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| Photo Credit: AP. |
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two Los Angeles City Council members held out Thursday against overwhelming calls for them to resign after a recording surfaced of them making crude and racist remarks in a secret meeting over redistricting tactics.
Gil Cedillo
and Kevin de Leon have issued no statements since Nury Martinez, who made
remarks about a colleague’s Black son along with crass comments about Armenians
and Jews, stepped down as council president Monday before resigning her seat
Wednesday.
However,
acting council President Mitch O’Farrell said he had spoken to Cedillo and “I
sense that he is making some progress toward that decision.”
Cedillo lost
his reelection bid this year and was already due to leave the council in
December.
Cedillo and
de Leon were under pressure after Martinez, who in 2019 became the first Latina
to hold the office of council president, stepped down and resigned.
Martinez
described herself on her website as “a glass-ceiling shattering leader who
brings profound life experience as the proud daughter of working-class
immigrants.” She is the daughter of Mexican immigrants and was born and raised
in the San Fernando Valley.
Cedillo, de
Leon and Martinez were part of a discussion last year with a powerful Latino
labor leader, who has since resigned, centered on protecting Latino political
power while redrawing council district boundaries. The once-a-decade
redistricting process can pit one group against another to gain political
advantage in elections.
In the recorded
conversation, Martinez called council member Mike Bonin a “little bitch.” She
described the behavior of his Black son on a parade float when he was 2 as
“parece changuito,” or “like a monkey,” the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday.
At another
point in the hourlong recording, Martinez called Indigenous immigrants from the
Mexican state of Oaxaca ugly, and made crass remarks about Jews and Armenians.
The
revelation of the recordings this week sparked outrage and calls for the
resignations of all three council members by their fellow Democrats, all the
way up to President Joe Biden, who arrived in Los Angeles on Wednesday as part of
a West Coast campaign visit.
In her
resignation statement, Martinez didn’t apologize for her comments, though in
words directed at her daughter she said she had fallen short of expectations
recently and added: “I vow to you that I will strive to be a better woman to
make you proud.”
The panel
can only request Cedillo and de Leon to voluntarily step aside. It cannot expel
members, only suspend them when criminal charges are pending. Members can be
censured but that doesn’t result in suspension or removal from office.
Meanwhile,
the furor over the recording threw the City Council into turmoil. For two days
in a row, rowdy demonstrators forced the panel to shut down meetings.
On
Wednesday, a crowd of about 50 protesters drowned out the acting president by
chanting “no meeting without resignation” and other slogans.
A minimum of
10 out of 15 members necessary for a quorum had assembled, but the meeting was
adjourned when one left. None of the three embattled council members showed up.
“Who shut
you down? We shut you down!” the raucous crowd cheered as the lights were being
turned down.
Also Wednesday,
California Attorney General Rob Bonta, another Democrat, said he will
investigate Los Angeles’ redistricting process, which could lead to civil
liability or criminal charges, depending on what is found.
“It’s clear
an investigation is sorely needed to help restore confidence in the
redistricting process for the people of LA,” he said.
Jessica
Levinson, a Loyola Law School professor who previously was a member of the Los
Angeles City Ethics Commission, said she did not see evidence in the recording
that would prompt criminal charges.
However, she
said a probe could force redrawing council districts even though the current
maps are being used to choose new council members next month.
“It is so
rare to have audio where … it gives the impression that they’re explicitly
drawing lines on the basis of race,” Levinson said. “If in the end we determine
these lines were illegally drawn, there needs to be a remedy for that, even
though practically ... it’s a disaster.”
Los Angeles
City Attorney Mike Feuer has called for creating an independent commission to
draw redistricting maps.
Thompson
reported from Sacramento. Associated Press writers John Antczak and Amancai
Biraben in Los Angeles, Sophie Austin in Sacramento and Julie Watson in San
Diego contributed to this report.