Malibu Burns: Is Your City Next?

Malibu Burns: Is Your City Next?

Malibu Burns: Is Your City Next?

By Mark Tepper

The smoke still hangs heavy over Malibu, a haze blurring the storied Pacific Coast Highway as it winds along the charred remains of multimillion-dollar homes. The once-pristine coastline is now blackened. But the truth? This disaster was tragically predictable.

The new year had barely begun when Los Angeles’s Westside learned what so many throughout LA county already knew—complacency kills. In January 2025, with holiday decorations just put away and resolutions still fresh, a treasured American paradise vanished in smoke.

For years, LA’s coastal elites had watched crises unfold from the comfort of their protected enclaves. They hadn’t blinked when looters had carried out smash-and-grab raids on LA’s urban centers during the 2020 riots. They hadn’t flinched when downtown LA had been ravaged by mass unrest. And when the Black Future Project had set up an anti-police encampment outside City Hall, they still had looked away. Their paradise remained untouched. Police continued patrolling their streets. Fire crews always arrived on time. Neighbors supported each other.

Living in Malibu and the Pacific Palisades bred complacency. Tucked away from the chaos, they didn’t worry about whether government could perform its most basic duties—like ensuring fire hydrants worked or clearing brush so fires wouldn’t consume entire neighborhoods. Instead, they focused on abstractions. They cast their votes for leaders who told them what they wanted to hear: that social justice means progress, even without accountability, and activism was the same as governance.

In the 2024 election, they overwhelmingly backed Kamala Harris, who had publicly endorsed the Minnesota Freedom Fund (MFF) in 2020—a group that helped release violent offenders like Shawn Michael Tillman, who was freed with MFF donations and later murdered a man in cold blood. They cheered for slogans about “upending the system” and applauded net-zero climate goals, even as those same policies blocked essential fire-prevention measures.

While they were busy championing reforms that made them feel virtuous from their glass-walled living rooms—donating to bail funds and trendy activism campaigns—they ignored the real-world consequences. They never asked whether their leaders could handle the basics: fire prevention, functioning emergency infrastructure, or adequately staffed fire departments. Meanwhile, their paradise was quietly turning into a tinderbox.

Well, congratulations. Their homes just went up in flames.

Wildfires don’t care about political ideology or how exclusive your zip code is. And now, the people who thought they were immune from disaster have learned the hard way that bad governance spares no one.

While LA’s elites grabbed $20 smoothies at Erewhon and talked about sustainability and DEI, the policies they backed resulted in crushing less privileged Angelenos—their local businesses shuttered, crime overran their neighborhoods, and rising costs and failing public services drove the families out.

But not everyone in Pacific Palisades and Malibu was living in a glass mansion, sipping green juice. Some were middle-class Americans, families who scrimped and saved to provide a better future for their children. And in a single fiery disaster, they lost it all. For them, complacency and bad governance weren’t just inconveniences—they watched their livelihoods vanish in plumes of smoke and ash.

This isn’t just a California crisis. It’s a warning for every community that believes it’s above the fray. The elites in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Portland, and Philadelphia vote for equity and progress while the foundations beneath them crumble.

History has a way of humbling those who believe they’re untouchable. Whether by war, disaster, or negligence, complacency always ends the same way—with devastation.

The lesson is simple: your wealth, your views, your ESG score, and your virtue signaling won’t save you from failed leadership. Safety isn’t a given—it’s something that must be fought for, demanded, and maintained.

If LA’s coastal residents want to rebuild their paradise, they’d better demand leaders who know how to protect it—not just preach about it. And voters across the country should take note. Your neighborhood could be next.