candidate

A few weeks ago, Katie Porter’s campaign for California governor was reeling. A day after an irritable TV interview went viral, an old video surfaced of the former Orange County congresswoman cursing and berating one of her aides.

Around the same time, the race for U.S. Senate in Maine was shaken by a number of disturbing online posts. In them, Democratic hopeful Graham Platner disparaged police and Black people, among other crude remarks. Soon after, it was revealed Platner had a chest tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol.

Meanwhile, in Virginia, several old text messages swallowed attorney general nominee Jay Jones in a cumulus of controversy. The Democrat had joked about shooting the Republican leader of the state House and blithely spoken of watching his children die in their mother’s arms.

Once — say, 20 or 30 years ago — those blow-ups might have been enough to chase each of those embattled candidates from their respective races, and maybe even end their political careers altogether.

But in California, Porter has pressed on and remains in the top tier of the crowded gubernatorial field. In Maine, Platner continues to draw large, enthusiastic crowds and leads polling in the Democratic primary. In Virginia, Jones was just elected attorney general, defeating his Republican opponent by a comfortable margin.

Clearly, things have changed.

Actions that once caused eyes to widen, such as the recreational puffs of marijuana that cost appeals court judge Douglas Ginsburg a Supreme Court seat under President Reagan, now seem quaint. Personal indiscretions once seen as disqualifying, such as the extramarital affair that chased Gary Hart from the 1988 presidential race, scarcely raise an eyebrow.

Gary Hart quit the 1988 presidential race soon after reports surfaced of an extramarital affair. He later unsuccessfully jumped back into the contest.

(Getty Images)

And the old political playbook — confession, contrition, capitulation — is obviously no longer operative, as candidates find it not only possible but even advantageous to brazen their way through storms of uproar and opprobrium.

Look no further than the extravagantly checkered occupant of the White House. Donald Trump has seemingly survived more controversies — not to mention two impeachments, an $83.3-million judgment in a sexual abuse and defamation case and conviction on 34 felony counts — than there are stars winking in the nighttime sky.

Bill Carrick has spent decades strategizing for Democratic office-seekers. A generation or so ago, if faced with a serious scandal, he would have told his candidate, “This is not going to be sustainable and you just better get out.” But now, Carrick said, “I would be very reluctant to tell somebody that, unless there was evidence they had murdered or kidnapped somebody, or robbed a bank.”

Kevin Madden, a veteran Republican communications strategist, agreed. Surrender has become passe. Survival is the new fallback mode.

“The one thing that many politicians of both parties have learned is that there is an opportunity to grind it out, to ride the storm out,” Madden said. “If you think a news issue is going viral or becoming the topic everyone’s talking about, just wait. A new scandal … or a new shiny object will be along.”

One reason for the changing nature of political scandal, and its prognosis, is the way we now take in information, both selectively and in bulk.

With the chance to personally curate their news feed — and reinforce their attitude and outlook — people can select those things they wish to know about, and choose those they care to ignore. With such fragmentation, it’s much harder for a negative storyline to reach critical mass. That requires a mass audience.

“A lot of scandals may not have the impact that they once had because people are in these silos or echo chambers,” said Scott Basinger, a University of Houston political scientist who’s extensively studied the nature of political scandal. “They may not even hear about it, if they don’t want to hear about it.”

The sheer velocity of information — “not only delivered to you on your doorstep, or at 6:30 p.m. by the three networks, but also in your pocket, in your hand at all times, across multiple platforms,” as Madden put it — also makes events more fleeting. That makes it harder for any one to penetrate deeply or resonate widely.

“In a world where there’s a wealth of information,” he said, “there’s a poverty of attention.”

Seven months after abruptly dropping out of the 1988 presidential race, Hart jumped back into the contest. “Let’s let the people decide,” he said, after confessing his marital sins.

(He also said in the same interview, a few months before relaunching his candidacy, that he had no intention of doing so.)

Hart did not fare well. Once he’d been the overwhelming front-runner for the Democratic nomination. As a reincarnated candidate, he trudged on for a few months before dropping out for good, having failed to secure a single convention delegate or win double-digit support in any contest.

“The people have decided,” he said, “and now I should not go forward.”

That’s how it should be.

Porter in California and Platner in Maine both faced calls to drop out of their respective races, with critics questioning their conduct and whether they had the right temperament to serve, respectively, as California governor or a U.S. senator. Each has expressed contrition for their actions. (As did Jones, Virginia’s attorney general-elect.)

Voters can take all that into account when they pick their candidate.

If they want a governor who drops f-bombs and snaps at aides, a senator with a history of off-putting remarks or — gulp — an adulterous convicted felon in the White House, that’s their choice.

Let the people decide.

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — President Bush carried his message of military victory and economic challenge to the job-blighted Silicon Valley on Friday, thanking defense workers for their contributions to the war with Iraq and pressing his tax cut plan as the cure for the region’s — and nation’s — economic ills.

“We’ve come through some hard times,” Bush told engineers and technicians at United Defense Industries, which makes combat fighting vehicles. “Remember, we’ve overcome a recession. We’ve overcome an attack on our soil. We have been in two major battles in the war against terror, one in Afghanistan, one in Iraq.”

As he gears up for his 2004 reelection campaign, Bush has been formulating a message that puts the blame for the sluggish economy and rising unemployment on outside forces and national security emergencies. But to call attention to his record on national security issues, Bush has been choosing defense-related settings for speeches on the economy.

Bush on Friday acknowledged the especially difficult circumstances in Silicon Valley, which he described as “this incredibly vibrant part of the American economy over the past years [which] is not meeting its full potential.”

The president’s visit came as the Labor Department in Washington announced a jump in the unemployment rate for April, bringing it to 6%. That tied the figure for December as the highest rate in almost nine years.

Bush noted the news and called it “a clear signal to the United States Congress we need a bold economic recovery package so people can find work.”

The president then devoted much of his speech to pushing for a tax cut of at least $550 billion, which he claimed would create 1 million jobs nationwide by 2004.

“The plan I just outlined is one that will boost the economy in the Silicon Valley,” Bush said. “It’s a plan that is bold because we need a bold plan. It’s a plan that is thoughtful because we need a thoughtful plan. Most importantly, it’s a plan that will invigorate the entrepreneur spirit, which has been so strong here, and make it more likely somebody who’s looking for a job will be able to find one.”

But Bush’s plan has run into resistance in Congress. The president initially proposed a $725-billion, 11-year tax cut plan to stimulate economic growth. House Republican leaders, responding to concerns about the mounting federal budget deficit, have reduced the plan to $550 billion. In the Senate, moderate Republicans have led the push to limit it to $350 billion.

“I know you’ll hear talk about the deficit,” Bush said. “And we’ve got a deficit because we went through a recession. A recession means the economy slowed down to the extent where we’re losing revenues to the federal treasury. We got a recession because we went to war, and I said to our troops, if we’re going to commit you into harm’s way, you deserve the best equipment, the best training, the best possible pay.”

The president also reprised the theme he laid out a day earlier in a national address from the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln off the coast of San Diego — that the military conflict with Iraq was “one victory” in the war on terrorism that began after the 2001 attacks on America.

“On September the 11th, 2001, America learned that the vast oceans no longer protect us from the threats of a new era,” Bush said. “On that day 19 months ago, we also began a relentless worldwide campaign against terrorists and those who hate freedom in order to secure our homeland and to make the world a more peaceful place. And we’re making great progress.”

The defense sector is a bright spot in Silicon Valley, one of the most beleaguered regions of the state. According to Bureau of Labor statistics, the San Jose area has lost almost 16% of its workforce since Bush took office in January 2001, a total of about 175,000 jobs.

Nationwide, 2.7 million jobs have been lost since March 2001, when the recession began.

