Calls continue to grow for the resignation of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass as photos surfaced online showing her living it up at a cocktail party in Ghana as warnings of the "fast-moving" Palisades wildfire had already been issued.
The photos, first discovered by the Los Angeles Times, were posted by Marissa Bowman, a city staffer. They show Bass posing for photos at the party, which the newspaper was able to timestamp via one image in which another partygoer's watch was visible.
The Times reports that Bass was still in attendance at the cocktail party even as the city’s emergency management department warned on X about "a fast-moving brush fire situation in the Palisades Hills area” and "thick smoke was visible from across the city."
Bowman appears to have scrubbed the cocktail party reception photos that were posted to her LinkedIn page, though a handful can still be accessed via an internet archive, including one with Bass posing beside her on a settee.
Karen Bass was at a cocktail party while the Palisades burned. https://t.co/xjk1BcncKd pic.twitter.com/qgeulSklac
— Eric Spiegelman (@ericspiegelman) January 15, 2025
Other images of the cocktail party were posted on Instagram by Ghanaian emcee Nathaniel Attoh. They show Attoh posing with a beaming Bass and providing a video demonstrating the atmosphere at the ritzy gathering as he speaks with U.S. Ambassador to Ghana Virginia E. Palmer.
Attoh captioned his Instagram post revealing the "post-Presidential Inauguration Cocktail for the delegation" was "sent by President [Joe Biden]."
He notes that "the delegation was led by Madam [Karen Bass], the Mayor of Los Angeles, the second largest city in the United States."
Bass, who is in her first term as mayor, was initially ripped by critics for being absent during the crisis and then returning from the trip to Ghana using a military plane. It remains unclear why the mayor of an American city was visiting Ghana for the African nation’s presidential inauguration, though she campaigned on a promise not to go abroad during her mayoralty.
Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl would like Angelenos to rest assured that while the photos show Bass living it up at a cocktail party, they are but snapshots of moments in time when, in his reality, the Mayor was working feverishly for the people.
“For the majority of the time, the mayor was in a different room on calls from L.A.," Seidl claimed without evidence.
If that were true, there would no doubt be photos of her hard at work to help LA residents in need, and they assuredly would have been already published.
Over 100k People Slap Karen Bass With Petition to Resign As Even a Kardashian Rips Her As a ‘Joke’
Bass's cocktail party images come as an old tweet has cropped up showing her criticizing Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) for not being in town during a crisis.
“Ted Cruz fleeing Texas in the middle of a deadly crisis is part of a larger pattern of the GOP abandoning folks in crisis,” Bass wrote at the time.
“We need to build a movement to kick them all out.”
Bass fled Los Angeles in the middle of a deadly crisis. Her departure for Ghana on January 4th came as the National Weather Service had issued extreme wind warnings. She did not touch down back in the city she presides over until more than 24 hours after the fires ignited.
Still, Bass has no regrets. When confronted by CBS News reporter Jonathan Vigliotti over the optics or timing of her trip to Ghana, Bass simply smiled and pivoted.
Earlier today, Karen Bass refuses to say she regrets trip to Ghana, then walks away from CBS News reporter -- the arrogance is real.pic.twitter.com/WqtvEn33xx
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) January 15, 2025
“Looking back, would you have taken that trip overseas?” Vigliotti inquired.
"You know, I am gonna focus today on what we ...” she replied.
When the reporter pressed her further on any regrets, she exclaimed, "No!" and walked away.
A petition calling on the Los Angeles mayor to resign over her handling of the Palisades Fire disasters has been exploding online, now garnering over 140,000 signatures.
“We, the undersigned residents of Los Angeles and concerned citizens, urgently call for the immediate recall of Mayor Karen Bass due to her gross mismanagement and failure to effectively respond to the devastating 2025 fires in and around the city of Los Angeles,” the petition reads.
“The people of Los Angeles deserve a leader who is present, accountable, and actively working to protect and serve our community,” it concludes. “Mayor Bass’s actions—or lack thereof—have shown she is unfit for the office she holds.”
The Los Angeles wildfires, including the Palisades and Eaton fires, have resulted in at least 25 deaths and have scorched over 40,000 acres across the region. These fires have devastated communities, destroying thousands of structures and forcing tens of thousands of residents to evacuate.
They're not out of trouble yet, either. The New York Times indicates that "a new round of fierce winds could blow through the area again" while some of the largest wildfires "are far from fully contained."
In a sane world, Karen Bass would have already tendered her resignation.
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