On 5 March, the American city of Los Angeles held the primary elections to its city council. Four races were won in the primary, while three needed a runoff.
The facts
The Los Angeles City Council has fifteen members, that are elected on staggered four-year terms. Seven seats are up for grabs at this date. The elections are nonpartisan, with party affiliation not listed on the ballot paper. If no candidate recieves a majority in the first round, the top two advance to a runoff held on 5 November.
Los Angeles factfile
- Population: 3.9 million (2020)
- Religions: Christianity 65.0% (Catholicism 32.0%, Protestantism 30.0%, Other 3.0%), None 25.0%, Judaism 3.0%, Islam 2.0%, Buddhism 2.0%, Hinduism 1.0%, Other 1.0% (2014)
- Ethnicities: Hispanic or Latino 47.5% (including Mexicans, Salvadorans, and others), Non-Hispanic White 29.4% (including British, Italian, and German ancestry), Asian 10.7% (Including Chinese, Filipinos, and others), Black or African American 9.8% (Including African-Americans and recent African and Caribbean immigrants), Two or more races 2.8%, Native American 0.5%, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander 0.2%,
- Political system: strong mayor-council city in a federal presidential republic
- Freedom in the World 2024 score: N/A, United States score: 83/100 (Free)
Despite the fact the elections are officially nonpartisan, records are still kept on the political balance of the council. Fourteen of the fifteen members belong to the liberal Democratic Party, and one is an independent.
Seven districts (those with even numbers) were up for grabs. In addition, education board elections, and a ballot measure (referendum) to mandate the HLA (Healthy Streets LA) plan to pedestrianise the city was held on the same date.
District 2 saw the term-limiting of incumbent Paul Krekorian. A Democrat, Kerkorian was a lawyer by profession before entering politics on the school board. After that, he was elected to the 43rd district seat in California’s State Assembly (lower house) in 2006. He served until he took office in 2010 on the LA Council for District 2, with the election taking place in 2009. In 2022, he was elected President of the Council.
Seven candidates ran to replace Krekorian. Rudy Melendez is an artist, with mental health worker Jon-Paul Bird in the running. Jillian Burgos is on the local neighbourhood council, while Marine Ghandilyan is a lawyer. Manuel Gonez is a director of an environmental group, while Sam Kbushyan is on the respiratory care board. Adrin Nazarian was the most politically well-known candidate, having been a Democratic member of the State Assembly for the 46th district from 2012 to 2022, when he stepped down to target this seat.
Nazarian had the endorsement of Krekorian and two other councillors, as well as incumbent Mayor Karen Bass and Sheriff Robert Luna. He also had the endorsement of the Los Angeles Times and the well-known federal representative from California Adam Schiff. Burgos and Gonez also picked up endorsements, the former from City Controller Kenneth Mejia and the local branch of notable progressive group Our Revolution, and the latter from two former local politicians.
In District 4, the incumbent Nithya Raman was running for re-election. A Democrat formerly involved in nonprofits focusing on homelessness and sexual harassment, she was elected to the seat in 2020. Her opponents are neighbourhood councillor Levon Baronian and neighbourhood prosecutor Ethan Weaver.
Raman recieved the endorsement of Bass, four other councillors, the LA Times, federal Representative Brad Sherman, and the local branches of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and Working Families Party (WFP), two left-wing organisations. Weaver also earned the endorsement of one former councillor.
District 6 saw incumbent Imelda Padilla standing again. A Democrat, she was elected in a 2023 special election, being a deputy of the incumbent councillor before that. She faced two challengers, with Ely De La Cruz Ayao working in real estate and Carmenlina Minasova working in respiratory care.
Padilla received the LA Times and the Los Angeles Daily News endorsements.
District 8 also saw the incumbent run again. That was Marqueece Harris-Dawson, a Democrat first elected in 2015. In 2023, he was elected President pro tempore of the City Council. He has two opponents: Jahan Epps, who works in real estate, and Cliff Smith, a roofer involved with unions. Harris-Dawson received the endorsement of Bass, federal Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove, and the LA Times.
