You're listening to KFI AM six forty wake Up Call with Me Amy King on demand on the iHeartRadio.
App KFI and KOST HD two, Los Angeles, Orange County.
It's time for your morning wake up call.
Here's Amy King.
It is five o'clock, straight up. This is your wake up call for Monday, March tenth. Good morning, I'm Amy King. We're live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. If you're hearing my voice right now, it means that your clock automatically changed and you did.
Get up this daylight saving time fairly, fairly.
I woke up yesterday, and, like we were talking about last week, most of the clocks adjust themselves. My Apple watch does it, my phone does it. Even my little alarm clock automatically adjust itself. So I'm sitting there on the couch yesterday and I'm watching my news shows because I'm obsessive and I watch all the news shows on Sunday morning, and I was like, Wow, it's only eight thirty. Oh wait that clock. I have to change myself. Shoot, I'm behind an hour already. Hey, we got another eagle.
The third eaglet has hatched. We knew that it was pipping on Friday, but he broke out over the weekend, and oh my.
Gosh, the little guy.
He's like so much smaller than the other ones, and you can tell he's weaker. And I'm just like, it's like breaking my heart when I'm like, Jackie, feed the little one, Jackie, feed the little one. But we you know, we know that it's it's a tough rope and they've got a fight to survive. And so we were talking over the weekend with editor Carla and I said, he's gonna have to fight hard, and she goes, I'm going to call him Rocky. Yeah, So that's what we're going
to call the little one. Yep. Okay, here's what's ahead on wake up Call. A bit of a shaky start to the more, A three point three quake rumbled under Malibu. The US Geological surveyces the quake happened at two twenty three. It's near where a four point one quake rattled Malibu yesterday. Yesterday afternoon's quake was followed by several smaller aftershocks. Flames shot through the roof of a graffiti covered building in
downtown la this morning. LA Fire says a fire and a commercial building spread to other units and a nearby building before firefighters put it out. By about three twenty, Israel has cut off electricity supply to Gaza. Offici'll say it's going to interrupt operations at a desalination plant that provides drinking water for part of the Strip. A Moss
called it part of Israel's starvation policy. We're gonna find out what's going on with this uh with ABC Stredonna Miller in Jerusalem that's coming up in just a couple of minutes at.
Five point twenty.
Is the high price of eggs really because of bird flu or could there be something else going on. ABC's Peter Haralumbus is going to tell us and speaking of bird flu and the flu and the measles, ABC's Jim Ryan says he finally has some good news for us on those fronts.
That's coming up at the bottom of the hour.
And EV's electric vehicles should they be mandated, they are going to be in California. A group says evs are great, but making people buy them is not the way to go. We're going to talk with the senior VP at SEMA coming up at five point fifty to find out what's up with that. Let's get started with some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. Eight people have been hurt by a guy who drove
into the showroom at a CarMax dealership in Inglewood. Investigators say the driver had taken his car to the dealer for an estimate, but apparently didn't estimate, but apparently didn't like the quote that he got. He drove away after he crashed into the building, but then later drove to
an LAPD station and turned himself in. An apparent trespasser is in critical condition after nearly being electrocuted at a hospital in North rich which the Fire Department says the man was hurt yesterday when he made contact with an electrical vault at Dignity Health Northridge Hospital Medical Center. He has significant burn injuries to more than half his body.
La Keunty Da.
Nathan Hawkman is expected to announce an update on the Menendez brother's case. Hawkman said last month his office would oppose the brother's request for a new trial. The brothers have also asked to be re sentenced, and they've asked Governor Knwsoim for clemency. In an effort to be released from prison. They're serving life sentences for murdering their parents. In nineteen eighty nine. More people are taking legal action over the wildfires in LA.
Twenty five more Pacific Palisades residents have joined the lawsuit filed against the City of Los Angeles and the Department of Water and Power after the January wildfires. This brings the total plaintiffs to forty eight. The lawsuit alleges the city designed a water supply system that wouldn't have enough water pressure to fight the fires. It also says the reservoir located near the Pacific Palisades had been empty since February of last year, which made it more difficult for
fire crews to access water. Brigida Degastino, Okay if I new.
