Endorsement
Why I'm Standing With Karen Bass
My endorsement of Mayor Karen Bass — and why her leadership matters for the future of Los Angeles.
Key points
- LAHSA reported two consecutive annual declines in homelessness in the City of Los Angeles in its 2025 count.
- LAPD reported lower homicide and person-crime totals in 2024, while City Hall has continued to revise housing-permitting rules.
- With the 2028 Olympics on the horizon, the next four years of decisions on housing, transit, and public safety will define what kind of city greets the world.
- Bass brings a lifetime of public service—from Sacramento to Washington to City Hall—and has earned a second term.
I’ve spent my career in Los Angeles and working on the civic problems that come with a city this big and this ambitious. So when I say I’m endorsing Karen Bass for a second term as Mayor, it’s not a casual statement. It’s a judgment about who is actually capable of doing this job at the moment we’re in.
A difficult term, measured against public records
Let me be straight: the last few years have been brutal for this city. The January 2025 Palisades fire destroyed homes and displaced families. Los Angeles has also faced a budget crisis, a housing shortage decades in the making, and the daily strain of homelessness on our streets. Nobody — including the Mayor — would tell you everything has gone perfectly.
There are, however, measurable results. The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority’s 2025 count results reported that homelessness in the City of Los Angeles declined for a second consecutive year. LAHSA’s point-in-time count is an annual estimate, not a real-time census, and it should be read with that limitation in mind. Even so, a sustained change in the count is meaningful.
Public-safety data also deserves precision. According to LAPD’s 2024 year-end figures released in March 2025, homicides and the category LAPD calls person crimes declined compared with 2023. Those citywide figures do not mean every neighborhood experienced the same improvement, but they show movement in the right direction.
Housing approvals and my planning perspective
Housing is the area where I can bring direct professional and public-service experience to this judgment. As a Los Angeles City Planning Commissioner, I see how land-use rules, departmental review, financing, and neighborhood concerns interact long before a project reaches construction. A mayor cannot solve the housing shortage alone, but the administration can make the approval process clearer and faster.
Mayor Bass’s Executive Directive 1 and subsequent development-services directives established and revised expedited paths for qualifying housing projects. I do not agree with every implementation choice, and speed cannot replace sound planning. My view is that the administration has treated permitting time as a real housing constraint rather than an abstract complaint. That matters to people trying to turn approvals into homes.
Recovery after the Palisades fire
The recovery remains unfinished, and residents are right to judge it by permits issued, homes rebuilt, infrastructure restored, and families able to return. The factual record includes the Mayor’s January 2025 emergency order to expedite rebuilding and later revisions and the City’s continuing official recovery and rebuilding resources. Whether that effort is moving fast enough is a legitimate political question. My judgment is that its scope and urgency warrant continuity and sustained attention rather than another transition in leadership.
Why I support a second term
There’s a bigger picture too. Los Angeles will host the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2028. The decisions made in the next four years — on housing, transit, public safety, recovery, and how we treat the most vulnerable Angelenos — will define what kind of city greets the world. I want steady, experienced hands on that work, not a learning curve.
I’ve watched a lot of people talk about fixing Los Angeles. Karen Bass has spent a lifetime in public service doing the work, from Sacramento to Washington to City Hall. The public records above inform my conclusion; the endorsement itself is my opinion. She has earned a second term, and she has earned my support.
The primary is June 2, 2026. If you care about this city the way I do, I’d ask you to vote, and to vote for Karen Bass.
— Brian Rosenstein