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Tag: los angeles times

  • Californians sharply divided along partisan lines about immigration raids, poll finds

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    California voters are sharply divided along partisan lines over the Trump administration’s immigration raids this year in Los Angeles and across the nation, according to a new poll.

    Just over half of the state’s registered voters oppose federal efforts to reduce undocumented immigration, and 61% are against deporting everyone in the nation who doesn’t have legal status, according to a recent poll by UC Berkeley’s Possibility Lab released to The Times on Wednesday.

    But there is an acute difference in opinions based on political leanings.

    Nearly 80% of Democrats oppose reducing the number of people entering the United States illegally, and 90% are against deporting everyone in the country who is undocumented, according to the poll. Among Republicans, 5% are against reducing the entries and 10% don’t believe all undocumented immigrants should be forced to leave.

    “The big thing that we find, not surprisingly, is that Democrats and Republicans look really different,” said political scientist Amy Lerman, director of UC Berkeley’s Possibility Lab, who studies race, public opinion and political behavior. “On these perspectives, they fall pretty clearly along party lines. While there’s some variation within the parties by things like age and race, really, the big divide is between Democrats and Republicans.”

    While there were some differences based on gender, age, income, geography and race, the results largely mirrored the partisan divide in the state, Lerman said.

    One remarkable finding was that nearly a quarter of survey respondents personally knew or were acquainted with someone in their family or friend groups directly affected by the deportation efforts, Lerman said.

    “That’s a really substantial proportion,” she said. “Similarly, the extent to which we see people reporting that people in their communities are concerned enough about deportation efforts that they’re not sending their kids to school, not shopping in local stores, not going to work,” not seeking medical care or attending church services.

    The poll surveyed a sample of the state’s registered voters and did not include the sentiments of the most affected communities — unregistered voters or those who are ineligible to cast ballots because they are not citizens.

    A little more than 23 million of California’s 39.5 million residents were registered to vote as of late October, according to the secretary of state’s office.

    “So if we think about the California population generally, this is a really significant underestimate of the effects, even though we’re seeing really substantial effects on communities,” she said.

    Earlier this year, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a series of raids in Los Angeles and surrounding communities that spiked in June, creating both fear and outrage in Latino communities. Despite opposition from Gov. Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and other elected Democrats, the Trump administration also deployed the National Guard to the streets of the nation’s second-largest city to, federal officials said, protect federal immigration officials.

    The months since have been chaotic, with masked, armed agents randomly pulling people — most of whom are Latino — off the streets and out of their workplaces and sending many to detention facilities, where some have died. Some deportees were flown to an El Salvador prison. Multiple lawsuits have been filed by state officials and civil rights groups.

    In one notable local case, a federal district judge issued a ruling temporarily blocking federal agents from using racial profiling to carry out indiscriminate immigration arrests in the Los Angeles area. The Supreme Court granted an emergency appeal and lifted that order, while the case moves forward.

    More than 7,100 undocumented immigrants have been arrested in the Los Angeles area by federal authorities since June 6, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

    On Monday, Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Long Beach), Bass and other elected officials hosted a congressional hearing on the impact of immigration raids that have taken place across the country. Garcia, the top Democrat on the House’s oversight committee, also announced the creation of a tracker to document misconduct and abuse during ICE raids.

    While Republican voters largely aligned with Trump’s actions on deportations, 16% said that they believed that the deportations will worsen the state’s economy.

    Lerman said the university planned to study whether these numbers changed as the impacts on the economy are felt more greatly.

    “If it continues to affect people, particularly, as we see really high rates of effects on the workforce, so construction, agriculture, all of the places where we’re as an economy really reliant [on immigrant labor], I can imagine some of these starting to shift even among Republicans,” she said.

    Among Latinos, whose support of Trump grew in the 2024 election, there are multiple indications of growing dissatisfaction with the president, according to separate national polls.

    Nearly eight in 10 Latinos said Trump’s policies have harmed their community, compared to 69% in 2019 during his first term, according to a national poll of adults in the United States released by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center on Monday. About 71% said the administration’s deportation efforts had gone too far, an increase from 56% in March. And it was the first time in the two decades that Pew has conducted its survey of Latino voters that the number of Latinos who said their standing in the United States had worsened increased, with more than two-thirds expressing the sentiment.

    Another poll released earlier this month by Somos Votantes, a liberal group that urges Latino voters to support Democratic candidates, found that one-third of Latino voters who previously supported Trump rue their decision, according to a national poll.

    Small business owner Brian Gavidia is among the Latino voters who supported Trump in November because of financial struggles.

    “I was tired of struggling, I was tired of seeing my friends closing businesses,” the 30-year-old said. “When [President] Biden ran again I’m like, ‘I’m not going to vote for the same four years we just had’ … I was sad and I was heartbroken that our economy was failing and that’s the reason why I went that way.”

    The East L.A. native, the son of immigrants from Colombia and El Salvador, said he wasn’t concerned about Trump’s immigration policies because the president promised to deport the “worst of the worst.”

    He grew disgusted watching the raids that unfolded in Los Angeles earlier this year.

    “They’re taking fruit vendors, day laborers, that’s the worst of the worst to you?” he remembered thinking.

