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Joe Rogan and comedian Adam Carolla criticized California Gov. Gavin Newsom Friday for his rhetoric about climate change, arguing he should blame the Palisades wildfires on poor management by local leaders instead.
Nearly a year after the Palisades wildfires became an international news story, critics are still blasting state leaders, accusing them of failing to sufficiently prepare for or competently respond to the fires.
“The thing about the fires is like, you know, Gavin Newsom’s like, ‘Oh, climate change,’ you know, just blame everything on climate change, which is insane,” Carolla said on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast.
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Comedian and podcaster Adam Carolla criticized California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s leadership. (Michael Tullberg/Getty Images)
“That was hilarious,” Rogan agreed. The podcaster has long criticized California’s political leadership, particularly Newsom himself.
Carolla touted New Orleans and Las Vegas as examples of places where people have managed to circumvent the forces of nature to create bustling cities, arguing that California shows it can endure natural disasters like earthquakes thanks to its local codes and rules for buildings.
“So you can mitigate any of this stuff,” he said.
But while California is prepared for earthquakes, local leaders have been repeatedly accused of failing to adequately prepare for the Palisades wildfires.
“So we did not prepare for the fires. We didn’t clear the brush. We didn’t fill the reservoirs. We didn’t do all the stuff,” Carolla continued. “And Newsom goes ‘climate change.’”
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California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass have faced heavy criticism for their management of California amid the disaster. (AP/Getty Images)
Rogan agreed, saying Los Angeles has long had the same dry climate and has always faced major fires.
“LA has always caught fire,” he said. “It doesn’t rain there. It doesn’t rain there ever. And it’s been like that forever. That’s why they film movies there. It’s not climate change, you f—— a——. It’s a lack of preparation,” Rogan said.
Carolla also mocked claims of rapidly rising sea levels, arguing that if they were true, much of the oceanfront property in Los Angeles that has been there since the 1930s and 40s would have been submerged.
“It’s a weird thing because people in California talk about climate change, but the lots that are on the ocean side of PCH are 10 million bucks more than the ones that are up the hill that would be safe from the ocean that was rising,” he said.
Newsom’s office has objected to Rogan and Carolla’s claims, which it describes as “factually inaccurate.”
“It is factually inaccurate to say there was a lack of preparation – resources were prepositioned thanks to alerts from the National Weather Service. You can see the historic response by the day here,” a spokesperson for Newsom’s office wrote, linking to a lengthy list of Newsom’s efforts, including cutting red tape to streamline the process of rebuilding what was lost.
“Additionally, it is well-known that there were significant winds (up to 100mph in places) driving embers (seen here) as well as historically dry grounds due to lack of rain fall for a significant period of time (as documented here).”
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A firefighter battles the Palisades Fire during a windstorm on the west side of Los Angeles on Jan. 7, 2025. (Ringo Chiu/Reuters/TPX Images of the Day)
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