Part 165: Rick Caruso vs. California – 2026 Election Hubris and Real Power Politics

Published April 10, 2025.

and

Apr 11, 2025

Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer, right, responds to an accusation made by businessman Rick Caruso as U.S. Rep. Karen Bass looks on during the March 22, 2022 mayoral primary debate at USC (Photo by Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times).

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By Zachary Ellison, Independent Journalist

Since November 2022, former Los Angeles mayoral candidate and billionaire real estate developer Rick Caruso has captivated the political class with questions of what would come next in his long-anticipated political career. Now, according to a new report from Los Angeles Times journalists David Zahniser and Julie Wick, if he were to challenge Mayor Karen Bass again, he would have to do so without the support of the Los Angeles Police Protective League (LAPPL), which has preemptively endorsed the incumbent as Caruso reportedly continues to poll away his political future. The “will he or won’t he?” dynamic behind Rick Caruso’s political calculations has raised questions about his intentions toward both California’s 2024 senate race and also the 2026 governorship showdown currently being shadowed by Kamala Harris. So far, Harris hasn’t announced a run despite widespread speculation and with attacks already flying.

So far in 2025, as Caruso has made the podcast rounds and launched a new nonprofit focused on wildfire recovery in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena, he’s repeatedly declined to confirm or deny his intention. This has left the Times at least openly speculating about the political ambitions of opposites such as Controller Kenneth Meija and Councilmember Traci Park, both of whom are seeking re-election and have ruled out challenges against Mayor Bass. The Times also floated names such as Councilmember Monica Rodriguez and even Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, who are quite unlikely to occur. A run from Rodriguez would likely face a fate similar to the ill-fated 2022 campaign of Kevin de León that floundered in the primary. The LAPPL didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on their endorsement of Karen Bass. The influential labor union spent millions fervently attacking Bass before the June 2022 primary.

A late entry by Rick Caruso for another almost entirely self-funded campaign would undoubtedly have only slightly better headwinds in the best-case scenario. Karen Bass as mayor has been far from a smashing success, with serious questions dogging both her wildfire leadership and signature homelessness program, Inside Safe. To be fair, Caruso, should he choose, could also likely fundraise from a wide array of wealthy backers and again outspend Bass by a significant ratio to reach what in some sense has seemingly been a lifelong ambition. The Times was left asking if anyone serious would file whether Caruso runs or not. De León has been banished to the political wilderness since the leak of the LA Fed Tapes and his defeat by Ysabel Jurado, who, like Mejia, is aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America-Los Angeles (DSA-LA) bloc that in recent years has been quite successful in turning out young, progressive voters for its candidates. Traci Park, for example, has made no secret that she detests the DSA-LA, as did De León in his re-election campaign. Park now employs several of De León’s former staffers.

In what might be an obituary far too soon, Los Angeles Times columnist Gustavo Arellano wrote about De León, “Hubris was the engine of De León’s 18-year political career.” Certainly, Caruso, even if more refined than De León, has no shortage of hubris. The retail mogul has been locked in a battle in Montecito to expand the Miramar Rosewood Resort that was pending appeal before the California Coastal Commission today. Critics claimed that Caruso’s development proposal, which includes a luxury retail component and affordable employee-only housing set to be built on a parking lot in a flood zone. The Commission denied the appeals with a unanimous vote during the second day of a three-day meeting at the Hilton Santa Barbara Beachfront Hotel. Recently a target for President Donald Trump over its restrictions on private development, the Commission staff recommendation was fully in favor of the project, stating that it would raise no “substantial issue” with California’s landmark coastal management program.

Coastal Commission Chair Justin Cummings noted about his ex parte conversations with appellant Unite Here Local 11 that Caruso’s team had told him THAT the union “may be trying to establish in Santa Barbara.” Unite Here Local 11 is closely aligned with DSA-LA Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez, among others. Speaking on behalf of appellant Heal The Ocean, attorney Marco Gonzalez of Coast Law Group stated, “We do not agree with the hubris of the applicant.” While the fight may have centered around parking issues and potential disaster, the bigger questions weren’t far away. Speaking for Caruso’s firm, Katie Mangin, Vice President for Acquisitions and Development accused opponents of using a strategy of “misinformation” and “mischaracterization.” Caruso’s team had won the support of several other unions, including the Western State Carpenters after a sustained campaign. In addition to affordable housing for employees only, the project would deliver a new luxury retail component for the posh resort.

