Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and challenger Nithya Raman will be on the same stage Tuesday night for their final debate before the Nov. 3 election, but the two mayoral candidates are expected to come in with starkly different game plans.<\/p>\n
With recent polls showing Raman in the lead, the councilmember will likely try to avoid making any kind of flub during the in-studio debate hosted by NBC4 and Telemundo52 in Universal City.<\/p>\n
\u201cA successful debate for Raman is one in which not very much happens,\u201d said Dan Schnur, a professor of politics at USC, UC Berkeley and Pepperdine. <\/p>\n
Raman floundered at the last NBC4\/Telemundo debate <\/a>during the mayoral primary, when Spencer Pratt was also on stage. She got better marks <\/a>after a debate with Bass before the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. in August. <\/p>\n Along with avoiding mistakes, Raman will need to paint a positive view of the city she hopes to lead, said Sara Sadhwani, a professor of politics at Pomona College.<\/p>\n \u201cShe needs to able to spell out a vision for the city of Los Angeles and inspire confidence that she would be able to deliver on such a vision,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n For Bass, it\u2019s a different task entirely. The mayor was the top vote-getter in the June 2 primary, but numerous several polls now show her trailing. The Berkeley IGS \/ L.A. Times poll, conducted Sept. 15-20, showed Raman with an 11-point lead <\/a>over the incumbent. <\/p>\n To gain ground, Bass needs to go on the attack and convince voters that Raman isn\u2019t fit to lead, Schnur said. <\/p>\n \u201cBass needs to explain to voters why voting for a relatively unproven candidate would be a dangerous risk to take,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m curious if it will go down the road of the nasty,\u201d Sadhwani said. The Times will have live coverage. <\/p>\n You\u2019re reading the L.A. on the Record newsletter <\/p>\n Sign up to make sense of the often unexplained world of L.A. politics.<\/p>\n By continuing, you agree to our Terms of Service<\/a>, which include arbitration and a class action waiver. You agree that we and our third-party vendors may collect and use your information, including through cookies, pixels and similar technologies, for the purposes set forth in our Privacy Policy<\/a> such as personalizing your experience and ads. <\/p>\n An influencer digs in on Bass<\/p>\n Social media creator Ed Choi made headlines this week, posting and then removing an Instagram video showing him and Raman declaring in unison: \u201cOnly you can stop fascist liars.\u201d<\/p>\n The pair used that phrase as an image of Bass appeared on the video. Raman, facing criticism for her words, said she was referring to Trump and Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, not the mayor or Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell, and had asked for the video to be taken down.<\/p>\n Choi defended his messaging, saying in a subsequent Instagram video that Bass is in fact a fascist, pointing to to Bass\u2019 decision to appoint McDonnell, a former L.A. County sheriff. He also cited the Los Angeles Police Department\u2019s treatment of anti-ICE demonstrators as evidence that the city is \u201cdescending into fascism.<\/p>\n Raman voted in 2024 to support Bass\u2019 selection of McDonnell, even as her fellow Democratic Socialists of America colleagues on the council cast opposed his appointment. On the campaign trail, she has repeatedly criticized McDonnell, saying the LAPD should not have used tear gas on anti-ICE protesters exercising their First Amendment rights.<\/p>\n Choi also claims in his video<\/a> that Raman is committed to defunding the police. But Raman no longer supports that idea, saying in February that LAPD staffing should not get any smaller.<\/p>\n Banned word lawsuit<\/p>\n When the Los Angeles City Council considered banning the use<\/a> of the N-word and C-word at its meetings last year, Stacey Segarra-Bohlinger was in attendance to give the politicians a piece of her mind. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is going to bring lawsuits,\u201d said Segarra-Bohlinger, who often sings parody songs at council meetings and has been a member of the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council.