← Election Series · Down-ballot coverage · California

Endorses Bass

The race

Los Angeles chose its November finalists in the June 2, 2026 top-two primary, certified by the City Clerk: incumbent Mayor Karen Bass 292,593 votes (34.26%), Councilmember Nithya Raman 247,781 (29.01%), and Republican Spencer Pratt 217,977 (25.52%), eliminated. Fourteen candidates ran. The general election on November 3 is therefore Democrat against Democrat — a one-term incumbent against a challenger from her own coalition's left wing. Raman had endorsed Bass for reelection before entering the race herself at the filing deadline.

Karen Bass — Incumbent. Bass came to City Hall after the state Assembly (including as Speaker) and more than a decade in Congress. Her credits, as documented in the coverage below: homicides and violent crime at multi-decade lows on her watch — her campaign cites a 28% drop in homicides and a 50% decline in gang-related killings — and a budget adding 510 officers toward a 9,500-officer target; her Inside Safe program has moved people from encampments into motels and housing, and city data released in May 2026 showed street homelessness down roughly 17.5–18% over two years. Her dirt column is long and proven. She was in Ghana when the January 2025 Palisades Fire broke out; she had signed a budget cutting the Fire Department by $17.5 million months earlier after Fire Chief Kristin Crowley warned in writing on December 4, 2024 that the cut endangered response — Crowley was later fired and sued, alleging retaliation. Rebuilding has been slow: of roughly 7,000 destroyed Palisades homes, about 1,070 had rebuild permits ten months later per the accounting below. A court-ordered Alvarez & Marsal audit of $2.3 billion in homelessness spending could not determine how much was actually spent; Inside Safe has run about $3,300 per person per month in motel costs with roughly 40% of participants returning to the streets on the figures reported. The city ran a nearly $1 billion deficit in fiscal 2025-26, with Bass initially proposing 1,647 layoffs. She also drew backlash for backing a deal to delay the $30 hospitality minimum wage until after the 2028 Olympics. Some of the harshest single-source compilations of these figures are partisan; the fire absence, the audit, the deficit, and the permit pace are each corroborated across the sources below and are priced as proven.

Nithya Raman — Challenger. Raman, Council District 4 since December 2020, was the first Democratic Socialists of America-endorsed candidate to hold office in Los Angeles, is a DSA member, and is DSA-endorsed for mayor. That is not a label we apply loosely: by our standing rule, a candidate carrying the DSA's own program and endorsement is extremist-tier. Her record matches the program: she chaired the council's Housing and Homelessness Committee for about three years — the very portfolio she now runs against — voted against expanding the 41.18 anti-camping zones around schools and daycare centers, began her career calling to make LAPD "much smaller," and voted against the police compensation agreement. Her signature alternative to Inside Safe, the Time Limited Subsidy program, was funded at $62.6 million to lease 2,000 apartments; by June 25, per a July 1 presentation to her own committee, three units were occupied. Her office's counter-credits: more than 2,000 people brought into interim housing and 633 permanently housed in her district on her office's count, and the strongest tenant-protection package in decades — expanded just-cause eviction rules and the first Rent Stabilization Ordinance update in 40 years, passed under her committee leadership. Bass's closing attack is managerial: "It says something that you do not have strong working relationships with any of your colleagues. Not one."

Pros and cons

Bass: Pros: Executive experience at every level; violent crime at multi-decade lows with a budget that adds officers; measured street-homelessness declines; endorsements from Governor Newsom, Senators Schiff and Padilla, former Vice President Harris, the county Democratic Party, and the county Federation of Labor. Cons: The Palisades Fire file — absent abroad, a signed fire-department cut over her chief's written warning, a fired chief's retaliation suit, and a slow rebuild; a $2.3 billion homelessness audit that could not track the money; a nearly $1 billion deficit. Raman: Pros: A real district-level housing record on her office's numbers; landmark tenant legislation; major labor backing in the runoff (Carpenters, Unite Here Local 11) and a $1.2 million Streets for All PAC commitment. Cons: Extremist-tier by our rule — DSA member and endorsee running the DSA program; her own $62.6 million homelessness program housed three households in its first rollout; votes against anti-camping protections near schools and against police pay; the homelessness crisis deepened citywide under her committee chairmanship.

Record gaps

OUR CALL

Our call: endorse Karen Bass. We state the reasoning plainly because neither candidate is one of ours. Raman is extremist-tier under our standing rule — a DSA member carrying a socialist program for the second-largest city in America — and the rule's instruction is to endorse the viable alternative noting its flaws. Bass's flaws are documented at length above and they are serious: the fire, the audit, the deficit. They are failures of management inside a normal governing framework. Raman offers the framework itself as the problem and a committee record — three occupied units out of 2,000 promised — as the proof of concept. Los Angeles voters who want the city governed rather than re-founded have one choice on this ballot.

Vote Bass.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race, claim by claim — see the full coverage on our website. Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same. --- Sources — - City of Los Angeles, Office of the City Clerk — certification of the June 2, 2026 Primary Nominating Election (Bass 292,593 / 34.26%; Raman 247,781 / 29.01%; Pratt 217,977 / 25.52%) — https://cityclerk.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2026/26-1100_misc_clk_certification_6-29-26.pdf - Washington Examiner — "Los Angeles mayoral primary results: Spencer Pratt upstart campaign falls short" (Bass vulnerabilities incl. Palisades fire and the $30 wage delay) — https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/campaigns/state/4590328/los-angeles-mayoral-race-nithya-raman-karen-bass/ - New York Post — "LA blew $60M on homeless 'fix' — it housed just three units" (July 15, 2026; Raman's $62.6M Time Limited Subsidy, three occupied units) — https://nypost.com/2026/07/15/us-news/la-failed-homeless-program-cost-60m-and-only-housed-three-people/ - LA Public Press — "Nithya Raman shook up the LA mayor's race" (tenant-protection record, 41.18 votes, housing-first positions) — https://lapublicpress.org/2026/05/nithya-raman-la-mayor-race-2026-election/ - Council District 4 (Raman's office) — homelessness results claimed for her district (2,000+ into interim housing, 633 permanently housed) — https://cd4.lacity.gov/initiative/homelessness/ - Civic Intelligence — Karen Bass record compilation (partisan source; LAFD cut, Crowley warning, permit pace, audit figures — cross-checked against the reporting above) — https://civicintelligence.news/society/drain-the-swamp/karen-bass-la-record - Associated Press — "Democratic socialists surge in mayoral races" (Raman identified as a DSA member advancing to the LA runoff) — https://www.ap.org/news-highlights/elections/2026/democratic-socialists-surge-in-mayoral-races-across-the-country-as-anti-trump-fervor-rises/

Election result — November 4, 2026

Result pending. No verified call (Associated Press or official) as of November 4, 2026. This page will be updated when the race is called or certified. The original article above is unchanged.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

← Full down-ballot enumeration