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Los Angeles’ Democratic mayoral candidates were torched by residents after a debate night in America’s second-most populous city that one voter described as “disgraceful.”
Besides being home to Hollywood, Los Angeles is one of America’s most economically important cities. The city, however, has struggled with recent fires, rising living costs, homelessness and outmigration. Those problems have fueled a particularly contentious mayoral race this year, which included a surprisingly competitive but ultimately unsuccessful bid by Republican Spencer Pratt.
With Pratt out of the race, Democrats Karen Bass, the incumbent, and Nithya Raman, a democratic socialist city council member, are locked in a competitive and bitter runoff for Los Angeles mayor. During last week’s debate, Bass and Raman traded personal attacks and insults, leaving some voters frustrated over what solutions the candidates could offer.
After the debate, voter Stacey Segarra Bohlinger told Fox News Digital she believes Bass and Raman are “both bad” and said, “I wish they could both lose.”
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Bohlinger, who until July served as a committee member on the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council, said that although she was initially “a huge champion” for Raman, “I don’t see substantive differences between the two of them.”
Bohlinger said Raman “reneged on a lot of the initial campaign promises she made” and also criticized the councilwoman’s approach to homelessness, which she described as “a very capitalist approach to what she thinks solving the issue of homelessness is.”
Regarding criticism of Bass, Bohlinger said, “I also agree with a lot of what said about the city not being in a good place right now.”
“She responded really terribly to the Palisades fires. She did not respond well to the Lineage fires,” she said, concluding, “I don’t have much good to say about either of them.”
Asked about her top issue, Bohlinger said the Los Angeles government “has a long sort of history of immense corruption.”
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“If you look up, you know, recent Los Angeles officials who have conviction records for corruption, it’s a really long list. So, I think along with the housing affordability issue [is] accessibility, transparency, more accountability, less corruption,” she said, adding, “We have a lot of sort of political dynasties in the city, and I think that’s a real fly in the ointment. I don’t think much is going to change until the corruption is dealt with.”
Meanwhile, Wayne Spindler, an Encino resident and regular City Hall critic, told Fox News Digital that “a lot of people … are upset.”
“They don’t like either one of them. And a lot of them are going to walk out of this [debate] and not vote,” he said.
Based on the debate, Spindler predicted the election is “going to be close” because “There was not a lot of enthusiasm.”
He said he will be voting for Raman, saying, “What I tell people is you got to go for one of the two.”
“You can’t write in Spencer [Pratt]. Spencer would have been the dream come true. That would have been amazing,” he said.
Another debate attendee, Gregory Wright, a committee member on the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council, told Fox News Digital that “for me it’s more important that Democrats win whatever part of the Democratic spectrum they’re in.”
“I am in favor of visionary ideas for the future,” he said, adding, “I think socialism is the right direction for the entire world.”
After the debate, Fox News Digital contacted the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council, which co-hosted the event, for comment. Council President Howard Katchen clarified that “the comments by Stacey Segarra Bohlinger and Gregory Wright are their opinions as individuals and do not represent the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council.”
Katchen reiterated that the two spoke as individuals and that their comments did not represent the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council. He called the debate a “success as determined by over 400 attendees, over 700 virtual viewers, NPR LAist live broadcast to what I was told over 500,000 listeners and covered by local, state, national and international media outlets.” He also clarified that “Neighborhood Councils don’t endorse candidates for elected office.”
Joey Tuccio, an animal rights advocate who previously supported Pratt publicly, told Fox News Digital he was outraged after the debate. Referring to his work helping animals and people on Skid Row, he said, “We are doing their job.”
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“We’ve been catering Skid Row for years for free. We’ve got no support from the city. We have rescued over 150 animals. My rescue partner rescued a seven-year-old child that was being sex trafficked by his father. And Karen’s office just said that they are avoiding us because we are ‘haters,’” he said. “I think that is one of the most disgusting things I’ve ever heard in my life, and it’s disgraceful.”
He said that, for now, “I’m going to be not supporting either of them.”
Asked what he is looking for in a candidate, Tuccio said, “We want people that will enforce laws.”
“Specifically on Skid Row, every day, every time we go, we see somebody overdosing, we see dogs that are abandoned, we see children without their parents, and we see good people living on the streets that are so scared,” he said, adding, “It is lawless, and it’s not getting better.”
“People are being robbed there, people are being attacked, people are getting murdered,” he continued. “There’s people hanging themselves … people dying and rotting before anybody finds them. And from the animal side, there are animals that are left there for days and days starving to death. But then we get calls from caseworkers because they can’t get the support of the city.”
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“So, we need people to actually take the reins of this and stop pretending that everything is rainbows and unicorns because it’s not, and we have to have people that don’t ignore the problems.”
Fox News Digital contacted the Bass and Raman campaigns for comment.
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