Four years after taking office with a promise to confront the city’s homelessness crisis, Mayor Karen Bass is fighting to keep her job against a former political ally who says Los Angeles cannot afford another four years of the same leadership.
City Councilmember Nithya Raman has sought to make the Nov. 3 mayoral election a referendum on Bass’ handling of homelessness, public safety, wildfire preparedness and the basic services residents depend on. Bass, meanwhile, is defending her record and warning that replacing her with a less experienced leader could disrupt the city’s progress as Los Angeles prepares to host the 2028 Olympics.
At the heart of the race between the two Democrats is a disagreement over how voters should judge the past four years: Bass argues that the city is making progress on entrenched problems and needs experienced leadership to continue it, while Raman says the results have fallen short and City Hall needs fundamental change.
A September poll by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies, co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times, found Raman leading Bass 39% to 28% among likely voters, with 33% undecided. The poll showed the candidates in opposite order from the June primary, when Bass finished first with 34% of the vote, followed by Raman with about 29%.
Former reality television star Spencer Pratt, who finished third in the primary with about 26% of the vote, is no longer in the race, adding a potentially consequential group of voters for Bass and Raman to compete for in the final weeks.
Bass said in an interview Saturday that she pays attention to polling but noted that “there’s a lot of different polls,” saying the most important finding is the large share of voters who remain undecided.
“So this race, to me, rests on the undecided,” she said.
Asked when the city’s persistent problems become her responsibility rather than problems she inherited, Bass rejected the distinction.
“It’s my record now,” Bass said. “I’ve been here for four years.”
She argued that Los Angeles has made progress during her first term but acknowledged that the work is incompleted. Asked what she would tell undecided voters, Bass pointed to reduction in street homelessness and crime, accelerated affordable housing development and efforts to improve basic city infrastructure.
“We have much more to do,” Bass said, “but what I feel confident in is the foundation that has been laid over these four years.”
Bass, 73, is a former congresswoman and California Assembly speaker who became Los Angeles’ first female mayor in 2022. A longtime community organizer, she entered office promising urgent action on homelessness.
Raman, 45, is an urban planner and former nonprofit executive who won a City Council seat in 2020 after defeating incumbent David Ryu, becoming the first Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidate elected to the Council. She won reelection in 2024 with Bass’ support and represents a district stretching from Silver Lake into the San Fernando Valley.
Now, the former allies are making sharply different arguments about what qualifies someone to lead the nation’s second-largest city.
A dispute over results
Homelessness remains at the center of the race, with both candidates claiming progress while questioning the other’s record.
Bass points to an 11% decrease in street homelessness since she took office, despite an increase in the latest annual count. According to the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, homelessness declined for two consecutive years before rising in 2026, when the city’s overall homeless population increased 3.4% and its unsheltered population rose 7.9%.
Bass acknowledged Saturday that the progress has not been sufficient.
“It isn’t enough,” she said. “We need to house many, many more people.”
Bass credits her Inside Safe initiative, which moves people from encampments into temporary housing, and says she wants to expand lower-cost shelter options rather than rely on expensive hotels. She also says the city needs greater control over a fragmented homeless response in which responsibility is divided among the city, Los Angeles County and LAHSA.
Bass said her administration is already moving toward a new system that would give the city greater control over housing and services.
“The city needs to develop our own method of providing services, because right now, the county providing services has not worked,” Bass said.
Bass also made a concrete promise for a second term: that the city would eliminate its major homeless encampments.
“You might see a tent here and there, but you would not see encampments anymore,” she said.
Raman says the city has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on Inside Safe without producing sufficient results. Under a plan she released for her first 100 days, Raman says she would begin shifting city homelessness dollars away from LAHSA and ask City Controller Kenneth Mejia to audit every dollar the city spends on homelessness. She has set a goal of eliminating tents and encampments across Los Angeles and bringing people indoors by the end of her first term.
Raman also points to a 49% reduction in unsheltered homelessness in her district over the past year. LAHSA data show the district’s unsheltered population fell from 181 in 2025 to 93 in 2026.
Bass disputes Raman’s claim to that success, arguing that Inside Safe operations accounted for a substantial portion of the district’s reduction. Raman, in turn, has criticized the programs cost per participant, a calculation the mayor contests.
Their disagreement also extends to encampment enforcement. Raman voted against expanding Municipal Code 41.18 to prohibit encampments within 500 feet of schools and day care centers and has routinely opposed efforts by other council members to create additional enforcement zones in their districts. She argues the law does little to address homelessness because it can simply move an encampment from one location to another.
