Politics

The start of the Palisades and Eaton fires: 24 hours that changed Los Angeles

Published

1 year ago

January 25, 2025

The start of the Palisades and Eaton fires: 24 hours that changed Los Angeles

As the sun rose on Jan. 8, the sky orange from ash and smoke, Angelenos anxiously waited for news about the extent of the damage from the Altadena and Pacific Palisades fires.

It would take days to learn that the conflagrations had caused an unprecedented level of destruction, killing at least 28 people, destroying and damaging more than 18,000 buildings valued at more than $275 billion, and leaving a burn zone 2½ times the size of Manhattan. That for decades to come, the disaster would divide our history into a “before” and “after.”

Here is how those first 24 hours unfolded.

Tuesday, Jan. 7

10:35 am.

The winds were screaming through the Santa Monica Mountains by the time Sue Kohl and her daughter Courtney wrapped up a morning meeting. It was a clear, sunny day in Palisades Village, and the women weren’t too worried about a small fire burning a few miles to the north.

Courtney left the office to walk to Starbucks but returned almost immediately, telling her mother: Get in the car. We’re going now.

From the sidewalk, their clothes and hair whipped by the wind, the women could see flames and smoke — a lot of smoke — coming from the hills. Kohl realized: If the winds turn, this fire could go anywhere.

At home in the Alphabet Streets neighborhood, Kohl put her dogs and photo albums in the car. She left everything else she owned, thinking she’d be back soon.

A large plume of smoke from the Palisades fire rises over the ridge line.

A mother carries her child as they move down a sidewalk away from a line of firetrucks.

11:13 a.m.

Los Angeles sent its first evacuation alert to cell phones in the northern and western Palisades, warning that a fire was burning along Palisades Drive, and those nearby “should get set for a potential evacuation.”

11:23 a.m.

Erin Kyle, her teenage daughter and her daughter’s best friend, who had spent the night at their town house in the Palisades Highlands, were speeding down the mountain, smoke billowing around them.

The sky was turning orange. Palisades Drive was the only way out of the neighborhood. Traffic slowed, then stopped.

As they got closer to Sunset Boulevard, flames burned on both sides of the road. Embers the size of matchbooks smacked into their windshield. To their right, the Calvary Christian School burned.

Some drivers pulled across the tree-lined median onto the northbound lanes of Palisades Drive, driving the wrong way to avoid the traffic jam. Others just abandoned their cars and ran, hauling bags and pet carriers.

“Mom, are we going to have to run?” her daughter asked.

Kyle told the girls that staying in the car was the best course of action. In truth, she wasn’t so sure, as she contemplated a list of several bad options: Leave the car, get hit by flying embers and struggle to carry everything they’d packed. Stay in the car and get burned alive if the fire moved closer.

If we don’t start to move in the next four minutes, she decided, we’ll get out of the car.

Miraculously, cars started to inch forward, but it would take Kyle and the girls more than an hour and a half to move 2.5 miles.

11:52 a.m.

Los Angeles County sent the first evacuation orders to a swath of the Palisades: “LEAVE NOW.”

Around noon

More than 7,500 miles away in Accra, Ghana, where it was around 8 p.m., Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass smiled for photos at a cocktail party at the U.S. Ambassador’s residence. Bass had flown to the West African nation Jan. 4 as part of a Biden Administration delegation to the inauguration of the Ghanaian president.

She’d left Los Angeles City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson as the acting mayor. Her staff said she spent most of the cocktail party on the phone dealing with the fire, and shortly after the photos were taken was hustled to a military base to board a flight back to the U.S.

12:45 p.m.

The Los Angeles City Council wrapped its first meeting of the year, which included more than an hour of wrangling over the $1-billion Television City project in the Fairfax district.

At the meeting’s end, Westside Councilmember Traci Park made a brief, urgent announcement: The Palisades fire was threatening homes and lives, she said. Mandatory evacuation orders were going out out soon.

“Pack your bags, be ready to go,” Park said. “This is an emergency.”

12:54 p.m.

In Malibu, the Getty Villa’s emergency preparedness coordinator, Les Borsay, was nervous. The edge of the Villa property was on fire, and embers were whipping through the air like they’d been shot from a gun.

A man strides across burned landscaping toward a structure with numerous archways.

The museum’s prized collection of Greek and Roman antiquities was sealed inside the galleries, the HVAC shut off and the doors taped to keep out smoke and ash. But flames were coming closer to the building that was once the home of oil tycoon J. Paul Getty and now housed labs and offices. The wood-shingled property didn’t have fire sprinklers.

