Representative Karen Bass (D., Calif.) and billionaire real-estate developer Rick Caruso will head to a runoff election for mayor of Los Angeles in November, the Associated Press projects.
As of early Wednesday morning, with 18 percent of precincts reporting, Caruso had received 42 percent of the vote while Bass had captured 37 percent. A run-off is triggered if neither candidate clears 50 percent.
Councilman Kevin de Leon sits in third place with just 7 percent of the vote.
The run-off winner will succeed Eric Garcetti, who is termed out and awaiting confirmation to serve as U.S. ambassador to India.
A Los Angeles Times/UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll of likely voters in the mayoral election found that the most pressing issues among respondents were homelessness and crime.
A billionaire real-estate developer who was a registered Republican until 2012, Caruso registered as a Democrat early in 2022. Caruso has spent $40 million on his campaign, far outpacing Mayor Eric Garcetti's previous record of $10.2 million, the Wall Street Journal noted.
Caruso has focused on cleaning up the streets, promising on his campaign site to hire 1,500 additional police officers and to increase funding for the police budget.
“We will not allow this city to decline. We will no longer accept excuses. We have the power to change the direction of Los Angeles,” Caruso told supporters on Tuesday evening.
Bass is a six-term congresswoman who currently represents California’s 37th congressional district, which covers parts of Los Angeles, and was previously a state lawmaker. Bass said she could draw on connections at all levels of government to help address the city’s homelessness crisis, in comments to the New York Times.
“Together we can make our city a place where you can afford to live, where you want to live, because you feel safe, because the air you breathe is clean, because people are no longer dying on the streets,” Bass said on Tuesday.
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