← The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
Lawrence on Los Angeles wildfires: 'This is the night my home might burn down.'
00:42:05
Tonight on The Last Word: Multiple out-of-control fires burn across Los Angeles. And Donald Trump reportedly speaks with Justice Alito amid the New York sentencing fight. Gadi Schwartz, Brent Pascua, and Laurence Tribe join Lawrence O’Donnell.
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- [00:00]
Lawrence O'Donnell
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- [00:31]
USAA Representative
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- [00:47]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Now it is time for the Last.
- [00:48]
Gaddy Schwartz
Word with Lawrence O'Donnell.
- [00:49]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Good evening, Lawrence. Good evening, Alex. And with this new report tonight, this means that the entire city of Los Angeles, the entire region of has fire spreading through it from the western edge that we knew about last night, the Pacific Palisades now to what you just reported, the Hollywood Hills, that's just about dead center. And then we've already had fire out on the eastern edge of Los Angeles. This means that really everyone in the region now, people who an hour ago in the middle of town, who were in the Hollywood area, West Hollywood, thinking they were completely safe, are now in their cars, not knowing where they're going. This is, this really is something we have never, ever seen before. And I believe that and that sunset.
- [01:41]
Gaddy Schwartz
Fire in the Hollywood Hills is now.
- [01:43]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Presently at 20 acres of flame.
- [01:47]
Gaddy Schwartz
So, I mean, it's a catastrophic situation.
- [01:51]
Brent Pasqua
It defies discretion.
- [01:52]
Lawrence O'Donnell
There's a lot of discovery. We're going to try to bring in as much simulcasting from KNBC in Los Angeles as we can to show these, these images that are just stunning. All right, Lawrence, we'll stick with your coverage. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Well, as this fire now spreads literally all the way across the Los Angeles region, this is the night when my house might burn down. It is being threatened by fire now in a way that wasn't possible even yesterday or earlier today that we did not know about. So many friends of mine have already lost their homes in Los Angeles. Patrick Verone, someone who I've known since college, a former president of the Writers Guild, where his family in a house his family grew up in in Pacific Palisades, that house has been lost. He's not the only one. Another writer friend of mine who I've known since college, reports that as many as half of the writers on the very popular TV show that he has written for for many years, half of them have lost their homes. This situation really is happening in a way that we have never seen before. I just got a text from an intrepid and award winning journalist, Daniel Voll, who is also a screenwriter who lives in the region, who has press credentials and has been allowed into areas that other people have not been, could not get into at this hour. Which means he is liter the last person who has seen my house standing, which the last time he looked at it, it was standing, but we don't know whether it is now. And by the way, that's the way it is for everyone who has evacuated is we do not know once we're out of the area what's happening to our house. We usually have no idea what's happening to our house unless people see images of the complete burning down of the houses in that area. Daniel Voll, when he was in that area reporting directly to me via text about what he was seeing, described it as something again he's never seen before in all of his reporting around the world at various hotspots and difficult situations. He said this was just at sunset when he said it's very surreal as the wind starts kicking up right now and this smoke just funnels directly out over the ocean like a sideways diabolical tornado sucking the smoke out into the coming night. And then there was the text today from my dear friend Michael Dinner. Just a brilliant director, one of the greatest directors in the history of television whose work you have seen from the Wonder Years to Justified and beyond. Michael lost his home in the Pacific Palisades yesterday and everything in it. It's the home where his two sons grew up, the home where the family just celebrated the holidays together and everything around them, where they were sitting when they were celebrating the holidays, has been lost. Michael texted me today with the simplest expression of what happened to him and his family and has been happening to thousands of families in Los Angeles. And he said the loss of the house that they loved isn't the most difficult part. He said it's the stuff, the evidence of four lives gone. That kind of pain is being felt throughout Los Angeles. There have been so far, I'm going to get the exact number, but it's about five deaths, which is of course the ultimate horror in this situation. There probably will be more the way this fire is spreading. But the biggest, most widespread kind of loss is going to be that loss of the Stuff the evidence of four lives lived for the last 20 years in a house that is going to be happening to so many people. I have the luxury of watching the possibility of my house burning down 2,500 miles away in New York in a second home. This will not be a difficult experience for me compared to anything else any of my friends have already gone through if my house isn't there tomorrow. But this is the way we Los Angeles residents are now. All living in Los Angeles, no matter where we are. If you have a home in Los Angeles, if you have an apartment, if you have anything in Los Angeles now, you do not know anymore whether you're going to see it again. NBC News correspondent Gaddy Schwartz has just arrived from the Pacific Palisades, which was the biggest problem before now to the Hollywood Hills, where the new fire has erupted there just about an hour ago. We've been watching it on these helicopters which have been allowed to fly tonight because the wind has dropped to the point where the helicopters can fly. Gatti, what is the latest there?