    Over a lunch of asada tortas and horchata in East L.A., Gavidia recounted being detained by Border Patrol agents in June while working at a Montebello tow yard. Agents shoved him against a metal gate, demanding to know what hospital he was born at after he said he was an American citizen, according to video of the incident.

    After reviewing his ID, the agents eventually let Gavidia go. The Department of Homeland Security later claimed that Gavidia was detained for investigation for interference and released after being confirmed to be a U.S. citizen with no outstanding warrants. He is now a plaintiff in a lawsuit filed by the ACLU and immigrant advocacy groups alleging racial profiling during immigration raids.

    “At that moment, I was the criminal, at that moment I was the worst of the worst, which is crazy because I went to go see who they were getting — the worst of the worst like they said they were going to get,” Gavidia said. “But turns out when I got there, I was the worst of the worst.”

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    Seema Mehta, Brittny Mejia

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  • $10-billion One Beverly Hills project gets off the ground

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    Development of the massive One Beverly Hills residential and hotel complex reached a milestone over the weekend as construction started going vertical.

    The work to erect the two tallest towers in Beverly Hills started Friday with an overnight continuous pour of 3,800 cubic yards of concrete, the equivalent of 41,000 wheelbarrows-full. It was the first of multiple foundation pours that will take place over the next 12 months, developer Cain said.

    The project near the intersection of Santa Monica and Wilshire boulevards broke ground early last year and has so far included demolition, drilling geothermal wells, installing utility lines and digging a deep hole to house underground parking.

    One Beverly Hills will be anchored by the Aman Beverly Hills, a 78-room, all-suite hotel that will be the brand’s first West Coast property.

    One Beverly Hills Gardens

    (Foster + Partners)

    The tower residences will also be branded and serviced by Aman, a Swiss company owned by Russian-born real estate developer Vlad Doronin, which Forbes describes as “the world’s most preeminent resort brand,” and attracts affluent guests such as Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and George and Amal Clooney.

    The two towers — 28 and 31 stories — will have a total of fewer than 200 condos.

    Interspersed among the property will be as many as 45 stores and restaurants, including a Dolce & Gabbana boutique, Los Mochis restaurant and Casa Tua Cucina restaurant and marketplace.

    “Over the next few months, you will start to see the buildings emerge from the ground,” said Jonathan Goldstein, chief executive of London-based Cain. “Reaching vertical construction is a powerful moment for everyone involved.”

    One Beverly Hills is one of the biggest real estate developments by cost under construction in North America, Goldstein said. He valued it at $10 billion upon completion.

    One Beverly Hills aerial rendering of two towers near other buildings.

    One Beverly Hills aerial rendering.

    (Kerry Hill Architects)

    It was conceived by London-based architect Foster + Partners. The firm is led by Norman Foster, an English lord perhaps best known for designing a landmark lipstick-like skyscraper in London known as the Gherkin and the hoop-shaped Apple Inc. headquarters in Cupertino, Calif.

    Set for phased completion beginning in 2027, the development connects the Beverly Hilton and Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills hotels in a unified, landscaped compound.

    City officials agreed to let Cain build by far the two tallest towers in Beverly Hills with the understanding that stacking the condominiums high would leave open space for 8.5 acres of gardens on the 17.5-acre site.

    The most public aspect of One Beverly Hills will be the gardens designed by Los Angeles architecture firm Rios, which also designed the 12-acre Gloria Molina Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles and created a new master plan for Descanso Gardens in La Canada Flintridge.

    One Beverly Hills will feature botanical gardens that reflect the diverse landscape of Southern California, with drought-resistant native plants fed solely on recycled water, including rainfall and the runoff from residents’ sinks and showers. The gardens are designed to have more than 200 species of plants and trees, including palms, oaks, sycamores, succulents and olives.

    Set within the historic grounds of the former Beverly Hills Nurseries, which later became the Robinsons-May department store, the gardens will feature two miles of walkways, trails, sitting areas and water features.

    “We’re entering an exciting new chapter with the One Beverly Hills project, and I’m delighted to see it moving closer to becoming a reality,” said Beverly Hills Mayor Sharona Nazarian. “This is an important addition to Beverly Hills, and I’m proud of the progress we’re making.”

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    Roger Vincent

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  • Iconic Stahl House, a Midcentury Modern stunner, up for sale

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    For decades, the Stahl House in the Hollywood Hills has been a rarity — a globally known icon of Midcentury Modernism and Los Angeles glamour, still in the hands of the family who commissioned it in 1960. But now it’s for sale.

    The asking price is $25 million, which might seem a startling figure for a two-bedroom, 2,300-square-foot home on a snug lot. But that figure might not surprise lovers of modernist architecture who know it as Case Study House #22.

    It was designed for the Stahl family by architect Pierre Koenig, captured on black-and-white film by photographer Julius Shulman and has been admired worldwide ever since.

    The Architect’s Newspaper called it “one of the world’s most famous buildings.” Los Angeles magazine called Shulman’s image “perhaps the most famous picture ever taken of Los Angeles.”

    “There are no comps for the Stahl house. It’s incomparable,” said William Baker, architecture director for the real estate firm the Agency Beverly Hills. The home was included in the company’s fall catalog Nov. 12.

    By Friday afternoon, Baker said, he had received hundreds of inquiring calls. In considering offers, Baker said, the family is open to individuals or institutions — “someone who’s going to understand it, honor the house and the story about it.”

