A Democratic member of Congress has offered a new conspiracy theory concerning the wildfires around Los Angeles.
During a Tuesday interview, Democratic Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove of California suggested race might have been a factor, according to Fox News.
“We need to find out the facts — a full-scale investigation on what went wrong. I and the CBC, the Congressional Black Caucus, for example, are curious about who decided to sacrifice Altadena, a historically Black community in the L.A. County area,” she said.
The allegation led CNN’s Sara Sidner to raise a question.
“Congresswoman, did you just say ‘sacrifice Altadena’? I mean, are you suggesting that this was done somehow on purpose to hurt Altadena? There are a lot of conspiracies out there,” she said.
Kamlager-Dove said she did not mean to imply an arsonist targeted the community. She did, however, call out insurance companies.
“There is no reason why only 2/5 of the folks who had their houses burned down were insured, and why companies are leaving California in droves, as well as other disaster-prone states,” she said.
In May 2023, State Farm said it would no longer accept new applications for homeowners insurance in California
“State Farm General Insurance Company made this decision due to historic increases in construction costs outpacing inflation, rapidly growing catastrophe exposure, and a challenging reinsurance market,” it said in a May 2023 release on its website
CNN noted at the time that over the past five years leading up to State Farm’s announcement, California had had an average of more than 7,000 wildfires a year, burning an average of more than 2 million acres.
State Farm was not the first company to decide California was not the place to be. In 2022, American International Group said it was getting out of the California home insurance market, according to NPR.
Los Angeles fire insurance expert Richard Giller said the state government contributed to insurers’ decision to leave the state, according to Fox News.
“So the insurance companies tried to seek approval for rate increases and the California Department of Insurance and the insurance commissioner decided, you know, they didn’t want homeowners to pay more money … It all came to a head with seven of the 12 largest insurance companies pulling out of the state,” he said.
During her Tuesday interview, Kamlager-Dove said there must have been a nefarious intent behind decisions residents have complained about.
“But what we do know is that power was shut off in Altadena. What we do know is that residents were not given adequate time to leave their homes,” she said.
Sidner said power was cut to limit the spread of the fires.
Kamlager-Dove said that when rebuilding begins, it should be seen through an “equity lens.”
One seriously has to consider the IQ level of some members of congress???????
If she is into conspiracy theories, how about this one? One article suggested the the fire was ignited by a foreign national who had entered the country illegally. What was not clear is if it was started by accident, through carelessness, or a deliberate attack? Anyway, this woman doesn’t seem to be dealing from a full deck.
This woman is unspeakably dumb, and whoever voted for her must be as dumb as she is. She has no comprehension of anything but trying to make a race case out of anything and everything. How very very sad.