- [07:13]
Brent Pasqua
Yeah, Lawrence, we see those helicopters above us. They are such a sign of relief, especially in the last few days. We haven't been able to see them flying, but we've got them flying over the Hollywood Hills right now. We just pulled up. I'm not sure if this is going to work because I'm on my phone right here. We're going to take a walk and see what we can see again. We're starting to see the of Hollywood. These are all cars that are making their way down the hill. And we've got the first tanker that we've seen down here on Hollywood Boulevard. That's the Laugh Factory over there. This is that volcano CVS Pharmacy right here on Crescent Heights. So Crescent Heights going up. So far we haven't seen any flames up on the ridge, but we have seen flames over on the other side of the Laugh Factory. It's still quite a ways away, but you see the helicopters working up there. We're gonna wait. Hold on real fast here and let's see if we can wait for this traffic to come through. Again, difficult to access this. There are now roadblocks going up throughout this area. The wind is not as bad as it was yesterday. Here's a quick, quick shot of what the wind is doing down here on Hollywood. Looks like we might be able to cross here. Give us a second. Yeah, let's make our way across. So again, you've got the fire department that's staging down here. And then these are the hills that are now being evacuated. We're told the evacuation zone is up there on Mulholland Drive, goes all the way down to Laurel Canyon, which means that this whole area, Chateau Mormont and all of these homes are most likely under evacuation at this moment. You see the. Let me see if I can zoom in here. But you can see the choppers that are flying through the smoke. They're coming in. They're making those drops. Those drops are so crucial right now. We're going to cross over here and we'll see what the fire engines are doing. I believe that they're here for structure, protection. People walking down the street. Not everybody knows about what's going on because it's just up the ridge and things are happening so quickly. But again, so many people in Los Angeles have been preparing for this. They saw what happened in the Pacific Palisades. They saw what happened in Eaton Canyon last night. There was a warning that the winds were going to continue throughout the night. We are seeing some of those wind gusts pick up, but so many go bags across Los Angeles are ready. You were just talking about your home and Lawrence. I hope your home is okay. My home is on the other side of these hills. Been on the phone with my wife. She's got the two kids at home and they've got the go bags ready. Because we are probably about maybe a quarter of a mile outside of that evacuation zone right now. The wind is blowing towards Hollywood. That's really important here because what's going to happen is as that that fire works its way up Runyon Canyon, it's going to go up because of the topography. But the wind is blowing this way. It is blowing down towards Hollywood. So the main concern right now is Hollywood Boulevard, is this area is Sunset Boulevard and everything that is down below for a couple of blocks. That's why that evacuation order has been given. You see behind us, we've got fire crews, we've got the police now staging. And this is one of the areas where you should be able to see up on the hill. It's very difficult to see because it's still a ways away. But people are hopefully heeding those warnings, evacuating because the winds are strong enough. You know, comparatively speaking, yet to yesterday, the winds are very, very light. But if this was any other day and there was a fire burning in the hill, we would say that these winds are extremely, extremely concerning. So it's not a time to let your guard. Fire continues. Choppers are working this fire. That is a good sign. Hopefully those can Continue through the night. But so many people now in Hollywood, Hollywood Boulevard, Sunset Boulevard, heating those warnings and we are seeing people starting to evacuate out of this area.
