets you.
I'll never forget I went out to the San Joaquin Valley.
I covered this for Fox, and you had, you know, all these, you know, farms, massive farms that were bone dry, and there was all of this water that was available to them, and it was not made available to farmers because they wanted to protect what's called the Delta Smelt.
Now, the Delta smelt, if you look it up and look at a picture of it, it looks like a little minnow fish.
It's not even like an exotic fish.
And by the way, not even an endangered species.
And they cared more about the delta smelt than they did about the farmers, and the farmers lost their entire livelihood because they chose a minnow fish that was not even on the endangered species list over the farmers over the people that would benefit from the farming and the food that they would produce.
I mean this is absolute madness.
And then they wonder, I wonder why people are leaving Los Angeles and New York and New Jersey and Illinois and droves.
That this is why people have had it.
They're waking up.
They're done.
And you've destroyed your states you know law, order, safety, security gone, massive taxes.
You know, if you live in New York City in New York State, 14% state and city income tax.
Same thing out in Los Angeles, same thing in all of California.
Illegal immigration, sanctuary state status, you know, put the burden on taxpayers.
Just just basically just pick their pockets to the point where they they're not going to stay anymore.
And the quality of life has gone to hell.
I mean defund, dismantle no bail laws, sanctuary states, known terrorists, cartel members, gang members, murderers, rapists, they just allow them into the country unvetted.
But January 20th can't come fast enough.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Hammond.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten well a little insane.
That's why we started normally a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity and some occasional SAS.
You're our kind of people catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you listen I actually can't believe what a friend of mine that lives out in the area and in California just sent me it is it reminds me of when I went to New Orleans Post Katrina and it was like I remember driving for miles and on either side everything was wiped
out entire neighborhoods are being wiped out Caitlin Jenner just texted me and says you have no idea how bad it is out here.
She's going to call in after the news at the bottom of the hour will and we'll get an update from her and our prayers are with the people of California today.
This is really bad driving the Liberals nuts.
Sean Hannity is back on the radio right now.
Alright 25 till the top of the hour 800 941 Sean our number if you want to be a part of the program as we now enter the new year and it should be by the way an everyday priority for everybody.
You've got to protect yourself you've got to protect your family and we now have known terrorists murderers cartel members in the country we have a lot of violent people very dangerous time for the country and for individuals what is your plan if that God forbid moment ever comes into your life you face a situation that demands personal protection.
Now I've always believed in the second amendment I still do and I also have the non well the less lethal launcher that is burner that is my first option it is a great compliment to owning a firearm.
If you or your family is in a situation where you are threatened you can start with the lease the less lethal option and the beauty of burner is it works.
I urge all of you go to their website BYRNA.com slash Hannity and take a look at the videos I mean it's incredible first it's legal in all 50 states you don't need a permit you don't need a background check I not only own them I buy them as gifts for many friends and and people in my life so they can be safe and secure in their home their business their day to day life the burner launcher has powerful deterrence tear gas kinetic rounds he can hit a target easily 50 60 feet away
and burner is now trusted by over 500 government agencies police departments and private security firms if you go to burner b y rn a dot com slash hannity you'll get 10% off any purchase and it may save your life one day and this technology is amazing.
We continue our coverage.
I mean, it's pretty unbelievable that if you listen to the if you listen to the experts, a lot of what is happening with this wildfire in California could have been prevented.
There's been decades of overgrowth in California forests.
You know, if you look at the liability laws around controlled burns, they don't allow control burns.
You can't remove brush.
It's all related to environmental radicalism and extremism.
I mean, the state itself should be involved in these control burns.
They should be involved in cleaning out the brush, which is the kindling for these big fires.
In much of California, if a landowner undertakes, you know uh a controlled burn on their own property, they have to drum jump through a series of hoops proving that they have the expertise to set a controlled fire that will stay controlled, but this is something the state ought to be doing.
And the sad part is is now we're learning, okay.
Well, the mayor of Los Angeles cut the LA firefighters' budget by a whopping nine, what, 17 million dollars, and meanwhile, they're spending six hundred and forty-four million to make the the port of Los Angeles, converting that into you know, a green energy hub.
Six hundred and forty-four million dollars.
And yet they're cutting back on firefighters.
Then firefighters, you know, they're at their wit's end fighting, trying to fight this fire.
They're willing to put their lives at risk, but they're finding all these broken fire hydrants.
Donald Trump warned about it in 2018, said uh you better get the water from the north in in Northern California down to the south because you're gonna need it, and he turned out to be more than right.
Uh all the state rules protecting, quote, endangered species.
I mentioned the Delta smelt that prevented farmers from being able to farm in the San Joaquin Valley.
And this is all madness.
Anyway, a friend of mine just sent me a video.
I mean, it went on for blocks and blocks and blocks of homes just you know burned to the ground.
