LA Fires Latest, Trump's Sentencing, TikTok At The Supreme Court
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A woman in Altadena, California, spent the night in her car after wildfires destroyed her house. It's burned down. It's not livable. Who could live here like this? Why did fire crews run out of water and how much difference did it make? I'm A. Martinez, that is Steve Inskeep, and this is Up First from NPR News. ♪

President-elect Trump will be sentenced today in a Manhattan criminal court. He was convicted for falsifying business records, hiding payments to an adult film star. The Supreme Court declined to interfere after the judge said Trump would likely face no punishment anyway. So how does a felony conviction affect a second term? The court decided it would at least listen to arguments by owners of TikTok. Congress set a deadline to sell or shut down. We'll hear the company's bid today to block the law. Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.

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Earlier this week, an LA Fire spokesperson underlined a reality of fighting wildfires. As long as winds are blowing through dry parts of Southern California, there's very little fire crews can do. Now they have a break. The Santa Ana winds have let up a little bit, slowing the spread and letting air crews dump water from overhead. So we can assess. At least 10 people have died.

And thousands of structures have been destroyed in Pacific Palisades and other communities like the one we will hear about now. Altadena is a little inland in the foothills to the east of L.A. And that is where NPR's Greg Allen has been reporting. Greg, you spent the day yesterday talking to people in Altadena. What are they telling you?

Well, you know, as you know, Altadena is a wooded community with a lot of older bungalows. And this is where the Eaton fire has left many of the homes just smoldering blackened ruins. Tiandra Pitts' home caught fire and was heavily damaged before fire crews extinguished it. It's burned down. It's not livable. Look at all this. Who could live here like this? No, no. And I'm asthmatic and I have a compromised lung.

I spent the day yesterday with Pitts. You know, she was evacuated after her house caught fire and the one next door burned to the ground. Her three kids are staying with family members, but she spent that night in her car. Yesterday, she was back with friends, removing whatever she could from the house. Now, we've heard that at least 20 people have been arrested for looting. Did you hear about that from people in Altadena?

Yes, Tandra Pitts said she was shocked when she returned home and found that her front door had been kicked in. When she went inside, many of her things were gone and things were just tossed everywhere. Look at shoes, purses. And they just pull everything out and took stuff. They take everything. We seen them doing it. How do you take that from somebody who already have enough disaster?

Looters took her son's sneaker collection. They left the boxes everywhere. They even took her washer and dryer. We talked to other residents who stayed in the neighborhood, and they told us that they chased off looters. L.A. Sheriff has promised a crackdown on looting, and communities now are imposing curfews throughout the area. Now let's get to the big picture. I mean, how many fires is L.A. dealing with right now?

Well, there are several with numbers changing all the time. The biggest concerns remain the Eaton Fire. Although it's stopped growing in size, crews still have zero containment on it. The other big one is the Palisades Fire, the one that destroyed much of Pacific Palisades.

Officials have made progress there and have started to contain that fire, and we've had deaths in both of those. Yesterday in the north part of the county, the Kenneth Fire quickly expanded, which forced additional evacuations. All right, now here's the kind of ugly part of this, in that politics have injected their way into this story. President-elect Trump has criticized California Governor Gavin Newsom, saying that he should have done more to get water flowing to help put out the fires. What's the response been to that in Los Angeles?

Well, you know, a lack of water was a major problem for firefighters combating the Palisades blaze on Tuesday and Wednesday. After hours of responding, the water pressure dropped and hydrants no longer had water. Fire crews used pumper trucks to draw water from reservoirs and fight fires that way. But it's led to big questions, not just from Trump, but also from people who saw their homes burn. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass was asked about the issue yesterday. You asked me, was I frustrated by this? Of course not.

Because we all know that this has been an unprecedented event. We also know that fire hydrants are not constructed to deal with this type of massive devastation.

You know, President Biden has even waded in saying he talked to Governor Newsom about the issue. Biden says when electricity was shut off in some areas to avoid more fires, that led some pumping stations to be left without power. Biden said Newsom assured him that generators are being deployed to make sure that this won't be a problem going forward. That's NPR's Greg Allen in Los Angeles. Greg, thanks. You're welcome.

President-elect Trump will briefly turn away from his transition to power to attend, likely virtually, his criminal sentencing today. The Supreme Court declined to block Trump's sentencing after a judge said the president-elect was unlikely to face punishment or even have to attend in person. He will, though, come away with a criminal record, though he can pursue an appeal. NPR political reporter Ximena Bastillo has been covering this trial. Good morning. Good morning. Work out the background for us. What's at stake here?

Well, this was a big part of the early 2024 presidential election. Trump brought the campaign trail to New York using the trial as a way to speak to the press, hold events and talk about his political platform. But ultimately, even with a criminal conviction, voters elected him into the White House. Now, Trump continues to call the trial a political witch hunt.

There was a lot of speculation over how a trial, a conviction, and even a sentencing could affect Trump's ability to win. Yet on election night, Trump decidedly won it in the court of public opinion and will be the first convicted felon to be sworn into the Oval Office later this month. Legal experts say that this sentencing brings a much-needed finality to the trial and formally convicts him. I did have a look at the court's finding on this. It's not an extended ruling, but they put a few words out. What did they say?

Well, last night, five justices of the Supreme Court, a court majority, agreed to allow the sentencing to proceed. In their decision, the court said that any concerns Trump had about the case should be first litigated through the lower courts. The justices also said that the sentencing will inflict a relatively light burden on him since New York Judge Juan Rashaun intends to impose that sentence of unconditional discharge.

