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Nov. 19, 2025 - Sean Hannity Show
28:24
Aftermath of Pacific Palisades
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This is an iHeart podcast.
Hour two, Sean Hannity Show.
Toll free here's on number it's 800-941 Sean.
If you want to be a part of the program, you know, the country right now is, whether people are conscious of it or not, are going through a massive amount of reflection about what they're expecting out of their government.
I mean, if you look at this lunatic running in Maine with his Nazi tattoo and, you know, a new Green Deal, radical cradle to grave, womb to the tomb socialist.
You see, I never thought Karen Bass in Los Angeles, the mayor out there as incompetent as she could be, would ever be challenged from the left.
You have this new Seattle mayor who, up until defeating the incumbent Democrat, another Mamdani, radical socialist slash communist, whatever you want to call them, and then Mamdani in New York.
This is now, and they're saying it, this is now the new model for the Democratic Party.
Bernie Sanders said it.
He wants to spread it nationwide.
Now, I urge everybody and the Green New Deal and AOC, who's the real leader in the House of Representatives, will defeat Chucky Schumer if she challenges him.
But I want you to think of these things, those of you that look towards the government to be the answer to all of the problems in your life.
Ask yourself in your town, in your city, in your state, how are your government schools doing?
Now, in my free state of Florida, they're actually doing very well, and yet it has some of the lowest taxes in the entire country.
But if you look at blue cities, blue states, it is atrocious.
We spend nationally per capita more on education for our children than any other country in the industrialized world, and we have the worst results.
How's that Obamacare thing working out for you?
Keep your doctor, keep your plan.
Average family saves $2,500 per family per year.
Millions lost doctors, millions lost plans.
For over 40% of the country, they have one Obamacare exchange option.
If they're lucky, they have two, but neither one is any good.
And you're paying a whopping 225 to 300 plus percent more for Obamacare, and it's not working for people.
You know, how is that defund dismantled no-bail law?
Reimagine the police working out in your blue city or your blue town or your blue state.
Not very well in most cases, which is why Donald Trump is sending troops to places like Memphis and D.C. and Chicago, et cetera, to restore law and order.
Now North Carolina.
So a lot of people put their faith, their hope, their trust, their belief in government.
And putting aside the Department of War, I don't know that much that the government has a great track record of doing particularly well.
Remember, they told all of us that they would put your money that you have paid in all of your working life into a social security lockbox.
Well, those guys in Washington over the decades have raided the lockbox and it's headed towards insolvency.
Just like, you know, Medicaid, Medicare, and states, they're all headed towards insolvency because they've been mismanaged.
And this is the lunacy and the false promise of socialism.
I wrote a whole chapter, Live, Free or Die, Socialism, Its History of Failure.
You know, now we're learning a lot about the Pacific Palisades.
It's, you know, over 10 months later, nearly a year later.
And where are we?
Well, we've learned new revelations, thanks to the LA Times and a series of articles that they've written that days before the major fire, there had been a smaller fire.
Firefighters alerted their battalion chief that there were still smoldering areas that needed to be monitored.
And lo and behold, they were taken off the job rather than monitoring it.
And before this reignited into the massive fire, days later, thousands of homes destroyed, 12 people killed.
And then we learned something else.
We learned of incredible failure on the state, local level in terms of, for example, we had reservoirs specifically designed for fires that are predictable in this area.
Wildfires are very predictable.
They don't practice the science of forestry in California because of environmental concerns.
In other words, they don't clear the kindling and the brush that is around these homes.
And that just adds fuel to the fire.
Literally, we have the science of forestry.
We have, for example, they put in, we had fire hydrants that had no water.
We had reservoirs that were empty.
And all of this happened.
And now we're being told, oh, yeah, they pulled out the firefighters before the previous fire was completely extinguished, which makes absolutely no sense at all.
You might recall at the time Gavin Newsom, at least he was in the state.
I give him credit for that.
He was confronted by a woman who's now working for Steve Hilton and trying to get him elected governor as a Republican, which is a near impossibility in my view in the state of California.
Remember, she desperately goes up to the governor, and this is what the governor said.
That was my daughter, school governor.
Please tell me what you're going to do.
I'm not going to hurt him, I promise.
I'm literally talking to the president right now to specifically answer the question of what we can do for you and your daughter.
Can I hear it?
Can I hear your call?
Because I don't believe it.
I'm sorry.
There's literally, I've tried five times.
That's why I'm walking around to make this.
Why is the president not taking your call?
Because it's not going through.
Why?
Oh, I'm talking to the president literally right now.
And can I hear?