Raman has said that as mayor she would not prevent council members from using the law in their districts. Bass has criticized Raman’s votes against 41.18, particularly restrictions around schools, arguing that she has repeatedly voted to take away a tool council members can use to remove encampments.
Policing and the Olympics
Public safety has become another central test of the candidates’ competing claims about leadership.
Bass says Los Angeles needs more police officers and has defended her administration’s efforts to recruit officers while expanding alternatives to armed responses for certain emergencies.
Raman has called for maintaining current police staffing levels while directing more nonviolent calls to unarmed responders, freeing officers to focus on crimes.
The two also disagree over the leadership of the Los Angeles Police Department.
Raman wants Police Chief Jim McDonnell replaced, arguing that his handling of protests and federal immigration enforcement has damaged trust in the department, particularly among immigrant communities.
“I believe that Chief McDonnell has not met this moment with the focus and responsiveness that immigrant communities have needed at this time,” Raman told SCNG during a campaign event announcing her 100-day plan. “And so I don’t believe he’s the right chief for this moment.”
Bass has defended McDonnell and warned that replacing the chief during preparations for the 2028 Olympics could destabilize the department at a critical moment.
“We are 640 days away from the largest sporting event to ever take place, a major national security event. And if you think that you’re going to find a police chief, you would send the department in disarray by doing that,” Bass said during an Oct. 13 debate hosted by NBC4 and Telemundo 52.
Raman declined to commit to a timeline for replacing McDonnell, saying the decision would involve the Police Commission and City Council.
Both candidates oppose the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Los Angeles, but Raman has criticized LAPD’s response to immigration-related protests, saying officers at times appeared to be protecting ICE agents and raising concerns about police data being accessed by federal immigration authorities. She argues that the city has lost the trust of immigrant communities under Bass’ leadership.
Bass continued to defend McDonnell on Saturday, arguing that replacing the chief ahead of the Olympics would destabilize the department. But she said it was important to review LAPD’s response to the protests and acknowledged problems with the way some officers responded.
But she said she did not believe the department anticipated the intensity of the protests, including protesters throwing bricks, water bottles and fireworks at officers.
“I certainly saw things that police officers did that they shouldn’t do,” Bass said, adding that she saw officers became angry “out of proportion to what they were faced” with.
“When they get angry, they respond,” she said. “And that’s not OK.”
Bass points to her administration’s efforts to restrict federal immigration agents from using city property and provide assistance to immigrants affected by the crackdown. She has also sought to turn the issue on Raman, accusing her of being “nowhere to be found” when the raids began and pointing to her own endorsements from immigrant-rights groups.
A defining crisis
The January 2025 Palisades fire remains one of the most consequential challenges to Bass’ leadership. Bass was on a diplomatic trip to Ghana when the fire erupted amid forecasts of dangerous winds, while the city’s preparation and response later came under scrutiny.
The mayor has repeatedly apologized for being outside the country when the fire began and has said responsibility for the city’s response ultimately rests with her.
“I take responsibility for everything that happens in the city,” she said. “If I had to do it over again, I would not have left town, but I would have been better informed about what was to occur. As mayor, it doesn’t matter whether I had a direct hand in it or not. At the end of the day, the buck stops with me.”
Asked Saturday about the failures identified by recent investigations, Bass said neither the city nor Los Angeles County was prepared for the severity of the fire and said the experience showed the region must prepare for extreme weather events beyond those it has historically confronted.
A state-commissioned independent investigation, released this month, found shortcomings in LAFD’s preparation and response, including gaps in incident-command experience, predeployment and coordination with other agencies.
Bass points to efforts to speed the rebuilding process, including executive orders intended to cut permitting delays. She said Saturday that about 1,000 homes are now under construction in Palisades and expressed confidence that the community will recover.
She also says the city is better prepared for another major fire, pointing to new leadership at the Los Angeles Fire Department and changes made since the Palisades disaster, including predeployment practices. During the October debate, she said Fire Chief Jaime Moore had implemented more than 90% of the recommendations from internal and independent reviews.
Raman argued that the fire has exposed serious failures in the city’s emergency preparation and management. She has called for greater coordination before, during and after emergencies and promised to appoint a dedicated official to oversee the Palisades recovery.
Both candidates support Measure FD, a proposed half-cent sales tax increase to fund fire services, although Raman argues that the city’s broader budget problems have left taxpayers being asked to pay more for basic services.
Housing and affordability
The candidates also face pressure to address the cost of living, particularly the shortage of housing that has pushed families and young workers out of Los Angeles.
