[img]1664|exact|Mayor Villaraigosa, Mike Feuer, and Stella Kalish Feuer||no_popup[/img]In either the sweetest or most detestable episode from the ice-encrusted campaign for City Attorney of Los Angeles, Mayor Villaraigosa this morning slid from his chair at City Hall back to his roots several miles away in Boyle Heights, where he was born 60 years ago this month, to hand his prestigious endorsement to the challenger Mike Feuer.
A golden moment for Mr. Feuer, who claims the financial and the ratings leads over the incumbent Carmen Trutanich – a dare that may or may not be decided in the primary on March 5.
The Feuer campaign called the media conference at the Boys and Girls Club on Cincinnati Street “a defining moment.”
With Mr. Feuer’s beaming mother, Stella Kalish Feuer, who grew up in Boyle Heights’s historic Jewish neighborhood, standing just feet away, the dapper mayor saluted her son:
“It’s time to restore strong leadership and integrity to the Los Angeles City Attorney’s office,” he said. “That is why I’m proud to endorse Mike Feuer. I have worked with Mike for years. He’s an innovative problem-solver, and he has with the experience to tackle the tough challenges and keep our city safe.”
The Flavor of Endorsements
Endorsements in latter-day instant campaigns can resemble 50 loaves of Wonder Bread – on the shelf, they all look and sniff alike.
There are bell-clanging exceptions though. Mayor Villaraigosa’s matters this season, as you may judge from the reactions of both sides.
“Mayor Villaraigosa is an extraordinary leader and public servant.,” Mr. Feuer said. “We have worked closely together for years, combating gun violence, expanding public transportation and much more. We both strongly believe in making L.A.'s streets and our kids' schools safe. We also believe in the importance of our neighborhoods.”
This morning almost felt like a Super Bowl moment for Mr. Feuer, rallying from a serious automobile accident on Dec. 3 when he was broadsided by another car and rushed to intensive care before being released five days later, refusing to recuperate on the sidelines.
To Mr. Trutanich, infuriated but not shocked by the mayor’s snub, Mr. Villaraigosa’s endorsement felt like a punch on his nose.
Swinging back tartly, his campaign spokesperson, John Schwada, said:
The Wrong Tactic?
“We think Mayor Villaraigosa is making a serious mistake by endorsing a career politician like former Assemblyman Michael Feuer. He last represented Beverly Hills and Bel-Air and learned the ropes on how to create a fiscal mess in Sacramento,the capital of dysfunctional and incompetent government.
“The Trutanich campaign will accept the approval of the voters over the endorsement of City Hall insiders any day. Fortunately, the polls show the people are not fooled by the Feuer campaign. Two polls (one by Loyola Marymount's School for the Study of Los Angeles and the other an internal poll commissioned by the campaign) show Trutanich as the clear frontrunner. In fact, our internal poll shows Trutanich trouncing Feuer after the pollster told voters about the good, the bad and the ugly about each candidate.”
Both candidates, of course, have a history with the mayor. You don’t have to be Carnac the Great to divine which one was more pleasant in texture.
“The mayor and Mike have a long standing relationship,” Dave Jacobson of the Feuer campaign said. “They have worked together for close to two decades on a wide range of issues, from public safety issues that reduce gun violence to Measure R, the transportation measure that will create tens of thousands of jobs and ease our city's traffic congestion.”
Very Different Experiences
Mr. Trutanich’s both recent and distant recollections of the mayor, his leader, have been slightly less rosy than what was just described about his opponent’s interactions.
The Trutanich campaign this morning said it was “surprised that Mayor Villaraigosa is showing such an interest in the City Attorney's office.”
The reason?
“Over the past four years, the mayor has cut the City Attorney's budget from $117 million to nearly $75 million. Under normal circumstances, such devastating cuts would have seriously jeopardized public safety. Fortunately for the public, Mr. Trutanich was at the helm during this painful period. He did more with less.
“Mr. Trutanich cut the use of expensive outside attorneys, saving millions for taxpayers, He won 134 of 147 civil liability lawsuits against the city, saving the city and taxpayers $285 million.
Looking at the Record
“He went after tax deadbeats who owed the city money and squeezed big settlements out of those who polluted our environment and ripped off our consumers. In short, the City Attorney's office, despite the cuts helped pay its own way. Thanks to Mr. Trutanich, the City Atttorney's office – despite losing 125 attorneys – was able to keep up with a caseload that includes filing 70 percent of all the criminal cases coming out of the LAPD.”
“The only thing we've heard about Feuer's record as an attorney is frightening,” said Trutanich chief strategist Rick Taylor. “During a recent debate, Mr. Feuer had no answer when he was asked if he had ever, ever tried a single civil or criminal case before a jury.
“Michael Feuer is a career politician. Mike Feuer would be lost in a courtroom. The courtroom is Trutanich's second home. The voters get it.”
The tone of the Trutanich campaign’s reaction remained unstinting.
“The campaign will accept the approval of the voters over the endorsement of City Hall insiders any day,” Mr. Schwada said.
“The voters appreciate Trutanich's record of winning for Los Angeles. It's a record that has protected the city's most vulnerable populations, its taxpayers and its neighborhoods. Take a look at Trutanich's exceptional record of accomplishments.”
