Many liberal Californians, including Hollywood elites, are turning on Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass after she stayed in Ghana instead of immediately heading home once wildfires destroyed the Palisades. But should the people of Los Angeles be surprised? Glenn reviews Mayor Bass’ radical history, as laid out in a short documentary by Errol Weber. She visited Cuba multiple times during the reign of Fidel Castro as part of the Venceremos Brigade, a Marxist training program that taught insurgency and guerilla warfare. She praised Castro, even when he died. And her government has defunded firefighters to fund NGOs. Once again, Glenn says, who you vote for matters.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: I want to take you back to November 7th 1983. Ronald Reagan is in office.

Do you know the date, November 7th, 1983?

It a night that echoes in the halls of American history.

It is the date that a radical group, known as M19, bombed the north wing of the United States capital.

They bombed it. It went off.

You don't know that date, November 7th, 1983.

I mean, isn't that the day that democracy almost died?

It was worse than the -- worst than the Civil War. Oh, no.

Sorry, that was January 6th, which all of us know, January 6th.

Why not November 7th, 1983. Now, the group that did it, M19, claimed they were fighting imperialism.

What they were really fighting for, was the threat to the foundations of democracy. These were radicals. Now, why am I bringing this up today?

Because if you're going to understand today, and the future, you have to understand the past.

And one name is out right now, that people are talking about, that you need to understand, who this individual is.

This individual is currently the mayor of Los Angeles.

Her name is Karen Bass. Now, this is the same mayor that was over in Ghana. And when she got back with the fires, she was asked, you know, do you have any comment?

You were over in Ghana. Is this dereliction of duty? What were you doing?

Do you have any message to the people of Los Angeles? Listen to this exchange.

VOICE: Do you owe citizens an apology for being absent when their homes were burning? Do you regret cutting the fire department budget by millions of dollars, Madam Mayor?

Have you nothing to say today?

GLENN: She's standing in the airport.

VOICE: You have nothing to say to the citizens today?

Elon Musk says you're utterly incompetent. Are you considering your position?

Madam Mayor, have you absolutely nothing to say to the citizens today who are dealing with this disaster? No apology for them?

Do you think you should have been visiting Ghana when this was unfolding, back home?

GLENN: Now, he's standing, you know that part, you know, where it bends, to go right into the -- right into the airplane.

You know, right as you're going into the ramp.

And then bends into the airplane.

She's standing right at that bend.

She was actually looking through the window, the glass, at security because she gets special treatment.

She gets to not go through the airport. She can just go down those stairs, and a car will pick her up and whisk her away. So she's standing there, looking at security, like open the door.

When are you going to open the door? Finally, she just looks through and shakes her head. And gets instruction. Just go the other way. So she leaves.

Now, what does she -- what does she have to say?

Well, not a lot. Not a lot.

But let's understand who she is, and why she doesn't have a lot to say. Karen Bass built her career, as a community activist. Oh, there's a code word we now understand what it means. The activism is a polite term now for her history. She's an activist.

Well, okay. Her history is tied to radicalism. Marxism.

And a dangerous ideology, that bled from the fringes, into the mainstream here recently.

Let's start with the facts on her. Back in the 1970s, Karen Bass was not just a casual traveler to Cuba.

Were there any?

When she went to Cuba, many, many times, she was a devoted participate in what's called the Venceremos Brigade.

What is that? I've never heard of it.

Well, it's a Marxist training program, directly tied to Fidel Castro's regime. Between 1969 and today, this group has sent hundreds of young Americans to Cuba.

Not for a vacation. Not for cultural exchange. But for radicalization.

You don't join the Venceremos Brigade because you want to learn -- what's the emoji with the salsa dancer? That's not what that is about. It's not about good Cuban coffee.

You join because you're a confirmed Marxist Leninist. A Los Angeles police investigator testified before Congress about this group. He said, members were trained in guerrilla warfare, sabotage, and bomb making. These are not idealists. They're insurgents in training. Karen Bass, she was not just a participant. She was a leader.

She visited Cuba repeatedly, she said, every six months.

We can verify eight times. She praised Fidel Castro, the dictator of Cuba, who was imprisoning dissenters, left a legacy of poverty and fear.

