Mayor Says She’s Investigating Her Own Trip Abroad While Wildfires Destroyed Her City

Democratic Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said that her trip abroad during the ravaging wildfires is under investigation by her own office.

Bass traveled to Ghana to attend the inauguration of Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama as devastating flames and high winds burned over 57,000 acres of land throughout her own city, according to city data. After the embattled mayor said very little regarding her overseas trip, she told Fox 11’s Elex Michaelson in an interview aired Tuesday that she would never have made the trip to Africa if she had been made well aware of the wildfires’ severity.

“First of all, when the White House called and asked me if I would represent , I said yes, it was a very, very short trip over a weekend and two business days,” Bass said. “We need to look at everything about the preparation and all of that for the fires because I think when we evaluate that, we will find that although there were warnings that I frankly wasn’t aware of, I think our preparation wasn’t what it typically is … That type of preparation didn’t happen. If it had, I will tell you, Elex, I wouldn’t have even gone to San Diego, let alone leave the country.”

The mayor said she is unsure why she had not properly prepared for the fires and assured that internal and external investigations are taking place into every aspect of local officials’ responses to the wildfires.

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“I don’t know, I mean, I think that’s one of the things we need to look at,” Bass said. “So two, investigations are taking place. One internal to the city and that’s the fire commission because that’s mandated by the city charter. So the commission will hire an outside entity to examine everything, the pre-deployment, why were fire fighters sent home, all of that that should have taken place that didn’t and also has contracted with the Fire Safety Research Institute which is a national institute that investigated what happened with the fires in Maui. So everything that happened, including that, needs to be examined.”