- [11:30]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Ganny one thing that Daniel Voll and other reporters who've been on the ground today have been telling me is that when you see the fire trucks, what the fire trucks define for you, I.
- [11:40]
Brent Pasqua
Think I lost you. So I'm going to. I'm going to head back and try to reconnect here.
- [11:44]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Okay. What I was just going to exchange with Gaddy there is that the fire trucks generally mean that's the line where the fire department wants to prevent the fire from crossing. Where you see the trucks is that they are on Hollywood Boulevard because of the gigantic fear of that fire crossing Hollywood Boulevard if it does that. That fire is now raging in the center of a major ur urban area. It's both residential and very urban, very business oriented area. It would be the equivalent of that fire breaking out in Manhattan. That's the kind of area that is in Los Angeles. And as we continue through this coverage tonight, one of the situations that's a challenge for people is that they literally now on evacuation after the Hollywood Hills fire has broken out, there is now confusion in Los Angeles about which way to go. People have felt prior to this time had been feeling more confident heading away from the ocean inland, but that's where the Hollywood Hills fire is now. There has been a lot of evacuation southward from Los Angeles. That's the direction my loved ones took today when they were ordered to evacuate. They've gone south toward the airport. A lot of people are going south toward the airport and beyond that. The trouble is some people trying to find a place beyond the airport have discovered that there are fires breaking out randomly now in other areas that they were intending to drive to. And so that issue of what direction to go is something that really needs as much government guidance as can possibly be provided right now to people who have literally, especially in the Hollywood Hills area in the center of town, there are people jumping into cars not knowing which direction to drive. And that's one of the issues that with their car radios, of course they can pick up information about that. People struggling who can afford it to find hotel rooms to go to, others trying others who are lucky enough to have friends far outside of the fire zone driving in that direction. But this is a kind of mass evacuation from all areas of Los Angeles that we really have not seen before in a situation like this. The helicopter pilots have been doing an amazing job of delivering to us exactly where These fires are breaking out. Yesterday we didn't have that because the winds were way too strong for the helicopters to get up in the air. And so we couldn't see this kind of coverage. And so there's a lot more available knowledge tonight at this hour than there was last night at this hour. This is a disruption to a community that is thought of as the show business capital of the world. But there is so much more that goes on there occupationally than that. It is. I can report to you that the studios did close down today. Warner Brothers, Paramount, the Fox lot, sequentially decided we must close down production. A friend of mine working on the Fox lot on the west side of Los Angeles, that was possibly the last lot to close down. About halfway through the day, production was shut down. People were sent home. That's when you know in the workings of Los Angeles, that's when you know something is very serious. The amount of costs involved in shutting down production on what's going on in those studios is astronomical. And no one wants to do it. It takes something really serious to shut down production there. I'm not saying what goes on in the studios is necessarily serious, but just to understand when the studios shut down, that's a much bigger event than schools being shut down. That's the message that says to the town. This is really something that's now getting beyond anyone's control and anyone's ability to predict what happens next. That's the situation there tonight at this hour. This is going to be a change situation in certain places by the end of the hour. And across the coverage overnight. People living in Los Angeles have been hanging on the local television coverage, which has been just excellent. Across every local channel. Shots like this available to people so they can know exactly what's happening, how close it is to them, how far it is from them, how much time they have. People have been making careful calculations about how much time they have to leave their homes based on just the excellent delivery of information from both the fire department government, the governor, the mayor, mayor's staff, when the mayor was out of town. And most importantly, though, more than anything, these images you're seeing right now from knbc, our affiliate in Los Angeles, and from the other network affiliates in Los Angeles, those local news channels and those local news teams, many of whom I know on the KNBC side and the technicians I know on the KNBC side, have just been heroic and going without sleep. And you see one correspondent out there on the camera. But there are many people involved in supporting that correspondent and getting that correspondent on camera, none of them are sleeping. They are working around the clock. Their own homes are in danger as they are doing this work. Their own families can be in danger while they do this work. This is as challenging an event to cover as Los Angeles media has really ever had to cover, given the geographic scope of it. This is just now an enormous area of fire that they are trying to cover tonight and trying to deliver people the information they need about how long they can stay in their homes, if they can stay in their homes, and exactly when they have to get out of their homes. This has been one of the most difficult things that I've personally had to cover here as I at the same time, field texts from people who are telling me what's happening to them and how they're trying to get out and where they need to go. But we're going to stay with it. We're going to take a break here. We're going to come back, we're going to try to get in some of the news of the day involving Donald Trump's appeal to the United States Supreme Court. But we're going to keep an eye on exactly what's happening there this hour. As this hour proceeds, we'll have more from Los Angeles. We'll be right back. Joining our breaking news coverage of the Los Angeles fire now from the Pacific Palisades area of Los Angeles is Cal Fire Battalion Chief Brent Pasqua. Brent, what is the situation there as of this hour?
