Los Angeles mayoral race still undecided

Audio By Carbonatix

(The Center Square) - The race for Los Angeles mayor remains too close to call while outstanding ballots are processed.

As of 2 p.m. Pacific time Wednesday, Los Angeles City Councilmember Nithya Raman had 377,458 votes (51.12%), compared to 360,864 votes (48.88%) for incumbent Mayor Karen Bass.

The numbers come from the office of Los Angeles County registrar-recorder/county clerk.

During the campaign in the nation's second-largest city, Raman and Bass battled each other over basic municipal governance, homelessness and emergency responses, including the fallout from the devastating 2025 Palisades Fire. Both candidates are Democrats. Bass is a former congresswoman and California Assembly speaker, and Raman was endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America.

It could be a long time before voters know the outcome.

“As Angelenos know all too well, we have a month of voting and a month of counting,” said Roxanne Hoge, chair of the Republican Party of Los Angeles County.

“That is an embarrassment," Hoge told The Center Square in an email Wednesday. "We will see what happens in the coming days.” 

The tight margin may be less of an enthusiastic endorsement of Raman and more of a referendum on the incumbent, said Tim Anaya, vice president of marketing and communications for Pasadena, Calif.-based Pacific Research Institute. 

"If she [Raman] does succeed, it really will just be that voters have had enough of Mayor Bass. and she was the only answer on the ballot," Anaya told The Center Square Wednesday. "At the end of the day, voters were left with two uninspiring choices." 

If elected, Raman will be among self-described democratic socialists serving as mayors in cities such as New York and Seattle.

The Bass and Raman campaigns did not respond to The Center Square’s requests for interviews.