Just When You Thought Palisades Fire Response Couldn’t Get Any Worse [WATCH]

Joel Pollack said evidence uncovered through private lawsuits indicates that California state government fire suppression policies contributed to the Palisades Fire, pointing to restrictions that prevented firefighters from fully extinguishing an earlier blaze that later reignited under high winds.

Pollack said the evidence did not come from his own reporting but emerged during litigation against public authorities following the destruction in Pacific Palisades.

“Smoking Gun evidence wasn’t found by me. It was uncovered during the course of private lawsuits against public authorities who failed in their duty to protect Pacific Palisades, and they have released drone footage that shows smoke rising from an earlier fire that took place on January 1, 2025, called the Lockman fire which the fire department failed to extinguish fully as it smoldered in the roots of plants,” Pollack said.

According to Pollack, the Lockman fire was not fully put out and later reignited, leading to a much larger and more destructive fire.

He said the failure to fully suppress the fire was influenced by state policies governing firefighting activity on parkland near Pacific Palisades.

“And we believe, and many others believe, that part of the reason that fire was never fully extinguished was that the state of California had a policy on Parkland of not allowing heavy fire suppression equipment into areas that were considered sensitive, either because they had rare plants or because they possibly had cultural resources,” Pollack said.

Pollack said the policies were created in late 2024 and applied to state parkland adjacent to Pacific Palisades.

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He said the restrictions required the presence of an archeologist before certain firefighting actions could be taken.

“And if you read the documents, these policies, which were crafted in late 2024 said that you could not suppress fire in the State Park, which is right up against Pacific Palisades, unless you had an archeologist present to tell you where you could and could not put out the fire,” Pollack said.

Pollack said those policies guided firefighters’ actions and contributed to the spread of the fire when weather conditions worsened.

“So as a result of these policies, you had this massive Inferno that spread in high winds and that destroyed the plants and likely many of the cultural sites,” Pollack said.

He added that the policy framework had previously been used against public agencies that attempted to suppress fires or create fire breaks, reinforcing caution among firefighters responding to the Lockman fire.

“Anyway, this policy helped guide firefighters because it had previously been used even against public departments that tried to suppress fire or to cut fire breaks,” Pollack said.

Pollack also criticized California Governor Gavin Newsom’s response following the fire, saying the governor denied state responsibility and attributed the outcome to local firefighting decisions.

“The governor of California, Gavin Newsom, who you showed there earlier, lying to one of my neighbors. He says that the state of California is not responsible that this was a local decision by firefighters,” Pollack said.

Pollack said Newsom claimed that the state had taken preventative measures ahead of extreme weather but failed to act at the site of the earlier fire.

“He says he sent 110 fire engines to Southern California in advance of the extreme winds, but he did not send fire engines to that spot where there had been a fire on January, 1 six days before the wind event, where there was smoldering fire, where some residents had reported smoke, and where the state knew there was a huge risk of reignition,” Pollack said.

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