Villanueva/Luna locked in a tight battle for LA County sheriff! Hertzberg/Horvath headed for runoff for LA County Supervisor! Pullen-Miles leads McKinnor in race to succeed Burke, trails in runoff for vacancy!
By Nick Antonicello
It looks like another five months of intense campaigning for all the major offices on the ballot that effect Venice, as billionaire businessman Rick Caruso and his $40 million campaign investment has paid off as he leads US House of Representatives member Karen Bass in the race to succeed Eric Garcetti as mayor of Los Angeles:
- Rick Caruso – 41.1%
- Karen Bass – 36.9%
In the highly contested race to succeed outgoing Councilmember Mike Bonin, the Bonin-endorsed candidate, Venice attorney Erin Darling is leading another Venice attorney, Traci Park.
Park, who was the acknowledged front-runner who jumped into the race last July with nearly $1 million dollars in independent expenditures funding behind her, slightly trails Darling despite that huge money advantage. Darling, who received the endorsement of the LA Times as well as the controversial incumbent, was one of the last to enter the contest and has surged in recent weeks thanks to the organizational support of the Bonin forces. The big loser tonight is former Garcetti mayoral aide Greg Good who was receiving about 9% of the vote.
He also received mass labor support as well as the endorsement of the powerful LA Democratic Party. The other candidates were Venetians Mike Newhouse and Jim Murez, Allison Poldorff-Polhill, conservative Mat Smith and teacher Soni Lloyd who finished last:
- Erin Darling – 31.39%
- Traci Park – 31.10%
In the race for Sheriff, incumbent Alex Villanueva is locked in a tight battle with Robert Luna. Villanueva, responsible for the cleaning up the street encampments at Venice Beach looks like a runoff is self-evident:
- Alex Villanueva – 31.47%
- Robert Luna – 27.17%
The race for LA County Supervisor is another barn burner with Robert Hertzberg leading Lindsay Horvath:
- Robert Hertzberg – 34.6%
- Lindsay Horvath – 24.71%
In what has to be the longest assembly race in history, Lawndale Mayor Robert Pullen-Miles is leading in the race for the full-term (38.5%) against Tina McKinnor (31.01%), the Democratic activist as of this writing has the lead for the unexpired term, 51.73 to 48.23%!
- Robert Pullen-Miles – 37.34%
- Tina McKinnor – 29.57%
Nick Antonicello is covering the various campaigns and races as they effect and impact Venice. He can be reached via e-mail at nantoni@mindspring.com
