Council

Claudia Aragon was headed home after dropping her puppy off at obedience school when the first text came in early on Friday, June 6.

“Ice showed up at the Home Depot in cypress park. Want to make sure we can help people,” an immigrant service provider texted her. “this is awful claudia.”

Aragon, who has directed Mayor Karen Bass’ Office of Immigrant Affairs since March 2023, had been sick and was planning to stay home that day.

But she lives only a few miles from the Cypress Park site and decided to drive over.

She arrived outside the Home Depot in the aftermath of the raid — an environment she described as akin to “calm after the storm” in the wake of a natural disaster.

“Everyone’s kind of trying to find their bearings and looking around like, ‘What happened?’ Some of the food vendors that were there were sort of putting things back,” Aragon said.

There would be little calm for Aragon over the next days and weeks.

Within an hour or so of getting home that Friday morning, Aragon’s phone rang again, with someone telling her that federal authorities were at a sprawling fast-fashion warehouse in the Garment District.

Far from being isolated incidents, the Cypress Park Home Depot raid and the arrests at Ambiance Apparel were initial blasts in what would be much broader upheaval, as the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement teams descended on Los Angeles and a military deployment soon followed.

Through it all, Aragon’s phone kept buzzing, as she connected with activists and a host of immigrant service providers.

The next few hours were a surreal and overwhelming frenzy, as Aragon, immigrant advocacy groups and the city all tried to piece together what was happening with little communication from the federal government.

Aragon, who worked in Bass’ congressional office before joining the mayor’s office, has known and collaborated with many of her community counterparts for years.

Those relationships were battle-tested early in Aragon’s city tenure, as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began sending buses of migrants to Los Angeles in 2023. Aragon was responsible for coordinating the response, as the city, faith and nonprofit partners helped situate the new arrivals.

A day or two after Donald Trump was elected to a second term in the White House, Aragon also sat down with the mayor’s senior staff to strategize on how the city could prepare for potential immigrant raids, since Trump had made no secret of his intentions during the campaign.

The city’s immigrant affairs office is currently a lean two-person team, with Aragon and a language access coordinator. The department was first created under Mayor James Hahn and then resurrected by then-Mayor Eric Garcetti.

Aragon herself is “a very proud immigrant,” having come to the United States from El Salvador when she was 7.

“To be here with Mayor Bass, having the opportunity to elevate the immigrant community through policy, through funding to provide support for providers who champion the community — my community, for families that are like mine — is amazing and an honor,” Aragon said.

It can also be painful at this particular moment in history, when the promise of the immigrant American dream that made her life possible now seems in existential jeopardy and so many are living in fear.

“People can’t even go down the street without being detained … I can’t even look at them and tell them they’ll be okay,” Aragon said.

State of play

— THE CHAOS CONTINUES: Federal immigration raids continued across L.A. County this week, reaching into Hollywood, Pico Rivera and other locations. In San Fernando, L.A. Councilmember Monica Rodriguez and San Fernando Vice Mayor Mary Solorio went on Instagram Thursday to spread the word about residents being swept up from the areas around a Home Depot in San Fernando and a Costco in Pacoima, in hopes of alerting their families.

“We only have first names of some of the individuals,” Solorio said. “Those individuals are Omar, Elmer, Antonio, Saul and Ramiro.” Rodriguez read out contact information for immigrant defense groups, saying: “We need to protect one another in these very scary times.”

In Hollywood, L.A. Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez voiced his fury over a raid in his district at the Home Depot on Sunset Boulevard.

“Despicable doesn’t even begin to describe what this is,” he told The Times. “You hear about this happening in military dictatorships and totalitarian governments. To happen here in the second-largest city in America is — I don’t have words, just outrage.”

— ‘PROFOUND HARM’: Several people were also detained at a bus stop near a Winchell’s Donut House in Pasadena, evoking angry responses from County Supervisor Janice Hahn and U.S. Rep. Judy Chu. Hahn, who chairs Metro’s transit board, worried that residents will be too afraid to go to work, attend church and, now, hop on public transit. “The fear they are spreading is doing profound harm in our communities,” she said. Metro officials underscored those concerns, saying the transit system has seen a 10% to 15% drop in bus and rail ridership since immigration enforcement activities began.

— BEHIND THE MASK: County Supervisor Kathryn Barger voiced fears this week that some of the masked men pulling over Angelenos may not be immigration agents but rather “bad players” impersonating federal law enforcement. “I tell you this story because we don’t know if they were ICE agents or not,” she said at Tuesday’s board meeting. Hahn wasn’t convinced, replying: “Make no mistake about it: It isn’t people impersonating ICE. It is ICE.”

— DODGER MANIA: Yet another part of the city caught in the uproar was Dodger Stadium. Raul Claros, a community organizer now running for an Eastside seat on the City Council, held a press conference Wednesday to demand that the team do more to help families devastated by the raids. “The largest economic engine in this area is silent!” he told ABC7 and other news outlets. “Wake up! Do better!”

The Dodgers later signaled the organization was willing to help. Before the team made its announcement, federal law enforcement agents were spotted outside the stadium, generating new protests. “People are out here because they don’t want to see their families torn apart,” Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez said in an interview with NBC. The team, in a statement on X, said it had denied entry to those agents. (Dodgers referred to them as ICE, federal officials said they were from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.)

— DOWNTOWN SETTLES DOWN: Confrontations between law enforcement agencies and anti-ICE protesters tapered off this week, prompting Mayor Karen Bass to scale back, and then repeal, her curfew order for downtown, Chinatown and the Arts District. But those showdowns have caused legal and financial shock wages.

— RISING PRICE TAG: For example: City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo reported Friday that the costs of the protests to the city had jumped to more than $32 million, including $29.5 million in costs to the LAPD. The City Council voted 12-3 on Wednesday to loan the LAPD $5 million from the city’s reserve fund to cover the associated police overtime. Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, who represents downtown, voted no, as did two of her colleagues: Hernandez and Soto-Martínez.

— A NEW GIG: Former Mayor Eric Garcetti (who, until recently, was serving as U.S. ambassador to India) has been named Ambassador for Global Climate Diplomacy on behalf of C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group.

— HEADING TO COURT: Free speech advocates have begun filing lawsuits to stop what they call the “continuing abuse” of journalists covering protests in L.A. One federal lawsuit, which targets the city, described instances where journalists have been tear-gassed, detained without cause and shot with less-lethal police rounds.

— THROUGH THE ROOF: The overall cost of legal payouts reached a new peak for City Hall this year, driven in large part by lawsuits over policing and “dangerous conditions,” such as cracked or damaged streets and sidewalks.

— TOURISM TURMOIL: The battle between tourism workers and a coalition of airline and hotel groups intensified this week, with the hotel employees’ union launching a pair of new ballot measures. Unite Here Local 11, which recently won approval of a $30 minimum wage hike for its members, proposed an ordinance to require voter approval for any hotel project that adds 80 or more rooms. Union co-president Kurt Petersen portrayed the measure as a response to an ongoing effort by the L.A. Alliance for Tourism, Jobs and Progress, a business group, to repeal the $30 wage.

— THAT’S NOT ALL: Unite Here also unveiled a ballot proposal to hike the minimum wage for employees in non-tourism industries. Under city law, hotel employees currently receive a minimum wage of $20.32 per hour, compared to $17.28 for most non-tourism workers. The union’s new proposal would bring every worker in L.A. up to their level, jumping first to $22.50 and eventually reaching $30 in 2028.

— ALL ABOARD: Officials with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority plan to lease 2,700 buses to get people around the city for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The agency needs $2 billion to make that happen — and is hoping to secure the funding from the federal government.

— COLE FOR THE SUMMER: Chief Deputy Controller Rick Cole is stepping down on July 11 from his job with City Controller Kenneth Mejia. In his announcement on LinkedIn, Cole called Mejia an “inspiring young leader” who “blazed a new path for transparency and accountability.” He also acknowleged the demands he’s faced since winning a seat on the Pasadena City Council, which he called a “more-than-part-time role.” “Kenneth has been incredibly flexible and supportive but I recognize that I couldn’t do justice to both jobs indefinitely,” he wrote.

MAKING THE ROUNDS

In the wake of the protests and weeklong curfew, L.A.’s mayor has been offering support to businesses in Little Tokyo, the Civic Center and other areas hard hit in downtown by vandalism, graffiti and theft. Bass spent about half an hour on Wednesday visiting restaurants on 1st Street, whose windows were covered in plywood.

Bass dropped into Far Bar, Kaminari Gyoza Bar and other spots, chatting up the proprietors and posing for photos with customers. Afterward, she made an appeal to Trump to withdraw the U.S. Marines, saying things were safe and stable.

“In light of the fact that L.A. is peaceful, there are no protests, there isn’t any sign of vandalism or violence, I would call on the administration to please remove the troops,” she said.

Bass was quickly interrupted from Clemente Franco, an Echo Park resident who said he was frustrated with the state of the city — dirty streets, broken sidewalks, streetlights that are out because of copper wire theft.

“A year and a half with no lights,” he told deputy mayor Vahid Khorsand, who attempted to form a buffer between Franco and Bass. “A year and a half the lights have been off. They took the wires. The whole street is black.”

Khorsand asked Franco to provide him a list of problem locations.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to tackle homelessness did not launch any new outreach operations this week, according to her team.
• On the docket for next week: The council’s transportation committee is set to meet Wednesday to take up a proposal to regulate public space around L.A.’s “ghost kitchens,” which have generated complaints about unsafe traffic behavior and other neighborhood woes.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

President Gustavo Petro has sought to call a referendum, in a move the opposition say violates the constitution.

Colombia’s Council of State has suspended a decree by President Gustavo Petro that sought to call a referendum on a labour reform, citing a lack of Senate authorisation.

The move on Wednesday comes after Petro last week bypassed legislative opposition and signed a decree summoning voters to the polls in August to decide on the labour reform.

The package includes provisions for an eight-hour daytime workday, higher weekend and holiday pay, and mandatory social security contributions from delivery app drivers – key social policies the left-wing leader has pushed for.

A majority of the social and economic reforms promised by Petro – who was elected in 2022 on pledges to right centuries of inequality in the Andean country – have been rejected by lawmakers.

The decree sparked criticism from the opposition, which argued that Petro’s decree violates the Political Constitution of Colombia and destroys the separation of powers of the country’s three branches of government.

Under Colombian law, the Senate must rule on the advisability of referendums. If the referendum were to be held, each measure would need to be approved by the majority of at least 13.5 million voters, a third of Colombia’s electoral roll, to be valid.

Political opponents also said the costly referendum was really aimed at boosting Petro’s party ahead of 2026 elections, when he cannot seek re-election.

Despite the failure to call a referendum, the Senate on Tuesday approved a revised version of the labour reform bill after extensive debate, with 57 votes in favour and 31 against.

The Senate previously rejected the reform bill in April, but it was revived after Petro warned he would declare a referendum to put the measure to a public vote.

The presidency dubbed the bill “a historic step toward decent work” in a post on X shared by Petro.

Protests were recently held in the capital Bogota and other major cities by advocates of Petro, who expressed their support for his proposed labour reform.

Colombia is still reeling from bombing attacks in the southwest of the country that left seven dead and an attempted assassination on conservative opposition senator, and presidential hopeful, Miguel Uribe Turbay, which sparked fears the country could return to its darker days of assassinations and prolonged violence.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

L.A.’s Little Tokyo neighborhood was a mess on Monday. Windows were shattered in multiple locations. Graffiti seemed like it was everywhere. State Assemblymember Mark Gonzalez (D-Los Angeles) had had enough.

Gonzalez, who took office in December, had already voiced outrage over the immigration raids being conducted in his downtown district. But this time, he took aim at the people he called “anti-ICE rioters,” portraying them as narcissists and urging them to stay far away from the demonstrations happening downtown.

“Causing chaos, damaging neighborhoods, and live-streaming for likes helps no one,” he said in a lengthy press release. “Our elders, small businesses, and public spaces deserve better.”

Gonzalez did not stop there. He chided demonstrators for spray-painting historic landmarks and pointing fireworks at police, telling them that “terrorizing residents is not protest.”

“If you’re out here chasing clout while our neighbors are scared and storefronts are boarded up — you’re not helping, you’re harming,” said Gonzalez, a former chair of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party. “You’re playing right into Trump’s hands and undermining the very movement you claim to support.”

Politicians in L.A. have been reacting all week to the reports of violence, theft and vandalism that accompanied a week of anti-ICE protests. But each has had a somewhat different way of naming the perpetrators — and summing up their actions.

Los Angeles City Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, whose district also includes much of downtown, was more muted in her description of the people who created mayhem this week, referring to them as “agitators” and “opportunists.”

