After months of the dirtiest political campaign in a generation, Los Angeles has elected challenger Antonio Villaraigosa as its new mayor. Tony Rap, as the verbose Villaraigosa was known in high school, buried fellow Democrat and incumbent Jimmy Hahn in a veritable double-digit landslide.
The election of a Spanish-speaking liberal Latino to preside over America’s second largest city carries huge political symbolism especially at a time when the national immigration debate is simmering. And before Villaraigosa even takes over his new office, it makes Villaraigosa an instant player in the future battle for Arnold’s state house.
No one can remember a bigger turn-out for a local pol’s victory party than the 5,000 or more who partied hearty in the downtown streets late Tuesday night. It was a tastily satisfying win for the former Assembly Speaker and current City Councilman who, four years ago, lost his first Mayoral bid when Hahn torpedoed him with a last-minute smear campaign tying him to crack dealers.
This season’s rematch was even a more vicious purse-swinging lollapalooza, each man battering the other into a bloody pulp. Not that both men share equal responsibility for the nastiness. The anti-charismatic Mayor Hahn who -- until Tuesday -- had racked up an record of six straight electoral wins for a city office may, indeed, have a soporific governing style; but he’s a ruthless bare-knuckles campaigner. He didn’t flinch this time around from gutter-level tactics, linking Villaraigosa to everything from gangs to “anti-American” and “anti-Israel” radicals.
Unlike in 2001, Villaraigosa fought back punch by punch, but kept himself on slightly higher ground. Mucking up Hahn required little fabrication as L.A. City Hall is already under a joint federal-county probe for various political pay-to-play scandals which are lapping at the doors of the Mayor’s office.
Four years ago, Villaraigosa lit the city on fire lustily campaigning as an unabashed progressive ready to sweep away politics-as-usual. This second time around Tony Rap played it much more subdued and up the middle, disappointing many of his more liberal supporters (but in the end winning a huge majority vote in the more conservative suburbs of the San Fernando Valley).
Only the huge, raucous turnout for Villaraigosa’s election night victory party rekindled the excitement of 2001. Much of the city had frankly been turned off by the mind-numbing mutual demolition match of the last few months and turn-out was only a notch or two higher than the predicted 30%.
When Villaraigosa takes over his new job, he’ll have to bring with him a few boxes of Glade to clear out the stench left behind by Hahn. And he’s going to have to call upon all of his political skills if he wants to recapture the attention, let alone the imagination, of a Los Angeles rendered politically numb by the sordid spectacle of the just-concluded campaign