Official Recall Effort Begins Against LA Mayor Karen Bass

A recall campaign against Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass filed paperwork with the Los Angeles Ethics Commission on Monday, officially beginning the long-awaited recall process against her.

The Recall Karen Bass Committee, headed by real estate agent and Republican donor Sahil Nandwani, says on their website that the primary reason the recall was started was because of Bass’ mismanagement of the wildfires, along with her slashing the LAFD budget before the fires. However, it wasn’t the only reason listed, with the recall group also saying that Bass brought about underfunded and overworked first responders, that small businesses are struggling and leaving LA under her watch, that she has failed to address homelessness with real solutions,  that public transit is unsafe, and that there has been no real progress on government reform and accountability.

“The LAFD’s budget was slashed by more than $17 million, stripping critical resources from firefighters as Los Angeles faces escalating wildfire threats and emergency response challenges,” the Recall Karen Bass Committee says on the site. “At a time when rapid response is more crucial than ever, officials are underfunding the very department responsible for protecting lives and property.

“Karen Bass’ Inside Safe program wasted $67 million while barely making a dent in LA’s homelessness crisis, securing permanent housing for just 255 people out of an estimated 46,000. At this rate, housing all of LA’s homeless would cost over $12 billion—the same amount Newsom proposed in 2021 to address homelessness across the entire state of California.”

The Mayor’s office responded swiftly to the news of a recall effort on Tuesday, denouncing the effort as an “extreme right-wing political stunt.”

“The recall committee’s filing is nothing more than another extreme right-wing political stunt designed to divide Los Angeles when we need to move forward,” said Bass political strategist Douglas Herman to the Los Angeles Times.

The group will need to collect the signatures of 15% of Los Angeles voters, or around 330,000, by early July in order for the recall to make it to a special election. However, when accounting for invalid ballots and other discrepancies, closer to 400,000 is likely needed.

Bass, Newsom recall efforts

While there have been recall efforts against other Los Angeles lawmakers in recent years, all have fallen short. Councilmen Kevin de Leon and Mike Bonin narrowly avoided recalls in 2023 and 2021 respectively. When it comes to the office of Mayor, only one previous Los Angeles Mayor has ever been recalled, with Frank Shaw voted out of office in 1938 amidst major corruption scandals.

However, recall efforts have also been more successful in California in recent years. Since 2018, State Senator Josh Newman, three San Francisco School Board members, San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin, and Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao have all been recalled out of office.

Governor Gavin Newsom has been a major target of recalls as well, with a recall effort in 2021 actually bringing it to a statewide vote. Currently, Saving California has an open recall effort against Newsom, with supporters having previously hinted at a Bass recall effort in January. And, like the Bass recall effort, the tipping point for many Newsom supporters came down to mismanagement over the wildfires.

And, like Newsom, the criticism has not let up against Bass. Post-fires, Bass’s approval rating has plummeted to only 37%. And in the past week, Bass has made national news for scapegoating the LAFD Chief Kristen Crowley for poor fire response and firing her. However, thanks to the department being behind Crowley, evidence pointing to Bass being the decision-maker behind many of the issues, and many lawmakers siding with Crowley, the Crowley decision has blown up in her face, likely adding to the fledgling recall movement against her.

“We have been waiting for this,” Andrea Callas, a Pacific Palisades resident whose home was damaged during the wildfires in January, told the Globe on Tuesday. “Everyone here wants Bass gone. Not as a blaming sort of thing, but because we all know that she made everything worse. She just did not care. You give that petition to any Palisades resident, they are going to sign it without question. She doesn’t deserve to be called an Angelino.”

More on the recall effort can be found at recallbassnow.com.