The race for Los Angeles County sheriff is already heating up — even with the primary not scheduled until next June. Six candidates have officially entered the field to unseat Robert Luna, with the early challengers slinging barbs, probing the incumbent’s political weaknesses and setting the stage for a heated campaign in the coming months.
Most vocal and well-known among the contenders is former Sheriff Alex Villanueva, who lost to Luna in 2022 and is now vying for a rematch. He is among a field of current and former lawmen who have criticized Luna’s time in office as ineffective, uninspiring and opaque.
Luna told The Times he deserves to keep his job through 2030, arguing voters should choose stability as Southern California prepares to host major events in the coming years.
“The last thing we need is more inconsistency in leadership as we start working toward the World Cup and the Olympics,” Luna said.
Villanueva registered a campaign committee in July and has since leveraged his ability to draw attention like few others in L.A. politics.
But the political dynamics have changed since 2022, when Joe Biden was president and Villanueva was still in charge of California’s largest law enforcement agency. Now, President Trump has ratcheted up political pressure on L.A., and last year, Janice Hahn defeated Villanueva in the primary for her county supervisor seat by a nearly 30-point margin.
Through it all, Sara Sadhwani, an assistant professor of politics at Pomona College, said it seems as though “Luna is generally liked, perhaps because he has brought a steady hand to the department” after what she termed “upheaval” under Villanueva.
The former sheriff has been heavily criticized for his combative personal style, pursuit of political vendettas and his handling of investigations into so-called deputy gangs deputies and other alleged misconduct.
“Does Villanueva have a lane to come back? I don’t think so,” said Sadhwani.
Luna launched jabs at his opponents, with the sharpest reserved for his predecessor.
“Not one of those individuals that is running comes close to the experience that I have and the accomplishments that I’ve had so far,” Luna said. “There were a lot of controversies and scandals with the previous sheriff that, again, eroded public trust.”
And yet, there’s no conversation about the sheriff’s race that won’t mention Villanueva, whose name recognition runs deep across L.A. County.
Villanueva told The Times he’s “eager to get back in the saddle,” especially now, when “there are prosecutors ready to prosecute,” a nod to the tough-on-crime stances of Acting U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli and L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman.
Former Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva talks with reporters at an election night gathering in Boyle Heights on June 7, 2022, when he was defeated by Robert Luna.
(Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times)
Villanueva had strong words for his 2022 opponent.
“The status quo is failing miserably the people of L.A. County,” he said. “I just can’t believe what Luna’s done to the organization I’ve spent my entire adult life in.”
Others jockeying for contention are pitching themselves as offering a breath of fresh air.
Lt. Eric Strong, who has served over 30 years in law enforcement and was seen as the most progressive of the 2022 candidates, is throwing his hat back in the ring after coming in third in that year.
“What really got me interested in running is seeing the continued failed leadership within the department,” Strong said in a recent interview. “Nothing’s changed. … Honestly Luna’s just a quieter version of Alex Villanueva.”
Then there’s Oscar Martinez, a proud immigrant and U.S. Marine Corps. veteran who made a career at the sheriff’s department after multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Andre White, 34, is the youngest candidate. A Compton-raised detective with 11 years at the department, he promises to take a “community-oriented approach” if he’s elected sheriff.
Brendan Corbett served as the assistant sheriff for custody operations under Villanueva.
Lastly, there’s Capt. Mike Bornman, who has decades of experience in the department and lists a “comprehensive forensic audit” of its books as the top priority on his campaign website.
In a recent phone interview, Bornman said he considered Luna a “vulnerable” incumbent.
The sheriff has faced criticism from opponents and advocates who say he has done too little to improve jail conditions, leading to a surge in inmate deaths this year. Like Villanueva, he has also faced pressure to do more to root out deputy gangs and boost recruitment.
“The morale is as bad as I’ve ever seen it,” Bornman said. “Something has to change,” he added. “I don’t think the department can take another four more years with the guy.”
