California
California fires live: 16 deaths confirmed as flames threaten UCLA campus and worsening winds predicted
LA fires death toll rises to 16 as new evacuation orders are issued
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Los Angeles wildfires that have destroyed 12,000 structures and killed 16 people.
Five of the deaths were attributed to the Palisades fire and 11 resulted from the Eaton fire, the coroner’s office said on Saturday evening.
The Los Angeles county sheriff, Robert Luna, said the death toll is expected to rise as authorities deploy search dogs to devastated areas. The sheriff also said 13 people are reported missing.
County supervisor Lindsey Horvath said the LA area “had another night of unimaginable terror and heartbreak, and even more Angelenos evacuated due to the north-east expansion of the Palisades fire”.
The CalFire operations chief, Christian Litz, said the main focus on Saturday would be the Palisades fire burning in the canyon area, not far from the UCLA campus and the J Paul Getty Museum. Over the past 24 hours, the Palisades fire spread over an additional 1,000 acres (400 hectares), consuming more homes.
A fierce battle against the flames was under way in Mandeville Canyon, home to Arnold Schwarzenegger and other celebrities not far from the Pacific coast, where swooping helicopters dumped water as the blaze charged downhill.
The National Weather Service warned of worsening Santa Ana winds that it predicted would pick up on Saturday night into Sunday morning in Los Angeles and Ventura counties, and again on late Monday through Tuesday morning, bringing sustained winds of up to 30mph and wind gusts up to 70mph.
The fire also was threatening to jump over Interstate 405 and into densely populated areas in the Hollywood Hills and San Fernando Valley.
In other developments:
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In response to criticism over water supply issues, the LA Department of Public Works released a statement “correcting misinformation” about the lack of water to fight the Palisades fire this week. The statement was released one day after the chief of the LA fire department, Kristin Crowley, told Fox LA that her firefighters had been hamstrung when hydrants ran dry in certain parts of the Palisades on Wednesday morning.
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Malibu has lost one-third of the eastern edge of the city, mayor Doug Stewart said yesterday evening. He said that Malibu, a community of about 10,000 people on the western edge of Los Angeles, has suffered three fires in three months, with the Palisades fire, which threatens to spread west of interstate 405, being the worst.
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Firefighters deployed from Mexico arrived in Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon. Canadian and Texan firefighters are also on their way to California.
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California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, has doubled the deployment of the state’s national guard to Los Angeles amid the wildfires.
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Newsom has also launched a website aimed at addressing misinformation about the Los Angeles area wildfires. CaliforniaFireFacts.com, a branch of Newsom’s own website, includes information about water availability, forest land management and LA’s fire department budget.
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The Southern California Edison CEO, Steven Powell, has told reporters there are now about 50,000 customers without power, “down from over half a million just a couple days ago”. Powell said there was no evidence that any of Edison’s equipment caused the Hurst fire but that the investigation was continuing.
Key events
Price gouging preventing displaced Californians from finding new places to live
California attorney general Rob Bonta has warned that it is illegal to engage in price gouging, looting or scamming of any kind and those who do in response to the fires will be held accountable by the law.
“We’ve seen businesses and landlords … jack up the price,” he told journalists at a press conference yesterday. “It’s called price gouging. It is illegal. You cannot do it. It is a crime punishable by up to a year in jail and fines.”
Prices should only be increasing 10% or less from before the fire, Bonta was quoted as having said. He said that “this is California law and it’s in place to protect those suffering from a tragedy”.
The comments come amid reports of California residents who have lost their homes to the fire struggling to find new places to live due to price gouging – where companies or an individual excessively raise prices during emergencies.
“We put in an application at a house … that was listed at $17,000 a month, and they told us if we didn’t pay $30,000, we weren’t going to get it. They told me they have people ready to offer more and pay cash. It’s absolutely insane,” Maya Lieberman, a 50-year-old stylist, who is unable to find anywhere to live, told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency.
Here are some of the latest images being sent to us over the newswires from California:
A preliminary estimate by AccuWeather put the damage and economic losses so far of the LA fires – that have already destroyed at least 12,000 structures – at between $135bn (£111bn) and $150bn (£123bn).
LA fires death toll rises to 16 as new evacuation orders are issued
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Los Angeles wildfires that have destroyed 12,000 structures and killed 16 people.
Five of the deaths were attributed to the Palisades fire and 11 resulted from the Eaton fire, the coroner’s office said on Saturday evening.