“Look, for the most part, this has been a peaceful protest,” she said in an interview. “But there are definitely some other folks that join that are not here to support immigrants and peacefulness, but are taking this as an opportunity to do something else. And I definitely condemn that.”

Jurado has spent the last few days highlighting her efforts to secure small business loans for struggling downtown businesses, especially those that were vandalized or had merchandise stolen. She is also pushing for city leaders to find another $1 million to pay for the legal defense of immigrants who have been detained or face deportation.

At the same time, the events of the past week have put Jurado in an awkward spot. Luz Aguilar, her economic development staffer, was arrested last weekend on suspicion of assaulting a police officer at an anti-ICE protest.

Normally, an aide like Aguilar might have been tasked with helping some of the downtown businesses whose windows were smashed or wares were stolen. Instead, Jurado faced questions about Aguilar while appearing with Mayor Karen Bass at the city’s Emergency Operations Center.

The LAPD has repeatedly declined to provide specifics on the allegations against Aguilar, whose father is Chief Deputy Controller Rick Cole. The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing rank-and-file officers, said in an email to its members that Aguilar has been accused of throwing a frozen water bottle at officers.

Neither Cole nor Jurado’s staff would confirm or refute that assertion. Jurado, in an interview, also declined to say whether she sees her staffer as one of the agitators.

“She is on unpaid leave, and we’ll see what happens,” she said.

The search for the right words has not been limited to downtown politicians.

Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson offered a lengthy soliloquy, saying police in recent days had encountered “looters coming out of stores with merchandise in their hands” who are using the ongoing protests as cover.

“Someone at midnight running around looting, even though there was a protest earlier, that person’s not a protester,” Harris-Dawson told his colleagues Tuesday. “That person’s a looter. That person’s a criminal.”

The same terms apply after Dodgers victories, Harris-Dawson said, when someone in a street celebration decides to set things on fire. “We don’t say Dodger fans burned a building. We say criminals burned a building,” he said.

Bass declared a local state of emergency in the wake of the downtown chaos, citing the violence against police, the vandalism and the “looting of businesses.” The declaration, issued Tuesday, simply refers to the perpetrators as criminals.

The mayor sounded genuinely frustrated, telling The Times on Thursday that she was “horrified” by the graffiti that covered the Japanese American National Museum, which highlights the struggle of immigrants, and other buildings in Little Tokyo.

“Anybody that is committing vandalism or violence does not give a crap about immigrants,” she told another news outlet.

Gonzalez, for his part, said he produced his anti-rioter screed after hearing from senior citizens in Little Tokyo who were terrified to leave their homes and walk into the melee on the street.

“They were literally throwing fireworks at cops’ faces at San Pedro and 3rd,” he said.

Other downtown residents sounded unfazed, telling The Times that the disruptions were “kind of the usual.” In recent years, major sports victories have been just as likely to end with illegal fireworks, graffiti and burning or vandalized vehicles downtown — even when the games aren’t played there.

Jurado said she is searching for “creative solutions” to prevent such crimes in the future, such as promoting the fact that downtown businesses are in “full support of the protests.”

“There were Little Tokyo businesses that weren’t graffitied on because they had a sign on the window that was pro-actively ‘Know your Rights,’ or against ICE,” she said. “So they didn’t get graffitied on. At least that’s from my anecdotal evidence.”

“So I think if we put that at the forefront, we can help educate our community members to keep our neighborhoods safe and beautiful,” she said.

State of play

— CITY IN CRISIS: The crisis sparked by the immigration sweeps reverberated throughout the week, with Bass urging President Trump to end the raids, ordering a curfew for downtown and Chinatown and speaking out against the tackling of U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla by federal agents. By the time the week ended, City Hall and surrounding government buildings were being guarded by scores of law enforcement officers from around the state — Hermosa Beach Police, San Fernando Police, Riverside County Sheriff, Santa Barbara County Sheriff, just to name a few. Amid the heavy police presence, Friday’s city council meeting was canceled.

— TAKING OFF THE GLOVES: For most of her time at City Hall, Bass has avoided public confrontations with other elected officials, including President Trump. But with ICE fanning out across L.A. and her city engulfed in protest, those days are over. As she navigates the crisis, Bass has also gained the opportunity for a crucial reset after the Palisades fire.

— CHAFED AT THE CHIEF: Earlier in the week, members of the City Council grilled LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell over his agency’s handling of anti-ICE protests. Harris-Dawson bristled at the idea that the LAPD would refer to federal immigration authorities as “law enforcement partners.” “If we know somebody is coming here to do warrant-less abductions of the residents of this city, those are not our partners,” he said. “I don’t care what badge they have on or whose orders they’re under. They’re not our partners.”

— PADILLA PUSHBACK: City Councilmember Imelda Padilla, in a separate line of questioning, asked if the LAPD could warn city officials when it hears from federal law enforcement that immigration raids are coming. McDonnell said such actions would amount to obstruction of justice. “That would be completely inappropriate and illegal,” he said.

— A ‘MIX OF EMOTIONS’: McDonnell has been offering support to LAPD officers who may have mixed feelings about the ongoing federal crackdown. In one message, he acknowledged that some in the majority-Latino department have been “wrestling with the personal impact” of the immigration sweeps. “You may be wearing the uniform and fulfilling your duty, but inside, you’re asked to hold a complex mix of emotions,” the chief wrote.

— WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS: Los Angeles City Councilmember John Lee broke his silence on the pivotal 2017 Las Vegas trip that later resulted in the criminal conviction of his onetime boss, Councilmember Mitchell Englander. Lee took the virtual witness stand last week in his own Ethics Commission case, repeatedly denying allegations that he accepted gifts in Vegas — food, drink, travel — in violation of city laws. At one point in his Zoom testimony, Lee said he stuffed $300 into the pocket of businessmen Andy Wang, a key witness in the proceedings, in an attempt to cover his share of the expenses at a pricey nightclub.

— RAPID RESPONDERS: Faced with an onslaught of ICE raids locally and threats from politicians nationally, L.A.’s immigrant rights groups are in the fight of their lives. Those groups have been participating in the Los Angeles Rapid Response Network, a coalition of 300 volunteers and 23 organizations formed last year to respond to ICE enforcement.

— COUNTING THE BEDS: We told you last week that City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo was the city’s star witness in its court battle with the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, which is seeking to place the city’s homelessness programs in receivership. On Wednesday, Szabo filed a declaration in federal court that pushes back on assertions that the city may have massively double counted the homeless beds it included under a pair of legal settlements. Szabo said city officials identified 12 instances of double counting in an agreement requiring 12,915 beds, and would appropriately correct the record.

— DEAL FOR MORE COPS? It seems like a lifetime ago, but last weekend Bass announced that she had struck a deal with Harris-Dawson, the council president, to find the money to restore her plan for hiring 480 police officers next year. Bass said Harris-Dawson has committed to identify the funding for those hires within three months. Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who sits on the budget committee, said he is open to finding the money but was not part of any promise to do so within 90 days.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature initiative to combat homelessness did not launch operations in any new locations this week. However, the council did go behind closed doors to confer with its lawyers on the legal battle with the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights.
• On the docket for next week: The City Council is set to take up the mayor’s latest declaration of a local emergency, this one in response to “violence against first responders, vandalism of public and private property, looting of businesses, and failure to follow” LAPD dispersal orders.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Los Angeles city councilmembers sparred with Police Chief Jim McDonnell Tuesday over the LAPD’s handling of protests against President Trump’s immigration crackdown, with some challenging the department’s relationship with its federal counterparts.

The chief appeared before the council to discuss the LAPD’s attempts to control the protests that have erupted mostly in downtown Los Angeles every day since Friday, sometimes descending into chaos.

Mayor Karen Bass and other local officials have decried both the federal immigration raids that prompted the protests and the vandalism and violence that have broken out at some protests. Over Gov. Gavin Newsom’s objections, the Trump administration has sent the National Guard and Marines to L.A., which Bass lambasted as unnecessary. She said Tuesday that she is considering a curfew for downtown L.A., as the protests showed no sign of abating and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that the military deployments would last at least 60 days.

McDonnell told the City Council that his officers arrested 114 people at protests Monday night — 53 for failure to disperse and 15 for looting. One person was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon on an officer and another was arrested for attempted murder. The LAPD arrested 27 people at protests on Saturday and 40 on Sunday.

In the testiest exchange of the afternoon, Councilmember Imelda Padilla asked the chief if the LAPD would consider warning city officials if it hears from federal law enforcement that immigration raids are coming.

“You’re asking me to warn you about an enforcement action being taken by another agency before it happens? We can’t do that,” McDonnell responded, noting that such a warning would amount to obstruction of justice.

“That would be completely inappropriate and illegal,” he said.

City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson said he disagreed with the chief on referring to agencies like U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as “law enforcement partners.”

“If we know somebody is coming here to do warrantless abductions of the residents of this city, those are not our partners,” he said. “I don’t care what badge they have on or whose orders they’re under. They’re not our partners.”

In an interview after the meeting, McDonnell said his department must continue to cooperate with federal agencies on issues other than immigration enforcement. Since 1979, the LAPD has taken a strong stance against enforcing federal immigration law, prohibiting its officers from initiating contact with anyone for the sole purpose of learning their immigration status.

“All of the crimes we investigate, potentially could be in partnership with [federal agencies],” McDonnell said. “It is a partnership, and without that partnership, we wouldn’t be able to go into the World Cup, the Olympics … that require that we work with federal, state and local partners.”

Other councilmembers took aim at the chief over his officers’ shooting of rubber bullets during the protests.

“To see a reporter get shot with a rubber bullet … on live television does not add to the de-escalation,” said Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, referring to an Australian reporter who was shot during a protest on Sunday. “We have to be mindful of the tactics being used by some LAPD members that is adding to the escalation.”

“Just like a few protesters can take away from the messaging, the same thing can be said about LAPD. It overshadows the response,” he added.

Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez said that some LAPD officers acted “out of line for the situation.”

“I have lawyers posting videos of them getting shot,” she said. “I’ve seen videos of non-lethals being fired at protesters more than 50 yards away.”

McDonnell replied that the LAPD is the best department in the country at holding its officers’ accountable for their actions. But he said he couldn’t speak about specific uses of force by his officers at the protests, since the situation was still developing.

On Tuesday, City Councilmembers Tim McOsker, Ysabel Jurado and Eunisses Hernandez signed a proposal asking various city agencies to provide information on the security infrastructure to “prevent unlawful entry by federal entities” at City Hall, council offices, public service counters, city-owned parking lots and other facilities.

“As this Federal political theater plays out, the safety of City facilities must be given special consideration for the sake of both City employees and the public,” the proposal said.

An aide to Los Angeles City Councilmember Ysabel Jurado has been placed on unpaid leave after being arrested on suspicion of assaulting a police officer with a deadly weapon at an anti-ICE protest, Jurado and her staff said Monday.

Luz Aguilar, 26, who serves as Jurado’s deputy for economic innovation and community growth, was arrested around 7 p.m. Sunday and booked several hours later, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department inmate records.

“The allegations are deeply concerning and I take them very seriously,” Jurado, who represents downtown and neighborhoods on L.A.’s Eastside, said in a statement. “While I respect the individual’s right to due process, I hold my team to the highest standards of conduct.”

Aguilar‘s father is Pasadena City Councilmember Rick Cole, who is also a high-level aide to L.A. City Controller Kenneth Mejia. Aguilar’s sister, 26-year-old Antonia Aguilar, was arrested at the same time, records show.

Both were being held in lieu of $50,000 bail.

Jurado said Luz Aguilar — who is listed in inmate records as AguilarCole — has been placed on unpaid leave while the council office assesses the facts and considers “appropriate action.” Although Aguilar was accused of assaulting a police officer with a deadly weapon, “it’s a developing situation,” said Lisa Marroquin, a spokesperson for Jurado.

Marroquin could not say which law enforcement agency the officer was from.

Cole, in a text message, said Monday that he did not yet have information on the allegations. A day earlier, while appearing at an anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement rally in Pasadena, he said the fight against the immigration arrests was personal to him.

“I’ve just seen pictures of my two daughters on a curb in downtown Los Angeles in handcuffs [with] the LAPD,” he said at the rally. “So I’m going to be figuring out where they are so I can go bail them out.”

Protests against federal immigration raids continued to rage Sunday after President Trump ordered the National Guard to Southern California. Some demonstrators in downtown L.A. dropped rocks from a freeway overpass onto police cruisers, while others vandalized government buildings, burned Waymo cars or burglarized businesses.

Mejia, Cole’s boss, is an outspoken critic of the Los Angeles Police Department. On Friday, Mejia voiced concerns about the presence of LAPD officers “within the vicinity of ICE raids.”

Mejia said he has asked for the department to turn over information about the financial impact of the raids on police resources. L.A. declared itself a “sanctuary” city last year, and Police Chief Jim McDonnell has repeatedly said that the LAPD is not involved in “civil immigration enforcement,” pointing to a decades-old policy.

