Iconic late-night talk show host Jay Leno whipped up about $21,000 worth of ribs, chicken, and other food to hand out to the emergency workers and volunteers who responded to the raging Los Angeles fires — and he is not done.
Joining Andrew Cuomo’s NewsNation show on Tuesday, he described how he started “cooking up for the guys and giving them a hot meal”:
“My God, these guys can eat. They went through the whole thing. We need more food,” Leno, 74, exclaimed. “So we got more food today. Got more food tomorrow, more food Thursday.”
Comparing the massive fire-fighting operation to a “military base,” the comedian said the Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD) is the “best fire department in the world.”
He then compared the destruction he saw to “Hiroshima.”
“Everybody thinks Malibu is heaven, but you have heaven and hell, literally, on the same street,” Leno explained. “Over here, there’s nothing, and over here, it’s just the chimneys that are standing.”
“Even in a warzone, you see buildings and walls. Everything is gone,” he added, before saying that people have remained positive despite the devastation.
“It doesn’t matter what sign you have on your lawn. You know, it’s come down to neighbors caring for one another,” Leno said. “I haven’t heard one political opinion. I just heard people [ask], ‘How can we save this?’”
He continued to on to say that actor James Woods, who has been a vocal critic of the LAFD for “promoting diversity” over putting out fires, is a “good friend of mine.”
“We’re probably on opposite sides politically, but I love the guy ’cause he’s smart,” Leno said, before bringing up how his actor friend helped to rescue a 94-year-old neighbor with dementia from the fires:
While Woods initially thought that his home was lost to the blaze, later thanked another neighbor for helping to save his Pacific Palisades residence.
Leno continued on to emphasize how little politics mattered when he was handing out plages of food, saying “It’s not a matter of whose president, who won or who lost.”
The Palisades fire has spread to over 23,700 acres since it sparked last Tuesday, and remains at just 19 percent containment, according to New York Times coverage.
The Eaton fire has burned through approximately 14,000 acres, and was nearly halfway contained as of Wednesday afternoon.
Other small fires are still burning around the Los Angeles area, and at least two dozen people have died as a result.