- [18:59]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Right now, as of this hour, the winds have died down substantially, which is making conditions a lot more achievable for firefighters to actually get the upper hand on this fire. So let's hope it stays that way.
- [19:13]
Lawrence O'Donnell
And Brent, going forward, how do you distribute resources when you have a geographic area now that is so spread out? These fires from end to end are about 30 miles apart with fires right in the middle.
- [19:29]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Right. You start to prioritize, you look to see where's the most life safety threat at. That's where you want to get your resources. That's our number one priority. Then after that, you're looking at structures, buildings, where can we do our best Good with our resources and we'll put them there.
- [19:46]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Brent, we have people, I've been speaking to people tonight in the middle of town, Midwilshire and West Hollywood. Hollywood in that area. Now that there's a threat there, they're wondering which direction to go for evacuation.
- [20:02]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Right. I was looking at the map myself and it was like, you know, there's a fire to the, to the east to the northeast of them. It looked like the best way was just to get on a freeway and start heading out and get going. You don't want to be caught on surface streets like we saw here at the Palisades fire. You want to do it early. That way it's more controlled than if everyone tries to go at the last minute and it turns into a parking lot.
- [20:28]
Lawrence O'Donnell
I know most people in the Palisades area when this began were generally heading south. The people that I was talking to individually is south just as a general direction. The safest way to aim right now.
- [20:43]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
You know, looking at the wind gusts south, it's actually pushing to the south. The wind is kind of out of the east northeast. So if you're above it and you can get higher and go north more, that's even better.
- [21:01]
Lawrence O'Donnell
What is the prospects for tomorrow? When we wake up tomorrow, where do you expect to learn the most of what has happened?
- [21:09]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
We're being cautiously optimistic right now with these winds. Last night we kind of saw the same thing, but then all of a sudden we had 70 mile per hour sustained winds starting at 10pm so we're hoping that's not the case tonight. We can get in there, do some good work. So when the sun comes up tomorrow, we can have our damage assessment teams come in, take a look and find out exactly what's been damaged and destroyed and report on some factual numbers.
- [21:37]
Lawrence O'Donnell
The city of Santa Monica, which is technically its own city, but very much a part of the life and spirit of the city, Los Angeles, and indistinguishable as you're driving along there. It's just south of where you are now. Brent, as we both know, and I know there's huge concern in Santa Monica with the Palisades fire going down Rustic Canyon, working its way down the canyon and then climbing up the hill into Santa Monica. What do we know about that progress now?
- [22:08]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Right. I know that remains a high priority on our part is to button that side up. We know that's over there. Right now, these winds are in our favor. So we've moved resources over there. We're taking full advantage of this, if you call it sort of break in the wind.
- [22:26]
Lawrence O'Donnell
And so is the idea that you set up the trucks in the spot which is going to be your line of defense. You don't want the fire moving past this point, right?
- [22:37]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Well, what we'll do is we'll try and get bulldozers actually out there and cut fire lines way out ahead of this fire and say that's going to be our standing point. We don't want it going past there. We're going to try and do that. That way we can stand our ground. Once we have that fire line, then we can get engines in there with water and hoses and stand our ground that way.