These are people's lives, you know, being upended in ways you can't even imagine.
You know, whenever there's a tragedy like this.
Now, I'm glad to see Joe Biden went out there today, especially since he never showed up to East Palestine after that that train derailment, that disaster there never showed up after Hurricane Helene in in North Carolina.
And if it wasn't for neighbor helping neighbor and Samaritan's Purse and Operation Hilo, you know, those people and and Elon Musk providing communications, they would be they'd be out of luck.
Anyway, Caitlin Jenner is with us, lives in Southern California, is very aware of the dangers of fires out there.
Uh this is something you talked about when you made your run for governor back in the day.
Boy, I certainly did.
That was like number one on my list of things to do.
Because fighting fires has to be offensive.
And removing brush, like you said earlier, in the uh in the forest, uh taking fuel away.
I live in Malibu, California.
Um the Wolfe fire came right through my house.
And uh I stayed with the house, and uh it made it because there was no fuel close to the house.
And uh we just need to do more of that.
What's happening here in Los Angeles?
Actually, uh today the winds are so hard.
Last night they were between 80 and 90 miles an hour at my house.
Um I live on top of a mountain in Malibu.
And by the way, for those people that don't know, they're called Santa Ana Winds, and they come by periodically, and and the winds are fierce, and if it happens while in the middle of a fire like this, it is devastating because it it literally moves the embers miles away in in many cases and creates new fires.
Absolutely.
Um I live in a um uh Santa Anna corridor, so I mean, every time my house gets hit.
Uh this afternoon, uh my roof blew off.
Um yeah, all the tar paper on my roof, this is the second time it's happened, lifted right up off my house and was thrown all the way down the mountain.
Uh trying to get that repaired.
Fortunately, I'm at the north end of Malibu.
Uh the south end of Malibu, and you get down at Pacific Palisade, it's just getting destroyed.
And and you're right, it's about preparation.
And Karen Bass isn't even in town.
You mentioned that.
Um she's off in Africa someplace.
But you know who's been on the phone, you know, all day long is Rick Caruso.
Rick Russo is the one that ran against Karen Bass, and the people of California didn't put him in place.
He's a very competent businessman, really great guy, and um he has a mall near where the fire was, and he goes running down there in the morning to make sure everything's gonna be okay, and they had no water in the fire hydrants.
I mean, you can't even make it up.
And then Gavin Newsom, God bless Gavin, he had this emergency uh presser today thanking the mayor, Karen Bass, who's in Ghana, who's in Africa for her leadership in all of this.
That's I I I I mean, is this some kind of bad joke?
Yeah, it really is.
And then actually, you said earlier uh you were talking about uh Biden being here and going to Santa Monica to the firehouse and you know, doing all of that.
He was on it was like in Santa Monica.
You know, he went out to the desert to do that a couple of days ago, you know, some national monument out there, and he came back here and he's in town.
I know because as you know, I'm a pilot, and they had a TFR, and it's a temporary flight restriction.
Any place the president goes and he stays someplace, there's a TFR, a no-fly zone over the area that he's at.
It's quite common.
And uh there was a TFR here the last couple of days because he was in town.
So basically all he did today was, you know, go down the street to the local uh fire station and do a television appearance and then and then leave.
Um that's the type God, I can't wait for the 20th of January.
Uh yeah, by the way, oh, he did reveal that his son Hunter and his wife may have lost their home during this fire.
They got notification yesterday their home was probably burned to the ground.
And by the way, the LA County fire chief now has an estimate that a thousand structures have been destroyed already, and they have zero percent of this fire under control as of you know 20 minutes ago.
They don't have any of it under control, and they don't have fire hydrants that work.
Explain that.
I know.
Well, I keep my plane up at Camarillo Airport, and that's the station where uh all of these firefighting helicopters uh they're based there.
And unfortunately they've been on the ground.
Now, first I thought, are they on the ground because where the fire is, it's underneath this TFR.
Temporary flight restriction.
Because Biden's there now not letting helicopters go in there.
I don't know.
I hope that the the firefighters and the city of Los Angeles is smarter than that and not to do something like that.
And and I'm well they they they cut the firefighter budget by 17 million dollars just a couple of months ago, and the fire hydrants don't work.
So if you don't have firefighters and you don't have water, tell me how you're gonna put out this firefight, the the this massive fire.
Absolutely.
I just want to know, Sean, that that beautiful home in Florida.
Do you have a guest house?
If you need one, I'll I have a room if if that's what you need, done.
Not a problem.
You know what By the way, the these fires have burned through five thousand four hundred acres.
Now, is there any that it you actually can go to college and get a degree in forestry?
You can go to college and you can be an expert.
And there are known methods to prevent incidents like this from happening.
That is what I find the most infuriating to me is something like this that is preventable.
Then you got to look at the reasons.
Well, why haven't they implemented the science of forestry?