A new study shows California is ranked fifth among the most expensive states for childcare in the US oh great.
The study by Birth.
Injury Lawyer dot com analyzed data from Childcare Aware of America and used the average cost of a center based in family childcare.
It found in.
California, center based childcare costs eighteen two hundred dollars a year that takes up fifteen percent of a married couple's income and forty eight percent of single parents. Let's say good morning now to ABC's Jordana Miller. She's in Jerusalem. Soa Gaza just can't catch a break. Israel's now cutting off electricity.
That's right.
The Israeli government announced on Sunday that they would be cutting off electricity to Gaza. But we have to remember that Israel cut off almost all of its electricity supplies to the strip more than a year ago when the war first broke out, right back in the in the winter of twenty twenty three. So this is not a good sign. And it will affect about six hundred thousand Palestinians in central Gaza because it will essentially shut down a desalinization plant and that helps with you know, water
supplies creating powdable water. So that is a problem, and it's going to affect the sewage systems there, but it's not going to have a dramatic impact the way for example, cutting off humanitarian aid has for the last two weeks. Right, It's another step that's you know, going to be uncomfortable for gossms. But remember they're now used to living either with fuel run generators or solar panels, and they're not as dependent on Israeli electricity anymore.
Okay, So all of the awfulness has made them better prepared. Is the desalination plant has power to that been cut off before or is this a new development with that plant?
The plant wasn't working for several months again at the start of the war, and then we'll put it back online during the first ceasefire deal in November December. That was one of the agreements right in the original the first seafire where we saw over one hundred hostages come out. So it had been functioning since November. There were recently some power outages with this plant, but they were fixed.
Now it will not be working because the Israeli electric Company will no longer be supplying the electricity there to keep it going, okay.
And now Jordana Hamas has called this the latest starvation policy by Israel, which is sort of hard to argue. But and Israel maybe trying to force Amas's hand to maybe get back and come up with a piece deal or to move forward with that phase too. But Hamas has already said, hey, we're willing to lose hundreds of thousands of people, So does it really force Amasa's hand.
Right, I don't think it's really going to work as a pressure tactic. The issue of humanitarian aid will, but I don't think the electricity is going to make a difference at this point. And I think it's important to point out there's not starvation right now in the Gaza Strip. Remember, for forty two days over, on average, about seven hundred trucks of aid came in each and every day. Oh okay,
so a Gaza strip. So yeah, they're not hungry right now, but of course those supplies will run out, you know, in several months.
Yeah, and didn't you say what I think in one of our conversations, you were saying that they needed an average of like three hundred a day, so then when they were getting six hundred, they were kind of stocking up.
Well, you know, before the war, Gaza received about four to five hundred trucks of aid, but not all of it was food. And the difference is that there were a lot of local you know, fields, bakeries, you know, they had their own way of you know, generating food in the Gaza Strip. Now, with all the destruction, you know, Gaza is ever more dependent on aid coming in and I think that's the major difference. I mean, there's not Israel.
Gaza's own production of food is not now at what it was before the war, right, Okay, so yes, so we have to be careful with comparisons. Nonetheless, I think the aid issue is something that could put pressure on Hamas. I think, Amy, we have to point out today for the first time since January, Israel Hamas, the United States and the Mediate are engaging in talks in Doha, in cutter And this is the first round of real indirect talks.
And we're hoping and praying that this leads to a breakthrough where we see some more hostages come out and an extension of this ceasefire.
Okay, well, we will hope that that moves forward. ABC Stdana Miller in Jerusalem. Thank you so much for the information.
As always, Thanks Tuckson.
All right, let's get back to some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. North Korea has fired several ballistic missiles into the sea. The launches happened several hours after the South Korean and US militaries began their annual Freedom Shield combined military drills. The US is the drills are routine. North Korea calls them an aggressive move and that they pose a threat. The
US is expected to impose more tariffs on Canada. ABC's Selina Wang says it could happen as soon as today.
The President is threatening to impose steep terrace on Canadian loveber in dairy products, he says, in response to the high tax that Canada puts on American lumber and dairy to protect its own industries.