Still, key to note that four conservative justices would have sided with Trump, meaning that he was just one justice away from not having to be sentenced today. Yeah, this is really, really interesting. They knew in advance that the president-elect wasn't going to be punished or wasn't going to even have to travel to Manhattan. And even so, there were four justices who were willing to side with Trump and delay the sentencing in whatever sense it would be inconvenient to the president-elect.

But still, it goes forward and reminds people of what this case was about. What was it that Trump was convicted of?

At the center of the prosecution's case were 34 invoices, checks, and ledgers that outlined a $130,000 payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Prosecutors argue that Trump paid off Daniels when he was running in the 2016 presidential election in order to keep her quiet about an alleged affair. The jurors ultimately convicted Trump of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. And how has Trump challenged that case?

Trump has sought to delay and throw out the whole case, especially after the Supreme Court ruled that presidents have broad immunity for official acts. Merchan, the New York judge that I mentioned, agreed to postpone the sentence several times. At one point, he agreed to push it until after the 2024 presidential election to avoid any perception of political bias. Merchan also delayed to allow Trump to make the case that he had immunity because of some evidence in the trial that overlapped with his time as president.

But Mershon said that sentencing should proceed. And where does the case go now?

Well, Trump has tapped in several of his personal lawyers on the case to join him in this next administration. That includes John Sauer, who appealed this case to the Supreme Court and, if confirmed by the Senate, will be representing the federal government at the Supreme Court level as Solicitor General. Trump has vowed to appeal the case, but moving forward, some ethical questions remain over his lawyer's ability to do so while serving in the executive branch.

This is what the Supreme Court said. If he has concerns about the case, pursue them in an ordinary appeal, they said. And Piers Amanda Bastillo, thanks so much. Thank you. Some other news now. Today, lawyers for TikTok will be arguing before the Supreme Court. They'll be facing off against the Justice Department over whether a law banning the China-based viral video app will take effect in a few days. And Piers Bobby Allen will be covering this story. Bobby, good morning. Good morning, Steve. What are you expecting to hear from each side?

TikTok's legal team will be making two arguments, one on behalf of the company and another on behalf of TikTokers. And their case is boiled down to this. Shutting down a massively popular social media platform violates the free speech of TikTok's U.S. corporation and the millions of Americans who use it every day. And TikTok plans to argue that it has done quite a bit to distance itself from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance. The Department of Justice is expected to say, not so fast.

Anything short of completely splitting off from ByteDance poses a risk, and that's because ByteDance's home is in China, and China is a foreign adversary of the United States. Now, the Justice Department says Americans' personal data on the app is vulnerable, and even the possibility, Steve, of China trying to manipulate the views of U.S. citizens is just too risky. Okay, so now the timing is important here.

The Supreme Court has a lot of power when they decide, oh, we should intervene before a deadline or let things play out and we will take our time and rule on things later. In this case, they said we're scheduling fast arguments for January 10th and the ban is supposed to start on January 19th. So is it likely really to take effect?

We don't know. It's possible that the court will stay the January 19th start date as justices deliberate. Now, the court is here, Steve, really trying to thread a very difficult needle, right? They likely want to make sure the federal government doesn't silence the voices of millions of Americans, but also they want to safeguard against possible covert influence from China. If

The Supreme Court upholds the law. Yes, it could start very soon. Apple and Google will then be legally required to remove TikTok from app stores. Web hosting firms like Oracle that support TikTok have to cut ties. It could be the beginning of the end for TikTok. Now, if the Supreme Court strikes down the law, well, then it's just business as usual for the app. It's interesting to think about this not only as a constitutional question, it's about free speech, among other things, but also a question of which branch of government is

has the power here. Congress passed this law, which the outgoing president signed. You have an incoming president who changed his mind about TikTok, used to be opposed to it. Now he says he favors it. A lot of his supporters use it. And he's about to take power. So what could he do after January 20th about TikTok?

He has enormous sway here. In recent months, as you mentioned, Trump has flip-flopped on TikTok. But now, you know, the former and future president really might be the decider here, because if the Supreme Court decides to uphold this law, who then will be charged with interpreting it? That would be President-elect Trump. And he can tell his Justice Department to

just not enforce it. Or he can try to cut some other deal and say, hey, actually, TikTok is in compliance with the law. So a lot of eyes are on exactly what Trump is going to do here. Okay. And of course, Congress would then face the question about whether they would want to assert their authority. But there's another group here. How are creators who use TikTok responding?

Yeah, in a number of ways. Some TikTokers are promoting workarounds already if a ban does take place, you know, getting on like a virtual private network to try to circumvent American cell towers. And others are saying, hey, TikTok might be banned soon. So how about you all jump on YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels, which, Steve, is another reality of all of this. If TikTok is banned, the biggest winners are likely to be Google and Meta. Thanks for that insight. NPR's Bobby Allen, really appreciate it. Thanks, Steve.

And that's Up First for this Friday, January 10th. I'm Steve Inskeep. And I'm Amy Martinez. You can listen to this podcast sponsor-free while financially supporting public media with Up First Plus. Learn more at plus.npr.org. That's plus.npr.org. Today's Up First, that's U-P-F-I-R-S-T, was edited by Gigi Dubon, Ana Yukonanoff, Cara Platoni, Jenea Williams, and Lisa Thompson. It was produced by Ziad Butch, Nia Dumas, and Lily Quiroz. We get engineering support from Nisha Hynas,

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