In fact, this is not just her youth. She's still there. When Castro died, she was one of them who called his death a great loss to the people of Cuba. Really?

A loss to the same people who risked their lives fleeing his regime, trying to get out of Cuba?

This is Karen Bass. She's the Los Angeles mayor, one of the largest cities in the United States of America.

So let's fast forward to the president. 4 million people. A city on fire. Literally, and figuratively.

Wildfires, raging across the city. Firefighters begging for resources. Like water!

Mayor Bass had other priorities. Instead of supporting her own fire department, she cut their funding. Where is the money going?

To NGOs. Nongovernment institutions.

That will be understood. NGOs. Nongovernmental institutions or organizations. That will come to know.

That's code for leftist activists, most times.

And she gave the fire fighting money, to homeless NGO, who are fighting for the rights of illegal immigrants.

Oh. Now, they're packaging that as she gave money to fight homelessness.

Okay.

Well, homelessness is a crisis. But let's not kid ourselves.

Los Angeles has poured billions of dollars into solving this problem.

And it ends up in tent cities. Open air markets. Streets lined with garbage and human waste. Chaos spreading. And wait. What does she do? She defunds the people who are fighting fires.

That's not. You don't take money away from the firefighters in an area of the country, that's known for fire fighting.

They don't even have enough firefighters. Okay. First responders, the people that run into buildings, and instead, she's in a different building in a different hemisphere.

She's in Ghana, attending the swearing in ceremonies of the -- I guess the president of Ghana, who I don't know anything about. Stu, I asked to look it up, maybe give us an update here in a second.

So her city was burning. And Mayor Bass was thousands of miles away, rubbing elbows at a presidential inauguration in Ghana.

Is that leadership, or is that dereliction of duty?

I mean, you can go. But was she on taxpayer funds going into Ghana? Why was she there?

Anyway, let's go back to the radical history for a moment. Because it didn't end with the Venceremos Brigade. M-19, the same group that bombed the Capitol in 1983, had direct ties to Cuba and the brigade.

Remember, she's a leader, in this.

Now, Susan Rosenberg, she was one of the women that Travolta Cuba. And returned as a domestic terrorist. Shared the same ideological roots as Karen Bass.

And I'm not saying Karen Bass planted the bomb or anything.

But let's be clear. She was part of exactly the same radical network. She called Fidel Castro, charismatic. She praised the dictator who was brutalizing his people. She aligned herself with a movement that believed in revolutionary violence, including the bombing of the Capitol.

Now, she of some reformed. She hasn't come out and said, oh, my gosh, have I learned my lesson?

That was really bad. I was a stupid kid. No. No.

She's held on to those things. And, in fact, she was considered a front runner for vice president under Joe Biden.

Her record was so toxic, so troubling, that even the democratic party said, can we do that?

When your Marxist roots are too bad, too heavy, for the Democrats, the progressives in Washington, DC, today!

That says something. So here we are, 40 years, since the Capitol bombing. Something that people just don't remember, because, well, the media didn't make it into a big deal.

And the ideology that fueled that bombing is alive and well. And sitting in the mayors office in Los Angeles.

Karen Bass is just using new words. She's fighting for justice, or equity. She's fighting for the people. But what has her leadership actually brought?

Homeless encampments. Not housing.

Tent cities. Fires burning out of control.

Fire departments stretched to its limits. Millions are funneled to political pet projects.

And all the while the city is spiraling deeper and deeper into chaos.

November 7th, 1983. I want you to remember that date because the seeds of radicalism planted then are still bearing fruit today!

And Karen Bass? Well, she's not just a relic of that radical past.

Had he in many ways, is a torch bearer.

By the way, I got tipped off by this, by a short documentary, I saw. On Karen Bass, from Errol Webber.

Errol Webber is a very smart guy.

We did a great, great job on this.

We tried to contact him, to get him to tell this story on the air today. We didn't get a call back. He lives in Los Angeles.

And we hope and pray that we just missed each other, and it's not because he is in jeopardy or his family is in jeopardy, or his home and neighborhood is in jeopardy because of these same fires.