President Trump imposed tariffs on Canada and Mexico last week, only to pause most of them soon after that. He said the US will impose reciprocal tariffs on a whole range of countries starting April second. Secret Service agents have shot a man near the White House.
An agency spokesperson says agents confronted the arm suspect, who allegedly pulled out a gun before being shot and was taken to the hospital in unknown condition. The Secret Service had reportedly been notified about a potentially suicidal individual traveling from Indiana to Washington.
D c kfi's Michaelkastners's President Trump was not at the White House at the time. He spent the weekend at his resort in Florida. Fighter jets from Norad intercepted a civilian aircraft there yesterday afternoon when it entered restricted airspace. A small plane has crashed in Pennsylvania. Mannheim Township fire chief Scott Little says the plane ended up in a parking lot of a retirement community. Five passengers were on board.
All five passengers were transported by.
Local MS agencies to local hospitals for treatment. The plane burst into flames when it crashed yesterday, damaging several vehicles. Officials say no one in the parking lot was hurt. Former Central Bank Central banker Mark Carney is going to be Canada's next prime minister. The governing Liberal Party elected him as its leader yesterday. Carney has vowed to stand up to President Trump's tariffs.
He's attacking Canadian families, workers and businesses and we cannot let him succeed, and we will.
Carney will replace Justin Trudeau, who made the decision last month to step down as Prime minister following ongoing criticism of his leadership by the public and from within his own party. He's expected to remain Prime minister during the transition. The Southland has been rattled by another earthquake. The three point three quake hit near Malibu at two twenty three this morning. A four point one quake rattled Malibu just
after one yesterday afternoon. US Geological SURVEYSS. Three smaller quakes rumbled under Malibu a short time later. Republicans have unveiled a spending bill to keep the government funded through September. The bill cuts non defense spending and boosts defense spending. The bill has to be passed by Friday to prevent a partial government shutdown. President Trump posted on social media urging all Republicans to vote yes, saying we must remain united.
The third egg for bald eagles Jackie and Shadow has hatched. All three egglets are now being fed and protected by the eagles in their nest hi above Big Bear Lake. The newest eglet has been struggling to get fed, as the other two that had hatched almost a week earlier are now much stronger.
But we're going to help.
He's a fighter, and like I said, Carla and I have agreed that his name should be Rocky because he's going to be a fighter. At six oh five, it's handle on the news. China is targeting the US with tariffs of its own let's say good morning now to ABC's Peter Harlambuos.
Good morning Peter, Good morning Amy, Thanks so much for having me.
Okay, so before we get started, I want to I want to settle this once and for all, because when we get a request for you or an availability for you, they phonetically spell out your name because it's spelled different than it looks and sounds. And then I heard you do like a lockout, which is when you say, hey, it's Amy King for k if I News.
That's your lockout.
I heard you say it differently than it's pronounced here.
How do you say your name so you actually have it right?
For the record, it's horror lamboos. It's that's how my parents have pronounced that. When I was a kid, it was just pronounced phanatically with the ch, So it's kind of a habit that's stuck in my head from elementary and middle of high school. Or sometimes I slip into say charlamboos, but the proper pronunciation, according to my parents and their parents is horror lamboosh.
Okay, all right, I feel better now because I heard you say it the other like You've got right. Okay, let's get down to business Peter Haralambus.
So, we know.
The elimination of millions of chickens because of bird flu is causing egg prices to go up, But is there something else, maybe something a little more underhanded going on that's leading to price increases for our eggs.
Yeah, that's exactly right, Amy. At this point, the DOJ is looking into just that possibility. We understand the Department of Justice is Civil Division is in the very early stages of an investigation into some of the country's largest egg distributors. They're looking into the possibility that it's high price and eggs isn't just caused by this massive culling of chickens because of the bird flu, but potentially because
of coordination among these companies. Again, very early stages, but they're looking into that possibility that this is something this high cost of eggs four ninety five for a dozen eggs on average by something more than just the bird flu. Again, we've seen some of the profits for these huge egg
companies actually skyrocket. For example, the country's largest egg distributor, their profits are up about thirty excuse me, three hundred percent, And there was actually a similar kind of spike in profits the last time the bird flow came around.