Fortunately, the museum was closed to guests on Tuesdays and the evacuation of non-emergency staff went smoothly. What’s more, Borsay and several operations workers who didn’t normally work at the Villa had been on site that morning to test the fire systems.

In another bit of good luck, a Los Angeles Fire Department helicopter swept by to drop water on the flames, six feet from the edge of the building.

12:59 p.m.

Through an N95 mask, a good Samaritan in the Palisades told a television reporter that he was trying to move cars that were abandoned in the road so firetrucks could get through but that some people had fled holding their car keys.

In a surreal moment, the reporter realized halfway through the interview that he was talking to actor Steve Guttenberg, who said he was trying to move every car he could — except for the Teslas, which he couldn’t figure out how to start.

1:38 p.m.

Evacuation orders expanded to the rest of the Palisades and north into the mountains to Mandeville Canyon Road: “Gather people and pets and leave immediately.”

2:20 p.m.

In the hills of the Palisades, near the Temescal Ridge Trail, Alex Emerick, 34, his younger sister, Rainier, and their parents grabbed garden hoses at their home of 33 years. The family had tried to evacuate when flames were visible from their driveway, but with traffic at a standstill in the neighborhood, they turned around.

They donned goggles and N95 masks and divided up, wetting down their shrubs and quashing small fires erupting in the front, side and back yards. The house across the street went up in flames. Because their bushes and trees bordered another property, putting out the spot fires in their yard may have helped prevent a “chain reaction of embers,” Emerick said, adding: “It’s like we were saving everyone’s properties at once.”

A woman sprays water from a garden hose near a car in a driveway as flames approach.

2:30 p.m.

Fire hoses snaked like spaghetti around the wheels of dozens of abandoned cars on Palisades Drive. Los Angeles County Fire Department bulldozer No. 5 pulled in and started shoving the vehicles aside to clear the road for firetrucks.

3:11 p.m.

In Dallas, at the end of a news conference before a game against the Mavericks, Los Angeles Lakers coach JJ Redick rubbed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose and told reporters that his family and his wife’s family had evacuated from the Palisades.

“A lot of people are freaking out right now, including my family,” Redick said. “From the sound of things, with the winds coming tonight, I know a lot of people are scared.”

4 p.m.

At a hastily assembled news conference on Will Rogers State Beach, Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristen Crowley told reporters that the fire had grown from 10 acres to 1,261 acres in less than six hours and was threatening more than 13,000 buildings. The winds would “pick up and get worse” between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone warned.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, in Southern California for a morning event with President Biden that had been canceled, said it “didn’t take more than a text message” for Biden to approve full federal reimbursement for the state’s wildfire response. But, Newsom warned, the night would be worse: “By no stretch of the imagination are we out of the woods.”

Firefighters on a hillside patio monitor an approaching fire.

5 p.m.

As the sun set, the last water drained out of a 1-million gallon tank tucked away in a cul-de-sac north of Palisades Village. That tank, and two others, help maintain water pressure in the highest hills of the Palisades. Gravity draws the water down into faucets, pools and hydrants below, and then the tanks are refilled with water pumped up from the city’s pipelines. Already, the firefight was straining that system.

5:35 p.m.

In Topanga Canyon, Zoe Nisman’s phone was blowing up with repeated notifications telling her to evacuate. She was also seeing a steady stream of messages from friends with news about beloved spots in Malibu — Reel Inn, Cholata Thai — that were gone.

“Everything I grew up with is burning,” Nisman said. “I guess it’s just time to pack.”

5:57 p.m.

As the power began to blink out in various neighborhoods, Angelenos unfolded sleeper sofas and made up guest beds for evacuees, listened to the wind rattling the windows, and wondered if they should pack a go bag.

6:11 p.m.

A man stands at a wrought iron fence in a yard.

Matthew Logelin, 47, was making buttered pasta with parmesan for his daughters, ages 3 and 5, when he heard a loud bang behind his home on Canyon Close Road in Pasadena.

He ran outside to check on two towering pine trees in his back yard. They hadn’t ignited, but then he saw flames — no bigger than a camp fire — burning beneath a Southern California Edison transmission tower on the mountain in Eaton Canyon behind their home.

The fire, first called the “Close fire,” after Logelin’s street, would soon be renamed the Eaton fire. Logelin, the grandson of a state fire marshal, knew what to do: call 911, warn the neighbors, pack the car.

6:26 p.m.