Well, I'm trying to get the president.
Interesting answer.
And of course, Karen Bass, well, she wasn't even in town.
She was at the swearing in of the new president of Ghana, an event I'm sure that obviously requires the attendance of the mayor of Los Angeles.
But she is being peppered with questions upon her return, and she gives very, very detailed, very articulate answers.
Do you owe citizens an apology for being absent while their homes were burning?
Do you regret cutting the fire department budget by millions of dollars, Madam Mayor?
Have you nothing to say today?
Have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today?
Elon Musk says that you're utterly incompetent.
Are you considering your position?
Madam Mayor, have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today who are dealing with this disaster?
No apology for them.
Do you think you should have been visiting Ghana while this was unfolding?
Back home.
Nothing, not a peep.
Joining us, John Kahn, Breitbart editor.
By the way, the artist behind the hitsong fighter that brought America's resilience to life following the attempted assassination of President Trump.
He lost his house in the Pacific Palisades fire.
And by the way, I had a guest on last night said not one home has been rebuilt, not one.
Also with us, Senator Rick Scott of Florida, who listened to the victims and witnesses of the Pacific Palisades fire who are being suppressed and shunned by the entire state.
Welcome both of you.
John, let me first offer my deepest condolences.
I'm so sorry.
The mayor, the governor all said they'd expedite these permits.
My understanding is nobody can get a permit.
What's happening out there?
It's very difficult right now, Sean.
Thanks for having me back.
I just want to thank Senator Scott and Senator Johnson for leading this crusade to get to the bottom of this.
It's stunning to me that two Republican senators who are not even from the state are the ones leading the charge to get to the bottom of what happened to what is essentially a Democrat stronghold of the Palisades with all the Hollywood folks.
But from what I understand, it's insane to get a permit.
People are wrestling with insurance.
I was back in LA a couple months ago, and my neighborhood is completely leveled still.
And there almost seems like, you know, it's this Ram Emmanuel quote about never let a good crisis go to waste.
It almost feels like between the insurance companies and the local government and state government that they're trying to break the collective will of the Palisadians.
And sadly, from the folks I've talked to that are there right now and currently in Nashville, it seems to be working because people are throwing up their hands saying, I don't want to start my life again in three or four years.
I want to start now.
Well, I mean, I don't know what they're supposed to do.
Now, I'm very fortunate that I live in the free state of Florida.
Senator Rick Scott was governor of the state, and he was phenomenal in the midst of many crises, including natural disasters, including how many hurricanes did you have when you were governor of the state of Florida?
John, I had four major hurricanes.
One Irma was bigger than the state of Florida.
I went out, you know, John.
First off, I just want to tell you, my heart goes out to you lives in your home.
I watched this after hurricanes, and the fact that the local and state government doesn't do anything to help you is just, you just get the whole community restarted.
I went out there and met with Spencer Pratt in August, and I just was shocked.
I mean, street after street, there's just nothing.
I mean, it's a burnt down homes, street after street after street.
And there's like, there's nothing happening.
There's almost no construction.
And so, you know, we're going to, look, my, my goal is to get to the bottom of this.
Number one, it's unfair to these families.
Number two, the federal government has spent a fortune on wildfire suppression.
This should never, ever have happened, ever.
And then the, and then as we know, that there was a fire.
They left before it was put out.
I'm not a firefighter, but I've been around when they put out.
We have, you know, the Everglade catches on fire a little bit every year or two.
And we spend a lot of time there putting water and water and water and turning over the dirt.
And they said it was smoldering and they left.
And then not fill up the reservoirs.
Spencer Pratt said there's a reservoir three doors for his house.
He always thought it was full of water.
And there hadn't been any water in it forever, he said.
And then the other reservoir, it was empty, the big reservoir for the Palisade.
So the firefighters that did, they came, I mean, there was no water for him.
And then you heard from these residents, there was no plan.
There was no evacuation plan.
There's no evacuation routes.
And then you can't get a permit to rebuild.
I mean, this is so unfair.
And then the state insurance plan, right, it doesn't cover your costs.
Spencer says, Spencer says, you know, the money he got will barely pay for pilings for his house.
And then they change the rules for what you have to build now is so much more expensive.
And his property taxes are going to go up.
And of course, if he can get property insurance, which is very difficult because of he haven't knew some of what he's done to the state, the insurance companies don't want to do business there.
He's still so sorry for the people.
So we had great, we had six, you know, victims out there, including Spencer.
And then some people from the audience piped up and brought the issues they had.
So you just, your heart goes out to what's going on out there.
Just it's just empty.
