Is this the most California story ever? Could be.
In the wake of the California wildfires that displaced thousands of Angelinos from their homes, celebrities did what celebrities do: put on a concert to raise money for the victims.
It was a huge production and raised $100 million that people assumed would go to the victims of the fires or help them get back on their feet. Everybody felt good about themselves, and artists got some nice publicity for “donating” an evening of their lives.
A good time was had by all, except, of course, the supposed beneficiaries of the concert’s fundraising. It turns out that they were never the intended beneficiaries. A bunch of nonprofits–many with no relation to the fire or its victims–are raking in the dough.
Some of the money went to food banks, which undoubtedly helped some of the victims, but much of the money went out to the usual suspects, and at least one grant was given to…the State of California.
Just shocking and infuriating.
Celebrities and others raised almost $100 million for the LA fires. It appears that almost none of it has gone to the actual victims. Instead it is being distributed to a bunch of completely unrelated non-profits.
— AG (@AGHamilton29) July 22, 2025
This story was uncovered by a local community news outlet — a tiny, one-woman operation. FireAid, the concert was big news, but with all such productions, the real news is the concert and celebrities, not the victims they are supposedly helping.
So where did all that money go?
To see the “front-line organizations, click here. Below is a representative sampling. (Editor’s note—some of those nonprofits are well-respected, but how are they really helping Palisades and Eaton fire victims who needed cash to buy beds/mattresses, computers/screens, replace furniture, help with rebuilding or make up the gap between what insurance will provide and actual costs to rebuild?)
Pathways LA reaches primarily single-parent families with a median family income of $12,096. The executive compensation is $291,327 click here.
Another nonprofit, After the Fire, is located in Sonoma: “We Coach. We Convene. We Collaborate. We Advocate.” In 2022, the 990 form listed $120,000 in compensation for the executive director with net assets of $474,126 click here.
A nonprofit receiving money was the California Native Vote Project click here, which is sponsored by another nonprofit Community Partners. click here. “The mission is to achieve justice and self-determination for Native American Communities through multigenerational power building, organizing, and civic engagement.”
IDEPSCA (Instituto de Educatcion Popular del Sur de California)click here received FireAid money. Its mission is “To create a more humane and democratic society by responding to the needs and problems of disenfranchised people through leadership development and educational programs based on Popular Education methodology. Specifically, our goal is to organize and educate immigrants concerned with solving problems in their own communities.” The executive compensation was $111,408, but other salaries and wages were $1,233,583, which was about 60 percent of the nonprofit’s revenue.
“We coach. We Convene. We Collaborate. We Advocate.” That sounds like a good organization to help fire victims.
The grant that went to the state was for CalVolunteers–whose honorary Chair is Gavin Newsom’s wife.
California Volunteers is the state office “tasked with engaging Californias in service, volunteering and civic action to tackle our State’s most pressing challenges. Jacqueline Yannacci, the head, appointed by Newsom, receives a salary of $141,420, and this group serves under the office of the governor.click here.
I went to the FireAid website, where they have a helpful grant application provided right there. Aside from gathering the name and the tax ID along with contact information, the application process asks two questions:
Seems rigorous enough.
I’m not sure how the California Native Vote Project is contributing to fire victim relief, but it is undoubtedly doing so. It must be, because it got money, right?
Major donors to the organization–big corporations all, in just the way that BLM scammed about the same amount of money for the benefit of its top dogs–no doubt get a nice tax write-off and some good publicity. It seems that everybody is benefiting except the actual fire victims.
Not every nonprofit is a scam, of course, and not every dollar donated to Fire Aid will go down a rat hole and pop up in Democratic campaigns come next year. Fire Aid even bought a fire truck for a local community!
But let’s face it, just as most aid to the homeless winds up in the hands of nonprofits that accomplish nothing, so will this money. The beneficiaries of nonprofits are the people who run and work at nonprofits. The “victims” are their excuse for collecting the money.
This isn’t the first benefit concert where the money wound up where it wasn’t supposed to go. The very first–Live Aid–wound up funneling most of the money to Ethiopian leader Mengistu Haile Mariam–who was the cause of the famine in the first place because he was committing genocide.
The Los Angeles fires have been great for Mayor Bass, Gavin Newsom, and all the grifters around them who are planning to build back better. Think of all the high density low income housing they can build, and how many state-approved contractors will get subsidies to redesign.
And how many coaches, conveners, collaborators, and advocates can justify their salaries for years to come.
