The Thorn West is a state and local news roundup compiled by members of DSA-LA. Our goal is to provide a weekly update on the latest developments in state and local politics, and to track the issues that are most important to our membership.

The Thorn West is looking for writers. If you're interested, let us know at [email protected]!

Issue No. 130 - October 14, 2022

City Politics

• In a recorded conversation, which took place last year and leaked to the broader public on Sunday, Council President Nury Martinez and Councilmembers Gil Cedillo and Kevin de León can be heard discussing, with LA Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera, how to manipulate the city’s redistricting process to consolidate their own power and those of their ideological allies, while deliberately disenfranchising Black voters, renters, and their own perceived political opponents on the left. Throughout the conversation, the councilmembers make repeated anti-Black statements, and make numerous derogatory remarks about the city’s Oaxacan, Indigenous, LGBTQ+, AAPI, Jewish, and Armenian communities. The flagrant racism and corruption on display in the recordings provoked calls for the three councilmembers to resign. The calls began on Sunday and had become nearly unanimous by Monday, by which time even the White House had weighed in. As of today both Martinez and Herrera have stepped down from their positions, while Cedillo and De León have not. Coverage can be found in Knock LA, which was the first outlet to publish the recordings. LA Podcast also recorded their analysis. (Warning to anyone who plans to listen to the recording that the language and thoughts expressed are upsetting.)

• Melina Abdullah of Black Lives Matter LA, in an interview with Breakthrough News, puts this week’s revelations in the context of anti-Black racism that is prevalent on the city council beyond the three councilmembers caught on tape, and calls attention to a list of demands put out by a coalition of Black activist groups and community leaders.

• The most vicious things said on the recording were directed at Councilmember Mike Bonin’s two-year-old son, who is Black. Bonin spoke emotionally about how that felt at Monday’s council meeting. Los Angeles magazine republished an interview in which Bonin had explained that his relationship with Martinez had soured at the outset of the pandemic when he was perceived to be too much of an ally to renters. He also spoke about the way he was treated by his colleagues on the council in explaining his decision not to seek a third term.

• Tuesday’s scheduled council meeting was, supposedly, filled beyond capacity; members of the public denied entry blocked off Main Street and held a rally where members of affected communities could voice their demands and hopes for the future. Inside council chambers, Councilmembers Cedillo and De León made an appearance, but they were forced to leave by public protest. … At Wednesday’s meeting protests continued, and a coalition of activists demanding “no resignations, no meetings” prevented any official business from taking place before the meeting lost quorum; Nury Martinez resigned that afternoon. ... Friday’s meeting was canceled after Councilmembers Marqueece Harris-Dawson and Mike Bonin both said that meetings should not occur until all three members on the recording had resigned. A rally was held outside City Hall, despite the cancellations. An overlapping coalition of activists have demanded a repeal of many of the council’s most repugnant recent actions, including 41.18 code revisions, renewal of evictions for tenants and for Project Roomkey participants, and increases to the LAPD budget. … Today, acting council president Mitch O’Farrell announced that next week’s council meetings will move back to Zoom, cynically leveraging Councilmember Bonin’s recent COVID diagnosis.

• As a response to these corruption revelations, a flurry of reform measures have been proposed from every direction, with several introduced at Tuesday’s council meeting. These include proposed ballot measures to increase the size of the council, an accelerated push for independent redistricting (perhaps even a redrawing of the lines before the 2024 election) and reform that would dilute the power of individual councilmembers to control land use in their own districts. Councilmember Nithya Raman, whom the tapes show was maliciously and intentionally disadvantaged by the redistricting machinations, has proposed an ad hoc committee to address multiple proposals. Raman spoke at length with LA Forward about the potential for reforms.

• Additionally, State Attorney General Rob Bonta has said that his office will launch an investigation into Los Angeles’ 2020 redistricting process.

• Eunisses Hernandez, who will take Cedillo’s seat after defeating him in June elections, was among many people to speak about the future of relationship between Los Angeles’ Black and Latine communities, and the illusion that there is a zero-sum competition between these groups. In the LA Times, an editorial by Fidel Martinez pushes back on the idea that the three councilmembers caught on tape truly had the interests of the Latine community as their top priority.

• Last but not least! DSA-LA is hosting a chapterwide forum on Zoom, focusing on a socialist analysis of the week’s events: RSVP here. Additionally, the DSA-LA voter guide dropped last week. As was heard on the tapes, certain neighborhoods are considered “headaches” that these councilmembers don’t want in their districts, for electoral reasons. That could be you! Vote early! Consider volunteering if you can!

Housing Rights

• Curbed puts a magnifying glass on the particular hostility to renters revealed in the leaked conversation.

Local Media

• The LA Times editorial board reconfirmed its endorsement of Kenneth Mejia for city controller (DSA-LA’s recommended candidate, as well), pushing back on recent campaign talking points from his opponent, Paul Koretz, who says that Mejia is too radical.

Environmental Justice

• CalMatters breaks down the pros and cons of Proposition 30, which would impose a 1.75% personal income tax increase on Californians making more than $2 million per year to fund a suite of climate programs.