“The economy is not growing fast enough, and you know it as well as anybody here,” Bush said.

Democrats responding to Bush’s remarks pointed to the job-loss figures. “There continues to be serious question in his leadership on economic security issues,” said Sen. Jon Corzine (D-N.J.).

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi called on Bush to extend federal unemployment benefits in response to the rising jobless rate — “a very fast way for us to inject purchasing power into the economy,” she said.

As president, Bush has been an infrequent visitor to California, which he lost to Democratic candidate Al Gore in 2000 by 14 percentage points. Bush’s trip was the sixth in his presidency and the first since Aug. 24. In contrast, Bill Clinton had visited California 17 times at this stage in his presidency.

Silicon Valley leans Democratic politically, but the choice of a defense industry plant ensured a warm and responsive crowd. The president spoke at a division of United Defense Industries, based in Arlington, Va., which makes ground combat systems such as the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, which was integral in Iraq.

Bush noted the 750-employee Santa Clara facility also makes the Hercules Tank Recovery Vehicle, which helped topple the statue of Saddam Hussein in central Baghdad.

“The guy with the sledgehammer on the statue needed a little help,” Bush said to laughter and cheers from the audience. “Thankfully, there was a Hercules close by.”

As he left Santa Clara, Bush was joined by Australian Prime Minister John Howard and his wife, who were to ride with him on Air Force One to his ranch in Crawford, Texas. Howard, who was a strong supporter of the president’s confrontation with Iraq, was to spend a night at the ranch — an honor that has been reserved for foreign leaders closest to Bush.

*

Times staff writers Joseph Menn in San Francisco and Nick Anderson in Washington contributed to this report.

DALLAS — Ross Perot, outlining how he would mend the U.S. economy, proposes a combination of tax cuts and loans for small business and tougher trade policy to create more jobs at home.

“We cannot be a superpower if we cannot manufacture here,” the Texas billionaire said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times. He called for the United States to make almost everything it needs at home. “We have to manufacture here,” he said.

Perot, whose undeclared presidential candidacy has surged in opinion polls, described himself as a “fair and free trader” but believes that “agreements we’ve cut with countries around the world are not balanced at all.”

He said he would adjust the “tilted deck” of trade with Japan “in a very nice, diplomatic way. In this case (make) the Japanese say: ‘We’ll take the same deal on cars we’ve given you.’ ”

The effect, he said, would be to drastically reduce imports from Japan. “You are going to see the clock stop,” said Perot. “You could never unload the ships to this country; just could never unload the ships.”

In a similar vein, he opposes a free-trade agreement with Mexico, believing it would drain manufacturing jobs from a U.S. economy that cannot afford to lose them.

Perot said he is willing to have his mind changed. “This is a complicated, multi-piece equation that we need to think through very carefully. In carpenter’s terms, measure twice, cut once,” he said.

But in Mexico, “labor is a 25- year-old with little or no health-care expense working for a dollar an hour. You cannot compete with that in the U.S.A., period,” he said. “So you would have a surge in building factories down there but a long-term drought here at a time we cannot pay our budget deficits.”

The interview centered on Perot’s agenda on the issues of trade, taxes and the federal deficit. In Perot’s view, problems of the U.S. economy are interrelated, from trade to the national debt and the troubled public school system–which he calls “the least effective public education system in the industrialized world.”

“We’ve got a country $4 trillion in debt, adding $400 billion this year,” he said in his Dallas office–graced by portraits of his family and the painting “Spirit of ‘76” on a wall behind his desk.

“And we have a declining job base, which gives us a declining tax base at a time when we’ve run our debt through the ceiling. In business terms, that’s a ticket for disaster. Never forget that every time you lose a worker–who goes on welfare–the welfare check exceeds the tax payment that used to come to the IRS.”

Perot’s reference to a declining job base reflects his belief–disputed by some scholars–that jobs created in the 1980s were at lower wages than the jobs they replaced as manufacturing companies restructured. Most analysts and government data agree that wages for less educated, industrial workers have fallen over the last two decades. But there have been rising incomes at the same time for educated employees–especially those in new, computer-based information industries.

Perot, who will turn 62 this month, is a pioneer of the information-based industry. In 1962 he founded Electronic Data Systems, which innovated the business for organizing computer data for large companies and the government. It made Perot one of the nation’s wealthiest men. But Perot says that advanced industries alone cannot be the solution for the United States.

“Don’t bet the farm on high tech,” he said. “Information industry is all about intellectual acuity. And in a country with the least effective public education in the industrialized world, it kind of makes you grimace.

“What I’m saying is, right now, we can’t take people out of factories and send them to Microsoft (the leading computer software firm). If their children had a great education, we could. That’s generational change. But their children are not getting a great education.”

Perot made great efforts on behalf of educational reform in Texas in 1984, and has said he supports greatly expanded funding for education starting at preschool levels for all children. “It’s the best investment we can make,” he has said.

But education is for the future, and there is a need to create jobs now in the United States, not overseas, Perot declared.

“Do we need to make clothing in this country? Of course we do. Do we need to make shoes in this country? Of course we do. We have places in our country where people would be delighted to work in a shoe factory for reasonable wages.

“When I think of shoes, I think of Valley Forge (the winter encampment during the American Revolution where George Washington’s soldiers wrapped their feet in bandages and rags),” said Perot, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy.

“My mind bounces back and forth between the world I hope we have and the world that might be. We might be fighting barefooted.”

Perot contended that jobs can be created fastest in small companies.

“The quickest way to stimulate the economy and have a growing, dynamic job base is to stimulate small business. You’ll create more jobs faster by going through small business than through the huge industries,” said Perot, who started his business career as a salesman for IBM.

He said small-business people today are starved for credit and capital since banks are cautious of lending in the aftermath of the speculative 1980s, and small business doesn’t have access to big stock and bond markets.

But if he should become President, solving the credit problem will be “easy,” Perot said. “Change the regulations and the banks will loan the money,” he said, indicating that bank examiners should loosen their definitions about prudent loans and reduce the amount banks must reserve against potential losses.

Perot would attract investors to small business ventures by reducing the tax on capital gains. “I’ve got to give you a reason to take money out of Treasury bills to invest in a high-risk, wildcatting venture,” Perot explained.

“I can’t force you to take your money out of T-bills, so I have to create an environment where you want to take this risk.” That means a tax preference. “But I’m not changing capital gains for everybody. This is for the really high-risk start-up of a small company,” Perot said.

But “you will rarely hear me use the word ‘capital gains tax rate.’ I’ll be talking about money to create jobs,” he said.

Perot’s own considerable fortune, estimated by various business publications at $3.3 billion, is invested mostly in T-bills and corporate and high-rated municipal bonds. He has $200 million invested in Perot Systems, $350 million in real estate and about $40 million in funds for start-up companies, including a stake in Next Inc., the computer company headed by Apple co-founder Steven P. Jobs.

Perot also spoke of pushing for legislation to allow, and encourage, banks to make equity investments in start-up companies–a form of government-backed development bank.

“Or some other vehicle will emerge,” he said. “You find what seems to be the best way out–and then you adjust 1,000 times as you go. That’s the way you do anything, whether it’s cutting grass or making rockets.”

Perot’s views on big business are harsh. He believes a ruinous gap opened up between management and labor in large corporations, between executives who paid themselves handsomely while demanding reductions in the pay of ordinary workers. The result was a reduction in American competitiveness and hurt the U.S. economy, he says, repeating a theme he sounded often in two stormy years on General Motors’ board of directors.

Today, he is not surprised that the chief executives of more than a dozen major corporations, meeting last month at the Business Council in Hot Springs, Va., uniformly disapproved of him and his candidacy.

“They’re part of the Establishment,” Perot said. “The status quo works for them right now, and I’m talking about major, major change.”

Still, big companies should be enlisted in a drive to turn the U.S. economy to pursuits of peace, from what Perot terms “45 years of Cold War which drained us. The Cold War broke Russia, but it drained us.”

For all his distrust of foreign trade agreements, Perot admires the way Japanese companies do business–in particular Toyota, which he studied while a director of GM. “They work as a team and their products have quality,” Perot said. “Have you spent time in a Lexus dealership? All those guys selling Lexuses have to do is get you to drive it around the block.”

Perot himself drives an ’87 Oldsmobile. But he said U.S. industry should start doing things the way Japanese industry does, having senior business figures help small start-ups, “targeting industries of the future and making sure sacrifice in corporations starts at the top.”

Perot acknowledges that many things he admires in Japanese industry stem from that country’s different way of organizing society. “But my point is, you and I, our company is failing. And we have a competitor who’s winning. I would say, let’s go study him and figure out why he wins.”

To pay for his programs, Perot said, “We are not going to raise taxes unless we have to. But I ain’t stupid enough to say ‘Watch my lips.’ ”

He would “go to a new tax system because the one we have now is paper-laden, inefficient, not fair and so on.” But he claims to have no specific ideas yet on how to change taxes. “I would get people in, and in 60 days I’d have half a dozen new tax systems,” he said.

“My points on taxes are basically three: We’ve got to raise the revenues to make the country go.

“Two, we’ll get rid of the waste. The Department of Agriculture, with 2% of our people engaged in farming, is bigger than it was when a third of our people were farming. You’ve got to cut it down and you need a strong consensus to do that.”

He has been criticized for not being more specific on what other programs he would cut, and by how much. But as a third step, he said he would demand authority to selectively cut programs approved by Congress. “Give me the line-item veto, or don’t send me there,” said Perot, echoing a demand first raised by Ronald Reagan.

Perot has become linked with the idea that wealthy people might help reduce the federal deficit by giving up their rights to Social Security and Medicare. By one calculation, which Perot ascribes to Bush Administration chief economic adviser Michael J. Boskin, such a sacrifice by the wealthy could save the Treasury $100 billion a year–although Perot says that figure has proved dubious.

“I’d give up Social Security in a minute,” said the Texas billionaire. “And if a lot of people would give it up who did not need it, that’s worth looking at.”

Would that be subjecting the venerable Social Security program to a “means test,” which would adjust individual benefits based on income or assets.

“I never got down to what means testing is,” Perot said. “We’ve just got to go through and look at every single item. We have work to do.”

Today we discuss Texas, overreaction and the voluminous field of candidates for California governor.

Is there anyone who is not running for governor?

I’m not. And neither are my two cats. At least they weren’t as of this morning, when we discussed the race before breakfast.

That leaves us somewhat short of the 135 candidates who ran in California’s 2003 recall gubernatorial election. But not by much.

I count nearly a dozen serious candidates, with possibly more to come. Why so many?

Opportunity.

This is the most wide-open race for California governor in decades. By comparison, you’d have to go back to at least 1998, when Lt. Gov. Gray Davis surged past a pair of moneybag candidates, Al Checchi and Rep. Jane Harman, in the Democratic primary, then stomped Republican Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren in November to win the general election.

Now, as then, there is no one who even remotely resembles a prohibitive front-runner.

Polling in the governor’s race has shown former Democratic Rep. Katie Porter and Chad Bianco, Riverside County’s Republican sheriff, narrowly leading the field. But with support for both in the middling 13%-to-21% range, we’re not talking about a pair of world-beaters.

Like nature, political ambition abhors a vacuum.

Speaking of moneybags…

Tom Steyer!

Yes.

After making a bundle as a hedge fund manager, the San Francisco billionaire and environmental activist has been panting after public office for years. Running for president didn’t work out in 2020, even after Steyer spent more than $345 million on his effort. (That’s close to what the Dodgers spent on their 2025 payroll.)

So now Steyer is running for governor, a move he appeared to telegraph by airing nearly $13 million in self-promotional ads that, oh yes, supported passage of Proposition 50, the Democratic gerrymander initiative.

What are his chances?

Longtime readers of this column — both of you! — will know I make no predictions.

But California voters have never looked favorably upon rich candidates trying to make the leap from political civilian to the governorship or U.S. Senate. In fact, over the last 50-plus years, a gilded gallery of the well-to-do have tried and spectacularly failed.

Perhaps Steyer will display the policy chops or the razzle and dazzle they all lacked. But his launch video certainly didn’t shatter any molds. Rather, it presented a stereotypical grab bag of redwood trees, potshots at Sacramento, multicultural images of hard-working-everyday-folk, a promise to fight, a pledge to build more housing and, of course, a dash of profanity because, gosh darn it, nothing says “unbridled authenticity” like a political candidate swearing!

Maybe his fellow billionaire, Rick Caruso, will show more creativity and imagination if he gets into the governor’s race.

At least Democrats have been showing signs of life.

Indeed. Dare I say, the party’s mood swing from near-suicidal to euphoric has been quite something.

Winning gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia — not by a little, but a lot — and prevailing in down-ballot contests in Pennsylvania and Georgia had a remarkably transformative effect. (Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral victory in sky-blue New York City was no big surprise once the democratic socialist prevailed in the primary.)

Literally overnight, Democrats seized the momentum heading into the 2026 midterm election, while Republicans have begun scrambling to reposition their party and recraft its messaging.

All that being said, even before their buoyant off-year performance those widespread reports of Democrats’ demise were greatly … well, we’ll leave that Mark Twain chestnut alone. As analyst Charlie Cook points out, 2024 was a deeply disappointing year for the party. But it wasn’t a disaster.

Democrats gained two House seats. There was no net change in any of the 11 gubernatorial races and legislative contests across 44 states ended in something close to a wash. The party lost four Senate seats — and control of the chamber — but three of those losses came in the red states of Montana, Ohio and West Virginia.

“This is not to argue that Democrats had a great night in November 2024, but it certainly wasn’t a massacre or a party-wide repudiation,” Cook wrote in a recent posting. “If voters had intended to take it out on the party as a whole, the results would have looked quite different.”

Rather than a wholesale takedown of Democrats, the result seemed very much a rejection of President Biden and, by extension, his hasty replacement on the ballot, Vice President Kamala Harris.

What does that mean going forth?

If you’re asking whether Democrats will win control of the House or Senate…

Yes?!?

…I haven’t a clue.

Democrats need to gain three seats to take control of the House and both history and Trump’s sagging approval ratings — especially as pertains to the economy — augur well for their chances. The president’s party has lost House seats in 20 of the last 22 midterm elections and, according to Inside Elections, the fewest number of seats that flipped was four.

That’s why I thought Proposition 50, which sets out to all but decapitate California Republicans in Congress, was a bad and unnecessary move, effectively disenfranchising millions of non-Democratic voters.

An appeals court last week tossed out a Republican gerrymander in Texas, putting Democrats in an even stronger position, though the legal wrangling is far from over. The Supreme Court temporarily blocked the decision, pending review. And still to come is a high court ruling that could gut the Voting Rights Act and yield Republicans a dozen or more House seats nationwide.

So the fight for control is far from decided.

As for the Senate, Republicans stand a much better chance of keeping control, given how the seats contested in 2026 are located on largely favorable GOP terrain.

But until the votes are counted, nobody knows what will happen. That’s the thing about elections: they help keep wiseacres like me honest.

Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia loves to show off his two corgis, displaying them on his social media accounts, his financial reports and his reelection campaign materials.

Cardboard cutouts of corgis even adorn the entrance to Mejia’s office at City Hall East, making it resemble the dorm room of an especially proud dog parent.

Now, Mejia’s corgis are the subject of a complaint submitted to the city’s Ethics Commission, alleging that the controller has impermissibly blurred the lines between his government communications and his campaign operation.

Former State Sen. Isadore Hall, looking to unseat Mejia in June, conceded in his complaint that the corgi images — especially the one meant to look like Sherlock Holmes, with a pipe and magnifying glass — are “adorable.”

Nevertheless, Hall suggested that the graphics run afoul of a city law barring candidates from using city resources, since the cap-wearing corgi appears both on Mejia’s official city website and on his campaign yard signs.

Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia uses images of corgis, sometimes sporting a pipe and a magnifying glass, on his website, his campaign materials and even the entrance to his office at City Hall East.

(David Zahniser / Los Angeles Times)

“These practices, if substantiated, undermine public confidence in the neutrality of the City Controller’s office and violate clear prohibitions on using public assets for campaign advantage,” Hall said in his complaint.

The complaint, and the focus on the controller’s signature mascots, has sent the race for the city’s top auditor position in an unusual direction. Jane Nguyen, a Mejia campaign spokesperson, pushed back on the idea that the controller failed to comply with city law, while also suggesting that Hall is “jealous of our cute corgi graphics.”

In an email, Nguyen said it’s common for politicians to use similar designs and color schemes in their campaigns and their official government duties. At the same time, she said the “Sherlock corgi” used in city publications is different from the one in Mejia’s reelection campaign.

“He is wearing glasses in one version and is not wearing glasses in the other version,” she said.

David Tristan, executive director of the city’s Ethics Commission, which levies fines when enforcing local campaign finance laws, declined to comment, saying his office “cannot confirm or deny the existence of a complaint or investigation.”

Attorney Jessica Levinson, a former Ethics Commission president, said the agency responds seriously to allegations that city resources have been misused for campaign purposes. Still, she voiced doubts that Hall’s complaint would lead to a meaningful ethics case.

“This is not the type of thing that’s going to topple democracy,” she said. “Even if the allegations are true, I don’t think this weighs particularly heavily on the minds of voters.”

Hall, 53, is basing his complaint on a city law that bars city employees from using city cars, email lists, supplies or other municipal resources for campaign purposes. For example, city employees cannot take part in campaign activities while wearing uniforms with “official city insignia.”

The complaint goes beyond Mejia’s corgis, which are a diminutive herding breed beloved by the late Queen Elizabeth II. Hall also contends that the controller’s campaign logo, font colors and other design elements match the branding on his official city website, making it appear that the city is effectively endorsing his reelection bid.

Nguyen said Mejia’s corgi images and other designs were created as part of his 2022 campaign, without using city resources. She also said that the campaign logo is “far different” from the controller’s city logo, since it contains the word “for.”

Mejia, 35, has proven to be a savvy purveyor of marketing, distributing corgi stickers at community events and sending his staff to City Council meetings in green city controller jackets. He and his team are equally strategic about publicizing data on homelessness spending, legal payouts and other city expenses.

On his campaign website, Mejia described himself as “the father of two corgis, Killa and Kirby. He is known for bringing his dogs to work, walking them down the marble corridors of City Hall. They also showed up this year on an Instagram video where Mejia and his staff performed choreographed moves to Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” outside City Hall.

Former state Sen. Isadore Hall has filed an ethics complaint against City Controller Kenneth Mejia, his opponent in the June election.

(Isadore Hall for Controller)

Hall has faced scrutiny over his own election activities.

In 2014, The Times reported that Hall’s Senate committees spent $7,812 on cigars and membership at cigar lounges, $42,000 on airfare and hotels and $11,000 to stay at the Fairmont Hotel in Kihei, Hawaii, during a conference.

Hall defended the expenditures, saying they were for campaign fundraisers, dinners with potential donors and other political activities. He won his Senate race and made an unsuccessful run for Congress two years later.

Nguyen, in her email, pointed out that Hall was also accused of illegally using general election donations to pay for his primary campaign for Congress in 2016. In response to those and other violations, the Federal Election Commission issued a $24,000 penalty to Hall’s campaign.

Hall said earlier this year that he learned from the experience and had held his accountant accountable for the error.

Hall is not the only candidate running against Mejia. On Tuesday, entertainment industry executive Zachary Sokoloff formally launched his own bid for controller, promising to bring a “problem-solving approach to City Hall.” Sokoloff, 36, said he would “lead by listening” and “bring people together to fix what’s broken.”

Rick Taylor, Sokoloff’s campaign strategist, said he views Hall’s ethics complaint as “not relevant” to the upcoming campaign.

“Let’s focus on what the public wants to know,” he said. “They want to know who’s capable and competent and can do the job.”

The 2028 presidential election is more than 1,000 days away, but you’d hardly know it from all the speculation and anticipation that’s swirling from Sacramento to the Washington Beltway.

Standing at the center of attention is California Gov. Gavin Newsom, fresh off his big victory on Proposition 50, the backatcha ballot measure that gerrymandered the state’s congressional map to boost Democrats and offset a power grab by Texas Republicans.

Newsom is bidding for the White House, and has been doing so for the better part of a year, though he won’t say so out loud. Is Newsom the Democratic front-runner or a mere flash in the pan?

Times columnists Anita Chabria and Mark Z. Barabak disagree on Newsom’s presidential prospects, and more. Here the two hash out some of their differences.

Barabak: So is the presidential race over, Anita? Should I just spend the next few years backpacking and snowboarding in the Sierra and return in January 2029 to watch Newsom iterate, meet the moment and, with intentionality, be sworn in as our nation’s 48th president?

Chabria: You should definitely spend as much time in the Sierra as possible, but I have no idea if Newsom will be elected president in 2028 or not. That’s about a million light-years away in political terms. But I think he has a shot, and is the front-runner for the nomination right now. He’s set himself up as the quick-to-punch foil to President Trump, and increasingly as the leader of the Democratic Party. Last week, he visited Brazil for a climate summit that Trump ghosted, making Newsom the American presence.

And in a recent (albeit small) poll, in a hypothetical race against JD Vance, the current Republican favorite, Newsom lead by three points. Though, unexpectedly, respondents still picked Kamala Harris as their choice for the nomination.

To me, that shows he’s popular across the country. But you’ve warned that Californians have a tough time pulling voters in other states. Do you think his Golden State roots will kill off his contender status?

Barabak: I make no predictions. I’m smart enough to know that I’m not smart enough to know. And, after 2016 and the election of Trump, the words “can’t,” “not,” “won’t,” “never ever” are permanently stricken from my political vocabulary.

That said, I wouldn’t stake more than a penny — which may eventually be worth something, as they’re phased out of our currency — on Newsom’s chances.

Look, I yield to no one in my love of California. (And I’ve got the Golden State tats to prove it.) But I’m mindful of how the rest of the country views the state and those politicians who bear a California return address. You can be sure whoever runs against Newsom — and I’m talking about his fellow Democrats, not just Republicans — will have a great deal to say about the state’s much-higher-than-elsewhere housing, grocery and gas prices and our shameful rates of poverty and homelessness.

Not a great look for Newsom, especially when affordability is all the political rage these days.

And while I understand the governor’s appeal — Fight! Fight! Fight! — I liken it to the fleeting fancy that, for a time, made attorney, convicted swindler and rhetorical battering ram Michael Avenatti seriously discussed as a Democratic presidential contender. At a certain point — and we’re still years away — people will assess the candidates with their head, not viscera.

As for the polling, ask Edmund Muskie, Gary Hart or Hillary Clinton how much those soundings matter at this exceedingly early stage of a presidential race. Well, you can’t ask Muskie, because the former Maine senator is dead. But all three were early front-runners who failed to win the Democratic nomination.

Chabria: I don’t argue the historical case against the Golden State, but I will argue that these are different days. People don’t vote with their heads. Fight me on that.

They vote on charisma, tribalism, and maybe some hope and fear. They vote on issues as social media explains them. They vote on memes.

There no reality in which our next president is rationally evaluated on their record — our current president has a criminal one and that didn’t make a difference.

But I do think, as we’ve talked about ad nauseam, that democracy is in peril. Trump has threatened to run for a third term and recently lamented that his Cabinet doesn’t show him the same kind of fear that Chinese President Xi Jinping gets from his top advisers. And Vance, should he get the chance to run, has made it clear he’s a Christian nationalist who would like to deport nearly every immigrant he can catch, legal or not.

Being a Californian may not be the drawback it’s historically been, especially if Trump’s authoritarianism continues and this state remains the symbol of resistance.

But our governor does have an immediate scandal to contend with. His former chief of staff, Dana Williamson, was just arrested on federal corruption charges. Do you think that hurts him?

Barabak: It shouldn’t.

There’s no evidence of wrongdoing on Newsom’s part. His opponents will try the guilt-by-association thing. Some already have. But unless something damning surfaces, there’s no reason the governor should be punished for the alleged wrongdoing of Williamson or others charged in the case.

But let’s go back to 2028 and the presidential race. I think one of our fundamental disagreements is that I believe people do very much evaluate a candidate’s ideas and records. Not in granular fashion, or the way some chin-stroking political scientist might. But voters do want to know how and whether a candidate can materially improve their lives.

There are, of course, a great many who’d reflexively support Donald Trump, or Donald Duck for that matter, if he’s the Republican nominee. Same goes for Democrats who’d vote for Gavin Newsom or Gavin Floyd, if either were the party’s nominee. (While Newsom played baseball in college, Floyd pitched 13 seasons in the major leagues, so he’s got that advantage over the governor.)

But I’m talking about those voters who are up for grabs — the ones who decide competitive races — who make a very rational decision based on their lives and livelihoods and which candidate they believe will benefit them most.

Granted, the dynamic is a bit different in a primary contest. But even then, we’ve seen time and again the whole dated/married phenomenon. As in 2004, when a lot of Democrats “dated” Howard Dean early in the primary season but “married” John Kerry. I see electability — as in the perception of which Democrat can win the general election — being right up there alongside affordability when it comes time for primary voters to make their 2028 pick.

Chabria: No doubt affordability will be a huge issue, especially if consumer confidence continues to plummet. And we are sure to hear criticisms of California, many of which are fair, as you point out. Housing costs too much, homelessness remains intractable.

But these are also problems across the United States, and require deeper fixes than even this economically powerful state can handle alone. More than past record, future vision is going to matter. What’s the plan?

It can’t be vague tax credits or even student loan forgiveness. We need a concrete vision for an economy that brings not just more of the basics like homes, but the kind of long-term economic stability — higher wages, good schools, living-wage jobs — that makes the middle class stronger and attainable.

The Democrat who can lay out that vision while simultaneously continuing to battle the authoritarian creep currently eating our democracy will, in my humble opinion, be the one voters choose, regardless of origin story. After all, it was that message of change with hope that gave us President Obama, another candidate many considered a long shot at first.

Mark, are there any 2028 prospects you’re keeping a particularly close eye on?

Barabak: I’m taking things one election at a time, starting with the 2026 midterms, which include an open-seat race for governor here in California. The results in November 2026 will go a long way toward shaping the dynamic in November 2028. That said, there’s no shortage of Democrats eyeing the race — too many to list here. Will the number surpass the 29 major Democrats who ran in 2020? We’ll see.

I do agree with you that, to stand any chance of winning in 2028, whomever Democrats nominate will have to offer some serious and substantive ideas on how to make people’s lives materially better. Imperiled democracy and scary authoritarianism aside, it’s still the economy, stupid.

Which brings us full circle, back to our gallivanting governor. He may be winning fans and building his national fundraising base with his snippy memes and zippy Trump put-downs. But even if he gets past the built-in anti-California bias among so many voters outside our blessed state, he’s not going to snark his way to the White House.

I’d wager more than a penny on that.

PORTLAND, Maine — The Democratic primary to take on Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine was shaken up Wednesday by the decision of one candidate to drop out and join a different race with similarly high stakes.

In a move that could have implications for the closely divided U.S. House as well as the Senate, Jordan Wood, a onetime chief of staff to former Rep. Katie Porter, withdrew from the Senate race to instead seek the congressional seat representing Maine’s 2nd District, where incumbent Democratic Rep. Jared Golden recently announced he will not seek another term.

That leaves Gov. Janet Mills, a party mainstay, and Graham Platner, an oyster farmer who has gained attention for his progressive views and provocative online posts, as the top Democratic challengers to Collins.

Wood’s announcement sets up a potential Democratic congressional primary in the key 2nd District with former Secretary of State Matt Dunlap. The leading Republican candidate for the House seat is former Gov. Paul LePage.

“After many conversations with my family and voters in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District, I’ve decided to step up and to be the fighter for the district where I was born and raised,” Wood said in a statement Wednesday.

Maine’s upcoming 2nd District and Senate races are both highly competitive and could help shape the balance of power in Congress. Collins is the sole Republican senator in New England, and toppling her has long been a goal of the Democratic Party. Republicans, meanwhile, have prioritized winning back the 2nd District, where President Trump is popular.

Dunlap announced his bid for the 2nd District weeks before Golden’s announcement that he is vacating. Dunlap said in a statement Wednesday that Wood entering the race “doesn’t change our campaign or our commitment” and that he’s “in this to fight for the people of Maine.”

LePage served as governor from 2011 to 2019. He announced his bid for Congress months ago. Brent Littlefield, a LePage spokesperson, said in a statement that Wood is too liberal for the 2nd District.

“Mainers will pick a job creator, Paul LePage, who will grow the economy and push back on high prices,” Littlefield said.

Two other one-time Democratic candidates for the Senate seat, brewery owner Dan Kleban and former Air Force civilian contractor Daira Smith-Rodriguez, recently dropped out and endorsed Mills. A handful of other Democratic hopefuls remain, though only Mills and Platner are campaigning aggressively.

Whittle writes for the Associated Press.

The revelers who packed Tuesday’s election night party in L.A.’s Highland Park neighborhood were roughly 2,500 miles from the concert hall where New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani celebrated his historic win.

Yet despite that sprawling distance, the crowd, heavily populated with members of the L.A. chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, had no trouble finishing the applause lines delivered by Mamdani, himself a DSA member, during his victory speech.

“New York!” Mamdani bellowed on the oversized television screens hung throughout the Greyhound Bar & Grill. “We’re going to make buses fast and — “

“Free!” the crowd inside the bar yelled back in response.

In Los Angeles, activists with the Democratic Socialists of America have already fired up their campaigns for the June election, sending out canvassing teams and scheduling postcard-writing events for their chosen candidates. But they’re also taking fresh inspiration from Mamdani’s win, pointing to his inclusive, unapologetic campaign and his relentless focus on pocketbook issues, particularly among working-class voters.

The message that propelled Mamdani to victory resonates just as much in L.A., said City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who won her seat in 2022 with logistical support from the DSA.

“What New York City is saying is that the rent is too damn high, that affordability is a huge issue not just on housing, but when it comes to grocery shopping, when it comes to daycare,” she said. “These are the things that we’re also experiencing here in Los Angeles.”

City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, appearing at a rally in Lincoln Heights last year, said New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s message will resonate in L.A.

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

DSA-LA, which is a membership organization and not a political party, has elected four of its endorsed candidates to the council since 2020, ousting incumbents in each of the last three election cycles. They’ve done so in large part by knocking on doors and working to increase turnout among renters and lower-income households.

The chapter hopes to win two additional seats in June. Organizers have begun contemplating a full-on socialist City Council — possibly by the end of 2028 — with DSA members holding eight of the council’s 15 seats.