Sean, it's just, you're just shocked.
It's just nothing built.
It's just a burnt down area.
Senator, I've known you forever.
We've been friends forever.
When you were governor, we became very good friends because you were always visiting New York with Bobby Jendel and Governor Rick Perry, and you were all up in New York, and you were courting businesses to move to your respective states, and you were very successful at it.
Let's be honest.
And it cracked me up because every time you guys were in New York, I put you in studio, and we became good friends.
And I'm honored to have you as my senator.
And I bugged you.
If this happened and you were the governor, where would we be right now?
First of all, these are predictable wildfires, predictable Santa Ana wins.
I know because I lived there in the 80s.
I know all about Southern California.
Well, you know, Sean, they did, it's like we do prescribed burns on our state property.
So what you do is you get rid of the brush because if you know it's brushes to get there and it gets dry, it's going to catch on fire.
Shocking, right?
In California, they have all this brush that they don't get rid of the brush.
You have to do that.
It's called forestry.
You can get a degree in it from so many schools around the country.
Yeah, and they just let them, and it's around these beautiful areas like the Palisades and Malibu and this stuff.
And so they just, it's a tinderbox.
And then they're shocked.
And then they were saying that because Bass has put so much money because I guess she wants more homeless people in California.
So you have homeless people out there and they'll start a fire, right, because they're trying to stay warm when it gets when it cools down.
So sometimes that's what starts this stuff.
So, but it's like it's no one cares.
It's like Bass and Newsome, you know, whatever the system is, they don't care.
If they don't show up, the other thing, Sean, when I had a hurricane, I showed up.
I got six million people to evacuate before.
Not only, I know for a fact, not only did you show up, you didn't sleep.
You worked around the clock.
You didn't leave.
You didn't leave people hanging.
People were taken care of, you know, before, during, and after.
And the follow-through was complete.
You never gave in.
No, these are people, right?
Like my goal was nobody die.
Nobody die.
Keep them alive.
We can rebuild everything.
You're going to have a hurricane.
I can't stop the hurricane.
And then what we did, then what we did is we helped people rebuild as quickly as we can.
I mean, this is what, John, 10 months since the houses burned down.
And so it's almost like nothing, like in 10 months, nothing.
Let me ask John.
John, how many homes have been rebuilt?
And do you also have to pay your normal property taxes on these properties?
Well, they gave us a little break on the property taxes, but with how much you pay normally, it's not a break for land you can't do anything with.
And what's worse is you have to hold on to your insurance policy.
So now I'm paying for a year of insurance, a couple thousand dollars or so, in case somebody stumbles onto my dirt and falls for liability.
Let me come back to both of you because this is too important.
I don't want to rush through it.
If you both can stay just like five more minutes, I promise we'll get right back to you.
800-941-Sean will continue with John Kahn and my senator, Rick Scott of Florida.
I mean, it's taken Rick Scott in Florida to help the people in the Pacific Palisades.
Pretty spectacular.
We'll continue.
America listens to Sean.
And he's on, on, on, on, on right now.
All right, we continue.
I mean, it's remarkable to me.
We are 10 months out.
You know, before we had empty hydrants and empty reservoirs out in California.
There was no, the science of forestry was not practiced in the state of California, rather.
And in California, you know, all these homes burned down, 12 people dead, and people have to still pay an enormous amount of money for insurance and property taxes even.
And they cannot get a permit to rebuild their home and their life.
It is a spectacular failure.
I applaud my senator, Rick Scott, for going out there and trying to help the people of California because the government out there is that incompetent.
But John Kahn, Breitbart editor, lost his house.
I was asking you before the break about, you know, you have to maintain insurance on the property even though there's no house there.
And you have to, do you have to pay some property taxes also?
I wasn't quite clear on that.
Yeah, yeah, you do.
I mean, they waived some of it, but it's still.
What do you mean waive some of it?
I mean, how much do you have to spend a year for your burnt-down house?
Well, it's about, I think I owe like another 10 grand in a couple of months.
I'm sorry, how much do you spend a year?
Well, that's what I owe in a couple of months.
I think it's about $10,000 for property tax, and that's with a break.
They're charging you $10,000 in property taxes, but they won't give you a permit to rebuild your home.
You've got to be kidding me.
Yeah, it's crazy.
And how much do you pay annually for the insurance for a home that doesn't exist on that property?
Well, that's about, I think it was about $1,500.
That's just in case somebody stumbles onto your dirt and trips.
It's for liability.
So $11,500 a year.
And now on top of not having your home, not getting your permit, having to find another place to live.
