{"id":165290,"date":"2026-02-05T16:07:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T16:07:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/165290\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T16:07:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T16:07:07","slug":"austin-beutner-ends-run-for-l-a-mayor-a-month-after-daughters-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/165290\/","title":{"rendered":"Austin Beutner ends run for L.A. mayor, a month after daughter’s death"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Former Los Angeles schools superintendent Austin Beutner said Thursday that he is dropping out of the race for mayor, citing the recent death of his 22-year-old daughter.<\/p>\n

Beutner, one of several candidates seeking to oust Mayor Karen Bass in the June 2 primary, made his announcement a month after the death of Emily Beutner, the youngest of his four children.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy family has experienced the unimaginable loss of our beloved daughter Emily. She was a magical person, the light of our lives. We are still in mourning,\u201d Beutner said in a statement. \u201cA successful campaign, and more importantly the job of Mayor, requires someone who is committed 24\/7 to the job. Family has always come first for me. That is where I need to be at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beutner\u2019s daughter died Jan. 6 at a hospital, according to officials with the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner, who have not yet determined a cause. <\/p>\n

The announcement comes as the lineup of candidates is still in flux, with Saturday\u2019s filing deadline fast approaching.<\/p>\n

L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath has been weighing a run, as has Maryam Zar, founder of the Palisades Recovery Coalition. Real estate developer Rick Caruso, who lost to Bass in 2022, is once again considering a mayoral bid \u2014 even though he publicly ruled that out last month \u2014 after The Times reported<\/a> that Bass was involved in watering down an after-action report on the Palisades fire.<\/p>\n

Bass\u2019 team said the mayor did not make changes to the report, saying \u201cthere is absolutely no reason why she would request those details be altered or erased when she herself has been critical of the response to the fire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bass, who is seeking a second four-year term, already faces challenges from reality television star Spencer Pratt, a Republican who lost his home in the Palisades fire; Rae Huang, a community organizer who is also a democratic socialist; and Adam Miller, a tech entrepreneur and nonprofit executive. <\/p>\n

If Bass secures more than 50% of the vote, she will win outright, avoiding a November runoff.<\/p>\n

Beutner, who entered the contest in October, spent much of his campaign denouncing Bass\u2019 handling of the Palisades fire, which destroyed thousands of homes and left 12 people dead. The fire severely damaged Beutner\u2019s home in Pacific Palisades and completely destroyed the residence of Beutner\u2019s mother-in-law.<\/p>\n

During the early months of his campaign, Beutner also criticized the mayor for hiking the fees that the city charges for trash pickup, sewer maintenance and other basic services. <\/p>\n

In his statement withdrawing from the race, Beutner continued to highlight some of the problems he discussed during his campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cLos Angeles is a special place, but every day it\u2019s becoming less affordable, less safe and a more difficult place to live,\u201d he said. \u201cTo solve these problems, new ideas are needed along with leadership capable of implementing them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beutner\u2019s daughter was found on Jan. 6 by the side of a highway in Palmdale in a \u201cstate of medical distress,\u201d according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff\u2019s Department. She later died at a hospital.<\/p>\n

After that, Beutner largely disappeared from the public eye, canceling more than a dozen campaign events and asking the public for privacy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Los Angeles schools superintendent Austin Beutner said Thursday that he is dropping out of the race for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":165291,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[8108,23105,12858,9342,339,71940,79809,1073,64873,48,52,51,47,50,49,63,3906,1839,2668,79808,79807],"class_list":{"0":"post-165290","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-announcement","9":"tag-austin-beutner","10":"tag-bass","11":"tag-daughter","12":"tag-death","13":"tag-emily-beutner","14":"tag-filing-deadline","15":"tag-home","16":"tag-l-a-mayor","17":"tag-la","18":"tag-la-headlines","19":"tag-la-news","20":"tag-los-angeles","21":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","22":"tag-los-angeles-news","23":"tag-los-angeles-times","24":"tag-month","25":"tag-palisades-fire","26":"tag-run","27":"tag-several-candidate","28":"tag-successful-campaign"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/165291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}