Political analysts cautioned that the race is sill wide open, with one expert declining to speculate during the “embryonic” stages as the field takes shape.
Anything can happen in the eight months remaining before the primary, but Sadhwani said one thing is clear: Unseating the current sheriff won’t be easy.
“I will say in general that an incumbent such as Luna typically has the upper hand and challengers need not only cause but the campaign fundraising ability to get their message out — no small feat in a county as large as L.A.”
So far, fundraising has been mostly anemic, at least according to the county’s most recent comprehensive campaign finance data available for the sheriff’s race, which covers only Jan. 1 through June 30.
Over those six months, Luna raised about $393,000; Bornman brought in nearly $23,000 of contributions; Martinez brought in about $6,700; and White raised less than $3,000. The other three candidates had not even declared their candidacies by June 30.
Champion quizzer Mark Labbett, who is best known for showcasing his knowledge on The Chase, has recently struck up a connection with beautician Deanne, and it shows no signs of stopping now.
In the latest episode, the pair were invited to a brunch where they had to tell the others what they thought of each other. Mark said: “We thought we’d get on, it’s been great and we are just seeing how it goes!” Both parties confirmed they would like to go on another date with one another.
Paul claimed that Mark was ’emotionally unintelligent’ (Image: Channel 4)
But things took a sour turn when Mark, 60, turned to the dating experts Paul C. Brunson, Anna Williamson and Dr. Tara Suwinyattichaiporn to claim that he had known better than them all along.
He said: “We have just enjoyed each other’s company and sometimes there’s a little bit of overthinking it. We’ve not been the master strategists that you are, but, let’s face it, we’re smarter than you!”
Paul did not take kindly to the comment and things turned tense as he shot back: “Do you know why you always insult us? Because your emotional intelligence is on zero.”
Mark hit back sarcastically: “Sorry, but I’m nice to the people that count!” Paul would not let it drop and said: “When you get nervous, you insult people,” and Mark joked: “No just you!” and tried to say that it was some kind of ‘teaching response’.
Mark said he was only prepared to be ‘nice to the people that count’ as he gestured towards Deanne (Image: Channel 4)
Paul continued to lay into Mark but as the TV quizzer checked his watch to indicate boredom, Paul raged: “What you did right there, that’s contempt. You wanna be a teacher? Try being a damn student first!”
Things seemed to simmer down a bit when Mark, who previously dated TV presenter Hayley Palmer before she claimed he had split up with her on the phone, and prior to that was married to his second cousin Katie, 34, apologised for what he said.
In a confessional, Mark said: “I’ve upset Paul. I didn’t mean to but I don’t like talking about my feelings, especially in front of a lot of people.”
Back at the brunch, Mark eventually said: “I’m sorry,” but Paul demanded to know whether his apology was ‘genuine’. Mark said: “It is!” and the pair agreed to put it behind them.
The rift between US President Donald Trump and his former adviser Elon Musk has erupted into the open, with each trading insults after the tech billionaire criticised one of Trump’s key domestic policies.
The two billionaires escalated the feud throughout Thursday, lobbing barbs at each other on the social media sites they each own, suggesting a bitter conclusion to their unlikely alliance.
The day began with Trump saying he was “disappointed” with Musk’s criticisms of his administration’s centrepiece tax and spending bill, musing that it may be the end of their “great relationship”.
Musk then accused Trump of “ingratitude”, adding: “Without me, Trump would have lost the election”.
After hours of sparring, Trump appeared to downplay the situation. “Oh it’s okay,” he told news site Politico. “It’s going very well, never done better.” His aides have scheduled a phone call with Musk for Friday, the same news site reported.
Musk also appeared to believe there was a need to patch things up. Late on Thursday, in response to post by Bill Ackman, a prominent Trump backer, which suggested the pair needed to make peace, he wrote: “You’re not wrong”
The breaking point in the relationship between the president and his one-time ally came after weeks of Musk lobbying against Trump’s “big, beautiful” spending bill, which was passed by the US House last month and is awaiting a vote in the Senate.
