Independent journalist Kevin Dahlgren reports from the aftermath of the Spokane fires. Three separate fires in the Spokane area burned over 15 square miles and forced tens of thousands to evacuate earlier this month. Police have one man in custody who admitted to starting one of the three fires.
On the Ground Discovery Institute Media is on the ground in Spokane, WA. Kevin Dahlgren is reporting from the frontlines of the devastating inferno that decimated hundreds of homes. An arson suspect is in custody. Follow us for the latest updates.
“This Fire Could Have Been Prevented” Sources say the inferno that torched the Centennial Mills building in Portland’s Pearl District over the weekend may have been caused by homeless squatters. Kevin Dahlgren and I have been reporting on the ground and talked to witnesses who watched in horror as the historic 116-year-old abandoned structure went up on flames.
Kevin Dahlgren appeared on Newsmax on July 22, 2026, alongside Harrison Baum to discuss the suffering and exploitation of the homeless in Skid Row. Dahlgren described Skid Row as one of the worst and most corrupt places he has ever been. It’s “the embodiment of radicalized policies run amok,” he explained.
This month on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Vice President JD Vance discussed Israel, Jeffrey Epstein, and aliens, topics that have lit up public conversation. Largely overlooked, however, were his thought-provoking remarks about America’s homelessness crisis, which highlight the harmful results of present policies in some of our largest cities and the need to enact new policies that prioritize restoring lives. Vance recalled attending an office Christmas party near Skid Row, the notorious 50-block area in downtown Los Angeles overcome by homelessness, illicit drug use, and crime. He described armed security and “gigantic walls” protecting the party. He told Joe Rogan that it reminded him of visiting the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. “Crazy wealth and status and privilege on the Read More ›
Independent journalist Kevin Dahlgren investigates the homeless situation in San Francisco’s Tenderloin and Mission neighborhoods. “The entire time I’ve been on the Tenderloin, I have interacted with hundreds of homeless people,” explains Dahlgren. “I have yet to encounter one outreach worker.”
For years, the political left has controlled the conversation around homelessness, addiction, and mental illness in most major West Coast cities. They control the nonprofits. They control the bureaucracies. They control the county commissions, the grant systems, the academic language, and most of the policy decisions. And yet the crisis keeps getting worse. That should tell us something. At some point, we have to stop judging these policies by their intentions and start judging them by their results. Because no matter how compassionate the language sounds, the outcome is obvious to anyone willing to walk the streets: more tents, more overdoses, more untreated mental illness, more open-air drug use, more crime, more suffering, and more people slowly dying in public. Read More ›
Unable to Intervene San Francisco: A Shoplifting Paradise for the homeless. I visited San Francisco to document the homelessness crisis and witnessed some of the most blatant shoplifting I’ve ever seen. Every store I entered, someone was actively stealing while security guards stood by, often appearing unable or unwilling to intervene. Shoplifters Openly Admit to Theft I interviewed several shoplifters afterward. Nearly all admitted they steal because they believe nobody will stop them. Only two said they planned to eat the food they took. Most intended to resell the merchandise. Hands Tied California treats theft under $950 as a misdemeanor, and many offenders clearly see that as a green light. Store employees and security guards repeatedly told me their hands Read More ›
Skid Row in Los Angeles stands as a stark example of what happens when ideology overrides reality. Spanning roughly fifty blocks, it is one of the most concentrated homeless zones in the United States, filled with people trapped in addiction and untreated, severe mental illness, often marked by psychosis — a loss of contact with reality. For years, Los Angeles has wrapped its homelessness policies in the language of empathy and housing justice. But Skid Row reveals a harsher truth. What exists there is not simply poverty. It is a concentration of addiction, untreated mental illness, disorder, and human collapse in one of America’s most visible zones of urban breakdown. Los Angeles has embraced Housing First, a model that places Read More ›
Dashed Hopes The support Mayor Katie Wilson once had among the homeless is fading faster than many expected. On the street, a different narrative is emerging, one that doesn’t match the optimism that followed her election. No Solutions Several people I spoke with say sweeps have actually increased since she took office, with little meaningful progress toward permanent solutions. For many, it feels like more movement without direction being pushed from block to block, but never off the street. What makes this shift more striking is who’s saying it. Broken Promises Many of the homeless individuals I interviewed identify as far left and were genuinely excited when Wilson was elected. They believed they were finally getting an ally in City Read More ›