    The Stahls purchased the lot in 1954 for $13,500 and enlisted Koenig to design the house after other architects were daunted by the slope of the lot. Koenig’s solution was a cantilevered L-shaped structure with walls of steel and glass, a pool and a free-standing stone-faced fireplace between the living and dining areas.

    The second bedroom can only be accessed through the primary bedroom — “an efficient use of space” for a family of five, Baker said. The Stahl family has said the home cost $37,500 to build.

    Shortly after the home’s completion, photographer Julius Shulman made a black-and-white photograph that became emblematic of the era. It shows the home at night, with two young women sitting inside in a cantilevered corner, its floor-to-ceiling windows revealing the lights of the L.A. Basin glittering in the background.

    To bring up the lights, Shulman later told Los Angeles magazine, he used a seven-minute exposure. The resulting image, along with others Shulman made of the house, is now owned by the Getty Research Institute.

    In years since, the home has served as a filming location for many TV and film productions, including the 1968 pilot episode of “Columbo” and the movies “Galaxy Quest” (1999) and “Nurse Betty” (2000).

    “This home has been the center of our lives for decades, but as we’ve gotten older, it has become increasingly challenging to care for it with the attention and energy it so richly deserves,” the Stahl family announced on its website. Bruce and Shari Stahl, the surviving children of original owners Buck and Carlotta Stahl, added, “[O]ur tour program will continue unchanged for the time being, and we will provide ample notice before any adjustments are made.”

    For the last 17 years, the house has been open for tours, most recently on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, starting at $60 per adult during the day, $90 in the evening, with advance booking required and tight limits on photography. However, the Stahl website indicates all tours are sold out through the end of February.

    The real estate listing notes that the home is “a protected landmark and the only Case Study House with original family ownership.”

    In nominating it for the National Register of Historic Places in 2009, Amanda Stewart of the Los Angeles Conservancy called it “perhaps the most iconic house constructed in the Case Study House Program.” That program, sponsored by John Entenza’s Arts & Architecture magazine from 1945 to 1966, yielded 25 completed homes, today considered top exemplars of Midcentury home design.

    “There’s not a lot of these Case Study houses left. I think there are 19 now,” Baker said. (Baker also said he had recently handled the sale of Case Study House #10 in Pasadena to a buyer who lost a home in January’s Pacific Palisades fire.)

    The Stahl home stands on Woods Drive just north of West Hollywood’s city limit, about a quarter of a mile from Chateau Marmont.

    Many architecturally important Southern California Modern homes have landed in the hands of institutions, including Frank Lloyd Wright’s Hollyhock House (1921), owned by the city of Los Angeles; the Schindler House (1922), owned by the Friends of the Schindler House and operated by the MAK Center for Art and Architecture; and the Eames House (1949), owned by the nonprofit Eames Foundation. The Sheats-Goldstein Residence, designed by John Lautner in 1961-63 and renovated by Lautner in the 1990s, has been promised by owner James Goldstein to the L.A. County Museum of Art.

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    Christopher Reynolds

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  • This L.A. car wash depends on immigrant labor. Can it survive Trump?

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    The car wash hadn’t yet opened for the day, but its owner was already on edge.

    He scanned the street for law enforcement vehicles and hit refresh on a crowdsourced map that showed recent immigration sweeps.

    “They were busy in our area yesterday,” he warned his employees. “Be careful.”

    But except for staying home, there were few precautions that the workers, mostly men from Mexico, could take.

    The business is located along one of L.A.’s busiest thoroughfares. Workers are exposed to the street as they scrub, wax and buff the parade of vehicles that streams in between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m., seven days a week.

    Immigration agents descended on the business multiple times this summer as part of a broader campaign against L.A. car washes. Masked men hauled away around a dozen workers, most of whom were swiftly deported. The Times is not identifying the business, the owner or the workers.

    The raids had spooked remaining employees — and many had stopped showing up to work. The replacements the owner hired were mostly other immigrants who showed him Social Security cards that he hoped were legitimate.

    Still, it was an open secret that the car wash industry, which paid low wages for back-breaking labor, largely attracted people without legal status.

    “Americans don’t want to do this work,” the owner said.

    After the raids, he had been forced to close for stretches during the typically lucrative summer months. He was now operating normally again, but sales were down, he had maxed out his credit cards and he was unsure whether his business would survive. Clients — frightened by the raids — were staying away.

    “My target is to pay the rent, pay the insurance and pay the guys,” the owner told his manager as they sipped coffee in the early morning November chill and waited for their first customer. “That’s it.”

    The manager, also an immigrant from Mexico, nodded. He was juggling his boss’ concerns with personal ones. He and his team had all seen friends, relatives and co-workers vanish in immigration raids. He left home each morning wondering whether he would return in the evening.

    The mood at the car wash had once been lighthearted, with employees joking as they sprayed down cars and polished windows. Now everybody, the manager included, kept one eye on the street as they worked. “We say we’re OK,” he said. “But we’re all scared.”

    A few minutes before 7 a.m., a BMW sedan pulled in for a wash. The manager flipped on the vacuum and said a prayer.

    “Protect me. Protect my colleagues. And protect the place I work.”

    The owner was born abroad but moved to Los Angeles after winning the U.S. green card lottery.

