Billionaire Republican Rick Caruso is trying to buy the LA mayorship
Billionaire Rick Caruso has catapulted himself into contention for mayor of Los Angeles https://t.co/qzRpS78Zrc
- POLITICO (@politico) June 1, 2022
California's primary election is on June 7 and the Los Angeles mayor's race is tight between Congresswoman Karen Bass (D) and billionaire real estate developer Rick Caruso (R-I-R-I-D). Caruso is a longtime Republican who turned Independent before going back to Republican then Independent again and then registered as a Democrat immediately before entering this race. It's a top-two system where all candidates regardless of party run in the same primary and an (R) next to your name leaves you dead in the water. If any candidate gets more than 50% of the primary votes they automatically win. Otherwise, the top two go on to the general election. The race has gained national attention with right-wingers salivating at the prospect of Caruso's victory in a Democratic stronghold.
Caruso has been running on the usual tough-on-crime Republican platform (pro-police, pro-business, anti-homeless, anti-environment, etc) under a slick veneer of faux progressivism and has inundated LA with highly polished ads that a lot of people are falling for. He's poured $38 million of his own money into his war chest. His campaign has spent over $40 million, 3 1/2 times as much as the nine other candidates COMBINED. By comparison, Bass has spent over $3 million total.
While most of the usual Hollywood donors are backing Bass, celebrities who have endorsed the billionaire-who's-never-held-public-office include: Kim Kardashian and Kris Jenner, Snoop Dogg (appeared in campaign commercial), Gwyneth Paltrow (appeared in campaign commercial), Elon Musk, George Lopez, Scooter Braun, Wolfgang Puck (appeared in campaign commercial), Ted Sarandos (Netflix CEO), Katy Perry.
Sources:
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