Shortly after leaving the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) after 129 days in the job, Musk took to his site X to call the bill a “disgusting abomination” and posting: “Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong.”
He argued that the bill will irresponsibly add to the US national debt, and encouraged his followers to phone their representatives to express opposition to the spending plan.
Speaking to reporters during a news conference with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Thursday, Trump defending the bill and said: “I’m very disappointed because Elon knew the inner workings of this bill better than almost anybody sitting here. All of a sudden he had a problem.”
He went on to suggest that Musk was upset about the removal of subsidies and mandates for electric vehicles, which could affect his Tesla business.
Musk denied this was the case and wrote: “Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.”
“Pork” is a term used in US politics to describe wasteful government spending, particularly on things meant to curry favour with particular groups or local areas.
The partnership between the two men began when Musk endorsed Trump last July after an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania. The Tesla boss reportedly funnelled $290m (£213m) into getting him back into the White House.
Amid a flurry of posts on X after Thursday’s news conference, Musk took credit for the sweeping Republican victory in last November’s election, writing: “Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate.”
“Such ingratitude,” he added.
Musk went on to post a poll, asking his followers: “Is it time to create a new political party in America that actually represents the 80% in the middle?”
Over the course of the day, Musk went on to repost a tweet calling for Trump to resign, argue that his global tariff plan will trigger a US recession, and to suggest without evidence that Trump appears in unreleased files related to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Epstein was arrested in July 2019 on charges of sex trafficking and died by suicide while awaiting trial. Trump was president at the time. He said he knew Epstein “like everybody in Palm Beach knew him” but had a “falling out with him a long time ago”.
The White House condemned Musk’s allegation, with press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying in a statement: “This is an unfortunate episode from Elon, who is unhappy with the One Big Beautiful Bill because it does not include the policies he wanted.”
On his Truth Social network, Trump claimed that Musk “just went CRAZY” and went on to post: “The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!”
Musk’s companies, including Tesla, SpaceX and Starlink have direct contacts with the US government and, like many other businesses, also benefit from subsidies and tax breaks.
In response, Musk said SpaceX “will begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft immediately”. The craft is used to shuttle people and supplies to the International Space Station.
However, he later he appeared to back down from that threat, saying in response to a post on X urging him to cool off: “Ok, we won’t decommission Dragon.”
Telsa stock dropped by 14% within hours of the row bursting out into public.
According to the most recent analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the spending bill working its way through Congress will increase the US national debt by $2.4tn over 10 years and leave nearly 11 million people without government-backed health insurance.
The White House disputes those figures, saying they don’t account for revenues brought in by increased tariffs.
Put in charge of radically slashing government spending at Doge, Musk initiated mass sackings and wholesale elimination of departments such as the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
Doge claims to have saved $180bn, although that number has been disputed, and is well short of Musk’s initial aim to cut spending by up to $2tn.
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s friendship and political alliance with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, who fueled Trump’s campaign with record amounts of cash before working at the White House by his side until last week, appears to be over, with both men leveling searing criticism against one another in a sharp public feud.
Musk had been criticizing the Trump administration over its signature legislation, known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” for its projected impact on the national debt throughout last week. But his calls to “kill the bill” on Wednesday prompted Trump, speaking to media from the Oval Office, to respond in kind.
“Elon and I had a great relationship, I don’t know if we will anymore,” Trump said Thursday. “And he hasn’t said bad things about me personally, but I’m sure that’ll be next. But I’m very disappointed in Elon.”
Musk, responding on his social media platform, X, took credit for Trump’s election victory. The billionaire entrepreneur, whose companies also include SpaceX and Tesla, contributed over $280 million to Trump and other Republicans during the 2024 presidential campaign.
“Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate,” Musk wrote. “Such ingratitude.”
The exchange broke open a feud that had been simmering for weeks out of public view. In private, Musk had relayed concerns over the bill to the president, while expressing disagreement with several other policies, including the establishment of an artificial intelligence campus in the Middle East and Trump’s announcement of global tariffs.
“I agree with much of what the administration does, but we have differences of opinion,” Musk said in a more muted tone last week, speaking in an interview with CBS.
“You know, there are things that I don’t entirely agree with. But it’s difficult for me to bring that up in an interview because then it creates a bone of contention,” he added. “So then, I’m a little stuck in a bind, where I’m like, well, I don’t wanna, you know, speak up against the administration, but I also don’t wanna take responsibility for everything this administration’s doing.”
In the Oval Office, Trump said he believed that Musk had turned on him after he rejected Musk’s recommendation for the head of NASA, a position that could benefit SpaceX, Musk’s spaceship company. He also said that Musk opposed provisions of Trump’s megabill that would phase out tax credits for electric vehicles.
“Elon knew the inner workings of this bill better than almost anybody sitting here. Better than you people. He knew everything about it — he had no problem with it. All of a sudden he had a problem, and he only developed the problem when he found out that we’re going to have to cut the EV mandate, because that’s billions and billions of dollars,” Trump said.
“People leave my administration and they love us, and at some point, they miss it so badly, and some of them embrace it, and some of them actually become hostile,” Trump added. “I don’t know what it is.”
But Musk denied he had been shown the bill, responding on X that he wouldn’t mind if the EV provisions remain in the text so long as others, which he said would balloon annual deficits, are cut.
“This bill was never shown to me even once and was passed in the dead of night so fast that almost no one in Congress could even read it!” Musk wrote. “Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.”
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released an assessment on Wednesday estimating that the “big, beautiful bill,” which has passed the House and is under consideration in the Senate, would add $2.4 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, and result in 10.9 million Americans losing health insurance coverage over the same period.
At the beginning of the administration, Trump put Musk in charge of the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, a White House program that intended on cutting federal spending and reducing the deficit. Musk’s tenure in the role, designated as a special government employee, ended last week.
On X, Musk posted a collection of past remarks from Trump warning against growing deficits and congressional actions increasing the debt ceiling, adding, “where is this guy today?”
“Either you get a big and ugly bill or a slim and beautiful bill,” Musk added. “Slim and beautiful is the way.”
SACRAMENTO — This just seems wrong: Californians overwhelmingly approved an anti-crime ballot measure in November. But our governor strongly opposed the proposition. So he’s not funding it.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and Democratic legislative leaders, however, are now under pressure to fund the measure in a new state budget that’s being negotiated and must pass the Legislature by June 15.
A core principle of democracy is the rule of law. A governor may dislike a law, but normally is duty- bound to help implement and enforce it. Heaven save us if governors start traipsing the twisted path of President Trump.
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But this isn’t the first time for Newsom. Voters twice — in 2012 and 2016 — rejected ballot measures to eliminate the death penalty. Moreover, in 2016 they voted to expedite executions. But shortly after becoming governor in 2019, Newsom ignored the voters and declared a moratorium on capital punishment.
Nothing on California’s ballot last year got more votes than Proposition 36, which increases punishment for repeated theft and hard drug offenses and requires treatment for repetitive criminal addicts.
It passed with 68.4% of the vote, carrying all 58 counties — 55 of them by landslide margins, including all counties in the liberal San Francisco Bay Area.
“To call it a mandate is an understatement,” says Greg Totten, chief executive officer of the California District Attorneys Assn., which sponsored the initiative. Big retailers bankrolled it.
“It isn’t a red or blue issue,” adds Totten, referring to providing enough money to fund the promised drug and mental health treatment. “It’s what’s compassionate and what’s right and what the public expects us to do.”
