Los Angeles Mayor 2022: Bass vs Caruso

[NewYorkExpress]

Bass is totally going to flame out against any competent candidate. Here's hoping someone like Hilda Solis jumps in.

[NewYorkExpress]

Joe Buscaino drops out, endorses Rick Caruso.

City Councilman Joe Buscaino on Thursday announced he is dropping out of the Los Angeles mayoral race and endorsing billionaire developer Rick Caruso.

"Rick and I agree on the playbook to solve the city's pressing issues," Buscaino said in a statement. "Today's decision did not come easy, but the future of Los Angeles is my priority. Together we will make Los Angeles cleaner and safer for all."

[NewYorkExpress]

We've got a poll of the closely watched Los Angeles County Sheriff's race from UC Berkeley.

Retired Long Beach Police Chief Robert Luna has an early edge over incumbent Alex Villanueva in the runoff for Los Angeles County sheriff, with support for the candidates falling largely along political lines, according to a new poll by UC Berkeley co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times.

Luna is favored strongly by liberals and Democrats, with 46% of voters who identify as strongly liberal saying they’d choose him and only 7% supporting Villanueva.

The sheriff, meanwhile, is more popular among conservative and Republican voters: 54% of voters who described themselves as strongly conservative said they’d vote to re-elect Villanueva if the election were held today. Only 13% said they’d select Luna.

“The question then, is where would you rather be?” said Mark DiCamillo, who directed the poll for Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies and has been surveying California voters for decades.

“In L.A. County, Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 3 to 1. Villanueva is not doing well among that huge constituency. That’s why I think in the early stages here, he’s got some problems.”

Overall, 31% of L.A. County voters support Luna, while 27% support Villanueva, poll results show.

[NewYorkExpress]

UC Berkeley has released a poll of the Mayor's race.

Rep. Karen Bass has built a double-digit lead in the Los Angeles mayor’s race with a little over two months to go until election day, firming up her base among the city’s Democratic voters and eroding Rick Caruso’s margin in the San Fernando Valley, a new poll shows.

Since beating Caruso in the June primary by 7 points, Bass has widened her advantage over the businessman to 43%-31%, with 24% undecided, according to a new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental studies poll, co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times.

Bass has consolidated support among liberal and Democratic voters, picking up the lion’s share of those who went for other candidates in the primary. She leads Caruso by nearly 2 to 1 among former supporters of Councilmember Kevin de León, who came in third in the primary, and wins overwhelmingly among backers of Gina Viola, the progressive activist who came in fourth.



Bass has also significantly narrowed the lead Caruso enjoyed in the Valley, the one region of the city the businessman won in the primary. The Valley accounted for 38% of ballots cast in the primary, and he won there by 7.5 percentage points. Now he’s up by just 2 points, according to the poll.

[NewYorkExpress]

Caruso under fire for claiming he's not White because he's Italian.

Los Angeles mayoral candidate Rick Caruso insisted he's not white, but really Italian — and thus "Latin" — during an awkward debate moment Tuesday in the nation's second-largest city.

The billionaire real estate developer Caruso is facing off against U.S. Rep. Karen Bass, a Democrat seeking to become the city's first Black woman mayor.

Next month's election comes in the wake of the L.A. City Council President Nury Martinez resigned from her position Wednesday after an audio recording of her making racist remarks surfaced.


In bringing up the ongoing scandal, Telemundo anchor Dunia Elvir stated: “The next mayor of Los Angeles will be either an African-American woman or a white man."

“I’m Italian,” Caruso interjected.

Elvir responded, “Italian American," as Caruso insisted that his racial identification be stated on his terms.

“That’s Latin, thank you,” Caruso said.

This has gotten panned on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/aretana/status/1580019103040823296

https://twitter.com/Pappiness/status/1580039939026083840