Okay, so here's the question then, is their profits are up. I was just thinking, well, of course they're making more because they're charging more, but the supply is down. But you're saying, even though the supply is down, they're still making more money than before the bird flu.
That's correct. So if you look at their profits, they're up. I mean, if you look back, for example, in twenty twenty three, the last time the bird flu got really quite bad, they saw their profits. They made more than one point two billion dollars. That's triple what they made the year prior. And you know, there's nothing illegal about that. There's nothing wrong in the United States with making more money when their supply for something goes down and the
demand states high. That's something that's inherent eggs. People continue to buy them. But what the concern is from the Department of Justice, according to a source with direct knowledge of this, is that there might be some kind of coordination among these companies to keep these prices high for longer, to basically continue making money despite the fact that the natural market conditions would have brought those prices down.
We'll have to.
See again, we're in the middle of this, so you know, in a way that DJ is looking to something as it's happening to see if that's going on. But if that's the case, it's really that would be very concerned and corporate behavior for something that Americans buy and rely on a daily basis.
Yeah, okay, And you said that they're in the early stages of this investigation, So can we expect to find anything out anytime soon or does this take months and months to play out?
I think we're talking about months and months, I understand in terms of where we are when th're reporting. Is there at the basically the subpoena stage, the civil subpoena is being sent by DOJ's Anti trust divisions and begins figuring out more information about this in order to get from that to a finding or a criminal finding of a civil finding of liability. That's months, if not years.
But in a way, it is exerting some pressure on these egg companies to basically, you know, if there is something happening that's below board, fix it now that they know there's a spotlight being shined on them again, the country's egg distributors are pushing back strongly on this claim.
That there might be price fixing. They're saying that American farmers are hurting, distributors are hurting, and the idea that these prices are they you know, are driven by something other than just the bird flu is completely wrong and misguided.
And I guess the numbers will show us if they really are getting record profits. That you know, paints a little different picture than what they're saying.
It's written for what it's worth. Counting foods in the country's largest distributor and distributor and producer of eggs. I believe their profits so this quarter are three hundred forty two percent compared to last year. That's in their SEC filings. They've disclosed that, but not hiding that fact.
ABC's Peter Haralambus, thank you so much.
We'll talk to you again soon.
Thanks so much, Avery thinking.
Do you know how long it took me to learn how to say his name?
About as long as col Shriver. If you've been listening to Wake Up Call, you know.
Okay, let's get back to some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom.
More rain is in the forecast this week.
The National Weather Services two systems are going to be moving through southern California. Meteorologist Mike Wafford tells KFI the first system could bring some light rain tomorrow.
The strongest period for US is going to be Wednesday night and the Thursday morning. That's when we'll see the heaviest rain and potentially some rain rates that could be a problematic for some of the burn areas.
Colder temperatures are also in the forecast this week. The head of the LA Department of Water and Powers asking for seven hundred thousand dollars for security.
The Chief Meditan, the chief Engineer, cited threats made against her since the Palisades fire earlier this year. Her department's been criticized over the state of water infrastructure in the city at the time of the fire and the manner in which it responded to the crisis.
K if Ice Tammy Trujillo says the utility board is set to vote tomorrow on a security contract for general manager. General Manager Jennie Kinyonis. A fourteen year old boy has been stabbed in a parking lot during a carnival in Anaheim. Police are trying to figure out what led to the attack last night. They say the teen's injuries are not believed to be life threatening. He was taken to the hospital. One person was detained. A Hindu temple in Chino Hills
has been vandalized. The San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department says the graffiti was discovered on Saturday. The messages, disparaging the Prime Minister of India, among other things, were political in nature. The at taggers spray painted a marble sign, a brick wall and the sidewalk. The graffiti had been removed by Sunday morning. Ukrainian President Zelenski's arrived in Saudi Arabia for
talks on ending the war with Russia. Ross Cullen reports Zelensky is meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salmon.