<\/p>\n Segarra-Bohlinger filed suit Tuesday, represented by lawyers with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. The group contends that word bans \u2014 which can lead to people who use those words getting kicked out of meetings and potentially barred from future ones \u2014 violate First Amendment protections of free speech. <\/p>\n \u201cThe Council has weaponized the Word Ban and Meeting Ban to silence, remove, and prospectively exclude its critics,\u201d asserts Segarra-Bohlinger\u2019s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. <\/p>\n Segarra-Bohlinger filed the suit after her repeated use of the C-word at two council meetings last year, once while singing a parody song of the Ghostbusters theme song in which she repeated the line \u201cCouncil is afraid of the word c\u2014\u201d four times.<\/p>\n Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson is standing by the ban. <\/p>\n \u201cIn a moment of very serious attacks on our basic rights in this country, it\u2019s especially absurd that some individuals would waste the court\u2019s time defending the right of racists and misogynists to hurl invectives at the public simply to hear their own profanity,\u201d he said in a statement to The Times.<\/p>\n State of play<\/p>\n \u2014MONEY, MONEY, MONEY: Hedge fund manager Aaron Sosnick dropped another $3 million<\/a> into Estamos Con Nithya, the pro-Raman independent expenditure committee sponsored by Western States Regional Council of Carpenters. Sosnick, who has been pushing for an expansion of the city\u2019s bike lane network, has now put $6 million into the committee.<\/p>\n \u2014 UNION KERFUFFLE: The LAPD\u2019s officer union said Tuesday it will oppose Measure FD<\/a>, the half-cent sales tax measure on the Nov. 3 ballot pushed by the city firefighters\u2019 union \u2014 setting up a bitter and expensive clash between two of the city\u2019s most powerful unions.<\/p>\n \u2014 LEFT UNREAD: Citing lingering concerns about the potential misuse of police license plate readers, the Los Angeles City Council voted Tuesday to delay an agreement<\/a> that would enable the deployment of hundreds of the controversial devices<\/a> until officials are satisfied that the technology will be wielded responsibly.<\/p>\n \u2014 LAUSD WOES: The state\u2019s school Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team concluded that the Los Angeles Unified School District is at \u201chigh risk\u201d of insolvency<\/a> \u2014 and needs to move quickly to avoid losing control over budget decisions.<\/p>\n \u2014 HIT THE SKIDS: Federal authorities along with local partners like LAPD made more than a dozen arrests<\/a> on Skid Row during a massive drug trafficking crackdown in the troubled Downtown neighborhood.<\/p>\n \u2014 LAPD\u2019S LEGAL BILLS: The city of Los Angeles has shelled out nearly $480 million<\/a> over the last five and a half years to end legal disputes involving the Police Department, including claims of excessive force, litigation over traffic accidents and cases filed by employees who allegedly faced retaliation after reporting misconduct.<\/p>\n \u2014 POLLING UPDATE: New polling from the pro-Nithya Raman independent expenditure group that was conducted between Oct. 2 and Oct. 7 found that Raman is leading the mayor 43% to 33% with 23% undecided. The poll\u2019s margin of error is 3.5%. <\/p>\n \u2014 A separate poll sponsored by the United Firefighters of Los Angeles City, Local 112 and conducted between Sept. 25 and Oct. 5 found a tighter race, within the margin of error, with Raman leading 35% to 33% with 19% undecided. That poll\u2019s margin of error was 4%.<\/p>\n \u2014 A third poll conducted for the Bass independent expenditure group Unidos con Bass of 602 likely Latino voters found the incumbent ahead by 12 points, 40% to 28% for Raman. The poll, conducted between Oct. 1 and Oct. 8, has a margin of error was 4%. That\u2019s a 36-point swing from a UC Berkeley IGS\/L.A. Times poll from September that found Raman ahead with Latinos by 24 points, 45% to 21%.<\/p>\n QUICK HITSWhere is Inside Safe? The mayor\u2019s signature program went to Councilmember Ysabel Jurado\u2018s district on Santa Fe Avenue and 23rd Street and moved 35 people indoors. That\u2019s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to LAontheRecord@latimes.com<\/a>. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here<\/a> to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.<\/p>\n
The debate, being conducted in partnership with Loyola Marymount University, will run from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. and will be moderated by NBC4 news anchor Colleen Williams, NBC4 chief political reporter Conan Nolan and Telemundo 52 news anchor Alejandra Ortiz. <\/p>\n
On the docket next week: Bass and Raman will square off in a debate Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. on NBC4\/KNBC and Telemundo 52\/KVEA.Stay in touch<\/p>\n