Nithya Raman Wins Los Angeles Mayoral Race as Progressives Sweep Key Offices

As a blue wave swept through US politics this week, Los Angeles saw a major shake-up of its own, with democratic socialist Nithya Raman defeating incumbent mayor Karen Bass to become the city's next mayor.

Raman was the first democratic socialist to serve on the Los Angeles city council. Even in the deep blue city, her victory was hardly a given, and it marked a stunning win for the progressive wing of the party. With her election, America's two largest cities will now be run by democratic socialist mayors.

The wins for DSA-LA did not stop there. Los Angeles voters backed Marissa Roy for city attorney and Angela Gonzales-Torres, who defeated incumbent Jimmy Gomez for a US House seat. Other members won seats on school boards and the Burbank city council, meaning Burbank has the first socialist-majority city council on the west coast, DSA-LA said.

Volunteers knocked on more than 110,000 doors during this election season, and the organisation said this was its largest-ever slate of candidate victories. This week's victories have boosted DSA-LA, which had more than 6,000 members as of last month and has seen another 2,000 people join this week alone, the chapter said.

Anna Gross, a DSA-LA steering member, said in a statement that the results show Angelenos are looking for an alternative to politicians beholden to billionaires and corporate interests. She added that with representation across LA county, in the most powerful positions in city hall and for the first time in US Congress, the organisation looks forward to showing Angelenos what Democratic Socialist leadership can deliver.

DSA support was significant for Raman, and a large network of volunteers canvassed for her across the city ahead of the election. But her campaign was also helped by the fact that Karen Bass was deeply unpopular. Polling has long shown that Angelenos are frustrated about the state of the city, and resentment over Bass's handling of the Palisades fire grew.

Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles initiative at the Luskin School of Public Affairs at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that if the Palisades fire had not happened in January of last year, he does not think Nithya would have run, and he does not think Karen Bass would have been defeated. He added that a significant majority of the city's people think the city is on the wrong track, and the Palisades fire was really the poster child for all that people are unhappy about.

Raman joined DSA in 2019 and was first elected to the city council in 2020, defeating an incumbent Democrat backed by Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton. Yaroslavsky said at the time that her election marked a significant shift in the architecture of Los Angeles politics. In the years since, the city has voted in three other DSA candidates to serve on its 14-member council.

DSA member Patrick Padilla said in an interview with the Guardian in September that the organisation's platform has broad appeal, even among people who do not identify as democratic socialists. The group focuses on affordable housing and tenant rights, immigrant rights, Medicare for All and the Green New Deal, among other issues.

Padilla said they are coming to find that the status quo has not been serving everyday working Americans, and that when he is on the doors, people are just focused on how they can get by day to day.

Several candidates on the chapter's endorsed slate this year won by huge margins. In the city attorney race, Roy won with 67.39% of the vote, according to the latest data available. Roy has pledged to make the city attorney's office into the largest public interest law office in the city and to use the law to fight for working people, immigrants, renters and consumers.

Gonzales-Torres won with 60.6% of the vote to Gomez's 39.4%, according to the most recently available figures. Gomez had served in Congress for nearly a decade and was endorsed by Aipac, which spent $2.7m in support of his candidacy. Gonzalez-Torres described the war in Gaza as a genocide that the Israeli military is only able to commit with the financial and political support of the US government, standing in sharp contrast to Gomez.

While Raman's victory is undoubtedly a win for the chapter, the endorsement was complicated. Raman entered the race at the last minute after DSA-affiliated colleagues had already backed Bass, and another candidate was in the running. DSA member Rae Huang also ran in the mayoral primary, and the chapter opted not to support any candidate.

The organisation censured Raman in 2024 for pursuing an endorsement from a Democrats for Israel group, and its decision to back her in this election came after internal debate. Shortly before the election, the organisation's national leaders considered rescinding the chapter's support until Raman stated her position on the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement. A vote on the matter ultimately failed.

While it is the start of a new era in Los Angeles politics, the job of the mayor is the same. Once in office, Raman will have to build trust in communities that did not vote for her, Yaroslavsky said, which the mayor-elect has acknowledged.

Raman said: To every voter out there who voted for Mayor Bass or who chose not to vote in this election at all, please know this, I am going to city hall to work every single day to earn your trust and to earn your trust in this city again. She said that work starts now, so that the city can build housing people can afford, parks for children, a transit system that can get people where they need to go, a city that is safe for its working people and its families, and a city government that is actually capable of delivering on its promises.