President Trump’s favored candidate to become Los Angeles mayor looks like he won’t even make the runoff — a reality that has provoked a barrage of unsubstantiated claims of fraud from the commander in chief. Votes are still being counted in the nation’s second-largest city, where a high proportion of ballots are customarily cast by…
LOS ANGELES — Mayor Karen Bass and Councilwoman Nithya Raman, both Democrats, advanced to the general election in the city’s mayoral race on Tuesday, setting up a clash between one-time political allies and ending the hopes of reality TV star Spencer Pratt. With roughly 93% of the vote counted, Bass and Raman led a crowded […]
President Donald Trump and his movement of MAGA Republicans are venting their rage online after Republican reality TV star Spencer Pratt lost to two Democrats, Mayor Karen Bass and Councilmember Nithya Raman, in the Los Angeles mayoral race.Because Trump has accused all of the politicians he opposes of cheating, tracing all the way back to the 2016 Republican Iowa caucus, he naturally has accused Bass and Raman of cheating Pratt. MAGA Republicans online are taking notice."I'm at the rare intersection of: - Was rooting for Pratt - Thought he was good for the LA political conversation - Dislike California's election administration laws and policies - But understand how the process works,” posted an X user named Stephen Richer.Similarly Republican pollster Frank Luntz observed "reality TV star Spencer Pratt says he ‘will be done with trying to live in LA’ if he doesn't win the mayoral election. Yesterday, he was surpassed in the Los Angeles mayoral primary for the second run-off spot in November."Another Republican wrote going by Dr. Terry Simpson on X wrote that "I'm a Republican. Los Angeles is roughly 50% Democratic and about 10% Republican. Any candidate who wants to lead this city must win support well beyond the Republican base. Spencer Pratt didn't lose because voters didn't understand he was independent. He lost.”Other Republicans reacted with the outrage that Trump is trying to stir up, even though there is no evidence that anything illicit is occurring in the California election."A 43,000-vote swing just handed Nithya Raman the edge over Spencer Pratt in LA,” an X user who goes by jay plemons posted. “The exact size of the city's homeless population. Ballot harvesting from shelters, universal mail ballots, and late drops made it happen. Coincidence?"Similarly X user Mark Mendlovitz wrote, "The large variance of Pratt and Raman but not Bass should be setting off screaming alarm bells."Even House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested there might be fraud in California, despite the fact that he also acknowledged there is no proof. Instead he cited the absence of evidence as being in itself suspicious.“I'm not saying it's rigged,” Johnson told CNN’s Manu Raju on Monday. “I'm saying it stinks to high heaven. And everybody knows that. Let's remove the appearance of impropriety. Let's have, what a concept, let's have votes on an election the day of the election. That's what many states are able to do. I think California is playing around with this.”After Raju asked Johnson if he had proof the election was improper, he admitted that “I don't — some of these efforts are so diabolical and so far upstream that it is impossible to prove. But I think everybody knows instinctively something is wrong here. And that's a concern. We need people to believe in the integrity of our election system.”Trump, who attempted a coup after he lost the 2020 presidential election to then-Vice President Joe Biden, is reportedly falsely accusing the California election of being stolen as a preparation for denying the results of the 2026 midterms, which are also expected to swing against him.“By baselessly framing Ms. Raman’s rise as a Democratic scam, Mr. Trump extended his long-running project to erode public faith in elections — and gave an unusually clear preview of how he could greet any disappointing results for his party in November, when control of Congress is at stake,” wrote The New York Times' Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman on Monday. “He has been anything but subtle about his desire to limit the ability of Democrats to vote by mail, implying, with no evidence, that simply choosing that widely used means of casting a ballot is inherently suspect.”Swan and Haberman added, “Addressing a gathering of Republican lawmakers in March, he said the way to hold their majority was to pass a strict voter identification law cracking down on mail ballots. ‘It’ll guarantee the midterms,’ he told them, warning that failure would bring ‘big trouble.’”
Los Angeles’s registered Democrats waited until “the last minute” to cast their ballots in the June 2 primary election as they sorted out their options for California governor. And that down-to-the-wire vote had consequences in how the mayoral race results were reported, according to Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ). On Sunday, DDHQ projected Los Angeles City Council member…
The reality star couldn't outpace a democratic socialist to lead the second largest US city.
City Councilmember Nithya Raman will face off against incumbent Mayor Karen Bass in the November general election. The post Democratic Socialist Overcomes GOP-Funded Opponent to Advance in Los Angeles Mayor Race appeared first on The Intercept.
The president is using the slow count of mail ballots in California to renew his effort to cast doubt on election outcomes he doesn’t like, despite a lack of evidence of any widespread fraud.
Progressive and former reality TV star have been battling for the number two spot to face off against Karen BassNithya Raman, the progressive Los Angeles city councillor, appeared to be edging out Spencer Pratt in the LA mayoral race challenging Karen Bass as Donald Trump continues to repeat falsehoods that California elections are “rigged”.The pair have been battling for the number two spot to face off against the incumbent, who already secured enough votes to advance to a runoff in November. Pratt, a former reality TV star, held a lead over Raman for days, but as ballot processing from last week’s election continued, the city councillor has pulled ahead. Continue reading...
CNN's Phil Mattingly chided Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) on Monday after Johnson offered a startling answer to a reporter asking about alleged election fraud in California. Republicans have been up in arms since Sunday after Democrat Nithya Raman leapfrogged Republican Spencer Pratt, a reality TV personality, in the Los Angeles mayoral primary race. Raman built up her lead as a slew of mail-in ballots went her way, a trend that analysts at the Los Angeles Times expect to continue through the deadline to receive ballots on Tuesday. President Donald Trump and several high-ranking Republican lawmakers have claimed, without evidence, that the election appears to have been rigged. "I'm saying it stinks to high heaven," Johnson said on Monday when he was asked about the results by CNN's Manu Raju. "And everybody knows that. I think California is playing around with this.""But what evidence is there to prove this was rigged?" Raju replied. "Some of these efforts are so diabolical and so far upstream, it is impossible to prove," Johnson said. "But I think everybody knows instinctively something is wrong here."Mattingly chuckled as he replied to Johnson's comments on "The Lead." "So diabolical it's impossible to prove," Mattingly said. "Which just sounds like anything my four-year-old does most days." CNN's Jamie Gangel, a special correspondent, said Johnson's comments show he was playing to an audience of one — Donald Trump. "He is not going to contradict Donald Trump, but the way he's saying it is really disingenuous," she said. "It's a distinction without a difference, because he is saying it stinks to high heaven. So he's not using the word rigged, but that's what he's putting out there. I think the problem here ... this is dangerous when you undermine faith in the election. Let us not forget we have seen the result of what happened on January 6th. We do not want that to happen again."