Rolled back Proposition 47
Proposition 36 partly rolled back the sentence-softening Proposition 47 that voters passed 10 years earlier and was loudly promoted by then-Lt. Gov. Newsom.
Proposition 47 reduced certain property and hard drug crimes from felonies to misdemeanors and arrests plummeted, the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found.
Proposition 36 was inspired by escalating retail theft, including smash-and-grab burglaries, that were virtually unpunished. Increased peddling of deadly fentanyl also stirred the public.
The ballot measure imposed tougher penalties for dealing and possessing fentanyl, treating it like other hard drugs, such as heroin and cocaine. But the proposition offered a carrot to addicted serial criminals: Many could be offered treatment rather than jail time.
Newsom adamantly opposed Proposition 36.
“We don’t need to go back to the broken policies of the last century,” the governor declared. “Mass incarceration has been proven ineffective and is not the answer.”
Newsom tried to sabotage Proposition 36 by crafting an alternative ballot measure. Top legislative leaders went along. But rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers rebelled and Newsom abandoned the effort.
The Legislature ultimately passed 13 anti-theft bills that Newsom and Democrats hoped would satisfy voters, but didn’t come close. Totten called the legislative product “half measures.”
Proposition 36 was flawed in one regard: It lacked a funding mechanism. That was part of the backers’ political strategy. To specify a revenue source — a tax increase, the raid of an existing program — would have created a fat target for opponents.
Let the governor and the Legislature decide how to fund it, sponsors decided.
“We didn’t want to tie the hands of the Legislature,” Totten says. “The Legislature doesn’t like that.”
Anti-crime measure won’t work without funding
Without funding from Sacramento, Proposition 36 won’t work, says Graham Knaus, chief executive officer of the California State Assn. of Counties.
“We believe strongly that if it’s not properly funded, it’s going to fail,” Knaus says. “Proposition 36 requires increased capacity for mental health and substance abuse treatment. And until that’s in place, there’s not really a way to make the sentencing work.”
There’s a fear among Proposition 36 supporters that if treatment isn’t offered to qualifying addicts, courts won’t allow jail sentencing.
“That will probably get litigated,” Totten says.
“Counties can’t implement 36 for free,” Knaus says. “Voters declared this to be a top-level priority. It’s on the state to determine how to fund it. Counties have a very limited ability to raise revenue.”
The district attorney and county organizations peg the annual cost of implementing the measure at $250 million. State Senate Republicans are shooting for the moon: $400 million. The nonpartisan legislative analyst originally figured that the cost ranged “from several tens of millions of dollars to the low hundreds of millions of dollars each year.”
Newson recently sent the Legislature a revised $322-billion state budget proposal for the fiscal year starting July 1. There wasn’t a dime specifically for Proposition 36.
The governor, in fact, got a bit surly when asked about it by a reporter.
“There were a lot of supervisors in the counties that promoted it,” the governor asserted. “So this is their opportunity to step up. Fund it.”
One supervisor I spoke with — a Democrat — opposed Proposition 36, but is irked that Newsom isn’t helping to implement it.
“It’s disappointing and immensely frustrating,” says Bruce Gibson, a longtime San Luis Obispo County supervisor. “Voters have spoken and we need to work together with the state in partnership.”
In fairness, the governor and the Legislature are faced with the daunting task of patching a projected $12-billion hole in the budget, plus preparing for the unpredictable fiscal whims of a president who keeps threatening to withhold federal funds from California because he doesn’t like our policies.
“I am quite concerned about adequately providing the necessary funding to implement Proposition 36,” says state Sen. Tom Umberg of Santa Ana, a strong Democratic supporter of the measure.
He’s fearful that the Legislature will approve only a token amount of funding — and the governor will veto even that.
Under California’s progressive system of direct democracy, voters are allowed to bypass Sacramento and enact a state law themselves. Assuming the statue is constitutional, the state then has a duty to implement it. To ignore the voters is a slap in the face of democracy.