Stretched thin by the Palisades fire and hurricane-force wind gusts, the Los Angeles Fire Department made a rare request to off-duty firefighters: Call in with your availability to work.

The request, the first of its kind in nearly two decades, was an indication of just how serious the fire had become. Complicating matters, a garbled version began to circulate on X and Instagram, where posts claimed the LAFD was “begging anyone with firefighting experience” to call the department’s downtown operations center. The phone line was soon flooded with calls.

7:26 p.m.

Altadena residents east of Lake Avenue were ordered to evacuate. Gusts of up to 100 mph carried burning embers two miles from the blazes. All helicopters were grounded. As Los Angeles headed into a night of unprecedented wind and fire, firefighters could get no help from the air.

7:55 p.m.

In Altadena, Christian Manoukian, 27, was searching desperately for his grandmother outside the Terraces at Park Marino, a nursing home and memory care facility off Lake Avenue.

A staff member had called his uncle 15 minutes earlier, warning: There’s a lot of smoke inside. The facility is in danger. Please come if you can.

Nurses were evacuating the building at a sprint, pushing patients in hospital beds and wheelchairs down two long blocks to the parking lot of a 7-Eleven. The wind snatched at blankets and face masks. Embers whipped through the air. People yelled in Tagalog, English, Spanish and Armenian over the blaring sirens.

“This word is overused, but it was the height of chaos,” Manoukian said.

Manoukian and his uncle found his grandmother and drove her to a nursing home in Highland Park that agreed to take in Altadena residents. Other patients were loaded into ambulances and Pasadena city buses. The nursing home was ablaze less than an hour later.

Two people with face masks prepare to load a patient on a gurney onto a bus.

9:20 p.m.

Every time Steven Seagle, 59, checked the hillside behind his house north of Altadena Drive, the Eaton fire was closer. The flames were chewing through the mountains at more than 100 yards per minute, or more than three miles an hour.

“I’ve never seen anything move that quickly,” Seagle said. “I knew we weren’t coming back.”

His wife and kids and cat had already departed. But Seagle stayed behind to shut off the gas and collect a few more items: his foster son’s glasses, his foster daughter’s photo album, the rings that had belonged to his wife’s late mother. Seagle, a comic book author and artist, also grabbed his portfolio.

But he left behind his favorite painting, by artist Suzanne Jackson. At 4 feet by 6 feet, the frame was too big to fit in the car. (Hours too late, he realized that he could have cut the canvas from the frame.)

Seagle’s last stop was the towering Moreton Bay fig that had shaded the property for decades. You’re the reason we moved here, he told the tree. I hope you can make it. Then he drove away.

10 p.m.

The level-headed experts who usually told John Harabedian that everything would be fine were instead warning of hurricane-force wind and desperate firefights.

Harabedian, the newly elected representative for Altadena and Pasadena in the state Assembly, was in Sacramento for the first week of his first legislative session. In his room at the Sheraton, texts from family, friends and constituents were pouring in. His wife and kids were evacuating. His friends’ homes were burning.

We could lose Sierra Madre, Pasadena, Altadena, La Cañada — everything along the foothills, Harabedian thought. Nothing will ever be the same.

The orange glow of fire lights the night sky along a suburban street at night.

10:25 p.m.

The power was flickering at the Oakridge Mobile Home Park in Sylmar, and Amy Condit was on edge.

The winds were the strongest she’d ever felt, stronger even than 2008, when the Sayer fire destroyed 480 of the park’s 600 homes. She’d made a mental list of what to pack.

A gust of wind landed like a punch. The sky lit up light blue, a moment of daylight in the night.

“I would have sworn it was a nuclear bomb, except the color was wrong,” Condit said.

She looked up the mountain beyond her back yard and saw flames erupt at the base of a power transmission line. Then they started to race toward her.

Condit screamed to her mother to call 911 and hurried to collect a few belongings: documents, pillows, a cuckoo clock. The wind tore her cat, Precious, from her arms.

When an evacuation alert arrived 15 minutes later, Condit was ready. That blaze would soon be called the Hurst fire.

11:11 p.m.

Live images of flames devouring Palisades Village filled the 11 p.m. broadcast on KTTV.. Developer Rick Caruso called in, and in eight minutes, he gave voice to the shock, grief and anger that had engulfed the neighborhood.

The hurricane-force gusts bearing down on Los Angeles hadn’t been a surprise, Caruso said, but the city still hadn’t been prepared. People who lost their homes and businesses were “paying the ultimate price” for L.A.’s mismanagement, he said, including hydrants in the Palisades that were running dry.