Now, you moved to Tennessee, correct?
I'm in Nashville now, yes.
Are you going back?
Are you going to sell your lot and probably lose a fortune on that end of this deal?
You know, I don't know yet, Sean.
I mean, the problem is the insurance is a big problem as well because it's like whack-a-mole with, like, for State Farm, it's whack-a-mole with their adjusters.
You start dealing with one, and then they switch to another one.
I think I've been through five, and every time you have a new one, you have to start over, and they have to get familiar with your case.
I don't have my money.
My house is to rebuild my house would be well worth well over the cap that they owe me.
But they're delaying and delaying and delaying.
So until you know what money you are going to get, you don't even know if you can rebuild.
So you can't even apply for a permit.
Let me go back to Senator Rick Scott.
Senator, honestly, you do such a great job for us here in Florida.
I really do applaud you for trying to help people out because this is an unmitigated disaster.
And you know all about this because there are wildfires, but we've practiced forestry here in Florida.
So you mitigate the damage and you're all over natural disasters as governor.
And the same with Governor DeSantis.
You guys are all over disasters.
We're the best at it, to be honest.
And we get a lot of natural disasters out here.
Sean, the other issue that John's dealing with and people have palisades is you have to apply for a permit and it's not cheap.
It's not like five bucks.
What I was told, it was tens of thousands of dollars to apply for a permit.
And they've barely given they've suddenly, you know, John, what I was told is they've, just in permit fees so far, they've raised $30 million and just like a couple hundred people have gotten permits.
When I was out there last week with Senator Ron Johnson doing this investigation hearing, there was almost no houses being built.
And when I talked to people, they said, well, if they are building the house, they got that permit before things were burnt down.
So I don't know if that's what you're hearing, but it's also thousands of dollars.
And then they changed the rules on what you have to build.
So it costs way more money to build.
All right.
And then they've ruined the insurance market.
So the insurance never covers all the costs.
So it's like everybody's, it's like the whole government's against the Palisades.
And then there are people, Senator, and I know you have to run in a minute.
That's why I'm going to ask you one last question.
And then there are people now pushing, and you see this all over the country, cradle to grave, womb to the tomb, Zoron, Marxist, Kami Mamdani, politics.
We see it in Seattle.
We see it in Maine.
Even L.A. Mayor Bass is being challenged from the left.
I mean, if she's not left enough, I don't know.
I mean, this is insanity to me.
Nobody should, if I was in California, get out, leave now.
A lot of people already have.
Well, you know, when I became governor back in January 2011, you know, very few people from California were moving.
Actually, we had lost more people in 2010 because the economy was so bad in Florida.
So we added 1.7 million jobs when I was governor, but I recruited people, like you said, New York.
It was easier in New York and New Jersey.
It was hilarious.
I saw you up there all the time.
We became best friends.
But I went out to California.
We ran ads.
Rick Perry and I ran ads out there.
But now there's so many people leaving California.
Think about it.
California is beautiful.
But it's, you know, unless you're wealthy, you can't afford to live out there.
Or you have to be really poor where they give you everything for free.
So think about this.
The taxes are so high, but their schools are not as good as Florida.
Their universities are not as good as Florida.
The law enforcement, right?
You know, they don't like their law enforcement.
They want to defund the police.
So Bass hates, you know, she cut the budget for the fire department.
You realize that before the fire.
That was a brilliant move, too.
Senator, I'm going to keep my word and let you go at your scheduled time.
Thank you for being with us.
We appreciate you taking the time.
And I'm grateful that you are my senator here in the free state of Florida.
Thank you.
John, I'll give you the last word.
And I want to just echo what I said earlier and what the senator said.
I feel so sorry for you and your family.
I really do.
My heart goes out to you.
This is exactly what I try to warn my audience about.
Do not put your faith, your hope, your trust, your belief in government to get anything right, especially out there.
Yeah, I appreciate that, Sean.
I mean, one thing what Senator Scott said that really moves me in the wake of something like this, he said, where are they?
Where is Gavin Newsom?
Where are our leaders?
He's in Texas, grandstanding, so he can make his run for president.
That's where he was.
Or in Brazil, or on X with some adolescent Twitter stream while people are trying to figure out how to rebuild their lives.
Is Adam Schiff out there doing what Rick Scott and Ron John are doing?
No, and neither is Fadilla.
And we haven't heard hide nor hair from those guys.
Wait a minute.
They're Democrats, right?
Aren't they supposed to be compassionate?
Aren't they the ones that preach that they care the most, that they have a monopoly of compassion for people?