- [22:57]
Lawrence O'Donnell
And Chief, what about the personnel? What about, how are, I'm sure you've got people out there who haven't slept in a day. How do you manage that?
- [23:07]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
I do and they look exhausted, but I ask them the stories and they talk about losing a house here or there or a house being destroyed, but then staving the rest on the street and they say that's what keeps them going. Whether it's the just the excitement of it all, but knowing they did some good, they want to go back out there. They say there's no way they can go in and sleep when the fire is still burning actively. Like this.
- [23:35]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Chief, everyone working to fight this fire lives in the region. They are all, I assume, also getting calls and texts from their family and loved ones about their own situations.
- [23:46]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Right. Everyone here knows someone that has a house in the area. We've been checking on houses for friends and friends of the family. So yes, very well known area and just everyone's trying to look out for everyone out here.
- [24:02]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Cal Fire Battalion Chief Brent Pasqua, thank you very much for joining us tonight. And much more importantly, thank you for everything you and your teams are doing out there to save us all. You're welcome.
- [24:13]
Professor Lawrence Tribe
Thank you.
- [24:14]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Thank you. Coming up today, Donald Trump appealed directly to the Supreme Court to try to get out of his criminal sentencing in Manhattan on Friday. Harvard constitutional law professor Lawrence Tribe is going to join us. We're going to stay with the fire coverage, but we're going to get a few words in from Professor Tribe about what we need to know about that Trump appeal. We'll be right back.
- [24:38]
Gaddy Schwartz
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- [25:09]
USAA Representative
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- [25:23]
Gaddy Schwartz
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- [25:52]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Breaking news. President Biden has canceled his planned trip to Rome to meet with the Pope because of the California fires. President Biden has just issued a major disaster declaration for Southern California because of the fires. We're going to continue to keep our eye on the fires. And when we have the images, the local feed of like that helicopter shot from KTLA in Los Angeles, when we're able to just put that on the screen that without any words of description. For most Los Angeles residents, when they see the the streets that are superimposed by computer on some of these images, it tells them exactly what's going on very clearly. They know what they're dealing with and that's why we have tried to keep up those images as much as possible. That's what local news has been delivering to viewers in Los Angeles. Knbc, our affiliate there, has been just doing an extraordinary job with some remarkable people who I know working there continuing to do that. I'm gonna turn to other news for a moment here because this morning, Donald Trump did what no other CR criminal defendant in history has ever done. He appealed directly to the United States Supreme Court to block his criminal sentencing. In a New York State case scheduled For Friday at 9:30am in Manhattan, Donald Trump made that appeal directly to the Supreme Court before exhausting all of his appeals within the state of New York, which is the normal sequence for anyone not named Trump. The Trump criminal defense lawyers offered the United States Supreme Court what they called an appeal appeal raising claims of presidential immunity. That's right. The man who is not president of the United States and who was convicted of 34 felonies in Manhattan this year when he was not president of the United States, is claiming that the new doctrine of presidential immunity created by the Supreme Court this year for Donald Trump should also apply to Donald Trump when he is not present. Two New York judges have rejected that claim this week. Emergency petitions to the Supreme Court of the United States, like the Trump petition are directed at the individual member of the Supreme Court who is assigned to hear emergency petitions from that particular geographic region of the federal court system called a circuit, and the Supreme Court justice assigned to the circuit that includes New York City is New York City native Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Justice Sotomayor ordered District Attorney Alvin Bragg Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to respond to the Trump petition by 10am tomorrow, which is almost exactly 24 hours before Donald Trump is scheduled to be sentenced. Justice Samuel Alito did not say that he would recuse himself from the new Trump appeal even after it was revealed today that he asked Donald Trump for a favor Yesterday. Justice Alito explained the situation this William Levy, who one of my former law clerks asked me to take a call from President Elect Trump regarding his qualifications to serve in a government position. I agreed to discuss this matter with President Elect Trump and he called me yesterday afternoon. So yesterday afternoon, Samuel Alito is on the phone with Donald Trump recommending that he hire one of his former law clerks for the Trump administration. That is a call that could have waited. Samuel Alito knew that Donald Trump was appealing his sentencing schedule and would very likely be appealing directly to the Supreme Court any minute now. But the Supreme Court justice