    He used his life savings to buy the car wash, which at the time seemed like a sound investment. There are some 36 million vehicles in California. And in Los Angeles, at least for most of the year, people can’t rely on rainfall to keep them clean.

    His business already took a major financial hit this year during the L.A. wildfires, which filled the air with smoke and ash. Customers didn’t bother to clean cars that they knew would get dirty again.

    Then came President Trump, who promised to deport record numbers of migrants.

    I’m not brave. I need the work

    — Car wash employee

    Previous administrations had focused on expelling immigrants who had committed crimes. But federal agents, under pressure to meet arrest quotas, have vastly widened their net, targeting public-facing workplaces that pay low wages.

    Car wash employees — along with street vendors, day laborers, farmworkers and gardeners — have become low-hanging fruit. At least 340 people have been detained in raids on 100 car washes across Southern California since June, according to the CLEAN Car Wash Worker Center, which advocates for workers in the industry.

    The owner was shocked when agents toting rifles and dressed in bulletproof vests first stormed his business, blocking exits with their vehicles and handcuffing employees without ever showing a search warrant.

    “It was a kidnapping,” he said. “It felt like we were in Afghanistan or Iraq, not in the middle of Los Angeles.”

    Some of the men that the agents dragged away in that raid and subsequent ones had been living in the U.S. for decades. Many were fathers of American children.

    The manager was racked with survivor’s guilt. He was from the same small town in Mexico as one of the men who was detained and later deported. Another worker taken by agents had been hired the same morning as the raid.

    That’s when many employees stopped showing up. One stayed home for almost a month straight, surviving on groceries his friends and family brought to his apartment.

    But eventually that employee — and his brother — returned to the car wash. “I’m not brave,” the brother said. “I need the work.”

    The brother had been in the country for nearly 25 years and had three U.S.-born children, one of whom had served as a Marine.

    He had toiled at car washes the whole time — crouching to scrub tires, stretching to dry roofs and returning home each night with aching heels and knots in his neck. Less punishing industries weren’t an option for somebody without valid work documents, he said, especially in the Trump era.

    He had been at the car wash during one of the raids, and had avoided being detained only when the owner stepped in front of him and demanded agents speak to him first.

    The man said he had made peace with the idea that his time in the U.S. might come to an end. “At least my children are grown,” he said.

    The two brothers were working this brisk November day, hand-drying Audis, Mercedes and a classic Porsche. They earned a little over minimum wage, and got to keep most of their tips.

    Their bosses had told them that if immigration agents returned, the workers should consider locking themselves inside the cars that they were cleaning. “Don’t run,” the manager said. “They’ll only chase.”

    At the cash register, the cashier watched a website that tracked Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions around the region. So far, there was no activity nearby.

    She had been present during the immigration sweeps, and was still mad at herself for not doing more to stop agents from taking her co-workers. “You think you’re gonna stand up to them, but it’s different when it happens,” she said. “I was like a deer in the headlights.”

    As workers cleaned his Toyota Camry, a retired history professor waited on a bench, reading a biography of Ulysses S. Grant. The ICE raids had scared some clients away, but had prompted others to express their support. He said he had made a point to patronize the business because he was angry at the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

    “They’re not getting the worst of the worst, they’re getting the easiest,” he said.

    He noted that a friend of his — a Latino born in the U.S. — now carried a copy of his birth certificate. Just in case.

    “That’s not the America I grew up in,” the customer said.

    The owner of the car wash, too, was trying to square the promise of the United States with the reality that he was living.

    “I thought Trump was a businessman,” he said. “But he’s really terrorizing businesses.”

    The owner had paid taxes on his employee’s earnings, he said. So had they. “They were pushing the economy, paying rent, paying insurance, buying things.”

    “Fine, take the criminals, take the bad guys,” he continued. “But these are hard workers. Criminals aren’t working at a car wash or waiting in front of a Home Depot.”

    The owner had recently obtained American citizenship. But he was disillusioned — by the raids, L.A.’s homelessness crisis, high healthcare costs. He said his wife longed to leave the U.S. and return home.

    “This is not the American dream,” he said. “This is an American nightmare.”

    As the sun began to sink on the horizon, the last car of the day pulled out of the car wash — a sparkling clean Tesla.

    The manager turned off the vacuum, recoiled hoses and exhaled with relief. He and his staff had survived another day. Tonight — at least — they would be going home to their families.

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    Kate Linthicum

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  • Snow-starved California ski resorts delay openings despite powerful recent storms

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    It may have felt like the recent rain would never end in Los Angeles, but the record-breaking precipitation in Southern California has failed to translate into a much-desired dumping of snow at ski resorts across the state.

    While Friday was originally set as the opening date of the Heavenly and Northstar ski resorts in the Lake Tahoe area, officials said mild weather and stubbornly insufficient flurries have delayed those plans.

    Vail Resorts, which owns both resorts, has yet to announce an updated opening date. But the forecast ahead does not look promising.

    “A dry forecast is in store for the next week through Thanksgiving and Black Friday,” Open Snow wrote in its Tahoe area forecast Friday. “We could see a change in the pattern the weekend of the 29th with colder air moving in and maybe some snow. Overall, through the long-range, there are no big storms showing up, but hopefully that changes as we go deeper into December.”