“LAPD’s presence raises serious questions about whether we are abiding by our City’s mandate as a Sanctuary City and is a cause for concern and confusion regarding LAPD’s role,” Mejia said in a statement on social media.

An LAPD spokesperson did not have any details on the arrests when reached by The Times.

Jurado, a former tenant rights attorney, won a seat on the 15-member council in November. During the campaign, she described herself as an abolitionist — someone who supports the abolition of police and prisons.

During the campaign’s final weeks, Jurado was heard on a recording telling college students, “F— the police, that’s how I see ‘em.” She later issued a statement downplaying her remark, saying it was “just a lyric” from a rap song.

The City Council has scheduled a special meeting Tuesday to discuss the federal immigration raids — including “related threats to public service and facilities” — and has left open the possibility of a closed-door meeting with McDonnell on that topic.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has reached an agreement with City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson to find the money to reverse the cuts to police hiring made last month by the council.

On Friday, Bass signed the 2025-26 budget approved by the council, which reworked much of her plan for closing a $1-billion shortfall. Among the council’s changes to the mayor’s spending plan was a reduction in the number of police officers hired in the coming fiscal year, which would drop from 480 to 240.

The following day, as part of her signing announcement, the mayor highlighted the separate deal with Harris-Dawson to ensure that “council leadership will identify funds for an additional 240 recruits within 90 days.” The budget year begins July 1.

The money for the additional officers would be allocated within the 90-day deadline, said Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl.

“No one got everything they wanted,” Harris-Dawson said in a statement. “There is still more work ahead, especially our commitment to work with the Mayor to identify the funds for an additional 240 recruits within 90 days.”

Restoring the 240 police recruits would require the council to free up an additional $13.3 million for the coming year. In 2026-27, the cost of those officers — who would be working their first full year — would grow to about $60 million, according to a city estimate.

Bass proposed a budget in April that called for laying off about 1,600 civilian city workers, one-fourth of them at the LAPD. The council voted last month to reduce the layoff number to around 700, in part by scaling back the mayor’s hiring plans at the LAPD and the Los Angeles Fire Department.

During their deliberations, council members said a slowdown in the hiring of police officers would protect the jobs of other workers at the LAPD, including civilian specialists who handle DNA rape kits, fingerprint analysis and other investigative tasks.

Bass, in her statement, thanked the council for “coming together on this deal as we work together to make Los Angeles safer for all.” She said the budget invests in emergency response, homeless services, street repairs, parks, libraries and other programs.

“This budget has been delivered under extremely difficult conditions — uncertainty from Washington, the explosion of liability payments, unexpected rising costs and lower than expected revenues,” she said.

During the budget deliberations, Bass voiced dismay about slowing down recruitment at the LAPD. In recent days, she had weighed whether to veto all or a portion of the budget, which could have led to a messy showdown with the council.

The council voted 12 to 3 to approve the reworked budget proposal last month. Because only 10 votes are needed to override a veto, Bass would have had to secure at least three additional votes in support of her position on police hiring.

Whether Harris-Dawson has the support of his colleagues to find the money — and then spend it on police hiring — is unclear. Unless the city’s labor unions make financial concessions, the council would likely need to either tap the city’s reserve fund or pull money from other spending obligations, such as legal payouts or existing city programs.

The budget provides funding for six classes with up to 40 recruits each at the Police Academy over the coming fiscal year. Bass had originally sought double that number, providing the department with 480 recruits.

Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, who chairs the council’s budget committee, said she shares the mayor’s goal of restoring LAPD recruit classes — and looks forward to “working with her to make it happen.”

“The question has always been how to do it in a way that is fiscally responsible and sustainable,” Yaroslavsky said.

To increase police hiring and eliminate the remaining 700 layoffs, the council will need to turn to the city’s labor unions for additional savings, Yaroslavsky said.

The council’s budget provided enough funding to ensure the LAPD has 8,399 officers by June 30, 2026, the end of the next fiscal year. The $13.3 million sought by Bass would bring the number of officers to more than 8,600.

The LAPD had 8,746 officers in mid-May, down from about 10,000 in 2020, according to department figures.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Noah Goldberg and Laura Nelson, giving you the latest on city and county government.

If Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass manages to hold on to her power to oversee the city’s homelessness programs, she may well have one person to thank: City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo.

Szabo, a fixture in the administrations of the past three mayors, was effectively the city’s star witness in its legal battle against the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, the nonprofit group that sued the city in 2020 over its handling of the homelessness crisis.

During a seven-day hearing that concluded Wednesday, the alliance pressed U.S. Dist. Judge David O. Carter to take authority over homeless services away from Bass and the City Council and give it to a to-be-determined third party overseen by the court.

On four of those seven days, Szabo sat in the witness chair, defending the city’s decisions and occasionally offering cutting remarks about the city’s critics. Above all, he insisted the city would meet its obligation to provide 12,915 additional homeless beds by June 2027, as required under a settlement agreement with the alliance.

Szabo, who reports to both Bass and the council, is well known within City Hall for his work preparing the city budget, negotiating with city unions and providing policy recommendations on homelessness and other issues. During his time in Carter’s courtroom, he was also a human shield, taking the brunt of the hostile questions and helping to ensure that Bass and others would not be called to testify.

Throughout the proceedings, the city’s lawyers lodged hundreds of objections to the alliance’s questions, sometimes before they had been fully asked. Carter cautioned them that the rapid-fire interruptions could make things difficult for inexperienced witnesses.

He also made clear that the group did not include Szabo.

“Mr. Szabo,” the judge said, “certainly is used to the stress.”

The alliance had placed not just Bass but also Councilmembers Monica Rodriguez and Traci Park on its witness list, saying all three had made public statements criticizing the response system. Bass herself called the system “broken” during her State of the City address in April, a fact highlighted by Matthew Umhofer, an attorney for the alliance.

Those statements, Umhofer said, only reinforce the alliance’s argument that the city’s homelessness programs are beyond repair and must be placed into receivership.

“The city is not fixing that broken system,” he said during closing arguments. “It’s simply doubling down on that broken system.”

Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl, asked to explain the mayor’s use of the word “broken,” said she was referring to a number of obstacles, including “an urge from many to return to the old way of doing things that allowed homelessness to explode.”

“But change is happening,” he said. “Under the Mayor’s leadership, we are moving forward.”

The city’s newly hired legal team from Gibson Dunn, the law firm that persuaded the Supreme Court to uphold laws barring homeless encampments on public property, sought to amplify that message. They also claimed the mayor and council members were shielded by the “apex doctrine,” which bars high-level, or apex, government officials from testifying except in extraordinary circumstances.

The city’s lawyers offered up just two witnesses of their own: Szabo and Etsemaye Agonafer, Bass’ deputy mayor for homelessness programs, saying they were the most familiar with the issues. The alliance initially sought 15.

Agonafer testified for about four hours, highlighting progress made by the mayor’s Inside Safe program, which moves people out of encampments and into hotels and motels.

Umhofer ultimately withdrew his subpoenas targeting Bass and the others, saying he didn’t want to incur additional delays. But he called Bass cowardly for failing to show up. By then, he said, his team had enough evidence to show that the city’s elected officials should no longer control homeless programs.

“We have quite literally put the homelessness response system in Los Angeles on trial,” said Elizabeth Mitchell, another alliance attorney, on the final day of proceedings.

The alliance used much of the questioning to highlight problems at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, also known as LAHSA. That agency, overseen by a board of appointees from the city and county, has been criticized repeatedly in audits dating back to 2001 — documents highlighted by the alliance during the proceedings.

Szabo acknowledged that LAHSA has faced issues with data collection. But he insisted that the city is closely tracking the beds required under its settlement with the alliance. “We have taken steps to ensure that the data we are reporting is accurate,” he told the court.

Carter, who has yet to rule in the case, did not sound as confident in the city’s attention to detail. On Wednesday, he demanded that the city turn over records regarding its compliance with another agreement in the case — this one known as the “roadmap.” The roadmap agreement, which expires June 30, required the city to produce 6,700 beds.

In his order, Carter raised questions about whether city officials had double counted “time-limited subsidies” — money used to help homeless people move into apartments and pay their rent — by applying them both to the roadmap requirements and to the obligations within the alliance settlement agreement.

Szabo said city officials are collecting the records for the judge.

Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, whose district includes Hollywood, voiced confidence in Szabo. He also praised Bass for taking on the issue of homelessness, pointing out that LAHSA reported that the city had made progress last year.

“We’re doing things that are showing results,” said Soto-Martínez, whose office has participated in 23 Inside Safe encampment operations. “Is it perfect? No. But we’re working through it.”

State of play

— ICE RAID OUTRAGE: L.A.’s elected officials voiced their anger on Friday over a series of federal immigration sweeps in Westlake, Cypress Park and other parts of the city. L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis said the individuals detained were “hardworking Angelenos who contribute to our local economy and labor force every day.”

Bass issued her own statement, saying: “We will not stand for this.”

“As Mayor of a proud city of immigrants, who contribute to our city in so many ways, I am deeply angered by what has taken place,” she said. “These tactics sow terror in our communities and disrupt basic principles of safety in our city.”

— WELCOME, AECOM: Nearly five months after a firestorm laid waste to a wide swath of Pacific Palisades, Bass announced that the city has hired the global infrastructure firm AECOM to develop a plan for rebuilding the area and reconstructing utilities and other infrastructure. The firm will work alongside both the city and Hagerty Consulting, which Bass tapped as a recovery contractor in February, according to the mayor’s office.

— SWITCHING HORSES? Businessman and gubernatorial candidate Stephen J. Cloobeck offered praise for L.A.’s mayor last year, commending her for her work addressing homelessness. He even said he had donated $1 million to LA4LA, an initiative promoted by Bass during her 2024 State of the City address, an event he attended. But last weekend, while making the rounds at the California Democratic Convention, he told The Times he wasn’t so keen on Bass’ leadership. “I would support Rick Caruso in a heartbeat over Mayor Karen Bass, and that’s a quote,” he said.

— MISSED MESSAGES: Bass has come under heavy scrutiny for deleting text messages she sent during the January firestorms. But she wasn’t the only one. L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who represents the area devastated by the Eaton fire, has an iPhone that “auto deletes” messages every 30 days, her spokesperson said.

— ENGINE TROUBLE: Earlier this year, then-Fire Chief Kristin Crowley cited disabled engines, and a lack of mechanics, as one reason why fire officials did not dispatch more personnel to Pacific Palisades before the Jan. 7 fire. But a Times analysis found that many of the broken engines highlighted by department officials had been out of service for many months or even years — and not necessarily for a lack of mechanics. What’s more, the LAFD had dozens of other engines that could have been staffed and deployed in advance of the fire.

— SAYONARA, CEQA: State lawmakers are on the verge of overhauling the California Environmental Quality Act, which has been used for decades to fight real estate development and public works projects in L.A. and elsewhere. One proposal would wipe away the law for most urban housing developments.

— PADRINOS PAYOUT: L.A. County has agreed to pay nearly $2.7 million to a teenager whose violent beating at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall launched a sprawling criminal investigation into so-called “gladiator fights” inside the troubled facility. Video of the December 2023 beating, captured on CCTV, showed Jose Rivas Barillas, then 16, being pummeled by six juveniles as probation officers stood idly by.

— EVADING EVICTION: A 70-year-old homeless man who illegally moved into a state-owned house in the path of the now-canceled 710 Freeway extension is fighting his eviction. Benito Flores, who seized a vacant residence in El Sereno several years ago, recently holed up in a tree house he built in the backyard — and so far has warded off attempts by sheriff’s deputies to lock him out.

— AIRPORT AHEAD: The long-awaited LAX/Metro transit center at Aviation Boulevard and 96th Street finally opened on Friday, bringing commuters tantalizingly close to Los Angeles International Airport. For now, free shuttle buses will run every 10 minutes along the 2.5-mile route between the transit center and LAX.

— BREAKING BARRIERS: The first transgender captain in the Los Angeles Fire Department died last month at age 80. Michele Kaemmerer joined the LAFD in 1969, retiring in 2003. She transitioned in 1991 and later led Engine 63 in Marina del Rey. In a 1999 interview with PBS, Kaemmerer said that some firefighters who knew her before she transitioned refused to work with her. Despite those hardships, she “always had a good attitude,” said her widow, Janis Walworth.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to combat homelessness did not launch any operations at new locations this week.
• On the docket for next week: The city’s newly formed Charter Reform Commission holds its first meeting on Tuesday, discussing the process that will be used to select its remaining members.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Soon, the most powerful Los Angeles County politician won’t be the mayor of L.A. It won’t be a county supervisor.

It will be the elected chief executive.