got on the phone with Donald Trump and asked Donald Trump for the favor of hiring his former law clerk. There is absolutely no doubt that Donald Trump was going to hire Samuel Alito's former law clerk with or without the call. The call accomplished nothing in that direction. It was purely Donald Trump's attempt to make Samuel Alito subservient and indebted to him by hiring his former law clerk after Alito asked him to do that. Alito should have never participated in such a phone call, but if he was going to do it, he could have done it next week easily. There is no hiring deadline for any job in the Trump administration, and it is impossible for Donald Trump to hire anyone before January 20th. Justice Alito's statement says we did not discuss the emergency application he filed today and indeed I was not even aware at the time of our conversation that such an application would be filed. We also did not discuss any other matter that is pending or might in the future come before the Supreme Court or any past Supreme Court decisions involving the President Elect. Samuel Alito knows that Donald Trump will take any legal steps possible to try to block the release of Special Prosecutor Jack Smith's report, and Samuel Alito knows it is possible those attempts could end up in the Supreme Court. Alito has never had a telephone conversation with a more active litigant before the Supreme Court than Donald Trump or a more predictable litigant before the Supreme Court than Donald Trump. I knew yesterday Donald Trump was going to appeal his sentencing to the United States Supreme Court. We discussed it on this program last night with Andrew Weissman. There is no reason to believe Samuel Alito yesterday wasn't smart enough to anticipate that Donald Trump would come to the Supreme Court today. At the latest, very latest, with the emergency petition he filed, Samuel Alito is claiming, I couldn't possibly have figured out yesterday what Lawrence O'Donnell figured out yesterday. That's what he's saying. But Samuel Alito, one of the most politically compromised Supreme Court justices in history, on a par only with Clarence Thomas, decided. Sure, I'll get on the phone with Donald Trump yesterday afternoon, two days before he's supposed to be sentenced, knowing he's fighting desperately to stop that sentencing. And I'm going to ask Donald Trump the favor of hiring a friend of mine who used to work for me. Joining our discussion tonight is Professor Lawrence Tribe, who has taught constitutional law at Harvard Law School for five decades. Professor Tribe, you have the floor on what happens next with the Supreme Court.
- [32:21]
Ted Danson
It's hard to focus on things as absurd as Justice Alito's claim that he had no idea that this was coming when everybody in the legal world knew it was coming. It's hard to focus on that while Los Angeles burns. I'm sorry about your house. I have children and grandchildren who have evacuated, who live in Los Angeles. I'm grateful to the firefighters there. But that's not what you need me to discuss. What you need me to discuss is the absurd attempt by President Trump's lawyers to claim not just an absolute privilege of extraordinary scope for a sitting president, but for a president elect. There is no president elect privilege. Leapfrogging the state courts in this way is absolutely unprecedented. It's a defiance of principles, of federalism. It's also a ridiculous appeal because the claim that the Supreme Court's immunity opinion protects Donald Trump from being sentenced, by the way, sentenced without any custodial judgment, sentenced without even a fine. We're told it's almost certain to be a sentence in name only. But the idea that it's so urgent for him to prevent sentencing on Friday simply because some of the evidence that was admitted in the case involved testimony by Hope Hicks and Madeleine Westerhout, people who worked in the White House, that stretches an already extraordinary privilege beyond the breaking point. There is no sense in which they were discussing official matters The Supreme Court itself, in its immunity decision, said that there is no privilege when the president is engaged in activity of a political kind as opposed to his official duties. And the entire case involving the 34 state felonies which Donald Trump has been convicted of committing in order to prevent people from learning about his affair with Stormy Daniels all involves activities he engaged in before he was president. So we now have the bizarre phenomenon of a not yet president claiming that what he did before he ever became president in order to commit state crimes to become president in the first place shouldn't be the subject of sentencing. And in this case, the sentence is simply part of the verdict. What is he afraid of? That he will virtually appear in court? He's been told he doesn't even have to show up and hear the judge explain how serious his crimes were. He's obviously trying to cover up history, just as he's trying to prevent the publication of the report. This man may never be required to spend a minute in prison or pay a dollar in fines, but he also says in remarkable language in his brief that merely publishing and publicizing critical information about him will do irreparable harm to the national security of this country. It's like the old English law in which imagining bad things about a king or a queen was a form of treason. So he's now not only a king, but he's a king in waiting who says that the onus of having to prepare, and he doesn't have to prepare anything, having to get ready to hear a recitation of what he did the day after tomorrow, so terrible that he is entitled now to leapfrog the state courts and get special treatment. It would be ludicrous if it weren't so tragic.
