Eric Garcetti wins race for L.A. mayor; Greuel concedes

[ucrdem]

Source: Los Angeles Times


Garcetti's victory caps a nearly two-year campaign that saw a record $33 million spent by the candidates and outside groups.

By Seema Mehta and Laura J. Nelson
May 22, 2013, 3:27 a.m.

Wendy Greuel called Eric Garcetti early Wednesday morning to concede the mayoral election, a Greuel campaign source told the Times, ending a two-year campaign to determine Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's successor and the new political leader of Los Angeles.

Garcetti will be the first elected Jewish mayor of the city. At 42, he will also be the youngest in more than a century. He is scheduled to take office July 1. "Thank you Los Angeles," Garcetti wrote in a Tweet posted at 2:52 a.m. "The hard work begins but I am honored to lead this city for the next four years. Let's make this a great city again."

During early returns Tuesday, Greuel led the mayor's race by a slight margin. But as the night wore on, Garcetti's lead grew. Election tallies from the City Clerk's office posted at 1:38 a.m., with nearly 73% of precincts reporting, showed Greuel had fallen eight points behind Garcetti.

After seeing those numbers—Greuel 46%, Garcetti 54%—she called Garcetti at 1:42 a.m. to concede the race.

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ln-garcetti-wins-race-for-mayor-20130522,0,6850215.story

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Squeaker, but Eric's the man. Both Dems.

[graham4anything]

1. Congrats to Eric. He is the first Jewish/Mexican/Italian mayor.

though 54 to 46 is NOT a squeaker.

[LeftInTX]

6. Wow! My kids are Armenian-Mexican

[ucrdem]

9. heck I always thought they were Italian

the Garcettis that is

[ucrdem]

10. Rhodes scholar too. Bright guy.

But I think he converted just for this election. Kidding.

[adieu]

2. Any relation to Gil Garcetti?

Former police chief of LA (I think)?

[jeff47]

3. Gil was DA. Eric is his son. (nt)

[adieu]

5. I was guessing there was a relation

Hate to see familial connections, but none of the news articles on this mentioned the relationship.

[olddots]

4. Another race built on negitives

a real squeaker , glad it's over .

[Cha]

7. Thanks, ucrdem. Weren't there any repubs

running for Mayor of LA? Not complaining.

[ucrdem]

8. thaks CHa, I"m pretty sure it's a non partisan race.

Last time I lived in LA Eric's city council district started across the street (well more or less) in echo park. Good guy, low key unlike his dad, who was a publicity seeker when he was DA, like his mentor Ira Reiner. Reiner either quit or lost to Garcetti pere after losing the McMartin Preschool case, a very nasty business, and Gil (Eric's dad) lost or quit after losing OJ. At least that's how I recall it.

Anyway it was hard to get a fix on who was winning even by people living there and Gruel was the clear media favorite so every time they appeared in local media (like local NPR stations) they always made her seem like a fait accompli. Turns out it wasn't. She wasn't terrible, in fact she was backed by the DWP and I think a couple of other City unions, but apparently she played that down and kind of ran as the stealth republican, or just assumed she'd win. Eric I know more about and I'm glad he won. But apparently it surprised everybody, especially the 8-point margin.

LA Times discussion with 2 local regulars, Patt Morrison and Ralph SHoensein:

WSJ analysis, with the typical WSJ slant:

Los Angeles councilman Eric Garcetti has earned the misfortune of replacing term-limited Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa this July. The bright-eyed, 42-year-old Democrat may have had higher ambitions, but his political future now looks as hazy as the Los Angeles sky.

Mr. Garcetti defeated controller Wendy Greuel by eight points in what is being reported as the most expensive and lowest turnout race in the city's history. The political upstart focused his attacks on Ms. Greuel's labor support, which she unsuccessfully sought to down play. But her bigger failing was that she didn't have a plan to revive economic growth in the city or to balance its lopsided books without rescinding a pay increase for public employees or modifying retirement benefits.

Mr. Garcetti presented a more optimistic vision and at least paid lip service to economic growth. He also won the endorsement of Republican Kevin James, who came in third place in the March primary, as well as the support of the Hollywood celebrities Mr. Garcetti represents on the city council. He promised to re-make Los Angeles in Hollywood's chic image—e.g., carless—and L.A. drivers presumably didn't hold this against him.

more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324659404578498882049036200.html

[Cha]

11. Yeah, that wsj is doom doom doom.. I would have gotten that even without

the heads up. I went to the link but log in is required or subscribe..

Found this interesting aside when I looked up Kevin James(wanted to see if he was the actor)

Wendy Greuel Slams Kevin James In Attack Mailer, But Courted Him For Weeks In Text Exchange

Wendy Greuel's mayoral campaign has launched an attack on Eric Garcetti with direct mail targeted at the African-American and Latino communities. In two similar mailers, the Greuel campaign highlights Garcetti's endorsement from white Republican Kevin James, who finished third in the March 5 primary.
"He's an Obama hater!" the mailer says, highlighting some of James' more intemperate remarks about the president. "Say no to Eric Garcetti! He sold us out to win Republican votes!"

Only problem with that: Wendy Greuel also courted James' endorsement. And we have the texts that show just how eager the courtship was -- she even joked at one point "I am stalking u : )."

http://www.kevinjamesformayor.com/

Eric Garcetti could surprise them all!

thanks for all the info, udrdem.. it's interesting to me. I use to live in California.. San Diego. Although, in the 70s and 80s.

[ucrdem]

12. Wow.

That's a mistake I wouldn't want to make. Apparently Greuel started out with a big advantage, being both the labor candidate, a winner in Dem LA, and with a base in the SF Valley, conservative suburbia, where she grew up and where her old council district is (she's been city controller for about ten years I think).

But it seems she lost Valley voters when she got the DWP (water and powert dep't) union endorsement, because it turns out Valley voters need a lot of water and power in the summer and despise the DWP and the union wages and benefits it pays its workers. So that's why Greuel became the conservative candidate, and lost a lot of non-valley support to Garcetti, who wound up getting most of the DWP-hating valley dwellers anyway, per the LA Times pollster.

So essentially Garcetti out-campaigned her and came from behind to win, but politically they're very compatible, almost identical, and that worked against Greuel because it led to a low voter turnout, even for May -- 300,000+ and still counting, but probably less than 1/4 of eligible voters when it's over, per Ralph Schoenfeldt of the Pat Brown Institute at Cal State LA -- and a lot of Greuel voters stayed home. She was strongly supported by African American voters, according to the LAT pollster, I think because of her support for after-school and community programs, but they couldn't make up the loss.

So the long and short of it is that it was a win-win and Garcetti happened to win. Some interesting Clinton-Obama dynamics too but instead of tediously spelling it out like I did in a humongous post I just lost when my laptop choked (thanks Romney! ) I recommend the LA Times YouTube above. It's about 2 hours and the first 2 or 3 minutes are blank. The really juicy race-gender-Cinton-Obama polling stuff comes in the middle, at around 55 to 65 minutes. Patt and Ralph don't show up till about 1:30 but there's plenty to keep a DU political junkie in bliss the whole two hours!

[Cha]

13. I can see why you called it a "squeaker" even though it

was 53% to 46%.

thanks for the heads up on the Vid.. when I have some extra time I'll check it out, thanks!

I hate it when I lose something I've just spent so much time on turning out!