And that attention will turn to the crucial face to face meetings scheduled for Tuesday between the United States and Ukraine looking at a possible framework for a truce, ceasefire, and potential future peace negotiations with Russia.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio is going to lead the US team. President Trump says he expects a lot of progress to be made this week. Many states in the US are in a race to get new power plants built as a way of keeping electricity prices down. Some of them dangling financial incentives. Others are loosening up regulations to attract power companies. The Electric Power Supply Association, which represents power plant owners, says it hasn't seen anything like
this before. Big Tech is buying up real estate to build power plants to generate electricity for artificial intelligence data centers. Our very own Jim Bryan was telling us that those the data centers need a lot a lot of power. Hey, you know what you need? You need to get ready to go for a walk with us. It's time for the Wiggle Waggle Walk. It's actually not quite time, but
it's coming up in less than a month. It's on April sixth at Brookside Park at the Rose Bowl, and we would love for you to join us for the Wiggle Waggle Walk and Run for Pasadena Humane.
They do such great work for our furry friends.
It starts at eight o'clock and then the run and walk starts at nine o'clock. There's vendors, food trucks, training demonstration, a dog costume contest, and of course we'll have the KFI booth there and you can get exclusive KFI swag, but quantities are limited first three hundred only. We would love for you to come and join us walk on the KFI team.
That would be great. Where the wake Up Call Wigglers.
If you can't join us at day, you can still donate and help us reach our goal ten thousand dollars not too bad.
Not with that not outside of reach.
And it's a great way to start your day on a Sunday morning. It's beautiful. You walk around the Rose Bowl. You get to see all kinds of dogs, whether you have a dog or not. It's just a great, great thing to come do. So, if you'd like to join us for the Wiggle Waggle, walk to KFIAM six forty dot com slash Wiggle KFIAM six forty dot com slash Wiggle and you can join the wake Up Call Wigglers. We'd love to have you come walk with us again.
It is Sunday, April sixth at the Rose Bowl. The deadline to apply for FEMA assistance for wildfire victims has been extended. Residents whose homes were damaged or destroyed in the fires and Pacific Palisades and Altadena. We're facing a deadline of midnight tonight, but that has been pushed back to March thirty.
First.
FEMA grants can be used to pay rent, pay for temporary housing, home repairs, property losses, and other things. The FEMA grants do not have to be paid back. Republicans have unveiled the spending bill to keep the government funded through September. The bill cuts non defense spending and boosts defense spending. The bill has to be passed by Friday to prevent a partial government shutdown. The sci fi comedy thriller Mickey seventeen has landed in first place at the
box office. The Robert Pattinson movie about a guy who dies over and over and then his remade, took in just over nineteen million dollars. It cost one hundred and eighteen million to make. At six o five Tendle on the news, why the head of DWP wants the city to spend seven hundred thousand dollars on her? Right now, let's say good morning too, ABC's Jim Ryan. Jim, you have some good news for us in spite of all this weird bad health news about I did bird flu and measles.
Yeah, I saw Mickey seventeen yesterday. He did pretty good.
Was it really a little long?
They could have lopped it off in a few places, But it's it's a pretty cool movie. I like it. It's fun.
It's supposed to. I heard it's a comedy.
It is. It's a I'd call it a black comedy.
Okay.
So there we go. Good news about seasonal flu, not bird flu, not measles.
I thought we had good bird flu news.
Not really. Well, yeah, I think they're they're Yeah, we're still lost. I mean, look at egg prices. They're at record highs. They went down a little last week, but still they're historically high. The good news is that flu season appears to have peaked around the country. The CDC is reporting fewer cases to your positive tests. Clinical lab tests are nineteen percent lower than they were the week before, and that's good. There are still some places around the
country that have a higher than normal flu rate. Oregon to your North Washington state, Idaho still pretty high. Yeah, it is low levels in Nevada and California somewhere in the middle with a moderate caseload of influenza, and even there it's beginning to go down. So now we appear to have made it through another flu season.
So traditionally, is this about the time of year that flu season kind of winds down or is it earlier late this year.
A little bit late, just a little bit late before it starts to back down just a bit. A couple of years with twenty one twenty two, it didn't peak until May, it didn't go up until May, and then it went down pretty dramatically from there. But yeah, this year, we're just a little little behind schedule in terms of when it normally peaks. But I mean, we worry about the measles, the West Texas measles outbreak. Almost two hundred people have gotten sick from that and two people have died,
you know, the avian flu. I think only one person that has died from avian flu, you know, beyond all the birds that have been destroyed and the cows that have gotten sick. But look at flu seasonal flu. It's one we kind of don't think about forty million influenza cases this year, according to the CDC, forty million, including more than five hundred thousand hospitalizations. Twenty two thousand people have died of flu this year.
That's crazy and you know what, and I know that, like we get a usually we'll find out, hey, the first flu death of the year happened. But then it just happens apparently so often, and it's so common that we just kind of don't even it doesn't even hit like the newswires.
I know, you know it's true, and it's kind of the forgotten problem out there, the health problem. So it's so important to get your flu shot. It's one that affects primarily middle aged, older people with the serious consequences. I mean, if the twenty two thousand people who have died during this flu cycle, according to the CDC, one hundred and fourteen have been pediatric desk so children. So yeah, yeah, mainly older people, mainly older.
What is it that kills you?
It's the lung stuff that follows it, the lung infection, the potential pneumonia, the things that come with the flu that affect older people in a much more severe way than younger people.
Okay, well, we're happy about the good news that the flu seasons. He'll take it, and then we'll look forward to talking to you when you tell us that bird flu and mesos are going away too.
It could be a little while.
All right, ABC's Jim Ryan, thanks so much to you.
All Right, time to get in your business as we do every day on wake up Call with Bloomberg's Courtney Donahoe.
Morning, Courtney, good Monday morning to you.
Okay, let's get started with stock markets, because it was quite the roller coaster ride even on Friday, with stocks bouncing up and down, and because of all this tariff talk. Are we expecting the wild ride to continue this week?
Oh, no doubt about it, and we're seeing it this morning. So traders all last week they were trying to make sense about a number of headlines around tariff. So on Friday we did see stocks hire. The Dow rose two hundred and twenty three points. But even though Friday saw games, it was the worst week for stocks in September. Now this morning, we are seeing S and P futures tumbling one percent. Dow future is down four hundred and eighty
five points at this hour. So if it opened up right now, if the Dow, if the markets were open right now, it'd be down about four hundred and eighty points. So we are racing for this tough start to the week. Not only the tariffs, but the federal workforce job cuts. That's raising the prospect of a slowdown in economic growth. And President Trump over the weekend scared the nervous Nelli's
here on Wall Street. He told Fox News that the economy faces a period of transition, and nobody on Wall Street they like certainty here on Wall Street.
Yeah, okay, here's something that's for certain I go to CVS a lot and get a lot of stuff there.
And you said that they're kind of changing.
Yes, they're preparing to open these smaller formats stores. So Shakeup's going to be coming. It's going to be a focus on pharmacies. So according to the Wall Street Journal, the downsize locations, they're still going to have health products like first aid, kids, cough syrup. However, grocery and beauty items from milk to nail polish that's going to go. Greeting cards gone. So the new stores, they're about half the size of the typical CBS location, but they're starting small.
Twelve of these small format stores will open over the next year.
Okay, so they're not closing the ones that they have, they're opening this new sort of streamline pharmacy centered store.
Well, CBS is closing a bunch of stores, and not all of them, not every single one, because they're trying to downsize their footprints. Real estate is expensive, and they've struggled in recent years from a number of things, including competition from discount retailers Amazon, and also you can't forget about the surge and theft where we see everything locked up. So they plan to close. Oh it's hard, and especially here in New York too. We see them all the time,
just as I'm sure you guys see in LA. But they planned to close about two hundred and seventy locations they planned, they planned this year. Eight hundred have been closed over the past three years, so a lot of local CBS's are shutting down.
All right, Bloomberg, Scortney, Donaho, thanks so much for the information. Let's get in your business again tomorrow, same time.