District 10 was another in which the incumbent stood for re-election. Democrat Heather Hutt was appointed to the council in 2022 after a legal case stopped the first appointee from attending. An appointee was needed because the incumbent was being tried for corruption This lasted until 2023, when the incumbent was convincted, and thus expelled rather than temporarily suspended, meaning Hutt’s appointment as a temporary member ended. However, a few days later, she was then re-appointed to finish the term. Four candidates stood against Hutt. These included 2020 runner-up and attorney Grace Yoo, former water and power commissioner and third place in 2020 Aura Vasquez, pastor Eddie Anderson, and Reggie Jones-Sawyer. Jones-Sawyer is a longtime Democratic member of the California state assembly, having first being elected in 2012 for the 59th district, serving until 2022 when he was redistricted to the 57th.
Anderson received the LA Times endorsement, and that of the California WFP, while Hutt received that of Bass. Jones-Sawyer was endorsed by the state’s Attorney General Rob Bonta as well as Schiff, while Vasquez received the endorsement of two people who have served in California’s legislature. Yoo was endorsed by incumbent City Controller Laura Chick.
The 12th district saw incumbent John Lee run for re-election. A staffer for an incumbent member who was then convicted for corruption, Lee was elected in the 2019 special election, when he was a member of the right-wing Republican Party. However, in 2020 he left the party to become an independent. His only challenger is nonprofit worker Serena Oberstein.
Lee received the LA Daily News endorsement, while Oberstein received that of the LA Times.
In District 14, incumbent Kevin de León is running for re-election. A Democrat with a union and political background, he was first elected to the California State Assembly for the 45th district in 2006, serving until 2010, when he was elected to the California State Senate for the 22nd district. In 2014, he became President pro tempore (leader) of the body, and was also redistricted to the 24th district. He served as President pro tempore until 2018, and did not run for re-election in 2018, instead unsuccessfully running for the federal Senate. In 2020, he was elected councillor. Seven candidates run against him. Wendy Carrillo, who formerly worked on progressive media organisations, is a Democratic member of the California State Assembly, being elected to the 51st district seat in a 2017 special election and was redistricted to the 52nd in 2022. Nadine Diaz is a social worker, while Genny Guerrero is an entrepreneur. Teresa Hillery leads the county Bar Association, while Ysabel Jurado is an attorney. Miguel Santiago is a Democratic member of the California Assembly, having represented the 53rd district from 2014 to 2022, when he was redistricted to the 54th. Finally, Eduardo “Lalo” Vargas is a teacher.
Carillo was endorsed by state Treasurer Fiona Ma, former State Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, and former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. Ysabel Jurdao picked up the endorsement of another councillor, while Santiago was endorsed by current Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and the LA Times. Vargas was supported by a number of left-wing groups.
In District 2, Adrin Nazarian picked up 14,033 votes (37.2%) and Jillian Burgos won 8,430 (22.3%). These two will have a run-off election on 5 November. Sam Kbushyan won 5,561 votes (14.7%) and Manuel Gonez took 4,613 (12.2%). Jon-Paul Bird received 2,685 votes (7.1%), with Rudy Melendez on 1,406 (3.7%) and Marin Ghandilyan taking 1,012 (2.7%).
In District 4, Nithya Raman received 32,562 votes (50.7%) and was re-elected without a need for a run-off. Ethan Weaver won 24,799 (38.6%) and Levon Baronion 6,899 (10.7%).
In District 6, Imelda Padilla won 16,476 votes (78.4%) and was re-elected without a runoff. Ely De La Cruz Ayao won 2,485 (11.8%) and Carmenlina Minasova won 2,067 (9.8%).
In District 8, Marqueece Harris-Dawson took 19,569 votes (78.4%) and avoided a runoff. Cliff Smith took 3,617 (14.5%) and Jahan Epps 1,771 (7.1%).
