They are hurting but managing to find hope in ‘tomorrow’ – the residents who have lost everything in the LA fires
They are the displaced and there are tens of thousands of them, 600 in an evacuation centre we visited.
From elderly people who fled without their medication, to pregnant mothers desperate to escape the smoke, they had nowhere else to go.
Jim Mayfield, who has lived in the northern suburb of Altadena for 50 years, wept as he told me his dogs, Monkey and Coca, were all he had left.
He said: “The fire was coming down, a ball of fire, it hadn’t made it to my house, but then I woke up and I seen it so I had to start evacuating.
“I had to grab my dogs, I didn’t have enough water and my house is burned down to the ground.”
Thousands of buildings have been burned to the ground since the fires in Los Angeles started
Sheila Kraetzel, another elderly resident, relived the sense of terror as homes were engulfed by the flames.
She said: “I smelt smoke, I was sleeping, and my dog alerted me that there was trouble.
“When I looked outside, there were embers floating across my yard.
“My whole neighbourhood is gone.”
“It was a beautiful, unique place,” she added, smiling.
Firefighters have been working around the clock to contain the wind-driven fires
Asked how she could smile, she fought back tears and replied: “Well, there’s tomorrow you know.”
How anyone could find hope amid the destruction we have witnessed here is beyond me.
Read more:
Scale of ‘most destructive’ blazes in modern US history
In pictures: Before and after the blazes
What caused the fires?
There are people handing out food and water, medical staff doing what they can. Volunteers have rallied from far and near.
One of them, Stephanie Porter, told me it felt “heavy” inside the centre.
“You walk through and see the despair on people’s faces, not knowing what their next step is, not knowing if their house is still standing,” she said.
“I had to take a few moments… and kind of cry, and then you go back to serve.
“It just breaks your heart.”
Three miles up the road, Altadena resembles a war zone, but residents have not been allowed to return.
When they finally do, they’ll discover there’s nothing left of the material lives they left behind.
Anti-Trump protests took place across America on Saturday, with demonstrators decrying the administration’s immigration crackdown and mass firings at government agencies.
Events ranged from small local marches to a rally in front of the White House and a demonstration at a Massachusetts commemoration of the start of the Revolutionary War 250 years ago.
Thomas Bassford, 80, was at the battle reenactment with his two grandsons, as well as his partner and daughter.
He said: “This is a very perilous time in America for liberty. I wanted the boys to learn about the origins of this country and that sometimes we have to fight for freedom.”
At events across the country, people carried banners with slogans including “Trump fascist regime must go now!”, “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state,” and “Fight fiercely, Harvard, fight,” referencing the university’s recent refusal to hand over much of its control to the government.
Some signs name-checked Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadorian citizen living in Maryland, who the Justice Department admits was mistakenly deported to his home country.
Read more: Donald Trump’s deportations explained
Pic: AP
People waved US flags, some of them held upside down to signal distress. In San Francisco, hundreds of people spelt out “Impeach & Remove” on a beach, also with an inverted US flag.
People walked through downtown Anchorage in Alaska with handmade signs listing reasons why they were demonstrating, including one that read: “No sign is BIG enough to list ALL of the reasons I’m here!”
Pic: AP
Protests also took place outside Tesla car dealerships against the role Elon Musk ahas played in downsizing the federal government as de facto head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The protests come just two weeks after similar nationwide demonstrations.
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Organisers are opposing what they call Mr Trump’s civil rights violations and constitutional violations, including efforts to deport scores of immigrants and to scale back the federal government by firing thousands of government workers and effectively shuttering entire agencies.
The Trump administration, among other things, has moved to shutter Social Security Administration field offices, cut funding for government health programs and scale back protections for transgender people.
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