FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Bill Maher is at home near Los Angeles. There are no fires. The sun is shining. The air-quality gauge says the air outside is good. This is not the kind of day that a man abandons his beloved California for Miami.
But the New York native acknowledges he came close to doing just that last year, weary from wildfire smoke, government regulation and COVID edicts.
“Just the fact that it’s on my mind, who has always loved California, will tell you that we have serious problems,” Maher says. “There’s an exodus from states that strike people — even liberal people — as overbearing. Tax-wise overbearing, regulation-wise, it’s insane what goes on here with regulations. I do understand this exodus.”