In District 10, Heather Hutt won 13,449 votes (37.8%), with Grace Yoo on 8,257 (23.1%), necessitating a runoff. Eddie Anderson took 6,846 votes (19.2%), with Aura Vasquez winning 5,006 (14.0%) and Reggie Jones-Sawyer taking 2,119 (5.9%).
In District 12, John Lee avoided a runoff with 33,574 votes (62.3%). Serena Oberstein won 20,314 (37.7%).
In District 14, Ysabel Jurado took 8,618 votes (24.5%), while Kevin de León won 8,220 (23.4%). Those two will head to a runoff. Miguel Santiago won 7,470 votes (21.3%), while Wendy Carrillo took 5,321 (15.1%). Eduardo “Lalo” Vargas won 1,638 (4.7%), with Teresa Hillery on 1,519 (4.3%). Genny Guerrero took 1,457 (4.2%) with Nadine Diaz on 904 (2.6%).
In the education board race, two incumbents were re-elected and two open seats went to runoffs. The ballot measure passed with 65.5% support.
Analysis
The bitterly fought races are common in the United States’ city politics, even though the candidates would probably be allies at every level. With fourteen Democrats out of fifteen members, the only Republican to be elected quickly left the party to become an independent after securing a seat. Los Angeles is the second largest city in the country, sitting in the deep blue state of California. In fact, the top six cities all have Democratic mayors: New York City (New York), LA, Chicago (Illinois), Houston (Texas), Phoenix (Arizona), and Philadelphia (Pennsylvania). In the top thirty there are only three with Republican mayors: Dallas (Texas), Fort Worth (Texas), and Oklahoma City (Oklahoma).
Democratic support is perhaps reaching a peak in urban areas. The Democrats are seen as the party for minority populations, which are more common in cities, as well as the young, educated, LGBT, and so on: all more likely to be city dwellers. California has been a Democratic state for some time now. Previously a close state (but not quite a bellweather), California massively switched to the Democrats under Franklin D. Roosevelt (Franklin Delano Roosevelt), who won four elections in 1932, 1936, 1940 and 1944. Harry S. Truman (the S did not stand for anything) managed to hold onto the state to win an upset victory in 1948, but war hero Dwight D. Eisenhower (Dwight David Eisenhower) flipped it red in his 1952 and 1956 landslides easily. These would be the first two elections in a run of nine out of ten wins for the red team, with only Lyndon B. Johnson (Lyndon Baines Johnson’s) 1964 landslide being the exception (this included Democratic national wins in 1960 and 1976). In 1992, Democrat Bill Clinton took the state in a three-man race with the Republican incumbent George H. W. Bush (George Herbert Walker Bush) and independent businessman Ross Perot. After that, California, much like New York, became a safe Democratic state, and the Democratic total went up at every presidential election since apart from 2012: in 2020, Joe Biden won 63.5% of the vote, the most of any candidate since Roosevelt in 1936, and the most total votes of any candidate in any state ever (California is the most populous in the Union). In Los Angeles County, which contains the city of LA, Biden won 71.0%. Notably, there was a demographic difference: white people were split about 50-50, while minorities were generally about 3:1 in favour of Biden.
Thus, the city was shocked when its progressive, nearly all-Democratic council saw the leak of three members recorded using racist comments. This took place at the office a local union, whose President Ron Herrera was also in the recording. The three members were Nury Martinez (District 6), who was President of the Council, Kevin de León (District 14), and Gil Cedillo (District 1). Cedillo had lost his seat in the 2022 election anyway and was outgoing. Nury Martinez resigned, but the other two did not despite calls going right to the top, with Biden demanding their resignation. Martinez was replaced by Imelda Padilla in a 2023 special election. Cedillo refused to resign, referring to the calls as “cancel culture”. Meanwhile, de Léon did not do so, is running for re-election, and even fought with protestors who demanded he step down.