There really is, you know, what's so fascinating about watching Gavin Newsom is there's this distance to him.
It's almost, you know, I hate to say it sociopathic, how he can, you know, claim to be ready to leave the country when he's left his own citizens out to dry.
He's not there.
How many times has he been to the Palisades?
He's in Brazil getting climate change recognition.
Climate change.
And he doesn't practice simple, you know, forestry science, and he doesn't have reservoirs.
You know what his answer was on reservoirs and being empty and fire hydrants being emptied?
Oh, you're going to have to ask local officials about that.
I'm not in charge of that.
Where does the buck stop out in California?
I would think with the governor.
Yeah, a million gallons in that reservoir that weren't, and it was empty.
A million gallons they could have had of water.
Well, I wonder how many homes could have been saved if they practiced the science of forestry because you have predictable wildfires.
They have a wildfire season and predictable Santa Ana Wednesday.
You know, you have those every year too.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
So they should have been prepared, shouldn't they have?
I think so.
I think so.
And I heard something this morning.
I don't know if it's confirmed yet, but now the state is claiming immunity from any wrongdoing or responsibility because supposedly they were unaware of that smoldering fire just after on January 1st.
And yet it just came out.
I read that they sent a state park representative to check it out early that morning.
So they're getting caught.
I think these afterfire reports and some of these reports that are coming out are really going to shed some light on all the negligence from both the state and local.
John, I just mean this from the bottom of my heart for you and all the victims and the families that lost loved ones as well in this.
My heart goes out to you, man.
It really does.
This is an unmitigated financial disaster for most people that live there.
And I'm so sorry.
You have my deepest sympathies that you have to live through this hell.
It's hell.
Well, thank you, Sean.
You've always been really good to me, so I appreciate it.
Well, hang in there, buddy.
God bless you.
Let's get to our busy phones.
We'll start in Miami in the free state of Florida.
Charles on the Sean Hannity show.
What's up, Big Charles?
How are you, sir?
I'm doing pretty good.
Hey, Sean, you're having problems with your blankets.
Maybe you ought to have them screen print your name on them.
No, it's not a matter that I have a problem, that my name is on them.
I have two wonderful children that are the, you know, the greatest gift God ever gave me.
And my children come visit their dad.
They're very close to their dad, and I'm honored that they are in apartments or houses.
So what they do is they say, Dad, can I have this?
What am I supposed to say?
No?
It makes it tough.
It's not just tough.
It's impossible for me to say no.
I can't say no to my children on stuff like that.
Now, if they ask me for something ridiculous, the answer is hell no.
But, you know, they want a bubble cuddle blanket because they like it that much.
It's theirs.
Anyway, what's on your mind?
Well, I lived in South America.
I lived in Venezuela actually in the 90s into 2000.
I got out in 2005 because it was a slow-motion train wreck.
You watched them vote this guy in, and you're telling everybody, don't vote for him, don't vote for him again, don't do this, don't do that.
And they kept doing it.
And my neighbor's property got confiscated by the government.
He was an Englishman at a cattle ranch.
And I tried to get him to confiscate mine because the world court paid him out of Petroleum State of Venezuela.
I think he got $2.3 million for property worth $300,000.
Right.
Well, I mean, I'm just going to tell you, we've seen, you look at Venezuela, Latin America, one of the richest countries, and in comes Hugo Chavez, and now it's one of the poorest countries, and it continues under Maduro.
It's sad.
I mean, I can't tell you how many people I know that fled Castro's Cuba, and I've met with them.
I've sat with them.
They've told me their stories.
And the same thing there.
I mean, Cuba should be, I mean, it should be one of the richest islands around.
It's so close in proximity to the U.S.
But, you know, a lot of smart people in Cuba said, I'm out of here.
And they came to America.
And having come from oppression and tyranny and even, you know, threats against their lives and confiscation of property and all that they've experienced.
You know, I find that the people that live under those systems that come here often appreciate the gift of liberty and freedom and the American dream more than Americans do.
We take for granted that which was given us as our birthright.
We take it for granted.
The people that lived under different systems that come here seem to appreciate it more, which is often the case.
Well, you also run into the ones that have been so indoctrinated.
Some of the Cubans that are here have been so indoctrinated that they always want to tell on their neighbors about doing this or doing that because that's what they do to survive in Cuba.
I get it.
That's all very real, 100% real.
My friend, I have to run.
We'll take a break.
We'll come back.
We'll have more of your calls on the other side.
800-941-Sean.
Our number, if you want to be a part of the program, we got a great, great Hannity tonight, 9 Eastern on the Fox News channel as we continue.
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