Whether another run for mayor would be good or bad for Caruso’s eponymous real estate operation remains to be seen, and perhaps the bigger question would be whether Caruso, like Trump, is able to separate the two. Caruso has become almost a bit of a punchline, with April Fool’s student pranksters at the University of Southern California, where he served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees, recently successfully sending out a fake email announcing that Caruso would be the new President. Local television outlet KTLA even picked up the story. USC is now reportedly punishing the students who successfully compromised its email system. According to an exclusive report on the pranksters from Morning Trojan journalist Tomo Chien, the students chose Caruso because “it needed to be somewhat believable…and also relatively innocuous.” The prank likely violated USC policy regarding computer system usage at the bare minimum.

What happens though when someone pranks an election? That’s what happened in October 2022 when two recordings made on October 18, 2021, and September 30, 2022, at the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor AFL-CIO (the “LA Fed”) were leaked on Reddit. Under username “Honest-Finding-1581,” the illegally made audio of former Councilmembers Nury Martinez, Gil Cedillo, Kevin De León, and the former president of the union, Ron Herrera, contained racially inflammatory and politically calculating discussion. Prosecutors declined to charge two now former employees of the union following an election. Both deny responsibility and are now being sued by both De León and Cedillo, with a jury trial scheduled in June in De León’s case pending resolution by mediation. Both former employees, unlike the USC April Fool’s pranksters, deny responsibility for the October Surprise that rocked LA in October 2022.

There have been significant delays in Cedillo’s case, which is also filed against the LA Fed itself in addition to the two employees. Cedillo’s attorney has changed from Brian Kabateck of Kabateck LLP to Alexandra Kazarian of Geragos & Geragos LLP, with Kazarian claiming in a sworn February filing under pain of perjury that following filing a “Substitution of Counsel” on August 28 that “Unbeknownst to me, the Substitution of Counsel had been rejected, and the notices continued to be provided to Mr. Cedillo’s prior attorney.” Kazarian claims that a lack of knowledge of the schedule caused the matter to “not appear on our calendar on the attorney portal.”

Reached for comment via email, Brian Kabateck denied any knowledge of the confusion, causing Cedillo to go unrepresented at a December hearing. De León is also represented by Geragos’s firm by attorneys Kim Casper and Mark Geragos himself, one of the most well-known names in American legal circles. Neither Nury Martinez nor Ron Herrera filed legal claims over the matter despite submitting declarations in support of De León’s case. Alexandra Kazarian didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the matter.

Nury Martinez resigned as Council President after the scandal, and Ron Herrera resigned as leader of the union following an abortive attempt to stop the Los Angeles Times from publishing news of the recordings. The leaker note titled “LA County Federation of Labor Scam” from “Honest-Finding-1581” provides an endorsement of Caruso’s campaign: “If Rick Caruso wins the Mayor's race, he will clean house at City Hall, including making sure Nury Martinez is out.” Caruso has a commanding political presence, with Zahniser and Wick quoting an anonymous “Democratic strategist” stating, “The Rick of it all is freezing the field…Everybody’s waiting to see whether Rick runs.” Martinez has been all but banished into the political wilderness following the scandal. Caruso has blamed Bass’s supporters for the leak, seeking to ascribe it to a Democratic establishment that was opposed to him and was seeking to hurt his candidacy. Meanwhile, De León and Cedillo have blamed the DSA-LA for the leak without any evidence.

Herrera was open in his support for De León’s re-election. Many in the Latino community have sought to portray the scandal as one that disempowered Latinos at the expense of African-American voters, even as the latter community has expressed outrage at the recorded conversation. Whether the 2021 redistricting process was skewed remains under investigation by the California Attorney General’s office under Rob Bonta. Asked for comment on their investigation announced in October 2022 immediately following the scandal, the AG Press Office issued the following statement: “Our investigation remains ongoing, and when we have a resolution it will be announced publicly.”

The AG investigation is believed to be led by two high-ranking attorneys, Deputy Attorney General Francisco V. Balderrama and Supervising Deputy Attorney General Vilma Palma-Solana. Last October, the Los Angeles Times published a story suggesting that based upon a “draft legal document,” the City of Los Angeles would soon be forced “to finalize new council district maps in time for the 2026 primary election.” Months later there are few signs that this is about to happen. It’s also not clear whether De León was allowed to participate in the negotiations given that he was party to the recordings that precipitated the investigation; the Times journalists David Zahniser and Dakota Smith noted that “De León declined to discuss Bonta’s findings, saying they were part of confidential legal discussions.” Zahniser, Smith, and James Queally, last October, writing on the matter at the increasingly reduced newspaper, have previously asserted that with the end of the potential criminal cases, “greatly reduces the chances of a trial that would unearth definitive answers about how and why the scandal was set into motion.”