    Mammoth Mountain, California’s highest-elevation ski resort, was also recently forced to delay the start of its season.

    The Sierra Nevada resort had initially announced a Nov. 14 opening date, but pushed it off as an atmospheric river storm swept across the state. While forecasters hoped the low-pressure system would blanket the slopes in Mammoth, mountainside temperatures remained too warm for serious snow.

    Disappointed skiers and snowboarders took to social media to share videos of the muddy slopes.

    Fortunately, thanks to a moderate storm earlier this week and robust use of snow machines, Mammoth was able to open for the season Thursday with around one-third of its lifts running. Nevertheless, season snowfall totals remain below average.

    Other major Golden State ski resorts are eyeing late November and early December openings. Palisades Tahoe is scheduled to open on Wednesday, just in time for Thanksgiving. Kirkwood resort, located south of Lake Tahoe, is hoping to open on Dec. 5.

    Those seeking to hit the slopes closer to Los Angeles will have to have patience. Big Bear Mountain Resort in San Bernardino County has yet to set an opening date and currently has just 1 to 2 inches of snow on the ground.

    Climate change has made the art of predicting and managing snowfall at California’s ski resorts much more challenging.

    Recent years have been characterized by extreme boom and bust cycles, going from alarmingly low-snow winters in 2020 and 2021 to extreme accumulations in the 2022-23 season, when Mammoth Mountain received a record-breaking snowfall of more than 700 inches at its main lodge.

    “We’re going through this climate whiplash of extreme drought years to extreme wet years — there are just no average years anymore,” Doug Obegi, a senior attorney at the National Resources Defense Council, said in a statement on 2023’s record-breaking season. “And we’re seeing that we are not prepared for either of those extremes.”

    Overall, snow seasons are expected to trend warmer and drier. Researchers predict that from the 2050s to 2100, rising temperatures could push average snowlines 1,300 feet to 1,600 feet higher across the Sierra Nevada compared to a century earlier.

    And extreme snow years, while welcomed by snowsport enthusiasts, come with their own challenges.

    When snow falls in extreme storms as opposed to steadily over the course of the season, it increases the risk of avalanches and can force resorts to stop running lifts due to safety concerns. Then in the spring, deep snowpacks melt faster than normal, which can lead to dangerous flooding and even worsen the upcoming fire season.

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    Clara Harter

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  • An L.A. man was detained in an immigration raid. No one knows where he is

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    WASHINGTON — No one seems to know what happened to Vicente Ventura Aguilar.

    A witness told his brother and attorneys that the 44-year-old Mexican immigrant, who doesn’t have lawful immigration status, was taken into custody by immigration authorities on Oct. 7 in SouthLos Angeles and suffered a medical emergency.

    But it’s been more than six weeks since then, and Ventura Aguilar’s family still hasn’t heard from him.

    The Department of Homeland Security said 73 people from Mexico were arrested in the Los Angeles area between Oct. 7 and 8.

    “None of them were Ventura Aguilar,” said Tricia McLaughlin, the assistant Homeland Security public affairs secretary.

    “For the record, illegal aliens in detention have access to phones to contact family members and attorneys,” she added.

    McLaughlin did not answer questions about what the agency did to determine whether Ventura Aguilar had ever been in its custody, such as checking for anyone with the same date of birth, variations of his name, or identifying detainees who received medical attention near the California border around Oct. 8.

    Lindsay Toczylowski, co-founder of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center who is representing Ventura Aguilar’s family, said DHS never responded to her inquiries about him.

    The family of Vicente Ventura Aguilar, 44, says he has been missing since Oct. 7 when a friend saw him arrested by federal immigration agents in Los Angeles. Homeland Security officials say he was never in their custody.

    (Family of Vicente Ventura Aguilar)

    “There’s only one agency that has answers,” she said. “Their refusal to provide this family with answers, their refusal to provide his attorneys with answers, says something about the lack of care and the cruelty of the moment right now for DHS.”

    His family and lawyers checked with local hospitals and the Mexican consulate without success. They enlisted help from the office of Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Los Angeles), whose staff called the Los Angeles and San Diego county medical examiner’s offices. Neither had someone matching his name or description.

    The Los Angeles Police Department also told Kamlager-Dove’s office that he isn’t in their system. His brother, Felipe Aguilar, said the family filed a missing person’s report with LAPD on Nov. 7.

    “We’re sad and worried,” Felipe Aguilar said. “He’s my brother and we miss him here at home. He’s a very good person. We only hope to God that he’s alive.”

    Felipe Aguilar said his brother, who has lived in the U.S. for around 17 years, left home around 8:15 a.m. on Oct. 7 to catch the bus for an interview for a sanitation job when he ran into friends on the corner near a local liquor store. He had his phone but had left his wallet at home.

    One of those friends told Felipe Aguilar and his lawyers that he and Ventura Aguilar were detained by immigration agents and then held at B-18, a temporary holding facility at the federal building in downtown Los Angeles.

    The friend was deported the next day to Tijuana. He spoke to the family in a phone call from Mexico.

    Detainees at B-18 have limited access to phones and lawyers. Immigrants don’t usually turn up in the Immigration and Customs Enforcement online locator system until they’ve arrived at a long-term detention facility.