The Los Angeles county sheriff, Robert Luna, said the death toll is expected to rise as authorities deploy search dogs to devastated areas. The sheriff also said 13 people are reported missing.
County supervisor Lindsey Horvath said the LA area “had another night of unimaginable terror and heartbreak, and even more Angelenos evacuated due to the north-east expansion of the Palisades fire”.
The CalFire operations chief, Christian Litz, said the main focus on Saturday would be the Palisades fire burning in the canyon area, not far from the UCLA campus and the J Paul Getty Museum. Over the past 24 hours, the Palisades fire spread over an additional 1,000 acres (400 hectares), consuming more homes.
A fierce battle against the flames was under way in Mandeville Canyon, home to Arnold Schwarzenegger and other celebrities not far from the Pacific coast, where swooping helicopters dumped water as the blaze charged downhill.
The National Weather Service warned of worsening Santa Ana winds that it predicted would pick up on Saturday night into Sunday morning in Los Angeles and Ventura counties, and again on late Monday through Tuesday morning, bringing sustained winds of up to 30mph and wind gusts up to 70mph.
The fire also was threatening to jump over Interstate 405 and into densely populated areas in the Hollywood Hills and San Fernando Valley.
In other developments:
-
In response to criticism over water supply issues, the LA Department of Public Works released a statement “correcting misinformation” about the lack of water to fight the Palisades fire this week. The statement was released one day after the chief of the LA fire department, Kristin Crowley, told Fox LA that her firefighters had been hamstrung when hydrants ran dry in certain parts of the Palisades on Wednesday morning.
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Malibu has lost one-third of the eastern edge of the city, mayor Doug Stewart said yesterday evening. He said that Malibu, a community of about 10,000 people on the western edge of Los Angeles, has suffered three fires in three months, with the Palisades fire, which threatens to spread west of interstate 405, being the worst.
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Firefighters deployed from Mexico arrived in Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon. Canadian and Texan firefighters are also on their way to California.
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California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, has doubled the deployment of the state’s national guard to Los Angeles amid the wildfires.
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Newsom has also launched a website aimed at addressing misinformation about the Los Angeles area wildfires. CaliforniaFireFacts.com, a branch of Newsom’s own website, includes information about water availability, forest land management and LA’s fire department budget.
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The Southern California Edison CEO, Steven Powell, has told reporters there are now about 50,000 customers without power, “down from over half a million just a couple days ago”. Powell said there was no evidence that any of Edison’s equipment caused the Hurst fire but that the investigation was continuing.
California
Republican governor candidate Chad Bianco says he’s the ‘antithesis to California state government’
We are counting down to the California governor’s race. Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County, is one of the two biggest names running on the Republican ticket.
In a one-on-one interview with Eyewitness News political reporter Josh Haskell, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said, “I am the antithesis to California state government because I am going to take a nuclear bomb into that building and absolutely destroy everything that they do to us behind closed doors.”
Although he’s been elected by the voters twice, Bianco says he’s not a politician — which is why he believes his campaign for California governor is resonating, as reflected in the polls.
“President Trump, in one year, from 2025 when he took over, until now, did absolutely nothing to harm California. What’s harming California is 30 years of Democrat one-party rule that have created an environment here that no one can live in anymore. They’ve only been successful here in California because we vote D no matter what. You vote D or die. I mean, that’s it. Charles Manson would be elected in California if he was the only Democrat on the ballot,” Bianco said.
Bianco isn’t the only conservative Republican running for governor, and according to polling, he’s neck-and-neck with former Fox News host Steve Hilton.
SEE ALSO: CA governor candidate Steve Hilton says ‘everybody supports’ Trump’s immigration policies
Leading in some polls in the wide-open California Governor’s race as the June primary creeps closer is Republican and former Fox News host Steve Hilton.
“Steve has no chance of winning in November. The Democrats know that I’m going to win in November, and so they have to do everything they can to keep me out of that,” Bianco said.
When asked about the affordability crisis in the state, Bianco said, “Almost the entire issue of affordability in California is because of regulation, excessive regulation imposed by government. Every single regulation can be signed away with the governor’s signature.”
“It is a drug and alcohol addiction problem that, and a mental health problem,” he said about the homelessness crisis. “Every single bit of money that is going to these nonprofits that say ‘homeless,’ zero money. You’re getting absolutely nothing. I can’t tell you that we would end what we see in the homeless situation within a year, but I guarantee you we would never see it again after two years.”
