The race for Los Angeles mayor has been in an extraordinary state of flux, with the candidate lineup shuffling and reshuffling in the final days before the filing deadline.
On Thursday, former schools Supt. Austin Beutner dropped out of the race, citing the death of his 22-year-old daughter. Hours later, L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said she was still deciding whether to launch her own challenge against Mayor Karen Bass.
Meanwhile, billionaire real estate developer Rick Caruso, who announced last month that he wasn’t running, briefly reemerged as a possible candidate, saying Wednesday that he hadn’t completely ruled it out. The following day, he changed course yet again, deciding not to enter the race after all.
Pomona College politics professor Sara Sadhwani said she has never seen so many major candidates on the fence about a mayoral bid so close to the filing deadline, which is noon on Saturday.
Although Horvath would seriously shake up the race, she would need to raise a significant amount of money in a short time, Sadhwani said.
“It appears to me that there are a lot of campaign donors sitting out of this race until now, waiting to see who will jump in,” she added.
The uncertainty doesn’t end there. Maryam Zar, who formed a community group to help guide the recovery from the Palisades fire, is also weighing a mayoral bid — and doesn’t plan to decide until the final day.
“It’s not an easy decision,” the Palisades resident said. “I have a life. I’m a parent. I started a nonprofit doing excellent work out of thin air.”
Bass, who was politically weakened by her performance during the fire and its aftermath, was already facing more than two dozen challengers looking to oust her in the June 2 primary — the vast majority little known to the public and not expected to pose any threat.
Still, there are exceptions.
On Wednesday, Brentwood tech entrepreneur Adam Miller launched a bid for mayor, saying the city is in dire need of strong management. The 56-year-old nonprofit executive said he intends to rely on his personal wealth to jump-start his campaign.
Reality TV star Spencer Pratt entered the race on Jan. 7, the one-year anniversary of the fire, which destroyed his home and thousands of others. Pratt has been regularly assailing Bass and her record on social media, even as he promotes his new book, “The Guy You Loved to Hate.”
Meanwhile, democratic socialist Rae Huang is running against the mayor from her political left on public safety, housing and other issues, appearing at one point with podcaster Hasan Piker.
The instability in the candidate lineup in some ways reflects Bass’ unsteady political position, slightly more than a year after the fire, which left 12 people dead and destroyed much of the Palisades and surrounding communities.
Bass faced sharp criticism for being out of the country when the fire broke out and struggled to project a sense of leadership when she returned. She has also faced criticism over her handling of the rebuilding effort, including her selection of a recovery czar who left after 90 days.
On Wednesday, The Times reported that Bass was directly involved in watering down the city’s after-action report on the fire, citing unnamed sources. Within hours, Caruso voiced outrage over the allegations, saying he was taking another look at whether to enter the race.
“Karen Bass actively covered up a report meant to examine the most significant disaster in Los Angeles history,” he said on X. “This is a complete loss of public trust and an intentional act of covering up the actions that led to people dying.”
The following day, Caruso political consultant Mike Murphy said the developer, who lost to Bass in 2022, was “incredibly moved” by the outpouring of support but “will not be a candidate for mayor.”
Bass vehemently disputed The Times’ findings on the after-action report, calling them “completely fabricated.” She said she has been openly critical of the Fire Department’s failure to pre-deploy firefighters amid forecasts of catastrophically high winds — and would have no interest in hiding such information.
“What would be the purpose of covering up a report that I ordered?” Bass told reporters at City Hall on Thursday. “I ordered the report because I wanted the truth to come out.”
Bass entered the race in July 2024, when her reelection looked far more assured. Since then, she has faced criticism not just over the city’s response to the Palisades fire but also its handling of homelessness, housing production, street repairs and trash removal.
Bass and her campaign team have sought to highlight a list of accomplishments, including a steady decrease in homicides, a drop in street homelessness and her efforts to accelerate the construction of affordable housing. She said she has sped up permitting in the Palisades burn zone, where more than 480 homes are under construction.
If Bass secures more than 50% of the vote, she would win automatically and avoid a November runoff. But with so many candidates already in the race, a runoff is a “mathematical certainty,” said Douglas Herman, a Bass spokesperson.
“Mayor Bass is the best positioned candidate to win today and will prevail in November,” he said.
In the past, Los Angeles mayoral candidates have offered voters plenty of advance notice, frequently announcing their campaigns at least a year before an election to ensure they had enough time to raise the money they needed to get their message out.
In 2011, then-City Controller Wendy Greuel announced she was running for mayor a full two years before the 2013 election. Six months later, then-Councilmember Eric Garcetti announced he was doing the same.
The last mayoral race began shaping up in 2021, when former City Councilmember Joe Buscaino announced he was running about fifteen months before election day. That same year, Bass jumped in about eight months ahead. Caruso waited until very late to announce his run, since he planned to fund his campaign with his own money.
The timing is especially odd for Horvath, who has been steadily amassing endorsements and donations for her reelection bid representing a supervisorial district covering the Westside and San Fernando Valley. On Wednesday, the Avance Democratic Club endorsed Horvath in that campaign.
Horvath, in an interview, said it’s possible she may wait until Saturday, the final day, to make her decision. She acknowledged that she would face a compressed time frame for raising money if she runs for mayor.
Still, she noted she has “friends who are ready to help.”
“It will be a challenge,” she said. “But I’m up for a challenge.”