    According to Felipe Aguilar and Toczylowski, the friend said Ventura Aguilar began to shake, went unconscious and fell to the ground while shackled on Oct. 8 at a facility near the border. The impact caused his face to bleed.

    The friend said that facility staff called for an ambulance and moved the other detainees to a different room. Toczylowski said that was the last time anyone saw Ventura Aguilar.

    She said the rapid timeline between when Ventura Aguilar was arrested to when he disappeared is emblematic of what she views as a broad lack of due process for people in government custody under the Trump administration and shows that “we don’t know who’s being deported from the United States.”

    Felipe Aguilar said he called his brother’s cell phone after hearing about the arrests but it went straight to voicemail.

    Felipe Aguilar said that while his brother is generally healthy, he saw a cardiologist a couple years ago about chest pain. He was on prescribed medication and his condition had improved.

    His family and lawyers said Ventura Aguilar might have given immigration agents a fake name when he was arrested. Some detained people offer up a wrong name or alias, and that would explain why he never showed up in Homeland Security records. Toczylowski said federal agents sometimes misspell the name of the person they are booking into custody.

    The family of Vicente Ventura Aguilar, 44

    Vicente Ventura Aguilar, who has been missing since Oct. 7, had lived in the United States for 17 years, his family said.

    (Family of Vicente Ventura Aguilar)

    But she said the agency should make a significant attempt to search for him, such as by using biometric data or his photo.

    “To me, that’s another symptom of the chaos of the immigration enforcement system as it’s happening right now,” she said of the issues with accurately identifying detainees. “And it’s what happens when you are indiscriminately, racially profiling people and picking them up off the street and holding them in conditions that are substandard, and then deporting people without due process. Mistakes get made. Right now, what we want to know is what mistakes were made here, and where is Vicente now?”

    Surveillance footage from a nearby business reviewed by MS NOW shows Ventura Aguilar on the sidewalk five minutes before masked agents begin making arrests in South Los Angeles. The footage doesn’t show him being arrested, but two witnesses told the outlet that they saw agents handcuff Ventura Aguilar and place him in a van.

    In a letter sent to DHS leaders Friday, Kamlager-Dove asked what steps DHS has taken to determine whether anyone matching Ventura Aguilar’s identifiers was detained last month and whether the agency has documented any medical events or hospital transports involving people taken into custody around Oct. 7-8.

    “Given the length of time since Mr. Ventura Aguilar’s disappearance and the credible concern that he may have been misidentified, injured, or otherwise unaccounted for during the enforcement action, I urgently request that DHS and ICE conduct an immediate and comprehensive review” by Nov. 29, Kamlager-Dove wrote in her letter.

    Kamlager-Dove said her most common immigration requests from constituents are for help with visas and passports.

    “Never in all the years did I expect to get a call about someone who has completely disappeared off the face of the earth, and also never did I think that I would find myself not just calling ICE and Border Patrol but checking hospitals, checking with LAPD and checking morgues to find a constituent,” she said. “It’s horrifying and it’s completely dystopian.”

    She said families across Los Angeles deserve answers and need to know whether something similar could happen to them.

    “Who else is missing?” she said.

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    Andrea Castillo

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  • Crews battle hazardous fire on cargo ship in San Pedro, major emergency declared

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    A major emergency was declared at the Port of Los Angeles on Friday night as 186 firefighters worked to combat a massive and stubborn blaze involving hazardous materials on a cargo ship, authorities said.

    An electrical fire was reported below deck of the 1,100-foot container ship 1 Henry Hudson at 6:38 p.m., according to the Los Angeles Fire Department. An explosion rattled the boat just before 8 p.m., affecting power to lights and cranes, authorities said.

    Hazardous materials are in several of the cargo containers involved in the blaze and all firefighters are wearing protective suits and oxygen masks, according to LAFD. Specially trained hazardous materials crews are monitoring air quality as efforts continue to suppress the fire in the ship’s sub-levels.

    Marine crews are working to cool the outside of the ship to make conditions on the boat more tenable for firefighting crews. As of 8 p.m., incident command had instructed that no firefighting members go below deck.

    At that time progress on containment remained slow, according to LAFD. The ship did not appear to be sinking despite a large amount of water being used to fight the fire.

    Drones were being used to acquire thermal imaging of the blaze and assist the emergency response, authorities said.

    Earlier in the evening, authorities said six of the boat’s crew members were unaccounted for. At 8:30 p.m., LAFD confirmed that all 23 crew members had been found and safely assisted off the ship. No injuries have been reported.

    The California Highway Patrol announced at 10:30 p.m. that the Vincent Thomas Bridge, a main access point to the port’s terminals, would be closed until further notice due to the fire. Drivers are advised to avoid the area and follow detour routes.

    The U.S. Coast Guard also responded to the incident and established a safety perimeter of one nautical mile around the vessel.

    The cargo ship sails under the flag of Panama and arrived in the Port of L.A. on Wednesday after traveling from Tokyo, according to Vessel Finder.

    In a statement on X, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass said the city is continuing to monitor the incident closely. Gov. Gavin Newsom was briefed on the incident and his office is coordinating with local authorities to support the emergency response, officials said.

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    Clara Harter

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  • The first home has been rebuilt in the wake of the Palisades Fire

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    Less than a year after 6,822 structures burned in the Palisades Fire, the first rebuilding project has reached the finish line in Pacific Palisades: a two-story showcase home located at 915 Kagawa St.