“It’s probably going to be the second most powerful position in the state next to the governor,” said former West Covina Mayor Brian Calderón Tabatabai, one of 13 people now tasked with deciding just how much power should come with the post.

This week, the final five members were named to the county’s “governance reform task force.” The former politicians, union leaders, advocates and business owners will make recommendations on how to move forward with Measure G, the sprawling ballot measure approved by voters in November to overhaul L.A. County government.

Measure G was massive in scope but scant on details. That means members of the task force — five of whom were picked directly by supervisors — must figure out the contours of a new county ethics commission by 2026. They’ll also help expand the five-person board to nine by 2032.

Perhaps most consequentially, they will have to hammer out the powers of the new chief executive, an elected official who will represent 10 million county residents — a position that some task force members don’t even think should exist.

“I’m extremely concerned about the elected CEO,” said former Duarte Mayor John Fasana, a task force member. “At this point, we have to try and find a way to make it work.”

Rewind to last November’s election. The elected chief executive position was, by far, the most controversial part of the overhaul, and a bitter pill to swallow for some who were otherwise eager to see the Board of Supervisors expanded and ethics rules strengthened.

Currently, the chief executive, a role filled by Fesia Davenport, is appointed by the supervisors and works under them. She takes the first stab at the county budget and wrangles department heads, putting out whatever fires are erupting.

It’s not a glamorous job — many people don’t know it exists — but the chief executive, more than any other county leader, is responsible for keeping the place running smoothly.

With the passage of Measure G, the position will become a political one, beholden only to voters. Some have dubbed it the “mayor of L.A. County.”

Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, who spearheaded the overhaul, said that one of the most influential positions in local government will now come out of the shadows and be directly accountable to voters.

Supervisor Kathryn Barger has been deeply skeptical, warning that it will diminish the supervisors’ power and politicize a position that functions best behind the scenes. Supervisor Holly Mitchell had similar hesitations, as did some county employee unions.

Now, they’ve got to make it work.

Derek Hsieh, who heads the Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs as well as chairs the Coalition of County Unions, said both labor groups opposed Measure G and the creation of the elected chief executive. But now, as a member of the task force, he vowed to “bring success to that decision.”

In interviews, some task force members — both supporters of Measure G and opponents — said they plan to tread carefully.

“I’ve heard murmuring, like what if we get someone like an [Alex] Villanueva running amok and burning bridges unnecessarily,” said Marcel Rodarte, who heads the California Contract Cities Assn., referring to the bombastic former sheriff. “It’s a possibility it could happen. I want to make sure that those nine supervisors have the ability to rein in the CEO.”

Rodarte and his colleagues will take the first stab at creating checks and balances. Should the chief executive be able to hire and fire department heads? What are the veto powers? How much control will the executive have over the county’s purse strings? Currently, the position has no term limits — should that change?

Sara Sadhwani, a politics professor at Pomona College and a task force member, said she’s already hearing concerns about the lack of term limits, which would put the chief executive on an uneven footing with supervisors, who must leave after three four-year terms. She said the task force may consider a change in state law that would permit term limits.

“Looking at the federal government, there need to be very real constraints on executive power,” she said. “There has to be a healthy friction.”

Sadhwani said she’s expecting some pushback to parts of the proposal from county supervisors, who may be less than pleased to see their power siphoned away.

“We can imagine there are board members who do not want to see those powers move to an executive branch,” she said.

Rob Quan, a transparency advocate, said he’ll be watching closely.

“What I would like to see is this task force have the freedom and independence and insulation to come up with good, thoughtful recommendations,” he said. “What I don’t want to see is these supervisors using their commissioners as gladiators.”

State of play

— THREE-RING CIRCUS: L.A. city and county officials spent the past week in U.S. Dist. Judge David O. Carter’s courtroom — either monitoring or participating in a multi-day evidentiary hearing on the city’s settlement agreement with the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights. The stakes are high: the Alliance wants to place the city’s homelessness programs into receivership, effectively removing control from Mayor Karen Bass, on the grounds that the city is not meeting its legal obligations for providing such services. The city says it has made its best efforts to comply with the agreement.

So who was in the room? City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto monitored the hearing at various points. City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo was grilled on the stand over multiple days. Dr. Estemaye Agonafer, deputy mayor for homelessness, was sometimes prickly during three-plus hours of questioning.

— WHEN DOES IT END? The testimony in the Alliance case is expected to spill into next week, although it’s not clear how many more days are needed. Carter, who has remained unusually muted during this week’s proceedings, declared at one point: “Time’s not a concern.”

— READY TO MOVE ON: Speaking of homelessness, Councilmember Tim McOsker is looking to bring an end to Bass’ emergency declaration on homelessness, rescinding the mayor’s power to award no-bid contracts and lease buildings without council approval. The move comes two and a half years after Bass declared an emergency. Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, an outspoken critic of the city’s homeless programs, also has been a longtime supporter of terminating the emergency.

— WAGE WARRIORS: A coalition of airlines, hotels and concession companies at Los Angeles International Airport filed paperwork Thursday to force a citywide vote on a new ordinance hiking the minimum wage of hotel and airport workers to $30 per hour by 2028.

— FEELING POWERLESS: Former Animal Services General Manager Staycee Dains said in a series of interviews with The Times that she felt powerless to solve entrenched problems at her agency, including severe understaffing and mistreatment of shelter animals. Dains said she was repeatedly told by the city’s personnel department that she couldn’t fire problem employees. And she clashed with a union that represents shelter employees.

— MONEY IN THE MAIL: Many residents who lost their homes in the January wildfires should have received a tax refund after their damaged or destroyed properties were reassessed. But about 330 checks are in limbo after postal workers tried unsuccessfully to deliver them to vacant or destroyed homes.

— NO CHARGES: A former L.A. County probation official who was accused by more than two dozen women of sexually abusing them when they were minors will not be criminally prosecuted because the alleged incidents happened too long ago. Thomas Jackson, 58, has been named in dozens of lawsuits that were part of a historic $4-billion settlement.

— WHAT DISASTER? L.A. leaders declined to dramatically increase the budget of the city’s Emergency Management Department, despite the many natural disasters that could hit the region in years to come. Facing a nearly $1-billion shortfall, the City Council passed a budget that rejected the funding bump asked for by department leaders.

— I SUED THE SHERIFF: Former Times reporter Maya Lau is suing Los Angeles County and Villanueva, the former sheriff, arguing that her 1st Amendment rights were violated. Lau’s attorneys said she was the target of a sheriff’s investigation that was “designed to intimidate and punish” her for reporting about a leaked list of deputies with a history of misconduct.

QUICK HITS

• WHERE IS INSIDE SAFE? The mayor’s signature program to address homelessness went to the area around 103rd Street and Wilmington Avenue in Watts, according to the mayor’s team. That area is represented by Councilmember Tim McOsker.
• On the docket for next week: The supervisors meet Tuesday to consider a plan for holding regular meetings with city officials about the formation of the county’s new homelessness department. According to the motion, put forward by Horvath, the meetings would ensure “open communication” with the city after the supervisors voted to pull more than $300 million out of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, or LAHSA.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

In 2015, as a civil war was raging in South Sudan, the United Nations Security Council imposed the first set of sanctions on the country, including asset freezes and travel bans on various senior officials. Three years later, after a ceasefire agreement was repeatedly violated, the UNSC mustered the votes to impose a full arms embargo. Fragile peace eventually settled in, but the embargo was kept in place and was extended every year.

The review of the embargo is now coming up on May 29 and there is a push from African members of the UNSC – Sierra Leone, Somalia and Algeria – to lift it. On March 18, the African Union Peace and Security Council (AUPSC) publicly called for this measure to end.

But lifting the embargo on South Sudan at this moment would be a mistake. Violence has come back to plague the country, killing at least 180 people between March and mid-April, amid deepening divisions between President Salva Kiir and First Vice President Riek Machar, who has been placed under house arrest.

Allowing more weapons to enter the country would only escalate the dire situation. This would not be in the interest of neighbouring countries and the African Union as a whole.

Under the AU’s development plan, Agenda 2063, the continent set itself an ambitious goal of “Silencing the Guns” by 2020, later extended to 2030. With this, the AU wants to “end all wars and violent conflicts and promote dialogue-based mechanisms for conflict prevention and resolution”.

Yet, the AUPSC’s call for lifting the embargo on South Sudan does not fall in line with these goals. The justification for this stance is that free access to more weapons can enable the unification of government and opposition forces and reform the security sector.

But this logic ignores the growing fractures in South Sudan amid the renewed tensions between Kiir and Machar. Placing more guns in the hands of warring parties involved in serious human rights violations and crimes under international law would only make the situation worse.

South Sudan’s security and defence forces have attacked the very people they are tasked to protect: Civilians. The South Sudanese army, National Security Service and armed opposition forces have been implicated in war crimes and human rights violations for well more than a decade, including by the AU’s Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan and the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan.

Indeed, around the time the AUPSC called for the lifting of the arms embargo, South Sudan’s government reportedly used improvised incendiary weapons in aerial attacks, killing at least 58 people and injuring others, including children.

To be sure, the existence of the arms embargo is not enough – its enforcement is key. That is already faltering after in early March, Uganda sent troops and military equipment to South Sudan without providing notification or receiving special exemption from the UNSC Sanctions Committee. This is a clear violation of the embargo.

South Sudan’s Mi-24 helicopters also seem to be on the move, despite the government’s fleet reportedly being non-functional and grounded since the arms embargo was imposed in 2018. This suggests spare parts have been sourced in violation of the embargo.

On May 4, Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, reported that two helicopter gunships had bombed its medical facility in Old Fangak the day before and fired at the town, killing seven and injuring 20 others. Deliberate attacks on a medical facility performing its humanitarian function violate international humanitarian law and would constitute a war crime.  This is yet another indication of why the UNSC must renew the arms embargo and strengthen its enforcement.

If properly implemented and enforced, a renewed UNSC arms embargo would not obstruct security sector reform. Instead, it would block the disorderly and destabilising accumulation of arms in South Sudan, which is spurring the current conflict and contributing to violations against civilians.

If the AU is serious about silencing the guns, it should back the strict controls prohibiting arms transfers to South Sudan, and the African states in the UNSC should vote to renew the arms embargo.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

May 24 (UPI) — Dozens of employees were reportedly relieved from their positions with the National Security Council, with an eye towards downsizing the agency’s workforce.

Over 100 staffers received a memo earlier this week from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, informing them they were being put on administrative leave, CNN reported, citing two official sources.

The NSC staff members were not given any warning before being placed on leave, the Washington Post reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The decision was made by President Donald Trump after it was suggested by Rubio, The Post reported. Rubio also serves as a interim national security advisor to the president.

Trump fired his previous national security advisor Mike Waltz earlier this month, tabbing Rubio as an interim replacement. Waltz was later nominated to serve as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.

Since taking the second role, Rubio has favored reducing NSC staffing levels, Politico reported, with a plan of reducing the total workforce from around 350 people to a figure closer to 150.

“The right-sizing of the NSC is in line with its original purpose and the president’s vision,” Rubio said in a statement to Axios.

“The NSC will now be better positioned to collaborate with agencies.”

A White House official told Axios the NSC staff cuts were aimed at combating the “Deep State” within the agency. Another official told Axios it is Trump’s wish to keep Rubio as interim national security advisor “as long as possible.”

Early last month, the Trump administration fired a number of senior NSC advisors. The move came shortly after the president met with far-right podcaster Laura Loomer, although it’s unclear if the moves were related.

When tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado ran for Los Angeles City Council last year, she positioned herself as a potential fourth vote against Mayor Karen Bass’ plan to hire more police officers.

While she was waging her campaign, the council’s three-member super progressive bloc — Eunisses Hernandez, Nithya Raman and Hugo Soto–Martínez — voted against the mayor’s budget, decrying the amount of money allocated for the Los Angeles Police Department. Jurado, who went on to unseat Councilmember Kevin de León, said she would have joined them, turning the 12-3 budget vote into an 11-4.

Turns out it none of that was necessary.

On Thursday, the council approved a $14-billion annual budget that would cut police hiring in half, while sparing hundreds of other city workers from layoffs. Jurado, now on the council, praised the spending plan, then voted for it.

And this time around, the council members on the losing end of a 12-3 vote were those who occupy the body’s more moderate wing: Monica Rodriguez, Traci Park and John Lee.

The shift in budget votes from last year to now offers perhaps the strongest evidence of the political pendulum swing under way at City Hall. When other recent votes are added to the equation, the council chamber might even be undergoing a permanent realignment.

The council also voted 12-3 last week to hike the city’s minimum wage for hotel employees and private-sector tourism workers, boosting it to $30 per hour by 2028. Park, Rodriguez and Lee were in the minority on that issue as well, arguing that hotel and airport wages were rising too much and too quickly, jeopardizing the financial health of L.A.’s tourism industry.