“Why isn’t there water in the fire hydrants?” the anchor asked. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“You’re right — that’s a good question,” Caruso said, and twisted the knife against Bass, who beat him in the 2022 election: “Why don’t you call the mayor, who’s out of the country, and ask her?”

Wednesday, Jan. 8

2:58 a.m.

In Altadena, home health aide Kimberly Barrera, 26, was on the phone with 911, begging for help evacuating a cancer patient from Canyada Avenue. Her patient was weak from radiation treatment, could not stand on his own, and weighed more than 300 pounds.

When Barrera told the dispatcher she would need assistance, the dispatcher sighed, told her to wait, and then hung up. The fire was crawling up the back yard and the house was filled with smoke. Barrera knew they didn’t have time to wait.

Just leave without me, her patient told her. You’re coming with me, or we both stay here, she responded.

Barrera wrapped a gait belt around the man’s waist. On the count of three, she told him, you’ll put your arms around my neck and I’ll lift you by the belt.

“For a moment, I had superhuman strength,” she said.

He slid into the wheelchair and they raced out of the house. The sky was bright red.

3 a.m.

The third and final water tank in the Palisades, a squat steel cylinder in Temescal Canyon, ran dry.

A firefighter pulling a hose is silhouetted by the light of a flaming structure.

3:30 a.m.

Evacuation orders had just gone out to Altadena residents west of Lake Avenue, seven hours later than residents farther east.

Leisa Alexander, her husband and her mother-in-law scrambled into their car on Laurice Avenue, only to find themselves hemmed in on both sides on Marathon Road. In front of them, a tree had fallen into the roadway and caught fire. Behind them, broken power lines whipped in the wind.

Peering through the thick smoke, Alexander’s husband reversed the car under the power lines and drove east. Homes on both sides were on fire. They could feel the heat in the car.

Alexander wondered why an evacuation order hadn’t arrived earlier, and whether people without smartphones would know to leave. Thank goodness she and her husband had been there with her 84-year-old mother-in-law, she thought. If we hadn’t gone up, she wouldn’t be here.

Finally, they spotted an ambulance. Follow it, Alexander told her husband. They fled south.

4:36 a.m.

Phones in Los Angeles buzzed with an alert: FAST MOVING WILDFIRE IN YOUR AREA. AN EVACUATION ORDER HAS BEEN ISSUED FOR THE YOUR AREA. LEAVE NOW.

The alert, sent in error, marked the end of a long and sleepless night for many, as Angelenos waited for the sun to rise.

5:44 a.m.

The United Airlines flight carrying Bass back to Los Angeles pulled away from the gate at Washington Dulles International Airport.

6:18 a.m.

A fourth fire ignited in the Sepulveda Basin, near the intersection of the 405 and 101 freeways. Strong winds whipped the 30-acre blaze, known as the Woodley fire, south toward Burbank Boulevard.

6:30 a.m.

Eric Danneker and his wife Melissa sat in shock in a grocery store parking lot in Pasadena. The couple had fled La Paz Road in Altadena around midnight. A friend had just told them their home had burned.

The adobe-style home, built in 1925, had housed three generations of Melissa’s family. Eric grew up across the street. Everything they owned was with them in their cars: paperwork, clothes, and their dogs, Dreamer and Dribble.

Melissa thought of all the mementos and family heirlooms they had left behind. “The recipes,” she said. Her voice broke.

6:59 a.m.

At sunrise, miles from the fires, many Southern Californians found eerie remnants drifting down onto their yards and balconies: fragments of newspapers, a charred slip of a signed divorce settlement, a faded photograph of a couple holding a newborn.

Hot spots glow red in the remains of a house, a chimney still standing.

7:50 a.m.

In Malibu, smoke mingled with fog along the coast as television news crews began surveying the damage, broadcasting burned-out stretches of the iconic coastline and husks of beloved restaurants like Gladstones, Moonshadows and Reel Inn.

Celebrity hotel heiress Paris Hilton learned from watching KABC-TV that her Malibu home, where her son had taken his first steps, had burned. That moment of loss, she said, is something that “no one should ever have to experience.”

8 a.m.

A media briefing initially planned at Zuma Beach was changed to downtown amid threats of high wind and fire. Ferocious winds had stretched firefighters thin overnight, and the fires, which had already destroyed more than 7,000 acres, were burning with no containment.