    In a press release, Mayor Karen Bass announced that the home received a certificate of occupancy from the L.A. Department of Building and Safety on Friday, meaning it passed inspection and is safe to inhabit.

    “Today is an important moment of hope,” Bass said in a statement. “With more and more projects nearing completion across Pacific Palisades, the City of Los Angeles remains committed to expediting every aspect of the rebuild process until every family is back home.”

    The house was built by developer Thomas James Homes. Jamie Mead, the chief executive, said the permitting process took two months and the rebuild took six.

    “Given that the community needs housing, we thought this would be a great opportunity to show them what we can do,” Mead said.

    Plenty of rebuilding permits have been issued — nearly 2,000 in both the Palisades and Eaton fire zones, according to the state’s rebuilding dashboard — and the first few are reaching the finishing line. Earlier this week, an Altadena ADU received a certificate of occupancy as well.

    The Palisades property, however, is much bigger in scope with four bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms across nearly 4,000 square feet. It replaces a 1,600-square-foot ranch that burned down in January.

    Fire-resistant features include closed eaves to block embers, as well as plumbing for a fire defense system that homeowners can choose to add, which covers the home in water and fire retardant when flames get close.

    The first rebuilt home in Pacific Palisades – which just received a certificate of occupancy – on Kagawa Street.

    (Eric Thayer/Los Angeles Times)

    Real estate records show Thomas James Homes bought the property before it was destroyed. It sold for $3.4 million last November.

    The house was built as a showcase home — an advertisement of sorts for other residents looking to rebuild. Mead said the company is building homes for 30 families in the Palisades and expects to build 100 more next year. On its website, the company claims it can complete a rebuild in 12 months.

    A grand opening, in which the home will be opened to the community, is set for Saturday, Dec. 6.

    Rebuilding timelines vary from community-to-community and project-to-project. According to the press release, roughly 340 projects have started construction in Pacific Palisades.

    Some residents are still deciding whether to stay or build, while others filed plans in the first months after the fires, taking advantage of government initiatives to streamline the process.

    Times Staff Writers Hailey Branson-Potts and Doug Smith contributed to this report.

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    Jack Flemming

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  • L.A. County sheriff investigating new claims that Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs assaulted a music producer

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    Sean “Diddy” Combs, who is serving four years in federal prison for using prostitutes in “freak-offs,” is under investigation by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department in connection with new allegations of sexual assault. A record producer alleges Combs assaulted him on two occasions.

    The sheriff’s Special Victims Unit initiated the probe because one of the incidents occurred in East Los Angeles, according to Nicole Nishida, a department spokeswoman. The producer reported the incidents to police in Largo, Fla.

    Florida-based music producer John Hay revealed in media interviews that he was the “John Doe” plaintiff from a civil lawsuit filed in July alleging assault.

    The producer, who was not named by law enforcement investigating the allegations, alleged he was subjected to sex acts in 2020 and 2021 while working on a remix project of music by Biggie Smalls, a.k.a. Christopher Wallace, which put him into contact with Bad Boy Records and company executive Combs.

    A spokesman for Combs did not immediately respond to The Times’ request for comment on the investigation.

    The lawsuit states that, in December 2020, the producer was at a warehouse in Los Angeles that housed some of Notorious B.I.G.’s clothing. The items were being donated to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame later that year, when Biggie would eventually be inducted.

    Combs “provided drugs to everyone present. Everyone there was running around the warehouse and tripping on the drugs,” the lawsuit alleges. Combs “started watching porn on his cell phone, grabbed one of Biggie’s shirts off a rack, and began to masturbate with it in front of the plaintiff,” the suit states.

    Combs subsequently threw the shirt over the producer’s lap and arm, laughed and said “Rest in peace, Biggie” before leaving the room.

    In an incident in March 2021, the plaintiff claims that he was set up. He states in the lawsuit he was lured to a meeting by Biggie’s son, Christopher “CJ” Wallace Jr., and music producer Willie Mack.

    But upon his arrival, his head was covered, and Combs appeared and began yelling and ordered everyone to leave, the lawsuit alleges. Combs then allegedly attempted “to force plaintiff to perform oral copulation on Combs, while plaintiff’s head was still covered.”

    “I’m pushing for criminal charges to be filed against Combs at a state and federal level,” Hay told ShockYa earlier this month in an interview where he stated he was the civil suit plaintiff.

    According to a police report first obtained last month by People magazine, Hay reported the allegations on Sept. 20 of this year to Largo, Fla., police.

    Gary Dordick, the producer’s lawyer, said “we intend to present out client’s case to a jury in California and we are confident that the truth will prevail.” Dordick said in a message to The Times that he would not comment further given that a defamation lawsuit was filed last week by Wallace.

    Wallace, the son of Biggie Smalls and singer Faith Evans, sued Hay for defamation in a Florida federal court last week, calling Hay’s recent interviews “a calculated smear campaign” that included false statements that he attended Combs’ so-called freak-off parties and “conspired to lure Hay to a location where Combs purportedly assaulted him.”

    An attorney for Mack could not immediately be reached for comment.

    Wallace says in his defamation action that Hay worked on the remix project, titled “Ready to Dance,” with Wallace and Mack in 2020. A single was released, but the remaining songs were not, due to a lack of interest.

