Good morning. It’s Wednesday, Sept. 11.
- Homes burn as wildfire rages in Angeles National Forest.
- Kamala Harris baits Donald Trump in fierce debate.
- And a video explainer on the “Valley Girl ‘mmm.’”
California on fire
1.
A wildfire in the Angeles National Forest took a dangerous turn Tuesday as it surged from 6 square miles to more than 53 square miles in a matter of hours, sweeping through a ski resort and burning into the mountain community of Wrightwood. Several homes were destroyed, but numbers were uncertain, reports said. “It was really bad,” Brittney Ladd said after fleeing her Wrightwood home. “It definitely looked like the town was going to burn down.” Press-Enterprise | L.A. Times
- At least four wildfires were burning in the mountains surrounding Los Angeles on Tuesday. Here’s where they stand. 👉 L.A. Times | Cal Fire
2.
Southern California’s wildfires, in photos and video:
- Homes burned in the Wrightwood area.
- Fire tore through the Mountain High ski resort.
- Flames engulfed a weather station in the Santa Ana Mountains.
- Apocalyptic smoke curled over Lake Elsinore.
- Satellite imagery showed fires burning out of control.
3.
When Lauri Hutchinson, a fire-safety coordinator, shared information on Facebook about a wildfire racing through her Northern California community of Clearlake on Sunday, she was surprised to see the post disappear. Facebook had deleted it. The explanation: “you tried to get likes, follows, shares or video views in a misleading way.” An analysis found more than 40 similar instances of Facebook removing emergency-related posts. When a reporter asked why, the company said it was not aware of the problem. Washington Post
Statewide
4.
A few takeaways from the first and only scheduled debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump in Philadelphia on Tuesday:
- During a 10-minute exchange on abortion, Harris conjured images of women being denied the procedure since Roe v. Wade fell. “The government and Donald Trump, certainly, should not be telling a woman what to do with her body,” she said. Trump responded by distancing himself from red-state policies while falsely arguing that Democrats support allowing the murder of babies after birth. Washington Post | N.Y. Times
- Trump repeated an outlandish internet theory about Haitian immigrants in Ohio. “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. … They’re eating the cats,” he said. When moderator David Muir noted that there’s been no evidence of that, Trump said he’d learned it from “people on television.” Harris laughed. N.Y. Times | A.P.
- After the debate, Trump told reporters it was “the best debate I’ve ever had.” But even many conservative commentators said Harris got the best of the former president. Fox News host Brit Hume said, “Make no mistake about it, Trump had a bad night.” Guy Benson, an editor at Townhall.com, said he was “poorly prepared,” “unfocused,” and “took a lot of bait.” Elon Musk said Harris “exceeded most people’s expectations.” N.Y. Times | Politico
5.
Less than two weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom called a special session for state lawmakers to pass legislation aimed at Big Oil, the governors of Arizona and Nevada on Tuesday publicly urged him to abandon the proposal, saying it would raise gas prices in their states. That a Democrat, Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, objected to the proposal, which would require oil refiners to store more gasoline, posed a political problem for Newsom, who has portrayed industry opposition as an effort to protect profits. Politico | KCRA
Northern California
6.
Janet Kessler, a self-taught naturalist, has amassed a following of fans with her gorgeous photos and video of San Francisco’s urban coyotes. But the city’s animal control and parks agencies are not among them. They have accused her of going too far in her coyote advocacy, spreading unvetted information and posting her own signs in public parks. Animal control keeps a file that it calls “Janet Kessler’s misbehavior.” S.F. Chronicle
- See Kessler’s work on her website, Coyote Yipps.
7.
UC Berkeley announced that it would offer one of the nation’s few Palestinian and Arab Studies programs, months after pro-Palestinian protests roiled the campus. University officials said the new offering is unrelated to protests. Ussama Makdisi, the inaugural chair, said the initiative represented a “beautiful and brilliant initiative to finally frame the Palestinians as a people with a history … rather than reduce them to shadowy people who came out of the blue to disrupt our serenity.” L.A. Times | Mercury News
Southern California
8.
An Anaheim woman who was arrested after police said they found her intoxicated and passed out alongside the body of her 3-year-old daughter inside a hot car last Friday had campaigned for tougher DUI laws years earlier after her two sons were killed by a drunk driver. Prosecutors charged Sandra Hernandez-Cazares, 42, on Monday with child abuse and involuntary manslaughter. Temperatures on Friday reached 104 degrees. Police said the girl, Ily Ruiz, appeared to have died from heatstroke. NBC News | KCAL
- “I need help.” Ruiz’s father posted a distraught video on Facebook.
9.
A reckless driver caused a horrific crash that left six people dead in Riverside County on Monday, the authorities said. Patrol Sgt. Adrian Horta said a motorist had tried to pass on the right shoulder of a two-lane road in the community of Lakeview, then hit a guard rail and swerved into traffic. Fire officials said they arrived to find several vehicles in flames. KTLA | KABC
10.
When the federal government doled out pandemic aid in 2020, Orange County divided its relief windfall among its five supervisors to dole out as they saw fit. Some distributed grocery cards to low-income constituents; others funded projects including a skate park and library. Supervisor Andrew Do gave nearly all of his allocation to the newly incorporated Viet America Society, headed by his daughter, then a 22-year-old law student. She and others are now accused of pocketing millions. The New York Times dug into the scandal engulfing one of the country’s most influential Vietnamese American politicians.
- On Tuesday, Orange County supervisors voted to strip Do of his committee assignments. He was not present. LAist | Voice of OC
11.
Hundreds of Joshua Trees appeared to have been destroyed over the last week to make way for a 2,300-acre solar farm in the Mojave Desert 80 miles east of Bakersfield. While the clear-cutting of a protected species had the blessing of state wildlife officials, outraged residents of nearby communities organized a protest for Saturday. An online petition calling for a halt to the project, known as Aratina, collected more than 50,000 signatures. L.A. Times
12.
Adam Aleksic, a Harvard-educated etymologist with a large social media following, shared a fun video explainer on what he called the “Valley Girl ‘mmm.'” At some point, young women in the subcultural group associated with the San Fernando Valley began adding a small nasal sound to the end of their sentences. According to Aleksic, it’s a novel example of a “non-lexical conversational sound” that helps maintain conversational flow by signaling the end of what you have to say. Watch until the end for Aleksic’s spot-on demonstration. 👉 @etymologynerd
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