California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara has released the list of insurance companies that have agreed to give fire victims over 75% of coverage without making “the list” of their belongings. State Farm is not one of them.
State Farm, which represents 20 percent of the market in California, dropped more than 1,000 local policyholders in the months, weeks, and even days before the Palisades Fire on January 7, has come in for particular scrutiny for its treatment of its customers.
Earlier this week, a State Farm executive was fired after being exposed by James O’Keefe’s OMG News for, among other things, expressing the opinion that homes should never have been built in the Pacific Palisades in the first place.
State Farm has also resisted allowing fire victims who suffered the total loss of their homes and possessions to collect 100% of the value of their personal property coverage rather than first compiling an itemized list of their belongings.
The process of itemization, known as “the list,” has been described by the New York Times as an “unbearable strain.”
After California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara encouraged insurers to pay 100% of personal property coverage, some firms complied, and some offered at least 75%. But State Farm remained stuck at 50%.
In a press statement, Lara said: “Cutting the red tape and paying claims is what policyholders need now … We need insurance companies to meet this unprecedented moment and put money back into the pockets of wildfire survivors so they can rebuild their lives as quickly as possible.”
Lara also released a table detailing which companies had agreed to pay at least 75%, and which had not. State Farm was among those insurers in the “not” column.
State Farm and other insurers have been canceling policies and leaving the state thanks to California’s unique ixnsurance regulations, which keep premiums artificially low by preventing firms from taking future — rather than past — risk into account.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