The three ultra moderates also voiced alarm at their colleagues’ decision to scale back the mayor’s plan for increasing hiring at the fire department. Rodriguez, who gave a long and passionate speech against the budget, said in an interview she thinks “there’s clearly a shift in the politics of the council.”

“We have different ideology with respect to how we need to be making sure that the city is safe,” she said.

Soto-Martínez, who represents an Echo Park-to-Hollywood district, wouldn’t pin the political shift on any one vote, arguing instead that “the realignment has been happening for quite some years now.” The move to the left at City Hall, he said, has been driven by the election of candidates — including himself — who have sworn off contributions from corporations and real estate interests.

Because this year’s financial situation was so dire, and the list of proposed cuts so large, the council had no sacred cows when preparing the 2025-26 spending plan, he said. That paved the way for the council to scale back the recruitment of new police officers, he said.

“For many years, including the first two years that I was here, that issue was untouchable. No one would touch it or go near it,” said Soto-Martínez, who was elected in 2022. “And this year, we were realistic about police hiring.”

The realignment is in part of the product of years of campaigning and grassroots advocacy from the hotel workers’ union, LA Forward, Democratic Socialists of America-Los Angeles and many other organizations. But it also reflects the choices of Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who is still in his first year in his leadership role.

Harris-Dawson reshuffled the council’s committee assignments last year, offering plum spots to the newest arrivals. Hernandez, who promised during her 2022 campaign not to hire any additional police officers, landed a coveted spot on the budget committee. She then forged a strong working relationship with Councilmember Heather Hutt, another new appointee to the budget committee, who broke into tears on Thursday as she described Hernandez’ contributions to their deliberations.

Over the course of the budget committee’s nine meetings, Hernandez worked with her colleagues to restore funding for programs that help day laborers, an LGBTQ+ liaison in the city’s civil rights department and $1 million for the legal defense of immigrants facing deportation. She also fought for core services, such as street light repairs, graffiti removal and crews that address illegal dumping.

By contrast, Rodriguez, Park and Lee made clear they felt excluded from key decisions, particularly the budget committee’s vote to shift management over certain homelessness initiatives out of the office of City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo and into the Los Angeles Housing Department.

After a lengthy debate, the three moderates picked up two votes in their effort to delay those changes, not enough to win the day. Instead, their biggest victory — one that took multiple tries — was securing the votes to restore $376,961 at the fire department, which will allow the city to send 45 firefighters to paramedic training.

Park, whose district includes the fire-scarred Pacific Palisades, sounded furious by the time the entire budget came up for a vote.

“I don’t think we should agree to spend another penny on homelessness until we as a full council — not just the few of you who get invited into the conversation — have the chance to chime in,” she said, adding: “But instead of fixing that mess, what did we decide to go after? The increase [Bass requested for] our fire department, after all we literally just witnessed in January.”

One day after the budget vote, Councilmember Bob Blumenfield acknowledged that the pendulum had swung left at City Hall, pointing to the results of several recent elections. Still, he cautioned against reading too much into a single budget, saying a pendulum can swing in opposing directions.

Blumenfield, who represents part of the west San Fernando Valley, said he voted to slow down police hiring as part of a compromise to protect civilian jobs at the LAPD and elsewhere. “I hate seeing the lower number of police recruitment,” he said.

Blumenfield, who occupies the terrain between super progressive and ultra moderate, said he’s still hoping the council will find additional funds later in the budget year to allow the LAPD to hire more officers beyond the 240 that received funding from the council.

“I don’t like to look at the council as a spectrum. I don’t see myself on that spectrum,” he said. “On different issues, I feel like I’m on different parts of it.”

State of play

— SEEKING A VETO: Business groups pressed Mayor Karen Bass to veto the measure hiking the minimum wage of tourism workers, saying hotels and other businesses cannot afford to wage hikes of 50% between now and 2028. Bass, appearing Tuesday at the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, sounded sympathetic to their complaints but stopped short of stating her opposition.

“I’m concerned about the hit to tourism and just the hit in general, especially with downtown, but citywide, because downtown was already suffering,” she told the audience. She also raised doubts that she would intervene, calling the initial wage vote “veto proof.”

— BAD CALL: Former deputy Mayor Brian Williams struck a plea deal with federal prosecutors, admitting he called in a fake bomb threat to City Hall late last year that was blamed on anti-Israel sentiment. Williams, who handled public safety issues for Bass, falsely stated that he had just received a call on his city-issued cellphone from an unknown male caller who made a bomb threat against City Hall, according to his plea agreement.

— HOORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD: L.A.’s mayor promised to reduce barriers to filming in Los Angeles this week, signing an executive directive aimed at streamlining city permit processes and increasing access to legendary L.A. locations, such as Griffith Observatory and the Central Library. “We’ve taken the industry for granted,” Bass said. “We know that the industry is a part of our DNA here. And sometimes, if you think it’s a part of your DNA, you can think it’s always going to be here.”

— ZOO STORY: The elephants Billy and Tina were whisked out of the Los Angeles Zoo this week, relocated to a zoo in Tulsa over the fierce objections of animal advocates. The late night relocation drew complaints from Blumenfield and an array of activists, who argued that the pachyderms needed a much larger expanse of land for their health and well being.

— PUBLIC PAYOUTS: Two fired employees who received a combined $800,000 in legal settlements from the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority had accused the agency’s chief executive, Va Lecia Adams Kellum, of hiring cronies for top jobs, attempting to destroy records and being “extremely inebriated” at an out-of-state conference, according to two settlement demand letters released this week. LAHSA “strenuously” denied the allegations, saying the agency “made a business decision” to pay the fired workers and resolve the employee dispute.

— PUSHBACK OVER PCH: Officials from city and state government tussled this week over plans for reopening an 11-mile stretch of Pacific Coast Highway. Nancy Ward, who leads the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, complained that her office had been kept “in the dark” about the city’s security plan for the fire-ravaged Pacific Palisades area. A Bass spokesperson pushed back on that claim, saying the city would deploy 112 officers to staff 16 checkpoints 24 hours a day in the Palisades. Either way, traffic was flowing Friday afternoon.

— COUNTY CRIME: A veteran emergency management official with Los Angeles County has been arrested on charges of murdering his mother. Robert Barreras, 42, was suspended without pay, and had been on leave when the crime took place, a county official said.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to address homelessness carried out operations in two locations: the area around Lankershim Boulevard and Strathern Street in Councilmember Imelda Padilla’s San Fernando Valley district and the area around Vermont Avenue and 73rd Street in Harris-Dawson’s South L.A. district. Outreach workers also returned to other parts of South L.A. and Hollywood, according to the mayor’s team.
• On the docket for next week: The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to take up appointees to its new governance reform task force, which will help oversee the implementation of Measure G, last year’s voter-approved measure to overhaul county government.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

WASHINGTON — President Trump is ordering a major overhaul of the National Security Council that will shrink its size, lead to the ouster of some political appointees and return many career government employees back to their home agencies, according to two U.S. officials and another person familiar with the reorganization.

The number of staff at the NSC is expected to be significantly reduced, according to the officials, who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive personnel matter.

The shake-up is just the latest shoe to drop at the NSC, which is being dramatically remade after the ouster early this month of Trump’s national security advisor, Mike Waltz, who had hewed to traditional Republican foreign policy on some issues.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been serving as national security advisor since the departure of Waltz, who was nominated to serve as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations.

The move is expected to elevate the importance of the State Department and Pentagon in advising Trump on important foreign policy moves.

The NSC, created during the Truman administration to counter the emerging Soviet threat after the end of World War II, is an arm of the White House tasked with advising and assisting the president on national security and foreign policy and coordinating among various government agencies.

Trump was frustrated in his first term by political appointees and other advisors who he thought got in the way of his agenda.

There were roughly 395 people working at the NSC, including about 180 support staff, according to one official. About 90 to 95 of those being ousted are policy or subject-matter experts seconded from other government agencies. They will be given an opportunity to return to their home agencies if they want.

Many of the political appointees will also be given positions elsewhere in the administration, the official said.

The NSC has been in a state of tumult during the early going of Trump’s second term in the White House.

Waltz was ousted weeks after Trump fired several NSC officials, a day after the influential far-right activist Laura Loomer raised concerns to him about staff loyalty. Loomer has in the past spread 9/11 conspiracy theories and promoted QAnon, an apocalyptic and convoluted conspiracy theory, and took credit for the ouster of the NSC officials who she said were disloyal.

And the White House, days into the administration, sidelined about 160 NSC aides, sending them home while the administration reviewed staffing and tried to align it with Trump’s agenda. The aides were career government employees, commonly referred to as detailees.

This latest shake-up amounts to a “liquidation” of NSC staffing, with career government detailees on assignment to the NSC being sent back to their home agencies and several political appointees being pushed out of their positions, according to the person familiar with the decision.

A White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed that the overhaul, first reported by Axios, was underway. Andy Baker, the national security advisor to Vice President JD Vance, and Robert Gabriel, an assistant to the president for policy, will serve as deputy national security advisors, according to the White House official.

Waltz, during his short tenure heading the NSC, came under searing criticism in March after revelations that he added journalist Jeffrey Goldberg to a private text chain on an encrypted messaging app that was used to discuss planning for a sensitive military operation against Houthi militants in Yemen.

Waltz has taken responsibility for building the text chain but has said he does not know how Goldberg ended up being included.

Loomer had encouraged Trump to purge aides who she believes are insufficiently loyal to the president’s “America first” agenda.

She also complained to sympathetic administration officials that Waltz was too reliant on “neocons” — shorthand for the more hawkish neoconservatives within the Republican Party — as well as what she perceived as “not-MAGA-enough” types, the person said.

It wasn’t just Loomer who viewed Waltz suspiciously. He was viewed with a measure of skepticism by some Trump loyalists who saw the former Army Green Beret and three-term congressman as too tied to Washington’s foreign policy establishment.

On Russia, Waltz shared Trump’s concerns about the high price tag of extensive U.S. military aid to Ukraine. But he also advocated for further diplomatically isolating Russian President Vladimir Putin — a position that was out of step with Trump, who has viewed the Russian leader with tolerance and admiration.

Waltz’s more hawkish rhetoric on Iran and China, including U.S. policy toward Taiwan, seemed increasingly out of step with Trump, who has favored military restraint and diplomacy toward some traditional adversaries — though not toward certain allies, such as his belligerent rhetoric about taking over Greenland, Canada and the Panama Canal.

Associated Press writers Lee and Madhani reported from Washington and Kim from Fishkill, N.Y.

Only a few months ago, former Irvine Vice Mayor Tammy Kim had aspirations of returning to the City Council she previously served on for four years.

Now her immediate goal is to fight off charges that could put her in prison for several years.

The Orange County district attorney’s office announced Thursday afternoon that Kim was charged with 10 felonies tied to allegedly lying about her residency during her City Council tenure and while campaigning for mayor last fall.

Kim was formally charged with three felony counts of perjury by declaration, three felony counts of filing a false document, and one felony count each of a public official aiding the illegal casting of votes, of filing false nominations papers, of knowing of the registration of someone not entitled to vote and of voter registration fraud. She was also charged with a misdemeanor of making a false statement.

She could spend up to 11 years and two months in state prison and county jail if convicted on all counts.

She is scheduled to be arraigned Friday morning.

Kim briefly responded to a call from The Times, saying she was advised not to share too much per her attorney, Caroline Hahn.

“We’re entering a not guilty plea,” Kim said.

Hahn added that she and her client “planned to launch a vigorous defense” but did not answer further questions.

Kim is accused of using two fraudulent addresses while running for mayor in the November 2024 election and then in a City Council special election in early 2025, according to the criminal complaint. She owned a condo in the city’s 3rd District, where she had lived since 2015, according to a separate lawsuit filed against Kim to get her thrown off the City Council ballot.

Kim won election to the Irvine City Council in November 2020, receiving nearly 44,000 votes a 14-person, top-three-candidate race.

At that time, city elections in Irvine used an at-large voting system, meaning candidates could live anywhere in the city.

The city moved to district elections in the fall 2024, requiring council members to live in the districts they represent. Only voters from those districts could vote for those candidates.

Kim served until November 2024 when she ran for and ultimately lost a mayoral campaign to Councilmember Larry Agran by a margin of nearly 5,000 votes.

The district attorney’s office believes Kim improperly used an address to run for mayor, no longer claiming to live in the 3rd District condo she had owned for a decade.

To run for mayor, Kim changed her California driver’s license and her voter registration to a home in the 5th District, where she never lived, according to the criminal complaint.

The home belonged to a family Kim met through a Korean teaching class, the complaint alleges. Kim did not inform the family that she was using their address, according to the complaint.

She has been charged with certifying that address as her own under the penalty of perjury.