District 2 saw term limits applied to Paul Krekorian, who is of Armenian heritage. In the recording, insensitive remarks were given about one of his advisors in relation to that. Another one of his advisors and Krekorian’s preferred successor, Adrin Nazarian (also of Armenia descent), who chaired the legislative assembly’s Armenian Caucus was top candidate, but could not avoid the runoff despite the endorsement of many key Democrats such as Bass and Rep. Adam Schiff (CA-30), who rose to notoriety for his role in the first impeachment of Republican President Donald Trump. Left-winger Jillian Burgos will face him in the runoff. This represents the main split in the Democratic Party. In 2016, Hillary Clinton, the wife of Bill Clinton, was considered the main Democratic candidate for President. Herself a seasoned politician, she was defeated in the 2008 primary by relative newcomer Barack Obama, and served as Secretary of State in Obama’s first term before stepping down to prepare a 2016 role. With her place as an “annointed successor” likely, the challenge from the US’s most left-wing senator Bernie Sanders led to a bitter battle, and after Clinton lost to Trump, both sides blamed each other. Although they agree on many things, and the direction Trump took led to them co-operating more against what they see as a larger enemy, in many places where the Republicans aren’t a force (such as big cities like LA), the intra-party fight takes centre stage.
In District 4, Nithya Raman just got over the line to avoid a run-off. She defeated an incumbent, David Ryu, in 2020, and is popular amongst the Democratic political establishment, and comes from the left side of the party. However, in the audio recording, Martinez, de León,
District 6 had only had its special election last year, with Padilla coming through a narrow race. There seemed to be no appetite for another big campaign and Padilla won easily. In District 8, popular incumbent Marqueece Harris-Dawson was re-elected easily. District 10 has been more troubled recently. In 2020, Mark Ridley-Thomas was elected to the council, having been a well-known Democratic politician in city, county, and state politics for three decades. However, he was suspended in 2021 for corruption, expelled in 2022, and later convicted. Herb Wesson, who preceeded Ridley-Thomas as councillor, was appointed as interim member during the suspension. However, Wesson was term-limited and therefore his appointment was not allowed. Finally, he was replaced by Heather Hutt. Hutt needs a runoff to beat Grace Yoo, who forced Ridley-Thomas to a runoff in 2020 as well. Hutt was mentioned in the recording as being favoured by Martinez as someone who would work in her interests.
District 12 is the only one held by a non-Democrat in the city. Mitchell Englander was the only Republican (and non-Democrat) on the council when he was re-elected unopposed in 2015, but stepped down to enter the private sector in 2018 (he was later convicted of corruption). In the 2019 special election, Lee won to keep the only red seat red, but Lee then left the Republicans to become an independent. The 2020 election was very close, with Lee beating his sole opponent with just 50.6% of the vote, but he did much better this time. Lee has been charged by an ethics commission (but not a court) of being involved in Englander’s corruption involving a trip to Las Vegas (Nevada), but has denied it and sued the commission.
Finally, District 14 is that of Kevin de León. De León managed to stay in office, unlike Martinez (who resigned) and Cedillo who was already a lame duck. Much of the most insensitive comments were uttered by Martinez. The discussion centered on plans to gerrymander districts to include more Latino ones and less black ones. Martinez stated that the District Attorney was “with the blacks”, and insulted a fellow councillor’s adopted black child, calling him a “little monkey” (in Spanish) and said “he needs a beatdown”. She referred to Koreans as “so ugly” (in Spanish) and “short little dark people”, and said that Jews were “gonna screw everyone else”. However, de León was still criticised heavily, especially after he got into an altercation with a protestor. De León has always been considered an ambitious politician, leading the State Senate at one point and running against an incumbent Democrat (Dianne Feinstein) for the US Senate in Washington, D. C. Therefore, he did not want to give up his political career, but despite making a runoff, has his work cut out with just 23.4% of the first-round vote and was lucky the opposition was so split. Considering what LA is:, the most important country in the world’s second largest city, the level of scandals and corruption is remarkable. However, despite all this, the political makeup as a completely blue city will not change any time soon.
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