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L.A. Fire Captain, Union Leader: Warning That People Would Die Due to Lack of Resources Came True

During portions of an interview with CNN aired on Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Situation Room,” President of the United Firefighters of Los Angeles City Local 112 Freddy Escobar, who is also a Captain with the Los Angeles Fire Department, stated that his warning that people would die due to a lack of resources within the city’s “woefully understaffed” fire department is “what occurred.” And the city is “either going to have a fire department that’s going to reflect 2025 or we’re going to have a fire department that’s going to reflect the 1960s.”

Host Wolf Blitzer said, “Not long before deadly wildfires broke out in Los Angeles, firefighters were sounding the alarm about major staffing shortfalls inside the city’s fire department.” And that “a new CNN analysis backs up those concerns about staffing.”

CNN Senior Investigative Correspondent Kyung Lah introduced her report by saying, “We’ve heard sort of the back and forth about fire budgets involving the current mayor, but this is an issue that precedes this mayor. This is years in the making. The fire department has warned of dire consequences, saying that they need more money, they need more firefighters. And they warned of this as recently as last month.”

She then played a clip where she told Escobar, “At that commission meeting, you said, it’s dire, someone will die.”

Escobar responded, “It’s eerie listening to your words, because that’s what occurred.”

Lah then stated, “For years, the LAFD union president warned that a disaster like the Palisades fire could happen. And while the cataclysmic weather conditions were historic, Escobar also blames something predictable that hurt the fire fight, money.”

She then played a clip of Escobar saying, “This is a woefully understaffed fire department. We’re either going to have a fire department that’s going to reflect 2025 or we’re going to have a fire department that’s going to reflect the 1960s.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett

via January 14th 2025