( NYPost )
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass got into office promoting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and promising to tackle homelessness and pollution — but she never promised to drain the swamp.
Now she stands accused of adding to it, through “legalized corruption” and a number of eye opening scandals which have come to light after renewed scrutiny in the last two weeks following the revelation Bass and her cronies defunded the Los Angeles Fire Department by $17 million, contributing to them being underprepared to tackle the wildfires currently destroying the city.
These include:
The deputy mayor raided by the FBI over an alleged bomb threat against City Hall.
Endorsing a former councilor investigated over hush money payments for congress.
Awarding fat cat salaries of $750k to a pal, double the predecessor’s salary.
Council members accused of embezzlement, perjury, racketeering, tax evasion and bribes.
“Corruption is ingrained in Los Angeles,” said Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog, a non-profit public interest group.
“It’s the story of ‘Chinatown’, and it likely led to the intensity of the fires.”
The 1974 Hollywood film, which stars Jack Nicholson as a crusading private detective, chronicles the corruption in LA’s public utility company that controls water flowing to the city.
Today that same company — the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power — is a sprawling bureaucracy in need of serious reform, but has remained largely unchecked by politicians as it brings in billions from ratepayers to city government, Court told The Post.
“It’s a sacred cow and a slush fund for the city, with a serious lack of accountability,” he said.
DWP is controlled by the mayor and city council. Last year, Bass hired Janisse Quinones, a fellow progressive who opaquely stressed her mission would be “righting the wrongs that we’ve done in the past from an infrastructure perspective,” as CEO of the utility.
Bass pays her a $750,000 salary — almost double what her predecessor was making.
Quinones has been blamed by some members of the city’s fire department for failing to fix broken hydrants, many of which ran dry as the Palisades fire consumed homes in the Malibu and Pacific Palisades neighborhoods on Jan. 8.
Consumer Watchdog and the Los Angeles Times launched a lawsuit in federal court last year to unseal dozens of warrants in an extortion scheme involving the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office and the DWP.
The unsealed documents, some 1,400 pages, revealed the FBI believed Mike Feuer, the former City Attorney – the top lawyer to the city — had lied to investigators when he denied knowledge of a hush money payment to hide a litigation scandal in his office.
He called the claims “absurd” and was never prosecuted.
Feuer had run against Bass for mayor in 2022 but dropped out of the race and endorsed her. In turn, Bass endorsed Feuer, calling him “a longtime colleague and friend” who would “deliver for Los Angeles,” in a failed race for US Congress in 2023.
“We have a pay-to-play culture in Los Angeles,” said Susan Shelley, a member of the editorial board of the Southern California New Group, a columnist and vice president of communications for the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, a non-profit. “It’s legalized corruption.”
In Los Angeles, politicians can request “behested payments” or donations from individuals and companies who have business before the city. “This would be called ‘extortion’ elsewhere,” said Shelley, adding the Mayor’s Fund for Los Angeles has received some $1.8 million in behested payments from companies such as AT&T and Coca Cola, among others.
Bass, 71, initially came under the microscope for attending the inauguration of Ghana’s president earlier this month as fires began to rage in the city.
She has continued to deflect questions about her Africa trip, where she was part of a four-member presidential delegation, as photos emerged this week of her attendance at a cocktail party.
But the Los Angeles city government has been beset by a series of much worse scandals including embezzlement, perjury and racism – with some elected officials facing criminal convictions.
Deputy mayor Brian Williams was chosen by Bass in Feb. 2023 to oversee the city’s police department, fire department, the Port of Los Angeles Police, the Los Angeles World Airport Police and the city’s Emergency Management Department.
However, in a bizarre turn of events, he is suspected of ringing in a bomb threat against city hall last September. Due to his relationship with the LAPD, the matter is being handled by the FBI, who raided his home in December, after he was identified as the “likely” source of the threat. At that point he was placed on administrative leave.
He has not been charged in the matter and Williams’ lawyer said he “strongly maintains his innocence,” in the matter.
Meanwhile, in June 2023 prosecutors charged Councilmember Curren Price Jr. with embezzlement and perjury in a pay-to-play scheme.
According to a criminal complaint he was charged with receiving more than $150,000 from developers in exchange for voting to approve their projects. He was also charged with having the city pay for medical benefits for his girlfriend – all while he was married to another woman.
“This alleged conduct undermines the integrity of our government and erodes the public’s trust in our elected officials,” said former LA District Attorney George Gascón in 2023.
Curren has fiercely denied the charges and is still awaiting trial.
In the same year, Jose Huizar, a former Councilmember pleaded guilty to racketeering and tax evasion, and veteran city politician Mark Ridley-Thomas — LA County Supervisor in 2022 — was sentenced to federal prison for a bribery scheme in which he sought favors for his son from a university dean in exchange for political favors.
Ridley-Thomas’ case involved University of Southern California’s (USC) former dean of Social Work Marilyn Flynn. She admitted to funneling $100,000 in scholarship cash to Ridley-Thomas’ son in exchange for his intervention in securing a lucrative County health contract with the school. Ridley-Thomas is appealing the case.
Bass, who did not respond to The Post’s request for comment, was another recipient of a USC scholarship from Flynn in 2011, during what was then her first year in Congress.
Bass was working on a master’s degree in social work, which she completed in 2015. According to court papers, Flynn hoped to enlist Bass to obtain federal funding for the school.
Bass’s name is redacted from the court filings, but the Los Angeles Times confirmed her identity. Prosecutors later clarified she was not accused of any wrongdoing in the case.
However, Bass – who served in congress until 2022 and was at one time floated as a potential running mate for Joe Biden – later sponsored a bill in Congress that would have expanded USC’s and other private universities’ access to federal funding for social work — “just as defendant Flynn wanted,” the filing states.
In 2021, when The Post first revealed Patrisse Cullors, one of the founders of Black Lives Matter, had gone on a real estate spending spree, buying up three homes despite claiming to be being an avowed socialist, Bass backed her in a Tweet on X.
“I stand with Patrisse Cullors against any and all well-funded, baseless smear attempts,” Bass wrote. “I’ve worked with Patrisse for years and am proud to continue to call on her for advice as she continues the fight to instill the notion in this country that Black Lives Matter.”
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