Kim eventually finished her campaign and voted in November’s mayoral race based out of the 5th Diistrict home.

Shortly after her defeat, Kim declared her candidacy in December to fill the now- vacant 5th District seat, which Agran left after winning the mayoral election.

Kim eventually found a room in another 5th District home on Jan. 10 and changed her California driver’s registration that same day, according to the complaint. She then filed new nomination paperwork with the new 5th District address, according to the complaint.

Later that month, former mayoral candidate Ron Scolesdang sued Kim, claiming that she was fraudulently using an incorrect address. Scolesdang had hired a private investigator to monitor Kim, according to that lawsuit.

Kim eventually dropped out of the race on Feb. 7, the same day a Superior Court judge removed her name from the ballot.

Betty Franco Martinez won the special election.

The Los Angeles City Council signed off on a $14-billion spending plan for 2025-26 on Thursday, scaling back Mayor Karen Bass’ public safety initiatives as they attempted to spare 1,000 city workers from layoffs.

Faced with a nearly $1-billion budget shortfall, the council voted 12 to 3 for a plan that would cut funding for recruitment at the Los Angeles Police Department, leaving the agency with fewer officers than at any point since 1995.

The council provided enough money for the LAPD to hire 240 new officers over the coming year, down from the 480 proposed by Bass last month. That reduction would leave the LAPD with about 8,400 officers in June 2026, down from about 8,700 this year and 10,000 in 2020.

The council also scaled back the number of new hires the mayor proposed for the Los Angeles Fire Department in the wake of the wildfire that ravaged huge stretches of Pacific Palisades.

Bass’ budget called for the hiring of 227 additional fire department employees. The council provided funding for the department to expand by an estimated 58 employees.

Three council members — John Lee, Traci Park and Monica Rodriguez — voted against the budget, in large part due to cost-cutting efforts at the two public safety agencies. Park, whose district includes Pacific Palisades, voiced alarm over those and other reductions.

“I just can’t in good conscience vote for a budget that makes our city less safe, less physically sound and even less responsive to our constituents,” she said.

Rodriguez offered a similar message, saying the council should have shifted more money out of Inside Safe, Bass’ signature program to address homelessness. That program, which received a 10% cut, lacks oversight and has been extraordinarily expensive, said Rodriguez, who represents the northeast San Fernando Valley.

“Inside Safe currently spends upwards of $7,000 a month to house a single individual. That’s just room and board and services,” she said. “That doesn’t include all of the other ancillary services that are tapped from our city family in order to make it work, including LAPD overtime, including sanitation services, including the Department of Transportation.”

Councilmember Tim McOsker, who sits on the budget committee, said the fire department would still see an overall increase in funding under the council’s budget. Putting more money into the police and fire departments would mean laying off workers who fix streets, curbs and sidewalks, said McOsker, who represents neighborhoods stretching from Watts south to L.A.’s harbor.

McOsker said it’s still possible that the city could increase funding for LAPD recruitment if the city’s economic picture improves or other savings are identified in the budget. The council authorized the LAPD to ramp up hiring if more money can be found later in the year.

“I would love to put ourselves in a position where we could hire more than 240 officers, and maybe we will. I don’t know. But today we can’t,” McOsker told his colleagues.

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, who joined the council in December, also defended the budget plan, saying it would help create “a more just, equitable and inclusive Los Angeles.”

“This budget doesn’t fix everything. It doesn’t close every gap. But it does show a willingness to make some structural changes,” she said.

Bass aides did not immediately respond to inquiries about the council’s actions. A second budget vote by the council is required next week before the plan can head to the mayor’s desk for her consideration.

Bass’ spending plan proposed about 1,600 city employee layoffs over the coming year, with deep reductions in agencies that handle trash pickup, streetlight repair and city planning. The decisions made Thursday would reduce the number to around 700, said City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo, who helps prepare the spending plan.

The remaining layoffs could still be avoided if the city’s unions offer financial concessions, said Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, who heads the council’s budget committee. For example, she said, civilian city workers could cut costs by taking four to five unpaid furlough days.

“My goal, my fervent goal and hope, is that labor comes to the table and says ‘We’ll take some furloughs, we’ll take some comp time off,’” Yaroslavsky said.

The city entered a full-blown financial crisis earlier this year, driven in large part by rapidly rising legal payouts, weaker than expected tax revenues and scheduled raises for city employees. Those pay increases are expected to consume $250 million over the coming fiscal year.

To bring the city’s budget into balance, council members tapped $29 million in the city’s budget stabilization fund, which was set up to help the city weather periods of slower economic growth. They took steps to collect an extra $20 million in business tax revenue. And they backed a plan to hike the cost of parking tickets, which could generate another $14 million.

At the same time, the council scaled back an array of cuts proposed in Bass’ budget. Over the course of Thursday’s six-hour meeting, the council:

* Restored positions at the Department of Cultural Affairs, averting the closure of the historic Hollyhock House in East Hollywood, protecting its status as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

* Provided the funds to continue operating the Climate Emergency Mobilization Office, which had been threatened with elimination.

* Provided $1 million for Represent LA, which pays for legal defense of residents facing deportation, detention or other immigration proceedings. That funding would have been eliminated under Bass’ original proposal, Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez said.

* Moved $5 million into the animal services department — a move requested by Bass — to ensure that all of the city’s animal shelters remain open.

* Restored funding for streetlight repairs, street resurfacing and removal of “bulky items,” such as mattresses and couches, from sidewalks and alleys.

Even with those changes, the city is still facing the potential for hundreds of layoffs, around a third of them at the LAPD.

Although the council saved the jobs of an estimated 150 civilian workers in that department — many of them specialists, such as workers who handle DNA rape kits — another 250 are still targeted for layoff.

“We took a horrible budget proposal, and we made it into one that is just very bad,” said Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who represents part of the west San Fernando Valley. “It took a lot of work to do that, but it is better and we did save jobs. But the fundamentals are still very bad.”

AN OAP has died after drowning in a canal as a coroner issues an urgent warning to council officials.

Doreen Turner, 91, tragically lost her life after driving her car into the body of water in Chichester, West Sussex.

3

3

The horror crash happened on November 1 last year and sparked a police investigation.

A coroner has now ruled West Sussex County Council must install more safety measures along the road.

A probe found there was no forensic evidence of any mechanical issues in Doreen’s car.

Officers also concluded the 91-year-old had suffered no impairments that would affect her driving.

However the kerb at the end of the road was found to measure shorter than the standard height requirement.

A council spokesperson said: “We are currently reviewing this site in consultation with Sussex Police and will be responding to the coroner accordingly.”

Coroner Joanne Andrews could not determine the exact reason why Doreen’s car left the road.

But she warned the council “action should be taken”.

“In my opinion, action should be taken to prevent future deaths and I believe your organisation has the power to take such action,” she said.

This incident marks the second fatal crash in the same area within the past five years.

The coroner said the inquest heard there were “no devices present to prevent a vehicle which passes over the kerbstones from entering the canal”.

Beyond the kerb there is a five-foot section of grass before the canal starts.

West Sussex County Council has until June 25 to respond officially to the coroner’s concerns.

Earlier this month we reported the body of an unidentified woman in her 50s was pulled from a canal.

Cops had rushed to the Lee Navigation in Homerton, east London, at around 11.40am, following reports of a body in the canal.

No arrests have yet been made in connection with her death.

Elsewhere, an inquest heard how a two-year-old boy tragically drowned in a canal just as his family were in the process of moving house due to fears of living so close to the water.

Jayce Olutola was found by a police officer after he went missing from his home in Ettingshall, Wolverhampton, on August 11 last year.

And, a teenage boy who tragically died after jumping into a canal was pictured for the first time this month.

Delvin Musakwa, 13, was pulled from the water after jumping into the canal in Exeter, Devon, on May 5.

Police said the death is not being treated as suspicious, and added they will prepare a file for the coroner.

3

For anybody confused about whether Gov. Gavin Newsom planned to come to Los Angeles’ rescue Wednesday when he announced his May revision to the state budget, a clue could be found on the front page of his spending plan.

In an AI-generated image, the budget cover page featured the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco skyline, along with office workers who appear to be chatting it up in a forest glade next to an electric vehicle charging station. Not a hint of Los Angeles was anywhere to be seen.

Deeper in the budget proposal, no salvation was found for L.A. And at a news conference Wednesday, Newsom said flatly that he did not plan to provide cash to help dig the city out of its budget hole. The city is facing a $1-billion shortfall due to inflated personnel costs, higher than ever liability lawsuit payouts and below-expected revenues.

“The state’s not in a position to write a check,” Newsom said. “When you’re requesting things that have nothing to do with disaster recovery, that’s a nonstarter … I don’t need to highlight examples of requests from the city and county that were not related to disaster recovery and this state is not in a position, never have been, even in other times, to address those requests, particularly at this time.”

The governor’s rejection of Mayor Karen Bass’ pleas for state aid came as he discussed the state’s own economic woes. The state is confronting a $12-billion budget deficit in part due to a “Trump Slump,” Newsom said. The governor had to make cuts to his own signature program offering healthcare to immigrants without proper documentation.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass delivers her State of the City address at L.A. City Hall on April 21.

(Carlin Stiehl/Los Angeles Times)

The governor made sure to remind reporters Wednesday that the state had been more than willing to help with fire recovery efforts, but said that was the limit of its generosity. Newsom said that of the $2.5 billion offered to Los Angeles after the fires, more than $1 billion remained unused. That funding helped with emergency response and initial recovery from the January wildfires.

Despite Newsom’s edict, Bass didn’t appear ready to throw in the towel. She said she and the governor were “in sync” and in regular contact about the situation. State money to help with the budget crisis would be fire-recovery-related, Bass insisted.

“We had to spend a great deal of money of our general fund related to the wildfires. If we are able to get that reimbursed that relieves some of the pressure from the general fund,” Bass said in an interview with The Times. “We submitted a document to him where we are asking him if the state would be willing to give us the money up front that FEMA will reimburse — so we are requesting 100% fire-related.”

Bass visited Sacramento in March and April. She and L.A. legislators first requested $1.893 billion in state aid to help with the budget crisis and disaster recovery. The mayor has since pared down the request, but the amount she is now requesting is not public.

In the initial request, they asked for $638 million for “protecting city services under budgetary strain.” That request is likely dead. But the $301-million request for “a loan to support disaster recovery expenses pending FEMA reimbursement” still stands.

Bass said she most recently met with the governor two weeks ago, and he informed the mayor that the state’s financial situation was not looking good.

The revision is just a starting point for final budgetary negotiations between the governor and the Legislature, and the state budget won’t be completed until at least mid-June, weeks after the deadline for the City Council to approve its own budget.

“We have 36 members of the L.A. delegation fighting for the city and we’ll just have to wait and see what happens in June,” said Assemblymember Tina McKinnor, who chairs the Los Angeles County Legislative Delegation.

McKinnor said she is confident that the state budget will have money not just for fire recovery, but also to help the city manage its broader financial woes.

“We will not fail L.A.,” McKinnor said.

With the state lifeline in serious doubt, the cuts the city will have to make to balance its budget took another step toward reality.

While Bass is still hopeful for state aid, the council seemed less hopeful.

“We expected and planned for this outcome, but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating. The governor’s decision to withhold support from California’s largest city after we experienced the most devastating natural disaster in the state’s history is a serious mistake, with consequences for both our long-term recovery and the strength of the state’s economy,” said Katy Yaroslavsky, who chairs the council’s budget committee.

“This will not be a ‘no-layoff’ budget,” Yaroslavsky said on May 8 at a budget hearing.

Bass stressed that she is still trying to avoid any layoffs. The city plans to avert further layoffs by transferring employees to the proprietary departments, like the harbor, the airport and perhaps the Department of Water & Power.

“We’re all working very, very hard with the same goal in mind and that is having a balanced, responsible budget that avoids laying off city workers,” she said Thursday.

State of play

— MOURNING ONE OF CITY HALL’S OWN: Former chief of staff to Councilmember Kevin de León and longtime L.A. politico Jennifer Barraza Mendoza died Tuesday at 37 following a long battle with cancer. Barraza Mendoza began her career organizing with SEIU Local 99, helped lead De León’s Senate campaign and also served as a principal at Hilltop Public Solutions, among other roles. “In a political world of shapeshifters, she stood out as fiercely loyal and guided by principle,” De León said in a statement. “She never sought the spotlight — but when tested, she rose with unmatched strength to protect her team, her community, and what she knew was right.”

— MINIMUM WAGE WAR: The City Council voted Wednesday for a sweeping package of minimum wage increases for hotel workers and employees of companies at Los Angeles International Airport. One hotel executive said the proposal, which would take the wage to $30 in July 2028, would kill his company’s plan for a new 395-room hotel tower in Universal City. Other hotel companies predicted they would scale back or shutter their restaurant operations. The hotel workers’ union countered by saying business groups have made similar warnings in the past, only to be proved wrong.