“We would like a socialist City Council majority,” said Benina Stern, co-chair of DSA’s Los Angeles chapter. “Because clearly that is the logical progression, to keep growing the bloc.”

Despite those lofty ambitions, it could take at least five years before the L.A. chapter matches this week’s breakthrough in New York City.

Mayor Karen Bass, a high-profile leader within the Democratic Party with few ties to the DSA, is now running for a second term. Her only major opponent is former schools superintendent Austin Beutner, who occupies the center of the political spectrum in L.A. Real estate developer Rick Caruso, a longtime Republican who is now a Democrat, has not disclosed his intentions but has long been at odds with DSA‘s progressive policies.

In L.A., DSA organizers have put their emphasis on identifying and campaigning for candidates in down-ballot races, not citywide contests. Part of that is due to the fact that L.A. has a weak-mayor system, particularly when compared with New York City, where the mayor has responsibility not just for city services but also public schools and even judicial appointments.

L.A. council members propose and approve legislation, rework the budgets submitted by the mayor and represent districts with more than a quarter of a million people. As a result, DSA organizers have chosen the council as their path to power at City Hall, Stern said.

“The conditions in Los Angeles and New York I think are very different,” she said.

Since 2020, DSA-LA has been highly selective about its endorsement choices. The all-volunteer organization sends applicants a lengthy questionnaire with dozens of litmus test questions: Do they support diverting funds away from law enforcement? Do they oppose L.A.’s decision to host the Olympics? Do they support a repeal of L.A.’s ban on homeless encampments near schools?

Once a candidate secures an endorsement, DSA-LA turns to its formidable pool of volunteers, sending them out to help candidates knock on doors, staff phone banks and stage fundraising events.

During Tuesday’s party, DSA-LA organizers recruited new members to assist with the reelection campaigns of Hernandez and Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, a former labor organizer. They distributed postcard-sized fliers with the message, “Hate Capitalism? So do we.”

Standing nearby was Estuardo Mazariegos, a tenant rights advocate now running to replace Councilmember Curren Price in a South L.A. district. Mazariegos, 40, said he first became interested in the DSA in the seventh grade, when his middle school civics teacher displayed a DSA flag in her classroom.

The crowd at the Greyhound in Highland Park reacts to results on Tuesday.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

Mazariegos hailed the results from New York and California, saying voters are “taking back America for the working people of America.” He sounded somewhat less excited about Bass, a former community organizer who has pursued some middle-of-the-road positions, such as hiring more police officers.

Asked if he supports Bass’ bid for a second term, Mazariegos responded: “If she’s up against a billionaire, yes.”

“If she’s up against another comrade, maybe not,” he added, laughing.

When Bass ran in November 2022, DSA-LA grudgingly recommended a vote for her in its popular voter guide, describing her as a “status quo politician.”

Councilmember Nithya Raman, who represents a Hollywood Hills district, is far more enthusiastic. Raman has worked closely with Bass on efforts to move homeless Angelenos indoors, while also seeking fixes to the larger systems that serve L.A.’s unhoused population.

“Karen Bass is the most progressive mayor we’ve ever had in L.A,” said Raman, who co-hosted the election night party with the other three DSA-aligned council members, DSA-LA and others.

Raman was the first of the DSA-backed candidates to win a council seat in L.A., running in 2020 as a reformer who would bring stronger renter protections and a network of community access centers to assist homeless residents.

Two years later, voters elected labor organizer Soto-Martínez and Hernandez. Tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado became the fourth last year, ousting Councilmember Kevin de León.

Stern, the DSA-LA co-chair, said she believes the four council members have brought a “sea change” to City Hall, working with their progressive colleagues to expand the city’s teams of unarmed responders, who are viewed as an alternative to gun-carrying police officers.

The DSA voting bloc also shaped this year’s city budget, voting to reduce the number of new recruits at the Los Angeles Police Department and preserve other city jobs, Stern said.

To be clear, the four-member bloc has pursued those efforts by working with other progressives on the council who are not affiliated with the DSA but more moderate on other issues. Beyond that, the group has plenty of detractors.

Stuart Waldman, president of the Valley Industry and Commerce Assn., said DSA-backed council members are making the city worse, by pushing for a $30 per hour hotel minimum wage and a $32.35 minimum wage for construction workers.

“No one is ever going to build a hotel in this city again, and DSA were a part of that,” he said. “Pretty soon no one will build housing, and the DSA is a part of that too.”

The union that represents LAPD officers vowed to fight the DSA’s effort to expand its reach, saying it would work to ensure that “Angelenos are not bamboozled by the socialist bait and switch.”

“Socialists want to bait Angelenos into talking about affordability, oppression and fairness, get their candidates elected, and then switch to enact their platform that states ‘Defund the police by rejecting any expansion to police budgets … while cutting [police] budgets annually towards zero,’” the union’s board of directors said in a statement.

In New York City, Mamdani has proposed a series of measures to make the city more affordable, including free bus fares, city-run grocery stores and a four-year freeze on rent increases inside rent stabilized apartment units.

Some of those ideas have already been tried in L.A.

In 2020, weeks into the COVID-19 shutdown, Mayor Eric Garcetti placed a moratorium on rent hikes for more than 600,000 rent-stabilized apartments. The council kept that measure in place for four years.

Around the same time, L.A. County’s transit agency suspended mandatory collection of bus fares. The agency started charging bus passengers again in 2022.

City Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Eunisses Hernandez celebrate at the election night party they co-hosted with Democratic Socialists of America’s L.A. chapter and two other council members.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

In recent months, the DSA-LA has pushed for new limits on rent increases inside L.A.’s rent-stabilized apartments. Raman, who chairs the council’s housing committee, is backing a yearly cap of 3% in those buildings, most of which were built before October 1978.

Hernandez, whose district stretches from working-class Westlake to rapidly gentrifying Highland Park, is a believer in shifting the Overton Window at City Hall — moving the political debate left and “putting people over profits.”

Like others at the election party, Hernandez is hoping the council will eventually have eight DSA-aligned members in the coming years, saying such a shift would be a “game changer.” With a clear majority, she said, the council would not face a huge battle to approve new tenant protections, expand the network of unarmed response teams and place “accountability measures” on corporations that are “making money off our city.”

“There’s so many things … that we could do easier for the people of the city of Los Angeles if we had a majority,” she said.

SACRAMENTO — Antonio Villaraigosa, former Los Angeles mayor and current candidate for California governor, on Friday said he opposed the creation of a state-level single payer healthcare system.

Villaraigosa’s stance separated him from three rival Democrats who appeared on stage with him at a candidate forum at UC Riverside.

Candidates, who were asked about a single-payer healthcare system during a question-and-answer session that only involved raising their hands, did not provide explanations for their stances. But during earlier remarks, Villaraigosa had said he had no interest in selling “snake oil” solutions to voters on complex matters like healthcare.

The divide stood out because the four Democrats were otherwise closely aligned on prioritizing healthcare if elected in the 2026 race.

Aside from Villaraigosa, the candidates included: former state Controller Betty Yee, former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra and California Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond.

During the event, candidates were asked how they would approach a range of issues that impact an individual’s health, including aging, nutrition and mental illness.

The four contenders were largely on the same page, with all promising to work on removing barriers to care by expanding healthcare coverage and supporting programs that increase access to fresh food and mental health services. They all voiced support for creating pathways and incentives for students to study healthcare to help with industry staffing shortages.

Each also offered slightly different insights when asked a question about how to best support the “sandwich generation,” or those who are caring for both children and aging parents.

Becerra recalled how he and his siblings took turns caring for their aging father, which allowed him to spend his final years at home.

“There is nothing better because they are being cared for by those who love them,” Becerra said. “If I am governor, home care will be compensated.”

Yee said income tax credits could help and explained she would work with employers to improve employee leave options.