Definitely. I'll see you then.
All right, thank you.
Let's get back to some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. Jurors in the trial of an Orange County judge accused of killing his wife are due back today for another day of deliberations. This comes out they had previously said they were at an m pass but might be able to break the deadlock with more deliberations. They told the judge Friday they
were exhausted and asked to be excused at lunch. Jeffrey Ferguson has charged with second degree murder for fatally shooting his wife at their home in Anaheim Hills in twenty twenty three. He says it was an accident. The search is on for a forty five year old inmate who walked away from a re entry program facility in La herber Ramaswara is serving a three year sentence for robbery. Officials say they were alerted yesterday that he'd walked away.
He was last seen near Wiltshire Boulevard in South Bonnie Bray Street in Westlake. Four LA County Sheriff's deputies have been heard in an attack on the men's Central Jail Downtown. They were assaulted yesterday during what the Sheriff's department called a routine inmate movement. All four deputies were taken to the hospital. One has a puncture type injury. Officials say the inmates involved were also medically evaluated and remained in custody,
and that a jail made weapon was recovered. Eight people have been hurt when a car crashed into a carmac showroom in Inglewood. Bully say a customer had taken his car in to get an estimate on Saturday, apparently didn't like the quote that he got didn't have the value he expected, so he got upset and drove it right into the showroom, sending customers and workers scrambling. The guy drove away, but then ended up turning himself in a
short time later at an LAPD station. After pausing most tariffs against Mexico and Canada until April second, the President says he could be ready to impose tariffs on Canadian dairy and lumber as soon as today. He says it's in response to the high tax Canada puts on American products. A man's been arrested after leading police on a chase through several cities in Orange County and ramming at least
two police cruisers. Bully said the chase started yesterday and Garden Grove when police tried to pull a guy over who was driving a suspected stolen car. A Canite unit had to be called dan when the guy refused to surrender. We're just minutes away from handle on the news this morning. Republicans have a plan to keep the lights on in Washington. Can they get it passed without the Democrats? That's the big question right now.
Let's say good morning too.
The senior VP for Public and Government Affairs at the Specialty Equipment Marketing Association, it's Karen Bailey Chapman.
Good morning, Karen, Good morning, and happy Monday.
If you can call it a happy Monday. I agree.
Yeah, okay, So Karen, before we dive in, because we're gonna be talking about EV's and EV mandates, I really quickly just to familiarize people with what your group does.
What does your group do?
So we are the Specialty Equipment Market Association, probably best known for the SEMA Show, which is the largest automotive gathering that takes place in Las Vegas every November. What we do is we represent the manufacturers, retailers, and distributors
of aftermarket seculty, aftermarket automotive parts. So everything you do to your vehicle after you've bought it because you want to make it faster, improve the engine performance, or make it cooler looking, list it, lower it, all of the fun stuff people love to do to customize their vehicle. Those are the parts that we make. We represent fifty two billion dollars in retail sales annually as well as employee one point three million Americans.
Okay, so now that helps us a lot as we jump into this. So your group is for moving to a cleaner car industry, but your group is not for EV mandates? And which are there are several that are you know they're looming? And why why are you against the EV mandates?
We believe that government should remain technology neutral when it comes to our vehicles, not only because we believe that innovation, as it's already been proven, can continue to improve emissions out of our vehicles just based on the technology and innovation that we have, but also to protect consumers so that they have the ability to purchase and have available
to purchase the vehicles that best suit their needs. Whether you live in the rural community or you live in an urban or suburban areas, So all consumers have different needs, and we have the ability to do things with our vehicles and innovate to cleaner emissions. But government, we believe, should stay stay out of telling us what to do and allow the marketplace and the innovators to accomplish accomplish the goals.
Okay, So you're basically saying that the private sector is going to get there, but you've got to give You've got to let them do it on their own timetable and not force it by saying you must do like California has done saying new cars have to be electric or hybrid by twenty thirty five.
Exactly.
I think we've as an automotive industry, have proven that we've been able to do more with less over the over one hundred years that the internal combustion engine has been around in the marketplace. So I think we have a track record to prove that we're able to do that. So let us keep doing that. We believe that evs are part of our future, but they're not the only future.