— SECOND TIME’S A CHARM: Surprise! On Friday, the City Council had to schedule a do-over vote on its tourism wage proposal. That vote, called as part of a special noon meeting, came two days after City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto’s office warned that Wednesday’s vote had the potential to violate the city’s public meeting law.

Los Angeles Councilwoman Eunisses Hernandez in December in Los Angeles.

(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

— READY TO RELAUNCH: Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez plans to host her campaign kickoff event for her reelection bid Saturday in Highland Park, where she was born and raised. She already has a few competitors in the race, including Raul Claros, who used to serve on the Affordable Housing Commission, and Sylvia Robledo, a former council aide.

The left-wing councilmember has already won the endorsements of Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson and from colleagues Heather Hutt, Ysabel Jurado, Hugo Soto-Martinez and Nithya Raman. Controller Kenneth Mejia also endorsed her.

— PHOTO BOMB: Recently pictured with Eunisses Hernandez: Political consultant Rick Jacobs — the former senior aide to then-Mayor Eric Garcetti who was accused of sexual harassment. Jacobs now works as a consultant for the politically powerful Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters. Per a post on Jacobs’ LinkedIn, Hernandez posed for a photo this week with Jacobs and several union members while presenting the group with a city certificate of recognition.

Jacobs has denied the harassment allegations, but the scandal bedeviled Garcetti in his final years in office and nearly derailed his ambassadorship to India. Jacobs has remained in the political mix — some may remember his controversial appearance at Bass’ exclusive 2022 post-inauguration Getty House afterparty. Also worth noting: The Carpenters are major players in local elections, and their PAC spent nearly $150,000 supporting Hernandez’s then-opponent Gil Cedillo in the 2022 election.

“Councilmember Hernandez was proud to stand with the carpenters who built the little library at North East New Beginnings, the first-of-its-kind interim housing site she opened in 2024. She was there to honor their craftsmanship and community contribution — nothing more. She did not choose who else appeared in the photo,” said Naomi Villagomez Roochnik, a spokesperson for Hernandez.

— PARK GETS AN OPPONENT: Public Counsel attorney Faizah Malik is challenging Councilmember Traci Park from the left, the tenants rights lawyer announced Thursday. Malik is styling her campaign in the mold of prior progressive incumbent ousters, she said, though she has yet to garner any of their endorsements. But she did get an Instagram signal boost from former CD 11 Councilmember Mike Bonin, who characterized her as “A Westside leader who will fight for YOU and your family.” Meanwhile, centrist group Thrive LA had a fundraiser for Park this week, and declared her its first endorsement of the 2026 cycle.

— FIREFIGHT: Active and retired firefighters blasted the council’s recommendation to nix 42 “Emergency Incident Technicians,” who help develop firefighting strategy and account for firefighters during blazes. In a letter to the council, the firefighters said the 1998 death of firefighter Joseph Dupee was linked to removal of EITs during a previous budget crisis.

“Please do not repeat the same mistake that was made in 1998 when EITs were removed and said removal was found to be a contributing factor in the death of LAFD Captain Joseph Dupee,” the firefighters wrote.

— EMPLOYMENT LAW AND ORDER: Some LAPD officers are hitting the jackpot on what are known as “LAPD lottery” cases. The city has paid out nearly $70 million over the last three years to officers who have sued the department after alleging they were the victims of sexual harassment, racial discrimination or retaliation against whistleblowers.

The massive payouts are not helping the city’s coffers. One of the leading causes of the current fiscal crisis is the ballooning liability payments that the city makes in settlements and jury verdicts.

— WATER OLYMPICS: L.A. County’s plan to run a water taxi between Long Beach and San Pedro during the Olympics paddled forward this week. Supervisor Janice Hahn introduced a motion, with co-author Mayor Bass, to launch a feasibility study assessing ridership demand, cost and possible routes.

“[The water taxi] would give residents, workers and tourists an affordable alternative to driving and parking at these Games venues,” Hahn said.

— ROBO-PERMIT: City and county residents submitting plans to rebuild their burned down properties could have their first interaction with an AI bot who would inspect their plans before a human. Wildfire recovery foundations purchased the AI permitting software, developed by Australian tech firm Archistar, and donated it to the city and county. The tech was largely paid for by Steadfast L.A., Rick Caruso’s nonprofit.

— TRUMP’S VETS MOVE: President Trump signed an executive order calling on the Department of Veterans Affairs to house up to 6,000 homeless veterans on its West Los Angeles campus, but even promoters of the idea are skeptical of the commander in chief’s follow-through.

“If this had come from any other president, I’d pop the Champagne,” said Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks), whose district includes the West Los Angeles campus. Trump, he said, follows up on “like one out of 10 things that he announces. You just never know which one. You never know to what extent.”

— ADDRESSING THE ELEPHANTS IN THE ROOM: A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge denied a motion for a temporary restraining order Thursday that sought to stop the L.A. Zoo from transferring elephants Tina and Billy to the Tulsa Zoo. The judge said the decision was out of the court’s purview. The zoo said Thursday that the “difficult decision” to relocate the pachyderms was made with the “care and well being” of the animals at top of mind.

“Activist agendas and protests are rightfully not a consideration in decisions that impact animal care,” the statement said.

— CHARTER SQUABBLE: Bass made her four appointments to the Charter Reform Commission this week. She selected Raymond Meza, Melinda Murray, Christina Sanchez and Robert Lewis to serve as commissioners. She also named Justin Ramirez as the executive director of the commission. Bass’s appointments came on the heels of reform advocate Rob Quan sending out mailers about the mayor’s delay in making appointments, which left the commission unable to get to work.

“Karen Bass wasted eight months. That was when her appointments were due. Eight months ago,” Quan said in an interview.

— WORKDAY TROUBLE: The Department of Water and Power is slated to adopt a new human resources software, Workday, in mid-June. But Gus Corona, business manager of IBEW Local 18, warned of “serious concerns” and the potential for “widespread problems and administrative chaos.” In a letter this week to DWP CEO Janisse Quiñones, which The Times obtained, Corona said there was a “consistent lack of clarity” about the new system, especially around union dues and benefit deductions, retroactive pay and cost of living adjustments. “The level of uncertainty so close to a planned launch date is deeply troubling,” Corona wrote.

Quick Hits

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program went to Councilmember Curren Price’s district: 37th Street and Flower Street, according to the mayor’s office.
• On the docket for next week: The full City Council is scheduled to take up the proposed city budget for 2025-26 — and the mayor’s proposal for city employee layoffs — on Thursday.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

A key committee of the Los Angeles City Council voted Friday to cut the number of employees targeted for layoff by Mayor Karen Bass by more than half, bringing the total down to an estimated 650.

The council’s budget committee took steps to save more than 1,000 jobs by pursuing an array of cost-cutting measures, such as hiring fewer police officers and scaling back funding for Bass’ Inside Safe program, which moves homeless people into temporary or permanent housing.

Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, who chairs the committee, said those and many other moves would help the city protect core services, including tree trimming, street resurfacing, street light repair and sanitation teams that address illegal dumping.

“We looked for ways to save positions — not for the sake of job counts only, but to make sure the departments can still do the work our constituents need them to do for their quality of life,” said Yaroslavsky, who represents part of the Westside.

The committee’s recommendations for the proposed 2025-26 budget now head to the full council, which is scheduled to take them up on Thursday.

Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who sits on the committee, expressed some optimism after the vote.

“We were in very rough waters, and a very different landscape, when we started this process,” said Hernandez, who represents part of the Eastside. “And now there seems to be some light between the clouds.”

As part of Friday’s deliberations, the budget committee voted to recommend a slowdown in sworn hiring at the LAPD, which would leave the agency with 8,400 officers by June 30, 2026. That represents a reduction of about 300 from the current fiscal year and 1,600 compared with 2020.

The budget committee also agreed to eliminate 42 emergency incident technicians at the fire department, a move opposed by interim Fire Chief Ronnie Villanueva, while also canceling Bass’ plan for a new homelessness unit within that agency.

In addition, the five-member panel recommended a hike in parking meter fees, which is expected to generate $14 million in the upcoming fiscal year.

Yaroslavsky said the changes endorsed by the budget committee on Friday would save about 150 civilian workers in the police department.

Chief Legislative Analyst Sharon Tso, who advises the council, said she believes that city officials will keep finding ways to reduce the number of layoffs, by transferring workers to vacant city positions or to agencies that are unaffected by the budget crisis, such as Los Angeles World Airports and the Port of Los Angeles.

“I think we’re going to be able to truly get that number down to less than 500,” she told the committee.

Bass, faced with a nearly $1-billion shortfall, released a proposed budget last month that called for the layoff of about 1,600 employees, a fourth of them civilian workers at the LAPD. Some of the largest reductions were planned at agencies that handle sanitation, street repairs and maintenance of city facilities.

Friday’s deliberations set the stage for many positions to remain intact, particularly at the Department of City Planning, which had been facing 115 layoffs. Kevin Keller, executive officer with that agency, said the committee found the funding to restore more than 100 of those positions.

“I know there’s a lot of city workers that are breathing a big sigh of relief tonight,” said Roy Samaan, president of the Engineers and Architects Assn., whose union represents planning department employees.

L.A.’s budget crisis has been attributed to a number of factors, including rapidly rising legal payouts, lower-than-expected tax revenue and a package of raises for the city workforce that is expected to add $250 million to the upcoming budget, which goes into effect on July 1.

Bass and the council have been hoping to persuade city labor unions to provide financial concessions that would help avoid more cuts. So far, no deals have been struck.

On Friday, before the committee began its deliberations, Bass said she is optimistic about avoiding layoffs entirely. At the same time, she spoke against a budget strategy that pits the hiring of police officers against the preservation of other jobs, calling it “a Sophie’s Choice.”

If the LAPD slows down hiring, it will have fewer officers in the run-up to next year’s hosting of the World Cup, she said.

“I’m not going accept that as my choice,” she said.

During the final minutes of Friday’s five-hour meeting, council members made some last-minute restorations, identifying additional funds for youth programs, tree trimming and fire department mechanics. Hernandez pushed for the committee to restore $1 million for Represent LA, which provides legal defense of immigrants facing deportation or other enforcement actions, and $500,000 for graffiti paint-out crews.

Hernandez said the city needs to stand by immigrants amid a harsh federal crackdown. And she described graffiti removal as crucial for public safety in her district.

“Getting graffiti down quickly prevents a lot more people from getting shot, prevents them from getting killed,” she said.

When Los Angeles City Council members took up a plan to hike the wages of tourism workers this week, they received some carefully worded advice from city lawyers: Don’t vote on this yet.

Senior Assistant City Atty. Michael J. Dundas advised them on Wednesday — deep into their meeting — that his office had not yet conducted a final legal review of the flurry of last-minute changes they requested earlier in the day.

Dundas recommended that the council delay its vote for two days to comply with the Ralph M. Brown Act, the state’s open meeting law.

“We advise that the posted agenda for today’s meeting provides insufficient notice under the Brown Act for first consideration and adoption of an ordinance to increase the wages and health benefits for hotel and airport workers,” Dundas wrote.

The council pressed ahead anyway, voting 12-3 to increase the minimum wage of those workers to $30 per hour by 2028, despite objections from business groups, hotel owners and airport businesses.

Then, on Friday, the council conducted a do-over vote, taking up the rewritten wage measure at a special noon meeting — one called only the day before. The result was the same, with the measure passing again, 12-3.

Some in the hotel industry questioned why Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who runs the meetings, insisted on moving forward Wednesday, even after the lawyers’ warning.

Jackie Filla, president and chief executive of the Hotel Assn. of Los Angeles, said the decision to proceed Wednesday gave a political boost to Unite Here Local 11, which represents hotel workers. The union had already scheduled an election for Thursday for its members to vote on whether to increase their dues.

By approving the $30 per hour minimum wage on Wednesday, the council gave the union a potent selling point for the proposed dues increase, Filla said.

“It looks like it was in Unite Here’s financial interest to have that timing,” she said.

Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, who opposed the wage increases, was more blunt.

“It was clear that Marqueece intended to be as helpful as possible” to Unite Here Local 11, “even if it meant violating the Brown Act,” she said.

Harris-Dawson spokesperson Rhonda Mitchell declined to say why her boss pushed for a wage vote on Wednesday after receiving the legal advice about the Brown Act. That law requires local governments to take additional public comment if a legislative proposal has changed substantially during a meeting.

Mitchell, in a text message, said Harris-Dawson scheduled the new wage vote for Friday because of a mistake by city lawyers.

“The item was re-agendized because of a clerical error on the City Attorney’s part — and this is the correction,” she said.

Mitchell did not provide details on the error. However, the wording on the two meeting agendas is indeed different.