When challenged on that prediction, pointing to how the state doesn’t have the facilities to treat the number of people living on our streets, Bianco responded, “We have been conditioned to believe that buildings take five years to build. It takes 90 days or less to build a house, but in California, it takes three to five years because the government won’t allow it. The regulations that are destroying this state are going to be removed with me as the governor.”
Bianco also said California jails shouldn’t have to play the role of treatment facilities.
Although he says he supports the Trump administration and wants the president’s endorsement, Bianco has been traveling the state — meeting not just with Republicans, but Democrats and independents as well. He says all of our state government officials have failed.
The primary election is June 2.
No clear front-runner in race for California governor, new poll shows
A new poll shows there’s still no clear front-runner in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Copyright © 2026 KABC Television, LLC. All rights reserved.
California
PlayOn Sports fined $1.1 million by California watchdog over student data violations
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (FOX26) — California’s privacy watchdog has ordered PlayOn Sports to pay a $1.10 million fine and change how it handles consumer data after finding the company’s practices violated state law in ways that affected students and schools in the state.
The California Privacy Protection Agency Board issued the decision following a settlement reached by CalPrivacy’s Enforcement Division.
The decision is the first by the board to address privacy violations involving students and California schools.
Schools across the country use PlayOn Sports’ GoFan platform to sell digital tickets to high school sporting events, theater performances, and homecoming and prom dances, with attendees presenting tickets at the door on their mobile phones.
Schools also use PlayOn Sports’ platforms for other sports-related activities, including attending games, streaming them online, and looking up statistics about teams and players.
In California, about 1,400 schools contract with PlayOn Sports for these services.
[RELATED] X faces possible fines as EU probes Grok nonconsensual, sexualized deepfakes
GoFan is also the official ticketing platform for the California Interscholastic Federation, the governing body for high school sports.
According to the board’s decision, PlayOn Sports used tracking technologies to collect personal information and deliver targeted advertisements to ticketholders and others using its services.
The company allegedly required Californians to click “agree” to tracking technologies before they could use their tickets or view PlayOn Sports websites, without providing a sufficient opt-out option.
“Students trying to go to prom or a high school football game shouldn’t have to leave their privacy rights at the door,” said Michael Macko, CalPrivacy’s head of enforcement. “You couldn’t attend these events without showing your ticket, and you couldn’t show your ticket without being tracked for advertising. California’s privacy law does not work that way. Businesses must ensure they offer lawful ways for Californians to opt-out, particularly with captive audiences.”
The decision also describes students as a uniquely vulnerable population and warns that targeted advertising systems can subject students to profiling that can follow them for years, expose them to manipulative or harmful content, and develop sensitive inferences about their lives.
Instead of providing its own opt-out method, PlayOn Sports directed students and other users to opt out through the Network Advertising Initiative and the Digital Advertising Alliance, which the decision said violated the company’s responsibility to provide its own way for consumers to opt out. The company also allegedly failed to recognize opt-out preference signals and did not provide Californians with sufficient notice of its privacy practices.
“We are committed to making it as easy as possible for all Californians — from high school students to older adults, and everyone in between — to make the choice of whether they want to be tracked or not,” said Tom Kemp, CalPrivacy’s executive director. “Californians can opt-out with covered businesses, and they can sign up for the newly launched DROP system to request that data brokers delete their personal information.”
Beyond the $1.10 million fine, the board’s order requires PlayOn Sports to conduct risk assessments, provide disclosures that are easy to read and understand, and implement proper opt-out methods.
The order also requires the company to comply with California’s privacy law prohibiting the selling or sharing of personal information of consumers between 13 and 16 without their affirmative opt-in consent.
California
California bill to bar police from taking second job with ICE advances in state Assembly
Wednesday, March 4, 2026 4:43AM
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (KABC) — A bill that would prevent police officers from moonlighting with federal immigration enforcement agencies, such as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is advancing through the California State Assembly.
AB 1537 passed the State Assembly’s committee on public safety on Tuesday.
The bill also requires that officers report any offers for secondary employment related to immigration enforcement to their place of work.
Those failing to comply could face decertification as a peace officer in California.
The bill was introduced by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan, whose district includes Mar Vista, Ladera Heights, Mid-Wilshire and parts of South Los Angeles.
Copyright © 2026 KABC Television, LLC. All rights reserved.
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