A scheduled Tim Walz rally in Nevada was suspended due to fires that have destroyed 6,500 acres near Reno. The Vice Presidential candidate toured the fire site instead and visited the Democratic Party of Washoe County headquarters, where supplies were collected for 20,000 evacuated residents, including water, diapers, pet food, and other essentials. Mr. Walz praised local, state, and federal agencies for working together to support people who have lost their homes, which he described as “very challenging.”
Walz later brought pizza to Galena High School, which had been transformed into a local incident command center, before moving on to Las Vegas for a fundraiser. The GOP dismissed Walz’s visit as a political stunt, but Aaron Sims, the chair of the state’s rural Democratic caucus, who lost his home in the fire, said the Minnesota Governor had shown a level of care that is often absent from politics. He praised the Governor for not changing his plans to visit the Silver State, saying it “speaks volumes.”
The fires raging in Nevada continued to spread east over subsequent days and came within 70 miles of Los Angeles. Cal Fire spokesperson Rick Carhart said 6,000 had been forced to evacuate their homes amid triple-digit temperatures, while Mara Rodriguez, spokesperson for the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, warned that another 17,000 homes are vulnerable.
Additionally, in Northern California, homes, commercial buildings, and vehicles were destroyed around 100 miles from San Francisco, resulting in the evacuation of a further 4,000 people.
Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in San Bernardino County, and local school districts canceled classes for more than 20,000 students. The US Forest Service confirmed that people were also ordered to leave some campgrounds while firefighters in Idaho and Oregon prepared for blazes to spread into their states. Some fires had already begun to break out in the Gem State, while in Oregon, residents were warned to prepare for potential evacuations as flames affected around 80 acres to the west of Mount Bachelor in the Deschutes National Forest.
According to Cal Fire, there have been 6,045 fires in the Golden State so far this year.