Firefighters were prepared “for one or two major brush fires, but not four,” said Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone said.

A man stands next to a scorched tree, a large building behind him.

9 a.m.

More than a dozen employees had spent the night at the Getty Villa, patrolling in pairs to squash small fires with handheld extinguishers. The sound of the fire, crackling and popping, struck Borsay as weirdly familiar, like the YouTube yule log video he put on at Christmas.

The buildings survived the night. Now, it was time for Borsay to check on the collections.

The Villa was showing a special exhibit about Thrace, an ancient region spanning modern Bulgaria and parts of Greece, Turkey and Romania. Thrace’s tribes were wealthy and sophisticated, cited in “The Iliad” as allies of the Trojans who arrived in gilded chariots. Bulgaria loaned more than 150 objects to the exhibit, which took six years to organize, and the fire had become front-page news in the Balkans.

Gusts of wind had left ash rippled in waves across the terrazzo floors outside. Borsay peeled the blue tape off the double doors to the gallery and stepped inside. He couldn’t smell smoke. He couldn’t see dust. The golden antiquities gleamed gently under their spotlights.

The gallery was immaculate.

11:14 a.m.

At a fire station in Santa Monica, LAFD Chief Kristen Crowley told Biden and Newsom that the Palisades fire had grown to 10,802 acres overnight, an increase of more than 1,000%, in less than 24 hours.

11:16 a.m.

United Airlines Flight 667 pulled into a gate at Los Angeles International Airport. Bass exited to the jet bridge, where she was approached by a reporter for a British television network who had been on her flight.

Bass looked away, saying nothing, as the reporter asked whether Bass had a response to fire officials who said they were “stretched to the limit and running out of water.”

The reporter pressed on: “Do you owe citizens an apology for being absent while their homes were burning?” And again: “Have you nothing to say today?” No answer.

Times staff writers Nathan Solis, Andrea Chang, Connor Sheets, Dan Woike, Julia Wick, David Zahniser, Matt Hamilton and Ian James contributed to this report.

Politics

Dr Oz helps older woman who collapsed during Trump’s speech at Kentucky event

Published

21 minutes ago

March 12, 2026

Press Room

Dr Oz helps older woman who collapsed during Trump’s speech at Kentucky event

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Dr. Mehmet Oz rushed to help after a woman collapsed during President Donald Trump’s speech in Kentucky on Wednesday.

About halfway through Trump’s remarks at Verst Logistics in Hebron, Kentucky, an older woman behind the president’s riser appeared to need medical attention, prompting Trump to ask the crowd, “Do we have a doctor in the house? Take your time, please.”

A medical team quickly reached her, including Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Dr. Oz.

“First responders are incredible,” Trump said as he turned and watched emergency medical personnel take care of the woman.

DR. OZ REVEALS HOW HE IS BRINGING CHANGE TO DC AND HELPING THE MOST VULNERABLE AMERICANS

Dr. Mehmet Oz, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator, gave a thumbs up after helping a woman who fainted while President Donald Trump spoke at Verst Logistics in Hebron, Kentucky, on March 11. (Jim WATSON / AFP via Getty Images)

The president paused his remarks and asked if a song could be played in the meantime.

“Do you think the people backstage are listening to me?” Trump said, adding that if they could hear him, he suggested playing “Ave Maria.”

The song did not play, and Trump continued to watch as the woman received treatment.

DR. OZ WARNS WALZ TO ADDRESS ALLEGED SOMALI MEDICAID FRAUD OR LOSE FEDERAL FUNDING: ‘WE’LL STOP PAYING’

President Donald Trump reacts as Dr. Mehmet Oz joins first responders assisting a woman who collapsed during his speech. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

“Take your time,” he said. “She looks great.”

As first responders began escorting the woman away, Trump noticed Oz was among those helping her.

“It’s Dr. Oz! Can you believe it? Dr. Oz!” Trump said. “He’s a good doctor. Thank you, Oz.”

RFK JR: DR OZ SAYS TRUMP HAS ‘HIGHEST TESTOSTERONE LEVEL’ HE’S SEEN IN A MAN OLDER THAN 70

Dr. Mehmet Oz assisted a woman who collapsed during President Donald Trump’s speech in Hebron, Kentucky, on Wednesday. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

Trump resumed his remarks about seven minutes later, returning to criticism of California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

“We were talking about Gavin New-scum,” Trump said with a laugh. “Doesn’t seem like a very good subject right now. It made that young lady not feel so good.”

Wednesday’s event was not the first time Oz, a former heart surgeon, assisted during a medical episode while serving in the Trump administration.

In April, a young girl fainted near the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office while Trump was speaking during Oz’s swearing-in ceremony.

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Oz quickly rushed over to assist the child, who was later confirmed to be a member of his family.

In November, a man collapsed in the Oval Office as Trump was giving a press conference, prompting Oz to once again step in to help.

Politics

‘Just sign it.’ Video appears to show $5-a-pop ballot petition fraud; state launches probe

Published

1 hour ago

March 12, 2026

Press Room

‘Just sign it.’ Video appears to show -a-pop ballot petition fraud; state launches probe

A video circulating online appears to show signature collectors paying people to sign initiative petitions under other people’s names, according to officials, and now the state has opened an investigation.

The video, filmed by self-described street videographer JJ Smith, shows a long queue leading to a table set up at 6th and Mission streets in San Francisco. A man in line says they are being offered $5 to sign petitions. At the table, where there are lists with the information of apparent registered voters, a woman confirms the payment and — using a highlighter — instructs a person on the name and address that she is supposed to use.

“I get $5 too?” the person filming asks.

“Yeah,” says the woman.

“And what is it?”

“Just sign it,” she says.

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Petitions connected to at least three ballot campaigns — including the billionaire-backed effort to thwart California’s proposed billionaire tax — appear in the video.

“I approached some people and asked them what they were there for,” Smith told The Times. “They told me they didn’t know what they were signing for, that they just wanted the $5.”

Smith, whose real name is Omar Ward, has been known for posting images on social of people suffering from addiction on San Francisco’s streets.

He said he watched the scene for hours and estimated that a few hundred people cycled through the line over roughly two hours.

Those running the table did not ask for anyone’s identification and gave no explanation of what was actually being signed, he said.

The video showed voter data from San Luis Obispo County that was both visible and, as details were spoken aloud, audible in the footage.

The county acted immediately after becoming aware of the video and initiated an investigation through the fraud unit of the California secretary of state’s office, said Erin Clausen, public information officer for the San Luis Obispo county clerk’s office.

Clausen noted that, although voter registration data can be legally requested from county election offices, the data in this case may have been used inappropriately. The county is also planning on reaching out directly to voters who were specifically mentioned or identified in the video, according to Clausen.

“The activity shown in the video, if verified, would violate California election law,” County Clerk-Recorder Elaina Cano said in a formal statement released Wednesday morning.

The secretary of state’s office confirmed it had opened a formal investigation.

“Under California law, it is illegal to give money or other valuable consideration to another in exchange for their signature on an initiative petition,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “Those who abuse our system will be held accountable.”

The office is working with local officials and encouraged anyone with information to file a complaint.

One political committee, Californians for a More Transparent and Effective Government, confirmed its petitions were among those whose signature gatherers were allegedly paying people to sign and moved quickly to distance itself from the activity.

“Under no circumstance do we tolerate this type of activity in the signature-gathering process,” said spokesperson Molly Weedn. “We’ve taken immediate action and have demanded that the signature gathering firm identify these circulators and reject their petitions.” Weedn said the collectors were subcontractors, not campaign employees, and that attorneys were contacting authorities.

That committee is funded by another group, Building a Better California, also seen in the video. The other was for a proposed initiative called the Retirement and Personal Savings Protection Act of 2026. Representatives for the latter two have not responded to requests for comment.

Smith said this was not the first time he had witnessed this type of activity in the area.

“I saw something similar with ballots three days ago,” he said.

The investigation is ongoing. Anyone with information can submit a complaint to the Office of the California Secretary of State or contact their local county elections office.

Times staff writer Seema Mehta contributed to this report.

Politics

Reporter’s Notebook: Trump’s SAVE Act ultimatum runs into Senate reality

Published

12 hours ago

March 11, 2026

Press Room

Reporter’s Notebook: Trump’s SAVE Act ultimatum runs into Senate reality

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Passage of the SAVE America Act is of paramount importance to President Donald Trump and many congressional Republicans.

In his State of the Union speech, the president implored lawmakers “to approve the SAVE America Act to stop illegal aliens and other unpermitted persons from voting in our sacred American elections.”

The House approved the plan to require proof of citizenship to vote last month, 218-213. There’s now a different version of the legislation that’s in play. And, as is often the case, the hurdle is the Senate. Specifically, the Senate filibuster.

Attendees listen as Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, speaks at an “Only Citizens Vote” bus tour rally advocating passage of the SAVE Act at Upper Senate Park outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 10, 2025. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

So some Republicans are trying to save the SAVE America Act.