Okay.
And Karen, you say that small businesses might not be able to shift to the EV industry fast enough. Which small businesses are you talking about the ones who trick out the cars?
Well, that's actually our industry. Ninety five percent of our membership is small businesses. And so when you think about small business that makes parts for engines, that modifies engines, or any part of that powertrain it's not simply just shifting over. So many people like to say that, oh, you should just transition. Well, if you make mufflers, or you make intakes, or you make pistons, or you make anything that's in that powertrain, those don't exist on an EV.
And so you know, you're looking at entire swaths of the us E commune, especially the autumn motive sector, simply just going away.
Right, Because we were talking about I can't remember what it was, it Hurts or something got a huge fleet of electric vehicles, and they said because they don't have any maintenance.
Right, But then that's same. I don't know if it was Hurts or one of the other rental car agencies have also now been divesting of the vehicles as well, for a couple of different reasons. But yeah, they've also been divesting of that fleet.
And I think part of that was because if there was damage, you have to basically replace the car. You can't fix the car like a mechanic can fix the car. That's not really an option.
Yeah, exactly, Okay, exactly, And even look at what just happened in the wildfires in the LA area. How many people that were in those impacted areas saw evs that were burned up on the side of the road that law enforcement and emergency services couldn't just simply tow it away. They had to have special handling in order to remove them from the affected areas. So I think that right there is a proof and point in the LA area.
Okay, so you're lobbying Congress to like say, hey, you guys, hands off, just let us get there on our own. Don't slap these mandates on.
Exactly.
So you've got California that passed a rule that is putting this in place, the twenty thirty five ban on the gas and diesel vehicles. But the thing is, but under federal law, they have to get approval by the EPA. So in the days before the Biden administration left, their EPA went and signed off on this waiver. The issue that we really have with California's rule is the fact that eleven other states have signed on to follow it, and that's about forty percent of the American marketplace that
are going to be under California's rule. California's exemption that was given to them in the Federal Claim Air Act was supposed to be for California only not California plus forty percent.
So well, California always says it sort of leads the nation. So are you going to Congress then to basically try to get something passed so that they can't do these mandates.
Yeah.
So one of the things there's always, obviously in Washington, there's always a million different procedur rule ways to do things. And so one of the things that we're pushing for right now is with called the Congressional Review Act and what it does that allows Congress to issue an approval or disapproval of a federal agency's rule.
So in the case of.
The EPA approving the California van, it has been transmitted by the current EPA to Congress, which starts a sixty day window for Congress to issue a disapproval or what that's what we're asking them to do, is to issue a disapproval of this rule that California has put in place.
Not only will it stop this internal combustion engine ban that California has put forward for forty percent of the country, but also it's going to be one of the first times in a very, very, very long time that Congress is going to be able to really kind of tell California what is not allowed under federal law.
Okay, Karen Bailey Chapman with SEMA. I would love to check in with you as we get closer and to hearing a decision on this, because I mean, it affects so many of us, you know, so hopefully.
Letely absolutely would.
Love to all right, well, we'll plan on talking to you again and we'll be watching what happens. Sema, Senior Vice President of Republican Government Affairs. Karen Bailey Chapman, thank you, thank you.
All right?
So interesting, right, because so many people are getting them and then but it's like the sales have sort of leveled off as people are like maybe I don't want that, and hybrids are becoming the thing. But I didn't even think of the residuals of that of banning the EV's or not banning EV's, but banning the gas powered engines, and how that literally could put just hundreds of thousands of mechanics out of businesses.
Interesting.
I mean, you're gonna have them because you'll have the old cars, but as that phase is out, where are they?
Where do they go? All Right, Innovation, it's a wonderful thing. Isn't it hey?
This is KFI and KOSTHD two Los Angeles, Orange County Southland Weather from KFI. The storm rolling in he is taken a little longer than expected, which means we get another day of sunshine, highs in the sixties to mid seventies, clouding up tonight with a chance of showers after midnight.
Rain on the way tomorrow.
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