And then you look at the endangered endangered species act, then you look at that, they don't want you to cut down a tree, they don't want controlled burns, they don't want you know, it's it's gonna impact the environment.
What's the air like out by you today?
Fortunately, the wind is going out to sea, and so at my house, I'm fine.
Um, but the air quality in LA is just it's horrible.
The good thing is when you talk about uh the you can watch um the smoke clouds going, and all day this morning they were going straight out to sea, meaning the wind is pushing them very fast and the winds are very high.
I have had noticed in the last hour or two, the clouds are going the wind c uh are going much, much higher.
Meaning the winds are calming down, and it's not pushing the smoke out to sea quite as fast.
So hopefully we're at the the other end of those Santa Annas right now.
Uh but they say they're going to be some, not as difficult, not as tough as we've had today, uh, through tomorrow, and then hopefully we get through it.
But I was looking at the news out here, and there was like twenty homes on the beach, all gone on Malibu on the beach, on PCH.
Twenty homes in a row, all gone.
It's just unbelievable.
You think you have a place on the beach, you know.
You're gonna be okay because the fires are up there in the mouth, but nope.
Yeah, 20 homes gone right on PC.
Well, let me let me ask you, you said during a previous fire you stayed.
Did now had you taken measures to clear any brush near around your home on your own.
Oh, absolutely, Sean.
I'm a professional when it comes to this stuff.
I only All right, so my question is did you have to get permits to do it, or did you did you just say, I'm clearing out my property, I'm not gonna make it a fire hazard.
I'm not gonna tell them.
I'm just clearing my property.
But if you try to move any dirt on your property, there's some kind of flower.
The guys tell me, go around your property and look for this flower.
They gave me a picture of it.
If you find any of them, pull them out.
So when they come to look and say, Oh, I'm gonna move this dude from here to there, there's no one of these flowers.
You'll never get to move it.
Because it's an endangered flower or something.
All kinds of restrictions like that.
So let me get this straight.
So because you took proactive measures while other homes were lost near you, your home remained intact and you stayed with your home, even risking your life.
I mean, I I have a video of of some guy, I don't know if he put it up on social media.
I mean, is his house is surrounded by flames, and is he's like, I'm not leaving my house.
And he's out there with like a fire hose trying to fight back this fire, which I think is admirable, but yeah, I'm not so sure that any house is worth it.
Um I would agree.
Well, uh, it's not certainly not worth your your life, but uh I have a house that really when it was built, I I was built I was the second owner.
Uh uh was really built not to burn.
Uh there's metal doors, metal window frames.
The only thing I had was wooden garage doors.
But um it's all about preparation.
Uh I have guys come in and give me 75 foot of clearance, so there's no grass or brush or anything within seventy-five feet of the house.
I live as a on top of a hill.
Um I have my own water system, so I've got fire hoses.
Uh I've got my own generator, uh, that so when the electricity goes, because it will go off, you still have generators to run all the pumps and do everything.
I got a gas pump that will pump out of the pool uh and take the just shoot the water all the way over the house.
I'm so scared.
I got no mech, you know, I used to race cars.
I got no mixed suits, no mixed shoes, no make slump.
You said you sound like me.
I'm like a crazy, you know, prepper when I can be.
I was even crazier when I had a uh I had a big house.
I mean, I I had generators galore, I had four thousand gallons of propane.
Uh obviously I'm a firearms enthusiast.
I had emergency food and water and supplies and medical supplies.
I have it all.
I'm crazy.
Yeah.
I don't have the food supplies, but I do have I I think my house is not gonna burn.
It's just I will not let it burn.
And and it's because you but you you're and you're being proactive.
I mean, you're taking these necessary steps.
Look, for example, everything's changed in Florida after that building in Miami collapsed.
I mean, every every single condo building in Florida has to be up to code and you have to be hurricane prepared and you need hurricane windows and doors and i it I think it's just the right thing to do to prepare people for worst case scenario.
But I you know, uh but but here's the problem.
It doesn't matter how much homelessness, doesn't matter about quality of life, doesn't matter how much crime, doesn't matter how many how many homes might burn to the ground in the end.
It's uh California will rema remain a a left-wing radical haven.
And I don't I don't see it ever becoming conservative again.
Do you?
I only have about twenty seconds.
Um yeah, I know it's been I don't know, Sean.
I I look at California now, it's gotten a lot redder.
Have you noticed?
Compared to I noticed, but not it not red enough.
I mean, I I I would bet every penny I have your next governor is gonna be Kamala Harris, who by the way is her home is under an evacuation order.
Please, Sean, you just ruined my day.
Sorry, I'm just I'm just telling you.
Mark my words.
All right, Caitlin Jenner, our prayers in all seriousness are with the people of California, regardless of the incompetence of government.
They're losing, you know, their whole lives are being upended here, and lives are in jeopardy, and we're their prayers are with us.