- [36:54]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Professor Tribe, let's go back to the tragic that you mentioned at the beginning, because you've made me widen my frame of concern about this. I've been kind of tunnel focused on my house and my family, who I left behind in Los Angeles, by the way, coming back to New York before there was a fire, not knowing that I was, in effect, you know, evacuating before it was necessary. But I'm thinking of my brother in Boston, whose son lives in Los Angeles and has a gang of kids in the house, grandchildren, my brother's grandchildren, in a house in Los Angeles. And I'm thinking of you people on the other side of the country, where I am now, too safely here, worrying about grandchildren and children in Los Angeles. What is that like for you?
- [37:39]
Ted Danson
It's scary as hell. I mean, I trust my daughter, she's left her place. She has a couple of pet cats and 10 pet chickens. She was only able to evacuate two of them, two grandchildren and a husband. And they're all huddled in her husband's art studio in downtown of the little town where they live. And they think they're safe because there's little vegetation around there. But just like the people you've described, they don't know where to drive. If they were to try to drive anywhere, they'd be less safe. I suggested they fly here, but the, of course the airports are closed because of the wind and the smoke, so, you know, I almost didn't come on the show because I'm so worried about them, but I, but I thought that, you know, I have a few points to make that you might find useful, people might find useful. You know, we have to go on with, with our lives, but I, I pray for all the people in Los Angeles and that they all be safe.
- [38:46]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Your mind is working just like mine tonight. Professor Lawrence Tribe, get back on the phone with your daughter right now. Thank you very much for joining us. Thanks. Thank you. And when we come back, we'll have much more live coverage of the fires now burning across Los Angeles.
- [39:02]
USAA Representative
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- [39:07]
Lawrence O'Donnell
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USAA Representative
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- [39:11]
Lawrence O'Donnell
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- [39:12]
USAA Representative
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- [39:31]
Gaddy Schwartz
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- [40:03]
Lawrence O'Donnell
KNBC's Amber Freya spoke to a resident of the Hollywood Hills about the fire that has erupted there tonight.
- [40:13]
Amber Freya
I want to walk this way. We saw this man who was hosing down some of the sidewalk and some of the trees. Sir? Yeah, hi. Sorry to interrupt you. My name Is Amber with NBC? Do you. Do you live in this complex?
- [40:27]
Brent Pasqua
Yeah, I live right here.
- [40:28]
Lawrence (Resident)
Yeah.
- [40:28]
Amber Freya
What's your name?
- [40:29]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Lawrence.
- [40:31]
Amber Freya
So, I mean, what's going through your mind right now?
- [40:33]
Lawrence (Resident)
Oh, my gosh. This is my whole life right. Right here. You know, I. I spent my whole life savings to get by a condo here. And so I lost my family during COVID and so I don't really have anybody to call or anything, so it feels a little bit scary. Yeah.
- [40:48]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Yeah.
- [40:48]
Amber Freya
I mean, are people still in the complex?
- [40:51]
Lawrence (Resident)
A lot of people have left, but a lot of people are staying too, you know, I think we're gonna be okay. I hope so. I mean, all these fire trucks are going up there, but, you know, you never know. I mean, all you got are these Matt mansions right here. If they catch on fire, we're in real trouble.