Bass points to Executive Directive 1, which accelerated approvals for affordable housing developments. Her administration says more than 47,000 affordable units are now in the development pipeline under the program and that more than 10,000 affordable units have been built citywide since she took office.
Bass said Saturday that she wants to expand that pipeline to more than 100,000 units in a second term.
Raman argues that housing construction remains too slow and expensive. She says that on her first day as mayor she would issue an executive order putting housing permits on a “shot clock,” with the goal of cutting lengthy approval delays. She also wants to create an office of tenant protections to advocate for renters within City Hall.
During an August debate hosted by the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Association, the candidates agreed on the need to build more housing but differed over how Los Angeles should respond to state mandates. Bass defended her opposition to SB 79, saying Sacramento should not override local control over housing development. She said she favors concentrating more housing along commercial corridors and working with communities to avoid displacement and gentrification.
Raman, who voted against a City Council resolution opposing the law, argued that the state mandates are a consequence of Los Angeles not doing enough to plan for and build more housing. She said the city should instead develop its own approach for accommodating more housing, adding density where appropriate while preserving existing neighborhoods.
Both have expressed support for changes to Measure ULA, the property transfer tax intended to fund affordable housing and homelessness prevention, amid concerns about its effects on development. Raman, an early supporter of the measure, said during the October debate that she changed her position after reviewing data indicating it was discouraging new housing construction, a shift she said put her at odds with some political allies.
Their dispute extends beyond housing to how City Hall operates. Raman argues that residents should not have to rely on personal intervention from elected officials to resolve problems such as unsafe properties, saying city departments should work more quickly and coordinate better. Bass says her administration has worked to cut red tape and improve city services, while accusing Raman of struggling to work effectively with colleagues and constituents.
In Saturday’s interview, Bass framed that differences as a question of experience and relationships, pointing to her years in Sacramento and Washington and arguing those connections have helped her secure resources for Los Angeles. She accused Raman of struggling to work with her City Council colleagues.
“I think it’s very challenging to run the nation’s second-largest city if you have a history of not being able to work with people,” she said.
Raman has pushed back on that characterization, noting that many of her colleagues endorsed the sitting mayor before Raman entered the race — as Raman herself initially did — and pointing to her selection by colleagues for leadership roles on the council, including as chair of the Housing and Homelessness Committee.
Competing coalitions, millions in spending
The candidates entered the final weeks with different political coalitions and substantial financial backing.
Bass has secured endorsements from Gov. Newsom, former Vice President Kamala Harris, the Los Angeles County Democratic Party and a broad coalition of labor unions and elected officials. Her supporters include 13 of the 15 members of the Los Angeles City Council, including Councilmembers Eunisses Hernandez, Ysabel Jurado and Hugo Soto-Martinez, who, like Raman, are affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America.
Raman has won the endorsement of DSA’s Los Angeles chapter, along with the California Working Families Party, UNITE HERE Local 11 and the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters. She is also backed by City Controller Kenneth Mejia and Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, the only member of the five-member Board of Supervisors to endorse Raman. The other four supervisors have endorsed Bass. Raman has also drawn support from several environmental and pro-housing groups.
The split illustrates the cross-cutting alliances in the race, with divisions among both organized labor and the city’s progressive political establishment.
The candidates have each raised millions for the runoff, with Bass holding an edge in direct contributions while Raman entered the closing weeks with substantially more cash on hand . As of Oct. 17, Bass had raised about $2 million in direct contributions and received nearly $1.45 million in public matching funds, while Raman had raised about $1.5 million and received about $1.51 million in matching funds, according to the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission. Raman reported about $1.38 million in cash on hand, compared with about $632,000 for Bass.
Outside groups have poured millions more into the contest. Estamos con Nithya for Mayor of LA 2026, an independent expenditure committee sponsored by the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters, has raised more than $10 million to support Raman, including $6 million from Aaron Sosnick, a Reno-based hedge fund manager who has pushed for expanding Los Angeles’ network of bus and bicycle lanes.
The Los Angeles Police Protective League, Airbnb and other groups have spent heavily in support of Bass or in opposition to Raman.
Those independent expenditures are separate from the candidates’ campaign accounts and cannot be coordinated with their campaigns.
The money’s fueling a final push to win over an electorate in which a sizable share of voters remained undecided in September. For Bass, that means making the case that Los Angeles is making progress; for Raman, that the city needs a change in leadership.
Voters will make that choice Nov. 3.