Crackdown on looting in burnt-out areas as fires continue to burn in LA
Authorities in California have vowed to arrest anybody caught looting in burnt-out neighbourhoods, with one official warning: “We are not screwing around with this.”
Five separate wildfires continue to burn across Los Angeles County, including the Pacific Palisades blaze – which has torn through more than 20,000 acres of land and destroyed an estimated 5,000 structures.
Los Angeles sheriff Robert Luna said a curfew enforced overnight on Thursday would start again at 6pm local time on Friday (2am on Saturday, UK time).
LA fires updates:
Wildfires burn for fourth day killing at least 10
The curfew – which forbids anyone from entering mandatory evacuation areas between 6pm and 6am – was brought in after officers arrested several people for looting in the burned areas. It will be “strictly enforced”, Sheriff Luna added.
“We’re not screwing around with this, we don’t want people taking advantage of our residents that have already been victimised,” he said at a press conference.
The punishment for looting is a $1,000 fine and even potential jail time.
Fire crews battling the Kenneth Fire overnight. Pic: AP
National Guards stand near the structures burned by the Eaton Fire. Pic: Reuters
The National Guard has been deployed to help secure areas affected by the fires. They are helping to manage restriction zone checkpoints and prevent looting.
Pacific Palisades, which has borne the brunt of the destruction, is an exclusive neighbourhood loved by celebrities – many of whom have seen their homes completely burnt out.
Paris Hilton’s house in the nearby Malibu has also been destroyed, along with a number of other beachfront properties.
A staircase is all that’s left partially standing in a Palisades property after fires ripped through the area. Pic: AP
Beachside buildings destroyed by the Palisades fire. Pic: AP
Authorities are cracking down on illegal drone usage in fire traffic areas after a fire-fighting ‘super scooper’ plane was grounded due to being damaged by a drone.
They are continuing to investigate what caused the fires. A suspected arsonist was arrested near the Kenneth fire on Thursday afternoon local time.
The officials’ warning to looters came as 153,000 people remain under evacuation orders. While the fires are still burning, some evacuated residents have been able to make brief trips to their neighbourhoods – where many have discovered their homes reduced to ashes.
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LA residents weep as they return to burned homes
Authorities have also confirmed at least 10 people have been killed.
Among them was Rodney Nickerson, an 82-year-old who decided to stay in his home in Altadena, a suburb north of Los Angeles.
His daughter Kimiko Nickerson told Sky News: “He just didn’t want to evacuate. He’s been living here since 1968, and he’s been in Altadena my whole life.
“Like all of us on this block, in four blocks, he didn’t think it was going to be this devastating.”
Read more:
In pictures: Before and after the blazes
What caused the fires?
Furious woman challenges LA governor
The Palisades blaze – the biggest of the five – is just 8% contained, while the Kenneth fire, which threatens another celebrity-loved neighbourhood, Calabasas, has burnt through 1,000 acres and is 35% contained.
At least 10,000 structures, including thousands of homes, have been destroyed across the region.
It is certainly big – 940 pages long – but on the question of beauty, Congress is divided.
Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” has sparked ugly debate – both for its ambitious scope and for the political manoeuvring that’s gone on around it.
Elon Musk branded it “political suicide” for Republicans and threatened to fund challenges against those who back it in next year’s midterm elections.
But the president hit back, suggesting he would consider cutting Musk’s lucrative government contracts or even deporting him back to South Africa.
The “big, beautiful bill”, or HR 1 to give the proposed legislation its proper title, is Mr Trump’s signature spending and tax policy.
It extends tax cuts he secured in 2017 and bankrolls his second-term agenda in the White House.
File pic: Reuters
Here is a summary of the key points:
• Permanent tax cuts: Extending relief from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
• Small business support: Doubling the small business expensing limit to $2.5m (£1.8m) to help businesses expand and hire staff
• Child tax credit: Expanding the child tax credit and making it permanent, benefiting 40 million families
• Making housing affordable: Expanding the low-income housing tax credit to kickstart construction of affordable homes
• Defence and border security: Allocating $170bn (£123bn) for border security alone, including $46bn (£33bn) for completing the border wall
• Made-in-America incentives: Providing tax breaks and incentives for domestic manufacturing to promote US industry
• Healthcare and social welfare: Implementing restrictions on Medicaid, which provides healthcare for millions of Americans, and reducing funding for certain healthcare and nutrition programmes.
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Clash over ‘monster’ debt bill
Musk, Mr Trump’s former ally and the man who established the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), claimed the bill “raises the debt ceiling by $5trn, the biggest increase in history.”
“DOGE is the monster that might have to go back and eat Elon,” was President Trump’s response.
The national debt currently stands at $37trn (£27trn) and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the bill could add $2.4trn (£1.7trn) to that over the next decade.
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Trump threatens to ‘put DOGE’ on Musk
Bill splits Republican ranks
Republican Senator Thom Tillis voted against the bill and, following criticism from the president, announced he would not seek re-election in North Carolina.
He said he couldn’t support it due to his concerns about the impact cuts to Medicaid would have on people in his state.
Democrats in the Senate forced a full reading of all 940 pages and then a vote-a-rama, a series of marathon voting sessions.
Read more from Sky News:
Elon’s dad on the Musk-Trump bust-up
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Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
In the House of Representatives, it passed by a single vote, 215-214. In the Senate, Vice President JD Vance, had to cast the deciding vote to break a tie (50-50).
Legislatively, the progress of the bill has been a case study in the complexities of American law-making.
Strategically, it represents a mammoth effort to consolidate the president’s policy agenda and secure his legacy.
In the long Gaza war, this is a significant moment.
For the people of Gaza, for the Israeli hostages and their families – this could be the moment it ends. But we have been here before, so many times.
The key question – will Hamas accept what Israel has agreed to: a 60-day ceasefire?
At the weekend, a source at the heart of the negotiations told me: “Both Hamas and Israel are refusing to budge from their position – Hamas wants the ceasefire to last until a permanent agreement is reached.
“Israel is opposed to this. At this point, only President Trump can break this deadlock.”
The source added: “Unless Trump pushes, we are in a stalemate.”
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Will Trump achieve a Gaza ceasefire?
The problem is that the announcement made now by Donald Trump – which is his social-media-summarised version of whatever Israel has actually agreed to – may just amount to Israel’s already-established position.
We don’t know the details and conditions attached to Israel’s proposals.
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Would Israeli troops withdraw from Gaza? Totally? Or partially? How many Palestinian prisoners would they agree to release from Israel’s jails? And why only 60 days? Why not a total ceasefire? What are they asking of Hamas in return?
We just don’t know the answers to any of these questions, except one.
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Dozens killed at beachfront cafe in Gaza
We do know why Israel wants a 60-day ceasefire, not a permanent one. It’s all about domestic politics.
If Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were to agree now to a permanent ceasefire, the extreme right-wingers in his coalition would collapse his government.
Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich have both been clear about their desire for the war to continue. They hold the balance of power in Mr Netanyahu’s coalition.
Read more:
British-Israeli soldier killed in Gaza
‘Almost 60 killed in Israeli strikes’
If Mr Netanyahu instead agrees to just 60 days – which domestically he can sell as just a pause – then that may placate the extreme right-wingers for a few weeks until the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, is adjourned for the summer.
It is also no coincidence that the US president has called for Mr Netanyahu’s corruption trial to be scrapped.
Without the prospect of jail, Mr Netanyahu might be more willing to quit the war, safe in the knowledge that focus will not shift immediately to his own political and legal vulnerability.
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