- [41:05]
Amber Freya
What's your plan? Are you staying?
- [41:06]
Lawrence (Resident)
I'm gonna stay right. Until it catches. If it catches on fire, I'll leave.
- [41:10]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Yeah.
- [41:10]
Lawrence (Resident)
I have my two Bengal cats in here, and I don't know, they're freaking out, so I'd have to take them with me, but I don't know where I would go. Just in my car, I guess.
- [41:19]
Amber Freya
You're ready to go at least?
- [41:20]
Lawrence (Resident)
I am ready to go. You know, I've been working on this condo since I bought it. Every piece of it.
- [41:26]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Every.
- [41:27]
Amber Freya
You know, so. Sorry.
- [41:29]
Lawrence (Resident)
Well, we're going to start renting it and it's like. No, it's okay. It's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay.
- [41:34]
Amber Freya
It's gonna be okay.
- [41:35]
Lawrence (Resident)
Yeah.
- [41:35]
Amber Freya
It's not gonna get all the way.
- [41:36]
Lawrence (Resident)
Down to the most important fire in la. It has to be. I mean, we're right here, Hollywood Highland, you know what I mean? Yeah.
- [41:44]
Amber Freya
All right, sir. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
- [41:47]
Lawrence O'Donnell
That conversation makes so many of the important and painful points that we've been raising in our coverage. That man named. Named Lawrence, whose last name we didn't get plans to get in the car when he has to, but doesn't know which way to go. That is a very common reaction to what is happening in Los Angeles tonight. He would be leaving behind that home that he built, that home that he's worked on, that home that he's tried to perfect. And he raised something in what he just said there that I haven't thought about today when he said, I don't have anybody to call. My phone has been going nonstop since the fire started. With texts, with phone calls. It's been next to impossible to keep up with. Them. But I want to keep up with every single call and every single text I get from someone there, from someone who's worried about someone who's there, but I don't have anybody to call. That's the worst possible thing that could be happening with your phone tonight. We'll be right back. The front page of tomorrow's Los Angeles Times, which I think we'll be able to show you in a moment, carries the headline like a thousand fires. And that's it. That captures what's really happening in Los Angeles tonight across the space of at least 30 miles where fire is raging. The sub headline is wind driven blazes destroy homes. At least five dead. You should think of this as a windstorm, a very violent windstorm on a par with a hurricane, but with no rain. Rain would be heaven sent at this point. In Los Angeles, rain could help solve this problem much more quickly. The problem has been not enough rainfall in Los Angeles this year, making everything very dry, very combustible, ready to burn. And that is what you're seeing. You're seeing a violent windstorm at wind levels never seen before in Los Angeles. And wind finds flame wherever it is, no matter how tiny it is, wind will find that flame and wind will increase that flame and. And move that flame. And everyone in Los Angeles tonight is living with the question of is the wind coming my way? The future of your home in Los Angeles tonight, whether it will be there tomorrow, is up to the wind. Now that's what's going to decide what happens next in your neighborhood, on your street, to your house. And that is a situation that is in some ways not unique to California. But California is the state where you can lose your house every single day of the year to a natural event. Hurricanes are seasonal. Blizzards are seasonal. Earthquakes are not. Fires are not. These things can happen anytime. This intense wind increases the possibility of this fire and has fueled the fire. That is what you're watching there tonight. And there will be more of it. That is tonight's last word.
- [45:03]
Woody Harrelson
Hey, friends, Ted Danson here. And I want to let you know about my new podcast. It's called Where Everybody Knows yous Name with me, Ted Danson, and Woody Harrelson. Sometimes doing this podcast is a chance for me and my good bud Woody to reconnect after cheers wrapped 30 years ago. Plus, we're introducing each other to the friends we've met since, like Jane Fonda, Conan O'Brien, Eric Andre, Mary Steenburgen, my wife, and Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And trust me, it's always a great hang when Woody's there, so why wait? Listen to where everybody knows your name. Wherever you get your podcasts.