Wednesday’s agenda called for the council to ask city lawyers to “prepare and present” amendments to the wage laws. Friday’s agenda called for the council to “present and adopt” the proposed changes.

Maria Hernandez, a spokesperson for Unite Here Local 11, said in an email that her union does not control the City Council’s schedule. The union’s vote on higher dues involved not just its L.A. members but also thousands of workers in Orange County and Arizona, Hernandez said.

“The timing of LA City Council votes is not up to us (sadly!) — in fact we were expecting a vote more than a year ago — nor would the precise timing be salient to our members,” she said.

Hernandez said Unite Here Local 11 members voted “overwhelmingly” on Thursday to increase their dues, allowing the union to double the size of its strike fund and pay for “an army of organizers” for the next round of labor talks. She did not disclose the size of the dues increase.

Dundas’ memo, written on behalf of City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto, was submitted late in Wednesday’s deliberations, after council members requested a number of changes to the minimum wage ordinance. At one point, they took a recess so their lawyers could work on the changes.

By the time the lawyers emerged with the new language, Dundas’ memo was pinned to the public bulletin board in the council chamber, where spectators quickly snapped screenshots.

The Los Angeles City Council voted Wednesday to approve a sweeping package of minimum wage increases for workers in the tourism industry, despite objections from business leaders who warned that the region is already facing a slowdown in international travel.

The proposal, billed by labor leaders as the highest minimum wage in the country, would require hotels with more than 60 rooms, as well as companies doing business at Los Angeles International Airport, to pay their workers $30 per hour by 2028.

That translates to a 48% hike in the minimum wage for hotel employees over three years. Airport workers would see a 56% increase.

On top of that, hotels and airport businesses would be required to provide $8.35 per hour for their workers’ health care by July 2026.

The package of increases was approved on a 12-3 vote, with Councilmembers John Lee, Traci Park and Monica Rodriguez opposed. Because the tally was not unanimous, a second vote will be required next week.

Rodriguez, who represents the northeast San Fernando Valley, told her colleagues that the proposal would cause hotels and airport businesses to cut back on staffing, resulting in job losses. The same thing is happening at City Hall, with elected officials considering staff cuts to cover the cost of employee raises, she said.

“We are right now facing 1,600 imminent layoffs because the revenue is just not matching our expenditures,” Rodriguez said. “The same will happen in the private sector.”

Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, standing before a crowded of unionized workers after the vote, celebrated their victory.

“It’s been way too long, but finally, today, this building is working for the people, not the corporations,” said Soto-Martínez, a former organizer with the hotel and restaurant union Unite Here Local 11.

Hotel owners, business groups and airport concession companies predicted the wage increases will deal a fresh blow to an industry that never fully recovered from the COVID pandemic. They pointed to the recent drop-off in tourism from Canada and elsewhere that followed President Trump’s trade war and tightening of the U.S. border.

Adam Burke, president and chief executive of the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board, said Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom — nations that send a large number of visitors to Los Angeles — have issued formal advisories about visiting the U.S.

“The 2025 outlook is not encouraging,” Burke said.

Several hotel owners have warned that the higher wage will spur them to scale back their restaurant operations. A few flatly stated that hotel companies would steer clear of future investments in the city, which has long served as a global tourism destination.

Jackie Filla, president and chief executive of the Hotel Association of Los Angeles, said she believes that hotels will close restaurants or other small businesses on their premises — and in some cases, shut down entirely.

In the short term, she said, some will tear up their “room block” agreements, which set aside rooms for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“I don’t think anybody wants to do this,” Filla said. “Hotels are excited to host guests. They’re excited to be participating in the Olympics. But they can’t go into it losing money.”

Jessica Durrum, a policy director with the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, a pro-union advocacy group, said business leaders also issued dire warnings about the economy when previous wage increases were approved — only to be proven wrong. Durrum, who is in charge of her group’s Tourism Workers Rising campaign, told the council that a higher wage would only benefit the region.

“People with more money in their pockets — they spend it,” she said.

Wednesday’s vote delivered a huge victory to Unite Here Local 11, a potent political force at City Hall. The union is known for knocking on doors for favored candidates, spending six figures in some cases to get them elected.

Unite Here Local 11 had billed the proposal as an “Olympic wage,” one that would ensure that its members have enough money to keep up with inflation. The union, working with airport workers represented by Service Employees International Union-United Service Workers West, also said that corporations should not be the only ones to benefit from the Olympic Games in 2028.

Workers from both of those unions testified about their struggles to pay for rising household costs, including rent, food and fuel. Some pleaded for better health care, while others spoke about having to work multiple jobs to support their families.

“We need these wages. Please do what’s right,” said Jovan Houston, a customer service agent at LAX. “Do this for workers. Do this for single families. Do this for parents like myself.”

Sonia Ceron, 38, a dishwasher at airline catering company Flying Food Group, said she has a second job cleaning houses in Beverly Hills for about 32 hours a week. Ceron lives in a small studio apartment in Inglewood, which has been difficult for her 12-year-old daughter.

“My daughter, like every kid, wants to have her own room, to be able to call her friends and have her privacy. Right now, that’s impossible,” Ceron said.

L.A.’s political leaders have enacted a number of wage laws over the last few decades. The hotel minimum wage, approved by the council in 2014, currently stands at $20.32 per hour. The minimum wage for private-sector employees at LAX is $25.23 per hour, once the required $5.95 hourly healthcare payment is included.

For nearly everyone else in L.A., the hourly minimum wage is $17.28, 78 cents higher than the state’s.

Perched high above the Cahuenga Pass, the 24-story Hilton Los Angeles Universal City Hotel is positioned to be a prime gathering spot for visitors arriving for the 2028 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Sun Hill Properties Inc., which manages the 495-room hotel, has already signed a “room block” agreement with the LA28 organizing committee, reserving hundreds of rooms for Olympics fans. The City Council recently approved a plan to let the Hilton add a second, 18-story tower, which would open just in time for the Olympics.

Now, the future of the $250-million expansion is in doubt. On Wednesday, the Los Angeles City Council is set to vote on a requirement that hotels with 60 or more rooms pay their workers at least $30 per hour by 2028, along with a new $8.35 per hour healthcare payment.

If the council approves the proposal without significant changes, Sun Hill “absolutely will be pulling out of the room block for the Olympics,” said Mark Davis, the company’s president and chief executive. The hotel’s investors will also kill the 395-room expansion, he said.

“Our board was very adamant that if [council members] go forward with this nonsense, that it’s dead,” Davis said. “They’re going to move the project somewhere else.”

The council voted 12-3 last year to instruct City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto to draft the package of minimum wage hikes, which would apply not just to hotels but also private companies at Los Angeles International Airport, such as airlines and concessions. The minimum wage would be the highest in the country, according to Unite Here Local 11, the hotel and restaurant workers union, which has championed the proposal.

Mark Davis, president and CEO of Sun Hill Properties, said a proposal to hike L.A.’s minimum wage for hotel workers would kill a plan for a new 18-story hotel tower unless it is reworked.

(Marcus Ubungen / Los Angeles Times)

Backers of the higher wage say L.A.’s tourism workers are struggling to pay for food and rent, and deserve to benefit financially from the Olympics just as much as private corporations. They dismiss the hospitality industry’s dire warnings, including the notion that increased wages will scuttle the development of new hotels.

City Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez said the Sheraton Universal Hotel, a nearby competitor of the Hilton, has already been paying a higher wage to its unionized workforce. The real threat to the development of new hotels, he said, is higher interest rates and the economic uncertainty surrounding President Trump’s trade policies.

“So, I just don’t buy it,” said Soto-Martínez, a former hotel union organizer, as he referred to Davis’ warning.

Under the city’s proposal, the hotel and airport minimum wage would reach $22.50 on July 1. It would jump to $25 in July 2026, $27.50 in July 2027 and $30 in July 2028. On top of those increases, the $8.35 per hour healthcare payment would go into effect on Jan. 1.

Business groups point out that two hotels have closed in the past year — Four Points by Sheraton next to LAX and Mama Shelter in Hollywood, for a loss of 270 jobs. They say Trump’s trade wars are driving down tourist activity from other nations, with visitors from Canada especially lagging.

Once the increases are in effect, business leaders say, hotels with on-site dining won’t be able to compete with non-hotel restaurants, which will have a much lower minimum wage.

Jon Bortz, chairman and chief executive of the Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, said his company is already looking at scaling back restaurant operations at two of its Southern California properties — the Kimpton Hotel Palomar and the W Los Angeles West Beverly Hills, both in Westwood near UCLA.

The Palomar will likely offset the cost of the higher minimum wage by converting its restaurant into a self-service breakfast operation, while the W will probably close at least one of its two restaurants, Bortz said. “We have to change the business model of these properties to have any hope of surviving,” he added.

Bortz said the proposed wage hikes, along with other hotel regulations approved by the City Council in recent years, have spurred Pebblebrook to look to other markets for new hotel projects.

“Frankly, the [L.A.] market, from a broad-based buyer perspective, has been crossed off the map by investors,” he said.

Hotels in other parts of L.A. are considering similar reductions. An executive with Lightstone Group, which owns the 727-room Moxy + AC Hotels near the Convention Center, told City Council members last year that the minimum wage proposal would likely result in the closure of Level 8, a collection of restaurants on the hotel’s eighth floor.

Mark Beccaria, a partner with the Hotel Angeleno near the 405 Freeway, said in a separate letter to city leaders that he would have to shutter not just the hotel’s restaurant but also its valet parking, eliminating 39 jobs.

“Common sense says you cannot raise wages over 50% in a year when revenues are down,” he said.

Kurt Petersen, co-president of Unite Here Local 11, accused the hotels of fear-mongering, saying they are misrepresenting the potential impact of the planned wage hikes. Hotel owners, he said, “act like the sky is falling every time they have to share profits with their workers.”

“This ‘Chicken Little’ stuff has got to end. Every single time, hotels cry poverty, and then a day later, they’re doing fine. It’s always the same routine,” Petersen said. “What’s not falling is rent and healthcare. What’s not sustainable is workers not earning enough to live in Los Angeles.”

The hospitality industry issued similar warnings a decade ago — when the council approved the current hotel minimum wage — only to see tourism flourish in the years that immediately followed, said Víctor Sánchez, executive director of the L.A. Alliance for a New Economy, a pro-labor advocacy group that produced a report on that phenomenon.

In Long Beach, where residents voted to raise the hotel minimum wage last year, revenue per available room was up 15.7% in March compared with the same month the prior year, said Sánchez, citing data from the real estate group CoStar.

L.A.’s political leaders have enacted a number of wage laws over the last few decades. The hotel minimum wage, approved by the council in 2014, is currently $20.32 per hour. The minimum wage for private-sector employees at LAX is $25.23 per hour, once the required $5.95 hourly healthcare payment is included. Then there’s the minimum wage for nearly everyone else in L.A., which is $17.28 per hour — 78 cents higher than the state’s.

The hourly minimum wage for hotel and airport workers was already slated to go up this year, as part of regularly scheduled increases in the city’s wage laws. Once the council showed interest in the much larger increases, business leaders began warning that hotel developers would take their business elsewhere.

Few were as dramatic as Davis, who told council members that their proposal, as drafted, would “likely kill” the Universal City Hilton’s 395-room expansion.

Davis, whose company has hotels in Simi Valley, Colorado Springs, Colo., and the greater Denver area, said his board instructed him last year to look at acquiring property outside of California, in markets that “make more sense financially for an investment of $250 million.”

“The owners investing this money, they have to look at the numbers,” he said in an interview. “Any project survives only by its numbers.”

The Universal City Hilton already pays most of its workers more than $25 per hour, while also offering healthcare coverage, Davis said. If those health plans have a financial value lower than the $8.35 per hour, the company will need to make up the difference, he said.

Davis said he, too, is looking at scaling back restaurant operations, which would likely require layoffs.

At one point, Davis’ project drew support from the city’s political leaders.

The Universal City Hilton reached an agreement early on with construction trade unions, promising to pay a higher prevailing wage to the estimated 1,000 construction workers who would work on the new tower.

In August, the council voted unanimously to seek an economic analysis that would determine whether the city should provide taxpayer assistance to the project. The analysis, requested by Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Soto-Martínez, would have explored whether to allow the hotel to keep a share of the tax revenues generated by the new tower.

Raman, whose district includes a portion of Universal City, did not respond to questions from The Times about the project — or the potential impact of the higher tourism wage.

In recent days, the Hotel Assn. of Los Angeles has been appealing directly to Mayor Karen Bass, purchasing digital ads that ask her to intervene on the minimum wage issue.

Bass, in an interview earlier this year, said she wants hotel workers to “make a decent living” while also ensuring that their employers “are able to survive.”

“We have to make sure that we can address both — that we can address the needs of the workers without crippling the industry,” she said.