Thurmond said California should create a long-term care system for seniors similar to the system the state developed to help homeowners unable to access homeowners insurance.

The event was organized by Health Matters, a nonpartisan forum on health and equity that is organized by 11 health-focused foundations in California.

There are three essential components to a healthy democracy: elected officials, voters and political opposition. The first two make the most noise and get the most attention.

But that third pillar really matters too.

According to Ballotpedia, the online nonpartisan organization that tracks election data, of the nearly 14,000 elections across 30 states that the group covered this week, 60% were uncontested — with only one candidate for a position, or for some roles, no candidate at all.

Much of this week’s postelection analysis has been focused on the mayoral race in New York City and Zohran Mamdani’s victory. Yet the same night, as democracy in America took center stage, more than 1,000 people were elected mayor without facing an opponent.

Only about 700 mayoral races tracked by Ballotpedia gave voters any choice. Dig a little deeper and you find more than 50% of city council victories and nearly 80% of outcomes for local judgeships were all without competition.

That’s a problem.

Elections without political opposition turn voting — the cornerstone of our governance — into performance art. The trend is heading in the wrong direction. Since Ballotpedia began tracking this data in 2018, about 65% of the elections covered were uncontested. However, for the last two years the average is an abysmal 75%.

It’s a symptom of broader disengagement. Over two and a half centuries, a lot of lives have been sacrificed trying to perfect this union and its democracy. And yet last November, a third of America’s eligible voters chose not to take part.

Are we a healthy democracy or masquerading as one?

Doug Kronaizl, a managing editor at Ballotpedia who analyzes this data, told me the numbers show Americans are increasingly more focused on national politics, even though local elections have the greatest effects on our daily lives.

“We like to view elections sort of like a pyramid, and at the tippity top, that’s where all of the elections are that people just spend a lot of time focused on,” said Kronaizl, who’s been at the nonprofit since 2020. “That’s your U.S. House races, your governor races, stuff like that. But the vast majority of the pyramid — that huge base — is like all of these local elections that are always happening and end up being for the most part uncontested.”

Take New York, for example. For all the hoopla around Mamdani’s win, the fact is most of the state’s 124 elections weren’t contested. Iowa had 1,753 races with one or zero candidates; Ohio had more than 2,500.

And that’s being conservative. In some cases, if an election is uncontested, ballots aren’t printed and the performance art is canceled. Ballotpedia says its data doesn’t include outcomes decided without a vote.

We have elected officials. We have voters. But political opposition? We’re in trouble — especially at the local level, down at the base of the pyramid. The foundation of democracy is in desperate need of repair.

* * *

The former mayor of Tempe, Ariz., Neil Giuliano, has dedicated most of his life to public service. He said when it comes to running for office, people must remember the three M’s: the money to campaign, the electoral math to win and the message for voters.

“It used to be the other way around,” he told me. “It used to be you had a message and you talked about what you believed in.” Now, however, “you can talk about what you believe in all day long,” he said, but if you don’t have the money and the data to target and reach voters, “it’s either a vanity effort or a futility effort.”

When an interesting electoral seat opens in Arizona, Giuliano — who was elected to the city council in 1990 before serving as mayor from 1994 to 2004 — is sometimes approached about running again. For two decades now, his answer has been the same: No, thank you.

Instead, the 69-year-old prefers mentoring candidates and fundraising. He also sits on the board of the Victory Fund, the 30-year-old nonpartisan organization that works to elect openly LGBTQ+ candidates at all levels of government.

Giuliano said the rise in uncontested elections can be explained by two discouraged groups: Some people don’t run because they believe the positions don’t matter. Others are “so overwhelmed with everything going on they’re not going to alter their life,” he said. “It’s already challenging enough without getting into a public fray where people hate each other, where people need security, where people are being accosted verbally and on social media.”

That sentiment was echoed by Amanda Litman, co-founder and president of Run for Something. Her nonprofit recruits and supports young progressives to run for local and state offices. Since President Trump was elected last November, Litman said, the organization has received more than 200,000 inquiries from people looking to run for office — which could indicate some hope on the horizon.

“I think the problems have gotten so big and so deep that it feels like you have to do something — you have to run,” she said. “The number one issue we’re hearing folks talk about is housing. The market in the last couple of years has gotten so hard, especially for young people, that it feels like there’s no alternative but to engage.”

* * *

Indeed, these are the times that try men’s souls, to borrow a phrase from Thomas Paine. He wrote those words in “The American Crisis” less than two years into the Revolutionary War, when morale was low and the future of democracy looked bleak. It is said that George Washington had Paine’s words read out loud to soldiers to inspire them. And when the bloodshed was over and victory finally won, the founders drafted the first article of the Bill of Rights because they knew the paramount importance of political opposition. That is what the 1st Amendment primarily protects: freedom of speech, the press and assembly and the right to petition the government.

Today, the crisis isn’t tyranny from abroad, but civic disengagement.

And look, I get it.

Whether you watch Fox News, CNN or MSNBC, it usually seems as though no one in politics cares about you or your community’s problems. We would have a different impression if we listened to local candidates. There are thousands of local elections every year, starving for attention and resources, right at the base of the pyramid. Since the 20th century — when national media and campaign financing exploded — we have been lured into looking only at the tippity top.

One reason political opposition in local races is critical to democracy is that it teaches us to get along despite our differences. The president will never meet most people who didn’t vote for them, but a local school board member might. Those conversations will affect how the official thinks, talks, campaigns and governs. When the system works, politicians are held accountable — and are replaced if they get out of step with voters. That’s a healthy democracy, and it’s possible only with all three elements in place: elected officials, voters and political opposition.

* * *

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has dedicated most of his life to public service. He said he learned early on to care about his community because he grew up during the civil rights movement, “when they were sending dogs to attack human beings.”

Today, the 72-year-old is a 2026 gubernatorial candidate in California. He told me when it comes to the rise in uncontested elections, people have to remember “democracy is a living, breathing thing.”

“Not everybody can run for office, not everybody wants to run for office, but everybody needs to be involved civically,” he said. “We have an obligation and a duty to participate, to read about what’s going on to understand and yes sometimes to run when necessary.

“We got to stand up to the threat to our democracy, but we also got to fix the things we broke … and it’s a lot broken.”

Voters often want something better than the status quo, but without political opposition on the ballot, it can’t happen. That’s the beauty of democracy: It comes in handy when elected officials forget government is meant to serve the people — not the other way around.

Leanna Hubers contributed to this report. YouTube: @LZGrandersonShow

WASHINGTON — One year after Trump retook the White House and set into motion a dramatic expansion of executive power, the Republican president figures prominently in state and local elections being held Tuesday.

The results of those contests — the first general election of Trump’s second term — will be heralded by the victors as either a major repudiation or resounding stamp of approval of his second-term agenda. That’s especially true in high-profile races for Virginia and New Jersey governor, New York City mayor and a California proposition to redraw its congressional district boundaries.

More than half of the states will hold contests on Tuesday. Here’s a look at some of the major statewide and local races on the ballot:

Governors: New Jersey and Virginia

In New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli are the nominees to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. Sherrill is a four-term U.S. representative and former Navy helicopter pilot. Ciattarelli is a former state Assemblyman backed by Trump. In 2021, Ciattarelli came within about 3 percentage points of toppling Murphy.

In Virginia, Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears and Democratic former U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger look to replace term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. While Spanberger has made some efforts to focus on topics other than Trump in stump speeches, the president remained a major topic of conversation throughout the campaign, from comments Earle-Sears made about him in 2022 to some of his more polarizing policies, such as the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill tax and spending cut measure and the widespread dismissal of federal workers, many of whom live in northern Virginia.

Trump was scheduled to participate in telephone rallies for the candidates on Monday night.

