Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is facing renewed criticism on the eve of her re-election bid after defending her decision to remain outside the city during a devastating wildfire.

Bass, 73, came under intense backlash on social media after traveling to Ghana as the Palisades wildfire tore through California. She also pointed to the size of Los Angeles as a reason the city faces so many crises.

At the KBLA Talk 1580 Town Hall and Ballot Forum on Saturday, Bass was questioned about her January 2025 trip, which coincided with the disaster that killed 12 people and destroyed thousands of homes.

“When people go through grief—one of the stages of grief, and I know grief very well, is anger. People are mad,” she said.

“You are mad and I understand that. And even though objectively, even if I was here, there really wouldn’t have been anything that was done different.”

Bass then appeared to attribute some of the challenges to the sheer size of Los Angeles.

“The problem in our very big city is that it’s very difficult to leave town and not have something that happens,” Bass said.

“I’m not a firefighter, obviously, but it’s the role of mayor to be here.”

Her remarks drew swift criticism online, with angry constituents blaming the mayor for what they viewed as the city’s inadequate preparation.

“Even if she was there she still would have let them burn it down,” one Facebook user wrote.

Another user argued that the weather event had been forecast a week earlier and criticized the lack of additional staffing, pre-positioned equipment and generators at water pump stations. The commenter also pointed to the Palisades reservoir, which they said had been dry for months, writing that such decisions were made “at the highest levels” and accusing those responsible of incompetence or indifference.

A third commenter called Bass a “self-serving socialist” and alleged that the fire department was unprepared, the reservoirs were dry and hydrants failed, describing the situation as “a failure to provide basic services.”

Other commenters said Bass, her opponent Nithya Raman and California Governor Gavin Newsom “should be in prison together.”

“Mind you its has taken her now to really talk about it. Emergencies do happy and she’s right that the city is huge but there are more predictive ways we can organize online and in person and Bass didn’t make herself available,” another user wrote on X.

“Except there was a city wide emergency warning when she left for Ghana and the city was unprepared to respond to what happened,” another comment read.

Bass ultimately admitted months later that her trip to Ghana during the wildfires had been a mistake. In a July 2025 interview with Vice News, she said: “I was asked, ‘Do I regret going?’ Hell yeah.”

‘I mean, let me just do a comparison. If you are out of town and your kid or a member of your family gets sick or hurt, it doesn’t matter where you were or why you were there. You feel horrible,’ she said at the time, echoing similar wording to her latest defense over the contentious issue.

The mayor had traveled to West Africa as part of a US delegation attending the presidential inauguration in Ghana – despite multiple fire weather warnings issued for Los Angeles prior to her departure.

The Los Angeles Times later reported that Bass’s team had been made aware of the fire risks before the trip.

Still, Bass insists she was caught off guard.

‘I’m really not trying to give excuses, but there was no way in the world I knew that the city was in danger when I left,’ she said. ‘Absolutely no way.’

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Upon returning, Bass said she questioned fire officials about the lack of advance warning.

‘I did ask the chief when I came back, like, “Why didn’t you tell me?” and basically the response was: “Because we have Santa Anas all the time, and nobody expected hurricane-force winds.”‘

‘I didn’t get briefed. That’s true,’ she admitted. ‘But again, people did not anticipate the historic wind. And it wasn’t just LA – it was the county too.’

Bass said she spent much of the 12-hour flight back to the ‘city on fire’ on the phone preparing an emergency declaration.

She landed back in the US the day after wildfires began ravaging neighborhoods like Pacific Palisades.

Despite her admission of ‘wrongdoing,’ Bass continued to deflect criticism during the interview with Vice News’ Shane Smith, shifting blame to the county’s fire leadership.

‘What typically happens is that if there’s going to be a big weather event, there are these briefings that happen,’ she explained.

‘It’s either initiated by the fire department or the emergency department. I was used to the fire chief calling me and telling me, “This is getting ready to happen, come over, I need to brief you.” Everything goes into motion. That didn’t happen – in the city or in the county.’

When she eventually returned from Ghana, the embattled mayor received harsh criticism.

The controversy deepened after it was revealed Bass had proposed slashing the Los Angeles Fire Department’s budget by $23 million in 2024 – the final approved cut amounted to a whopping $17.6 million, the Daily Mail previously reported.

Amid growing backlash, Bass dismissed Fire Chief Kristin Crowley in February 2025.

However, Crowley pushed back, accusing city leaders of failing to support emergency operations during the fires.

But Bass defended her actions during the all-encompassing interview.

‘Yes, there were broken fire engines,’ she said. ‘We find out later that those fire engines were there broken because they’re used for spare parts. But there were 40 fire engines that were idle because they didn’t have the staff that [Crowley] sent home.’