The same newspaper hasn’t covered the civil cases filed in October 2023 in any depth even as a court battle has unfolded in which attorneys for accused leaker Santos Leon have suggested De León is engaged in “fraud” and alleged corruption in the Attorney General’s office in interfering with announced investigations by the LA Fed and the Los Angeles Police Department. The Los Angeles Times, under owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, has faced deep staff and editorial cuts along with accusations of news meddling. Gil Cedillo’s case is set to be back in court on May 27 for a status conference. Kevin De León is back on June 12 with a scheduled jury trial set to begin on June 27. Cedillo endorsed Caruso in 2022; De León didn’t endorse, stating that if the scandal hadn’t happened, he would have endorsed Karen Bass for Mayor.

The wife of Santos Leon, Karla Vasquez, has separate counsel. Both no longer work at the powerful labor union. Despite many months of investigation, neither had any known political leanings, nor was any direct evidence beyond the use of the internet protocol address found that would prove them to be the responsible parties. Mark Geragos had asserted in court that the District Attorney’s Charge Evaluation worksheet created by prosecutors under former District Attorney George Gascón was sufficient evidence to suggest culpability and justify a trial. About his relationship with Gil Cedillo and Mark Geragos, former attorney Brian Kabateck stated generously, “Gil is a wonderful man,” adding, “Mark Geragos is equally wonderful and we have a great relationship.” Civil legal proceedings require a reasonable belief that a claim could prevail.

Undoubtedly, many would say the same about Rick Caruso and even the much-maligned Kevin de León. Yet, Caruso, Bass, and De León weren’t the only figures to seek the mayorship in 2022. The Times story checks off activist Gina Viola, who, at least for now, is seeking someone younger and more energetic, but Mike Feuer, the former City Attorney goes undiscussed. Feuer left office in 2022 under the cloud of an FBI investigation before coming in 5th in the June primary after withdrawing from the election. Feuer was a close ally of former Mayor Eric Garcetti and was succeeded by City Attorney Hydee Feldstein-Soto (a Caruso ally), who is now facing a challenge from DSA-LA backed Marissa Roy, herself an employee of the California Attorney General’s office. He now works for the non-profit Inner City Law Center.

The Department of Water and Power (DWP) scandal saw Kabateck as part of an effort to essentially clean up the mess created by the City Attorney’s office under Feuer in overbilling ratepayers. Worth noting is that Caruso was a former President of the DWP’s board. Kabateck himself faced questions about his relationship with Feuer, including political donations. In response to an inquiry from the Times in 2023, Kabateck told them the allegations made by disgraced attorney Paul Paradis about him were a “joke.” Paradis is now served 12 months out of a 33-month prison sentence before being compassionately released to treat a brain tumor.

Former Deputy City Attorney James Patrick Clark and Gibson, Dunn, and Crutcher partner, who is currently facing disciplinary charges from the State Bar, recently had a hearing on April 8 with a disbarment trial set for April 15-17 and May 12-14. The case is SBC-24-O-30722. Cedillo’s civil suit is 23STCV24442; De León’s is 23STCV24461. What secrets of Los Angeles politics will be revealed next just might be a million-dollar and potentially criminal question. In 2022, Feuer said in endorsing Bass for Mayor said, ”As much as I am enthusiastic about supporting Karen, the choice is stark: She is right for L.A. Rick Caruso is wrong for L.A.” Rick Caruso has typically positioned himself as an anti-corruption crusader and is known to be friends with outgoing Governor Gavin Newsom and backed Harris in 2024. Caruso’s turn away from Republicanism has been real power politics, as much as his prior service on hte boards the DWP and the LAPD up to and through the James Hahn administration.

According to a report by Dakota Smith, Caruso and Bass today put aside their political differences to support rebuilding a city-owned recreation center in the Pacific Palisades. Caruso disclosed to the Times that he had a meeting 6 months after the election with Bass. Caruso’s new non-profit, Steadfast LA, is donating $30 million for the project. Bass said about the event, “It is appropriate for us to come together in a public-private partnership — that’s the best way to get things done…Government can’t do everything on its own.” Caruso and Bass have known each other for 30 years. Whether they take another go at it, much less whether anyone else enters, remains to be seen. The future of Los Angeles, and even the State of California, might depend on what happens in Los Angeles in 2026, and there are many unanswered questions.

Ruth Roofless contributed to this report. Follow her at: