On a recent Thursday morning, Los Angeles City Councilmember Kevin de León walked along a line of hundreds of people outside his Eagle Rock office, greeting them with handshakes and hugs — and boxes of eggs, produce and bread.
The occasion was De León’s monthly food giveaway.
“I'm glad they have this type of service because I don’t know what I would do,” said Barbara Bourland, a retired teacher. This was her first time at the giveaway. Her husband of 61 years died two months ago. Money is tight.
“After paying the bills, it doesn’t leave much money left over,” she said.
Bourland, 79, knew about the secretly recorded audio that surfaced more than a year ago in which De León, who is running for reelection this year, was heard participating in a conversation that included racist and derogatory remarks. In a discussion about redistricting with two other council members and a labor leader, he accused a white colleague of using his adopted Black son like a political prop akin to a luxury handbag.
The recordings prompted a flurry of calls for his resignation, including from President Joe Biden.
Bourland said she recalled receiving a campaign mailer from De León's office a few weeks ago. It was an apology letter. And she said she plans to support him in the March 5 election just like she did four years ago when he first ran for the office.
“Everybody has their faults,” Bourland said. “God is forgiving, so why shouldn’t I be?”
The incumbent council member is counting on the forgiveness of voters like Bourland in his battle to continue to represent the 14th L.A. City Council district, which stretches from downtown L.A. and Boyle Heights to Highland Park and Eagle Rock.
De León faces seven challengers, all of whom are looking to stop his attempted Rocky Balboa-style comeback from a hailstorm of criticism in the wake of the October 2022 leak of the tapes.
(Read more about De León and his challengers in the LAist Voter Game Plan.)
On the one hand, De León expressed remorse about his role in the conversation. In an interview with LAist, he said he was “profoundly apologetic and deeply sorry to those I hurt.” He said he should have stopped the conversation when racist comments were made by his colleague, former Council President Nury Martinez, who did resign.
He also has admitted what he said about his colleague and his adopted son was wrong.
But the 57-year-old longtime politician is also defiant. De León said he believes he is a victim of a “false narrative” that he is a racist. He denied accusations he was engaging in backroom dealing to redraw council district boundaries to keep himself and other allies in power. He pointed out that a majority of the City Council voted in favor of the redistricting maps that were discussed in the meeting.
The protests in the wake of the scandal were intense. Demonstrators calling on De León to resign shut down council meetings. People protested outside his house. There is still a lot of angry sentiment among his constituents.
A 32-year-old man, who identified himself only by his last name, Garza, was one of about 100 people who attended a debate at the Delores Mission in Boyle Heights earlier this month.
“What he said was racist and wrong,” said Garza, who works at a nonprofit. “He disappointed the community not only with his racist remarks but by trying to gerrymander the district so he could stay in power.
He added: “Take the bench, dude.”
Eviction defense attorney Ysabel Jurado is among those seeking to unseat De León. In an interview with LAist, she pointed out that he was stripped of all his committee assignments after the entire City Council called on him to resign.
“We, as a district, have suffered while he was being censured and not being on any committees,” she said. “I think this has been a huge distraction for this district.”
Jurado describes herself as a progressive who would have opposed a hefty pay raise for Los Angeles police officers and the lifting of a rent freeze — measures De León supported. She said the police labor contract adds to a projected budget deficit of up to $400 million that will take resources away from other programs and that the rent hike will increase homelessness.
De León has said officers deserved the raise and that he worked to reduce the allowed rent increase from 7 to 4%.
Two Democratic members of the state assembly also are challenging De León in the non-partisan race, both with similar politics to the incumbent.
Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo’s district overlaps much of the council district. She said De León’s participation in the secretly recorded conversation should disqualify him for reelection.
“What I heard was a conversation about benefiting the individual versus the benefits of a community,” she said.
Carrillo came under criticism after she was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol in November and crashing into two parked cars in Northeast L.A. She pleaded no contest to misdemeanor DUI and is attending a substance abuse program at Kaiser and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, she said.
“I’m doing the work to be a better version of myself,” she said.
Miguel Santiago is the other assemblymember running. He called De León’s comments on the tape “shameful.”
“I think this district wants change,” he said.
Santiago is the only candidate to benefit from outside money. Independent expenditure committees have spent more than $600,000 on his behalf, including groups representing the L.A. County Federation of Labor and a group of Latino-elected officials.
The other less-well-funded candidates in the race include health care professional Nadine Dias, community advocate Genny Guerrero, attorney Teresa Hillery, public school teacher Eduardo “Lalo” Vargas.
Inside his Eagle Rock office last week, De León stood amid a sea of glass statues. They are awards from community groups he’s received over his years as a politician. The wall is adorned with photos of him with other politicians, including two former governors.
“I’ve dedicated my life to the well being of all individuals, regardless of who you are,” he said. “That’s who I am, and that’s why I did not step down.”
De León was once a Democratic Party powerhouse, rising from labor organizer to leader of the California Senate. He unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate and L.A. mayor along the way. His story is compelling. He is the son of an unauthorized immigrant mother who raised him and his siblings alone, cleaning houses for a living. He was the first to graduate high school in his family.
He admits he faces “a tough election … given the circumstances.”
“But we’ve leaned in hard,” he said, touting the building of multiple homeless shelters and nine new playgrounds in the district.
It is the provision of those kinds of city services that may determine his fate.
Joe Gonzalez said he has voted for De Leon multiple times over the years — for state assembly, state senate, and for council member in 2020. The tape scandal is not his top concern.
“Everybody screws up once in a while,” said the retired letter carrier.
But he’s unhappy about the dirty streets he sees in his working class Boyle Heights neighborhood. “I see the lack of effort to do something in this neighborhood,” he said. “We’re being ignored here.”
“Community members have to gather together with their own brooms and mops and trash bags and go clean up areas,” he added.
So this time he’s looking for another candidate to support. “I will not be voting for De León.”
Peter Dreier, professor of politics at Occidental College, said it’s unlikely any of the candidates will win a majority of votes in the primary, meaning the top two finishers would face off in the November general election. He said De Leon has more name recognition on his side than the other candidates, and he has city slush fund money that he’s using to hand out “turkeys and such.”
“The real question is who is going to come in second to De León,” he said.