She also insisted the fire department’s budget was never truly cut – only delayed during labor negotiations.

‘And the budget cut – I don’t know the reasons for it – and then the budget cut that never happened,’ Bass added.

‘What we did when we did the budget was we put money aside for fire because we were in labor negotiations. When the labor negotiations were done, we put it back in the budget. Which is a common thing. We’re doing that right now.’

Just a couple of months ago, Bass was once again out of town in Chicago when another massive fire broke out at a cold storage facility in Boyle Heights. 

‘I was in Chicago three hours away, and I was there 24 hours’ Bass said, as she noted that she was constantly communicating with LAFD Fire Chief Jaime Moore while there. 

Fernando Guerra, director of the Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University, told the LA Times: ‘We’re talking about a fire, and she’s out of town, so it completely and totally reinforces that narrative of January 2025, and that’s not helpful.’

Gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton was among those criticizing Bass, and said at a news conference at the time: ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with Karen Bass that she seems to keep leaving the city every time something happens.’

The Daily Mail reached out to Mayor Karen Bass’s Office for comment.  

An Australian businessman connected to a troubled Bali property investment venture significantly understated his criminal record in court while locked in a bitter legal dispute with his former business partner.

Adrian Campbell, who is based in Thailand, presents himself as an entrepreneur committed to “improving the lives” of others through what he calls “innovative and impactful ventures”.

He is now chief executive of Kinnara Capital, a property development business that promotes investment opportunities for overseas buyers across South-East Asia.

Kinnara Capital has been linked to a stalled luxury villa project in Bali, where Australian investors reportedly contributed $5.2 million. The investors have since referred the matter to Indonesian police.

Campbell has launched defamation and consumer law proceedings against Jamie McIntyre in the Federal Court. The case remains ongoing, and the court has not yet reached any conclusions about the substance of Campbell’s claims.

However, a Federal Court judgment last month found that Campbell had misled the court and “substantially downplayed” his criminal history when seeking suppression orders against McIntyre, his former business partner who later became his legal opponent.

The two men were previously involved in Marina Bay Lombok, a property development promoted extensively across social media. The project was located about 30 minutes south-west of Bali.

Billed as a luxury waterfront retirement villa community, the development was repeatedly hit by delays and other setbacks. Investors said they received little information about the progress of the properties they had been promised.

In June, some structures were demolished after reportedly being built in the wrong location. Investors also told police they believed their money had been transferred into bank accounts in various countries. No charges have been filed over the development, while the Mail has sought an update on the Indonesian police investigation.

The dispute has since escalated into a bitter cross-border war of accusations, unfolding through the media as well as Australian and Indonesian court proceedings.

McIntyre has accused Campbell of using Australian media outlets as part of a coordinated public relations effort against him. Reports about the dispute have frequently highlighted McIntyre’s 10-year ban from managing corporations imposed by ASIC, while Campbell’s own record of multiple Australian consumer law convictions had not previously received the same attention.

In May, Campbell obtained urgent takedown orders over what he described as a “disinformation campaign” allegedly orchestrated by McIntyre. The material included several articles accusing Campbell of “fraud and misconduct”, “misappropriation of money” and other criminal conduct.

Campbell rejected the allegations as “defamatory and misleading or deceptive”, claiming they had cost him $25 million in contracts.

In an affidavit filed to support his application for the interim suppression orders, Campbell swore that he had “never been the subject of any criminal prosecution in Australia, for business practices or anything else”. He also stated that he had never been convicted of a criminal offence.

He additionally told the court that he had not been involved in a case in 2018 and had never been ordered to pay $500,000 in fines and compensation.

Three months later, Campbell amended his evidence, acknowledging that he had in fact faced criminal prosecutions and been convicted on several occasions.

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The Federal Court’s judgment last month detailed Campbell’s admissions about his criminal record, which reaches back to 2012, when he was convicted of fraud-related offences.

Then, in 2015, he was convicted on five counts of accepting payment and failing to supply goods or services in relation to the conduct of his business, International Solar Solutions, his affidavit stated. 

A report from the Queensland Office of Fair Trading states that Campbell and his business partner accepted $36,710 from customers to install solar systems, yet failed to do so for five months.

Campbell further admitted that he was convicted and fined in 2018 after pleading guilty to 11 charges of making false or misleading representations. He was also ordered to pay $102,200 in compensation. 

The charges relate to a scam in which Campbell and an associate pocketed $204,400 through selling distribution licenses for a certain model of smoke alarm despite knowingly having no right to do so. 

A copy of the court transcript obtained by the Daily Mail reveals that the sentencing Magistrate described the conduct as ‘deliberate’ and ‘a scam’, with a ‘lack of honesty’ and disregard for those affected.

Justice Derrington found that Campbell not only ‘substantially downplayed’ his criminal history, but also led the court to believe he was an Australian resident, when he isn’t. 

Furthermore, the $25 million in lost contracts he’d purported to have been disadvantaged by, were actually sustained by his companies.

So ‘exceptionally serious’ were these omissions by Campbell, that not only was the gag order overturned, but he was also ordered to pay 80 per cent of McIntyre’s legal costs on an indemnity basis. 

When approached for comment, Adrian Campbell said his past convictions were a ‘matter of public record and he never sought to hide them’. 

‘My first affidavit was incomplete. That was not intentional and was corrected in a later affidavit filed in the same proceeding. I regret the error and respect the Court’s finding. The matters referred to are behind me, and I have built Kinnara since then.’

‘A records search does not show these as prior disclosable court outcomes as they are removed/spent from my file so it was simply an error on my behalf that was updated and my apology was accepted by the courts, proceedings continue.’

Campbell also explained that his company Kinnara was involved in the Marina Bay City project as a sales and marketing agent and did not hold any of the purchaser funds.

‘Kinnara is a reporting party in this matter. It lodged its own report with Indonesian police in November 2025, and further reports have since been lodged by purchasers in Indonesia and with the AFP. Those are matters for the authorities, and Kinnara is co-operating fully.’

‘For around a year I have been the target of a sustained online campaign. I have spoken publicly and to the authorities about my concerns with the project. I will continue to do so, and to defend my reputation through the courts.’

Justice Derrington stopped short of throwing out the entire proceedings, as per McIntyre’s wishes. The substantial proceedings remain underway and will reconvene on October 9. 

Angela Paxton has become the target of online ridicule after appearing in a political advertisement urging Texans to vote Republican in November—while making no direct reference to her estranged husband, who is also on the ballot.

The state senator addresses voters in the ad and calls on them to support “the Republican ticket.” Her husband, Attorney General Ken Paxton, is seeking the US Senate seat against Democratic nominee James Talarico.

Angela, 63, filed for divorce from Ken, also 63, “on biblical grounds” in 2025 after he was accused of having an affair following their 38-year marriage.

The Daily Mail first reported Ken Paxton’s alleged affair with Christian influencer Tracy Duhon, 58, in September. The pair allegedly became romantically involved in May 2024 after meeting at the Kentucky Derby. Duhon is a mother of seven.

“People have asked my thoughts about this election, and turns out I have some,” Angela Paxton says at the beginning of the advertisement.

Although she never says her husband’s name, her remarks appear to signal support for his Senate campaign.

“Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. In a general election, it’s not as much about the individual players on the team. It’s about getting the whole team across the finish line,” Paxton says.

“Either we hold every Republican seat, or we hand the future of Texas to the other team… That’s why I’m voting for the Republican ticket on November 3. Let’s hold the line together,” she concludes.

The Republican appeal quickly prompted mockery online, with critics highlighting the apparent contradiction of supporting a ticket that includes the husband she is divorcing while carefully avoiding his name.

One critic called the advertisement “desperate,” while another joked: “So party over country. And party over biblical grounds, too.”

The advertisement was funded by Texas PAC, a super PAC linked to Senate GOP leadership that has spent millions backing Ken Paxton’s campaign, The Texas Tribune reported.

Angela’s latest public endorsement came only days after she delivered a similar message to a gathering of conservative women.

Speaking to more than 100 board members of the Texas Federation of Republican Women, the state senator urged them to vote for the party rather than focus on the individual candidates listed on the ballot.

“It’s not the people—it’s the seat,” she said. “We have more control over that seat and the future when we control the seat, when it’s still in the family—even if we’re mad at them.”

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Paxton added that if Republicans “lose it to the other team,” then any concerns about fixing “the nuances” surrounding a particular candidate would pale in comparison with what it would take to win the seat back.

When she announced her split from Ken, Angela claimed she had attempted to fix her marriage to Ken before ultimately deciding it was time to call it quits. 

‘And I have earnestly pursued reconciliation. But in light of recent discoveries, I do not believe that it honors God or is loving to myself, my children, or Ken to remain in the marriage.

‘I move forward with complete confidence that God is always working everything together for the good of those who love Him and who are called according to His purpose.’ 

In a statement issued after the filing, Ken noted, that ‘after facing the pressures of countless political attacks and public scrutiny, Angela and I have decided to start a new chapter in our lives.’

‘I could not be any more proud or grateful for the incredible family that God has blessed us with, and I remain committed to supporting our amazing children and grandchildren. I ask for your prayers and privacy at this time,’ he wrote.  

President Donald Trump announced his endorsement for Ken in May of this year, a last-minute saving grace for the Republican just days before voters hit the polls. 

‘Nothing was going to be able to overcome that endorsement,’ one Paxton insider who asked to remain anonymous told the Daily Mail Wednesday morning. 

‘Even Paxton’s scandals couldn’t stop that.’ 

Political insiders have assured the Daily Mail that Ken intends to marry Duhon and that she ‘has her eyes on being a senator’s wife.’  

The pair quietly moved into a $2.1 million mansion inside a gated community in the coveted Dallas suburb of Frisco.

The sprawling five-bedroom, five-bathroom property spans nearly 5,000 square feet and includes a swimming pool backing onto a manicured golf course and an exclusive $100,000-a-year country club.

Multiple political insiders told the Daily Mail that Ken is playing house in the luxury home – which property records show was purchased on February 13, just in time for Valentine’s Day – with Duhon.

The Daily Mail reached out to Attorney General Ken Paxton and State Senator Angela for comment.

A cleaner who helped turn a modest Sydney operation into one of Australia’s biggest privately owned cleaning businesses has become the centre of a bitter inheritance battle years after his death, with rival family factions fighting over a fortune estimated at $28 million.

George Tsivis married Angela Sakellis in 1968. The following year, the couple launched the business that would eventually grow into the Broadlex cleaning empire, starting out with just two people in Sydney.

Although their marriage ended during the 1970s, George and Angela continued working together for the next 40 years. Their joint efforts built a multimillion-dollar company that now employs about 2,000 people and serves major corporate clients, including CBRE.

George died in October 2016, leaving an estate valued at nearly $28 million. It included properties across Australia, significant business interests and millions of dollars in other assets. Probate was granted to his brother, Peter Tsivis, his de facto partner Karen Leith Williams and his nephew Michael Tsivis.

His death soon triggered a complex succession dispute involving valuable company shares, annual payments worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and control of the fortune he had spent decades accumulating.

The legal battle would continue for years, outlasting several of the people who were originally involved.

George’s sister, Maria Sotiriadis, died in December 2022, while his former wife Angela died in October 2023. Despite those losses, the dispute over shares linked to Broadlex continued and eventually reached the NSW Supreme Court almost 10 years after George’s death.

The central issue was George’s interest in Sequoyah Investments, a company associated with the Broadlex business empire.

George’s will required Angela to keep paying his brother Peter and sister Maria annual amounts equal to his $300,000 salary from Broadlex. Each sibling was to receive half of the payments, with the surviving sibling entitled to the full amount after the other died.

The will set out a path for Angela to inherit the valuable shares, but only if she met those payment obligations.

In a significant win for Peter, Justice Michael Slattery found that Angela’s estate had never become entitled to the shares because the annual payments required under George’s will were not made.

Peter will instead retain the benefit of the shares for the rest of his life. Once that interest ends, the multimillion-dollar asset will return to George’s estate rather than pass to Angela’s heirs.

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Justice Slattery said George’s intention was for Angela to “earn” the shares by making sure his siblings received the annual sums specified in the will.

“For years the parties were more focused on reaching a final settlement than making clause 11 work according to its true construction,” Justice Slattery wrote in his judgment.

He said both sides had allowed the arrangement to remain unresolved as negotiations continued, noting that “both parties gained some advantage in the negotiations from doing nothing”.

In one of his strongest criticisms of Angela, Justice Slattery concluded: “The probabilities are that she used the annuity as a bargaining chip.”

The judge ultimately ruled that Angela “only may receive” the shares by “earning them through consistent support for his closest living relatives by ensuring the specified payments are made to them”.

Court records from an unrelated Supreme Court dispute in 2019 paint a picture of Angela as a wealthy property owner who spent years helping struggling relatives.

A judge found she acted out of ‘genuine concern’ for family members after reconciling with her terminally ill niece Antonia in 2008. Angela later allowed Antonia, her husband Constantine and their two children to live rent-free in a Seaforth property she owned.

After Antonia’s death in 2010, she continued supporting the family, later moving Constantine into another North Manly property she owned. The relationship eventually broke down, sparking a separate legal battle when he refused to leave the home. 

The dispute offered an early glimpse into the family tensions that would later surround the Broadlex fortune.

Peter won the battle for the shares, but the war is not over.

Justice Slattery reserved questions about who should control the trust holding the Broadlex-linked shares and directed the parties to consult on the appointment of a new trustee.

Nearly a decade after George Tsivis’s death, one of Sydney’s most unusual succession battles is still not over.