It’s important to note that Trump never called for the Senate to alter the filibuster in his State of the Union address. But in a post last week on Truth Social, Trump declared, “The Republicans MUST DO, with PASSION, and at the expense of everything else, THE SAVE AMERICA ACT.”

Again, the president didn’t wade into questions about overcoming a filibuster. But “MUST DO” and “at the expense of everything else” is a clear directive from the commander in chief.

That’s why there’s a big push by House Republicans and some GOP senators to alter the filibuster — or handle the Senate filibuster differently.

It’s rare for members of one body of Congress to tell the other how to execute their rules and procedures. But the strongest conservative advocates of the SAVE America Act are now condemning Senate Republicans if they don’t do something drastic to change the filibuster to pass the measure.

Some Senate Republicans are pushing for changes, or at the very least, advocating that Senate Republicans insist that Democrats conduct what they refer to as a “talking filibuster” and not hold up the legislation from the sidelines. It takes 60 votes to terminate a filibuster. The Senate does that by “invoking cloture.” The Senate first used the cloture provision to halt a filibuster on March 8, 1917. Prior to that vote, the only method to end a filibuster was exhaustion — meaning that senators finally just run out of gas, quit debating and finally voted.

So let’s explore what a filibuster is and isn’t and dive into what Republicans are talking about when they’re talking about a talking filibuster.

The Senate’s leading feature is unlimited debate. But, ironically, the “debate” which holds up most bills is not debate. It’s simply a group of 60 lawmakers signaling offstage to their leaders that they’ll stymie things. No one has to go to the floor to do anything. Opponents of a bill will require the majority tee up a cloture vote — even if legislation has 60 yeas. Each cloture vote takes three to four days to process. So that inherently slows down the process — and is a de facto filibuster.

But what about talking filibusters? Yes, senators sometimes take the floor and talk for a really long time, hence, the “unlimited debate” provision in the Senate. Senators can generally speak as long as they want, unless there’s a time agreement green-lighted by all 100 members.

That’s why a “filibuster” is hard to define. You won’t find the word “filibuster” in the Senate’s rules. And since senators can just talk as long as they want, they might argue that suggesting they are “filibustering” is pejorative. They’re just exercising their Senate rights to speak on the floor.

A true filibuster is a delay. For instance, the record-breaking 25-hour and 8-minute speech last year by Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., against the Trump administration was technically not a filibuster. Booker began his oratory on the evening of March 31, ending on the night of April 1. Once Booker concluded, the Senate voted to confirm Matt Whittaker as NATO ambassador. The Senate was supposed to vote on the Whitaker nomination on April 1 anyway. So all Booker’s speech did was delay that confirmation vote by a few hours. But not much.

In October 2013, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, held the floor for more than 21 hours. It was part of Cruz’s quest to defund Obamacare. But despite Cruz’s verbosity (and a recitation of Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Suess), the Senate was already locked in to take a procedural vote around 1 p.m. the next day. Preparations for that vote automatically ended Cruz’s speech. Thus, it truly wasn’t a filibuster either.

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Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, during an oversight hearing in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 17, 2025. (Kent Nishimura/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

So, this brings us to the talking filibuster which actually gums up the Senate gearboxes. A talking filibuster is what most Americans think of when they hear the term “filibuster.” That’s thanks to the iconic scenes with Jimmy Stewart in the Frank Capra classic, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”

Most senators filibuster by forcing the Senate to take two cloture votes — spread out over days — to handle even the simplest of matters. That elongates the process by close to a week. But if advocates of a given bill have the votes to break the filibuster via cloture, the gig is up.

However, what happens if a senator — or a group of senators delay things with long speeches? That can only last for so long. And it could potentially truncate the Senate’s need to take any cloture vote, needing 60 yeas.

Republicans who advocate passage of the SAVE America Act believe they can get around cloture — and thus the need for 60 votes — by making opponents of the legislation talk. And talk. And talk.

And once they’re done talking, the Senate can vote — up or down — on the SAVE Act. Passage requires a simple majority. The Senate never even needs to tangle with 60.

Senate Rule XIX (19) states that “no senator shall speak more than twice upon any one question in debate on the same legislative day.”

Easy enough, right? Two speeches per day. You speak twice on Monday, then you have to wait until Tuesday? Democrats would eventually run out of juice after all 47 senators who caucus with Democrats have their say — twice.

But it’s not that simple. Note the part about two speeches per “question.”

Well, here’s a question. What constitutes a “question” in Senate parlance? A “question” could be the bill itself. It could be an amendment. It could be a motion. And just for the record, the Senate usually cycles through a “first-degree” amendment and then a “second-degree” amendment — to say nothing of the bill itself. So, if you’re scoring at home, that could be six (!) speeches per senator, per day, on any given “question.”

Questions?

But wait. There’s more.

Note that Rule XIX refers to a “legislative day.” A legislative day is not the same as a calendar day. One basic difference is if the Senate “adjourns” each night versus “recessing.” If the Senate “adjourns” its Monday session on calendar day Monday, then a new legislative day begins on Tuesday. However, the legislative day of “Monday” carries over to Tuesday if the Senate “recesses.”

It may be up to Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., whether the Senate “adjourns” or “recesses.” The creation of a new legislative day inhibits the GOP talking filibuster effort.

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., center, arrives for a news conference after a policy luncheon on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026, in Washington. (Mariam Zuhaib/AP Photo)

Democrats would obviously push for the Senate to adjourn each day. But watch to see if talking filibuster proponents object to Thune’s daily adjournment requests. If the Senate votes to stay in session, that forces the legislative day of Monday to bleed over to Tuesday.

Pro tip: Keep an eye on the adjournment vs. recess scenario. If a talking filibuster supporter tries to prevent the Senate from adjourning, that may signal whether the GOP has a shot at eventually passing the SAVE Act. If that test vote fails and the Senate adjourns for the day, the SAVE Act is likely dead in the water.

We haven’t even talked about a custom practiced by most Senate majority leaders to lock down the contours of a bill when they file cloture to end debate.

It’s typical for the presiding officer to recognize the Senate majority leader first on the floor for debate. So Thune and his predecessors often “fill” what’s called the “amendment tree.” The amendment tree dictates how many amendments are in play at any one time. Think of the underlying bill as a “trunk.” A “branch” is for the first amendment. A “sprig” from that branch is the second amendment. Majority leaders often load up the amendment tree with “fillers” that don’t change the subject of the bill. He then files cloture to break the filibuster.

That tactic curbs the universe of amendments. It blocks the other side from engineering controversial amendments to alter the bill. But if Thune doesn’t file cloture to end debate, then the Senate must consider amendment after amendment, repeatedly filling the tree and voting on those amendments. This would unfold during a talking filibuster, not when Thune is controlling the process by filing cloture and “filling the tree.”

This is why Thune is skeptical of a talking filibuster to pass the SAVE Act.

“This process is more complicated and risky than people are assuming at the moment,” said Thune.

In fact, the biggest “benefit” to filing cloture may not even be overcoming a filibuster, but blocking amendments via management of the tree. Republicans are bracing for amendments Democrats may offer.

“If you don’t think Democrats have a laundry list of amendments, talking about who won the 2020 election, talking about the Epstein files — if you don’t think they have a quiver full of these amendments that they’re ready to get Republican votes on the record, then I’ve got a bridge to sell you,” said George Washington University political science professor Casey Burgat.

Plus, forcing a talking filibuster for days precludes the Senate from passing a DHS funding bill. That’s to say nothing of confirming Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., as Homeland Security secretary. His confirmation hearing likely comes next Wednesday, but a protracted Senate debate would block a confirmation vote from the floor.

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Sen. Markwayne Mullin, Republican from Oklahoma, addresses reporters at the U.S. Capitol after being tapped as President Donald Trump’s new nominee to lead DHS, March 5, 2026. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Thune all but killed the talking filibuster maneuver on Tuesday — despite the president’s ultimatum.

“Do you run a risk of being on the wrong side of President Trump and your resistance to do this talking filibuster, tying the Senate in knots for weeks?” asked yours truly.

“We don’t have the votes either to proceed, get on a talking filibuster, nor to sustain one if we got on it,” replied Thune. “I understand the president’s got a passion to see this issue addressed.”

I followed up.

“Does he understand that, though?”

“Well, we’ve conveyed that to him,” answered Thune. “It’s about the math. And, for better or worse, I’m the one who has to be a clear-eyed realist about what we can achieve here.”

And there just doesn’t appear to be any parliamentary way to get there with the talking filibuster.

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Like many things in Congress, it all boils down to one thing.

As Thune said, “it’s about the math.”

Chad Pergram currently serves as Chief Congressional Correspondent for FOX News Channel (FNC). He joined the network in September 2007 and is based out of Washington, D.C.