Prominent California politician Karen Bass has won the Los Angeles mayoral race against billionaire and fellow democrat Rick Caruso.
According to the Huffington Post, Bass won the race against Caruso on Nov. 17. As such, she’s become the first woman to lead the city and the second Black person to be L.A. mayor. The city’s first elected Black mayor was Tom Bradley, who served from 1973 to 1993.
“No matter who you voted for, no matter who you are or where you live – I will be a mayor for you. That’s the only way forward. The crisis we face affects us all and all of us must be part of the solution,” she said during her first speech as mayor-elect.
Bass added that her first mayoral priority would be to handle the city’s homelessness crisis.
“I said all along that on day one–and day one is Dec. 12–I will declare a state of emergency. We will identify very specific areas where we will get people housed and we will roll out a whole plan in order to do that,” she said.
Bass is set to replace Mayor Eric Garcetti, who was reportedly forced to leave his post due to term limits. He was required to do so following a race against Caruso, a billionaire real estate tycoon who turned Democrat this year. She’s one of America’s most prominent Black woman politicians, as she’s represented L.A. in Congress for five terms. While serving, she won over 80% of the vote each time she ran, and, in 2020, she was a finalist on President Biden’s running mates list.
Prior to becoming involved in California politics, the 69-year-old worked as a physician assistant and organized a response to South Los Angeles’ crack epidemic in the 1980s–an epidemic that was hard-hitting in the African American community. Through her efforts, she secured millions of dollars in government funding to address the crisis.