As the only gubernatorial races held in the year following a presidential election, the contests have long served as the first major test of voter sentiment toward the party holding the White House. In every race for governor since 1973, one or both states have elected a governor from a party different than that of the sitting president.

New York City Mayor

The race to lead the nation’s largest city features Democratic state legislator Zohran Mamdani, independent candidate and former Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa.

Mamdani’s comfortable victory over Cuomo in the June primary generated excitement from the party’s more progressive wing and apprehension among the party establishment. Party leaders like Gov. Kathy Hochul and U.S. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries eventually endorsed the self-described democratic socialist months after he won the nomination.

The winner will replace outgoing Mayor Eric Adams, who initially sought renomination as a Democrat. After losing the primary Adams opted to run as an independent, but dropped out of the race in September and eventually endorsed Cuomo. In February, the Trump Justice Department asked a court to drop corruption charges against Adams because the case impeded Trump’s “ immigration objectives.” Trump later said he’d like to see both Adams and Sliwa drop out of the race in an effort to defeat Mamdani.

California Proposition 50

California voters will decide a statewide ballot measure that would enact a new congressional map that could flip as many as five Republican-held U.S. House seats to Democratic control.

Proposition 50, championed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, is in response to a new Texas map that state Republicans enacted in August as part of Trump’s efforts to keep the U.S. House under Republican control in the 2026 midterms. The Texas plan, which could help Republicans flip five Democratic-held U.S. House seats, has sparked an escalating gerrymandering arms race among states to pass new maps outside of the regular once-a-decade schedule.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Control of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court will be at stake when voters cast Yes or No votes on whether to retain three justices from the high court’s 5-2 Democratic majority.

Partisan control of the court could have major implications for the 2028 presidential race, since justices might be asked to rule on election disputes, as they did in 2020. Spending on Tuesday’s contests is on track to exceed $15 million as Republicans have campaigned to end the majority and Democrats have responded.

If all three justices are ousted, a deadlock in the confirmation process to replace them could result in a court tied at 2-2. An election to fill any vacant seats for full 10-year terms would be held in 2027.

Other notable contests

VIRGINIA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Republican incumbent Jason Miyares seeks a second term against Democrat Jay Jones. Much of the fall campaign has focused on text messages suggesting violence against political rivals that Jones sent in 2022.

TEXAS-18: Sixteen candidates hope to fill a vacant congressional seat previously held by the late Democratic U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner.

STATE LEGISLATURES: Control of the Minnesota Senate and Virginia House of Delegates is at stake, while New Jersey Democrats defend their 52-28 General Assembly majority.

BALLOT MEASURES: Maine voters will decide statewide questions on voting and a “red flag” law aimed at preventing gun violence. Texas’ 17 ballot measures include constitutional amendments on parental rights and limiting voting to U.S. citizens. Colorado and Washington also have statewide measures on the ballot.

MAYORS: Detroit, Pittsburgh, Jersey City and Buffalo will elect new mayors, while incumbents in Atlanta, Minneapolis and Cincinnati seek another term.

Yoon writes for the Associated Press.

As we mentioned last time when Sabrina Carpenter hosted “Saturday Night Live,” there’s no substitute for a host who fully throws themselves into “SNL.”

He may not have done double duty as host and musical guest the way Carpenter did, but Miles Teller appeared to fully embrace the challenge of returning to host for a second time (the first was in 2022). The “Top Gun 2: Maverick” star, who’ll next be appearing in the movie “Eternity,” gave a solid performance, appearing in nearly every sketch, including the cold open and two pre-recorded videos.

He first appeared as former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a candidate for New York mayor, in the cold open with help from Ramy Youssef and Shane Gillis as opponents Zohran Mamdani and Curtis Sliwa.

After that, Teller played a hungover game show contestant recovering from Halloween, a hockey player shooting a public service announcement for the unfortunately named Nashville Predators and both twin Property Brothers in a video sketch about the current White House renovation.

Teller was also in a sketch about a TV newsroom that decides to show viewers what its background employees are doing, a Netflix promo for a true crime story about husbands who don’t know where their wives went, one about a police press conference that takes a turn and a show closer about a silly Italian restaurant in Nebraska.

Teller handled it all well; he’s good with accents and earned strong laughs, especially playing two characters at the same time in the “Property Brothers” sketch and as Cuomo in the cold open.

Musical guest Brandi Carlile performed “Church & State” and “Human.”

This week’s cold open was one of the stronger (or at least funnier) political sketches of the season so far, tackling the New York mayoral race. As hosted by Errol Louis (Kenan Thompson), “the least famous person to be impersonated on ‘SNL,’ ” the debate sketch portrayed Cuomo (Teller) as a sexually harassing (“Yadda yadda yadda, honk honk, squeeze squeeze) panderer to Jewish voters; Mamdani (Youssef) as a force-smiling, TikTok-flirting candidate who’s pretty sure he won’t be able to implement his promises; and long-shot candidate Sliwa (Gillis) as an “old-fashioned New York nut” with one traumatic story after another to recount. The biggest surprise may have been Gillis, who as Sliwa recounted stories about being hung by his testicles and getting assaulted by a Times Square Spider-Man. Where was this energy when Gillis hosted “SNL”? As has been the habit on many a cold open, President Trump (James Austin Johnson) interrupts the proceedings to mock the candidates and insert his own commentary. This time, that included singing a song from “Phantom of the Opera” to conclude the sketch.

Teller’s monologue was short and simple, relaying how as a kid who moved around most of his childhood, “SNL” was a constant. He shared a photo of himself and his sisters dressed up as the “Night at the Roxbury” characters from the show and then made up a list of memories from the show, like having his first beer in the audience and falling over after having a few beers. Teller mentioned that he and his wife lost their Palisades home in January’s Los Angeles fires. As such, he made sure to point out the fire exits for the audience.

Best sketch of the night: An extreme White House makeover

The Property Brothers Jonathan and Drew Scott (Teller times two) meet their toughest clients yet: Trump and First Lady Melania Trump (Chloe Fineman) who need help with their current renovation of the White House to make room for a new ballroom. Melania shared her skeleton and withered tree decorations (“They are for Christmas,” she said), and the couple complained that 55,000 square feet and 132 rooms just isn’t enough space. With a budget of “$350 million to infinity” the brothers get to work with the help of park rangers and astronauts working through the government shutdown. But when it comes to getting paid for their work, there’s a problem. “Aren’t you guys from Canada?” the president asks. Then he calls ICE on them.

Also good: Nobody asked for this much transparency in news

On a show called Newspoint, the host (Fineman) and her guest (Thompson) are trying to have a serious news discussion, but because the show has opened up its full newsroom to viewers, all the workers in the background draw attention. Among them are Mikey Day, who awkwardly notices the cameras are on him before spilling a carrier of drinks, Bowen Yang as a worker who gets electrocuted by a copy machine and Teller, who has manga erotica up on his work screen. It’s nice to see some physical comedy from Day in particular and the sketch’s visual gags work nicely.

‘Weekend Update’ winner: George Santos is back, untruthful as ever!

Andrew Dismukes and Ashley Padilla (who should be a full cast member at this point instead of a featured player) played a couple who just made out but are trying to discuss the government shutdown. But it was Yang as chronic liar George Santos who stole “Update” (and some jewels) after Yang missed an opportunity on the last “SNL” episode to play the former representative, whose prison term was commuted by Trump. Santos claimed he finished the New York marathon, which hadn’t happened yet, and kept interrupting his chat with “Update” co-host Colin Jost to take calls with prisoners with a jail window and phone he brought with him. He purported to speak with Ghislaine Maxwell, Luigi Mangione and Sean “Diddy” Combs before revealing that the key to making prison rice pudding is preheating the toilet to 350 degrees. Santos ended the segment by revealing the necklace he stole from the Louvre and insisting that he’d just won the World Series.