    According to the suit, Hay was upset over the decision not to release the music he worked on and began accusing Mack of “inappropriate and abusive behavior” in 2021. But Hay never made an assault allegation, the suit claims.

    Combs is currently incarcerated at Federal Correctional Institution Fort Dixon, a New Jersey low-security federal penitentiary.

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    Richard Winton

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  • Supreme Court urged to block California laws requiring companies to disclose climate impacts

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    WASHINGTON  — The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business groups urged the Supreme Court on Friday to block new California laws that will require thousands of companies to disclose their emissions and their impacts on climate change.

    One of the laws is due to take effect on Jan. 1, and the emergency appeal asks the court to put it on hold temporarily.

    Their lawyers argue the measures violate the 1st Amendment because the state would be forcing companies to speak on its preferred topic.

    “In less than eight weeks, California will compel thousands of companies across the nation to speak on the deeply controversial topic of climate change,” they said in an appeal that also spoke for the California Chamber of Commerce and the Los Angeles County Business Federation.

    They say the two new laws would require companies to disclose the “climate-related risks” they foresee and how their operations and emissions contribute to climate change.

    “Both laws are part of California’s open campaign to force companies into the public debate on climate issues and pressure them to alter their behavior,” they said. Their aim, according to their sponsors, is to “make sure that the public actually knows who’s green and who isn’t.”

    One law, Senate Bill 261, will require several thousand companies that do business in California to assess their “climate-related financial risk” and how they may reduce that risk. A second measure, SB 253, which applies to larger companies, requires them to assess and disclose their emissions and how their operations could affect the climate.

    The appeal argues these laws amount to unconstitutional compelled speech.

    “No state may violate 1st Amendment rights to set climate policy for the Nation. Compelled-speech laws are presumptively unconstitutional — especially where, as here, they dictate a value-laden script on a controversial subject such as climate change,” they argue.

    Officials with the California Air Resources Board, whose chair Lauren Sanchez was named as defendant, said the agency does not comment on pending litigation.

    The first-in-the-nation carbon disclosure laws were widely celebrated by environmental advocates at the time of their passage, with the nonprofit California Environmental Voters describing them as a “game-changer not just for our state but for the entire world.”

    Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who authored SB 253, said at the time that the laws were “a simple but powerful tool in the fight to tackle climate change.”

    “When corporations are transparent about the full scope of their emissions, they have the tools and incentives to tackle them,” Wiener said.

    Michael Gerrard, a climate-change legal expert at Columbia University, described Friday’s motion as “the latest example of businesses and conservatives weaponizing the 1st Amendment.” He pointed to the Citizens United case, which said businesses have a free speech right to unlimited campaign contributions, as another example.

    “Exxon tried and failed to use this argument in 2022 when it attempted to block an investigation by the Massachusetts Attorney General into whether it misled consumers and investors about the risks of climate change,” he said in an email. “Exxon claimed this investigation violated its First Amendment rights; the Massachusetts courts rejected this attempt.”

    Under the Biden administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission adopted similar climate-change disclosure rules. Companies would have been required to disclose the impact of climate change on their business and what they intended to do to mitigate the risk.

    But the Chamber of Commerce sued and won a lower court ruling that blocked those rules.

    And in March, Trump appointees said the SEC would retreat and not defend the “costly and unnecessarily intrusive climate-change disclosure rules.”

    The emergency appeal challenging California’s disclosure laws was filed by Washington attorney Eugene Scalia, a son of the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

    The companies have tried and failed to persuade judges in California to block the measures. Exxon Mobil filed a suit in Sacramento, while the Chamber of Commerce sued in Los Angeles.

    In August, U.S. District Judge Otis Wright II in Los Angeles refused to block the laws on the grounds they “regulate commercial speech,” which gets less protection under the 1st Amendment. He said businesses are routinely required to disclose financial data and factual information on their operations.

    The business lawyers said they had appealed to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals asking for an injunction, but no action has been taken.

    Shortly after the chamber’s appeal was filed, state attorneys for Iowa and 24 other Republican-leaning states joined in support. They said they “strongly oppose this radical green speech mandate that California seeks to impose on companies.”

    The justices are likely to ask for a response next week from California’s state attorneys before acting on the appeal.

    Savage reported from Washington, D.C., Smith from Los Angeles.

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    David G. Savage, Hayley Smith

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  • Builders launch portal to make fire rebuilds faster and more affordable

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    People who lost homes in the Palisades and Eaton fires can now go online to pick vetted residential templates that could save them money and be ready as early as next year.

    Builders Alliance, a nonprofit organization formed in response to the fires, on Friday launched a portal that offers survivors a selection of homes, filtered by lot size, price range and other preferences.

    “We’re trying to create an ‘easy’ button for homeowners,” said Lew Horne, the chairman of Project Recovery, a group of academics and real estate industry experts who had created a road map for recovery.

    Construction crews work on rebuilding a home and properties after the federal cleanup in Altadena on Sept. 10.

    (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

    Project Recovery’s March report — which was compiled by professors in the real estate graduate schools at USC and UCLA, along with the Los Angeles chapter of the Urban Land Institute, a real estate nonprofit education and research institute — said an alliance of builders could work together for economies of scale to speed up reconstruction and make it more affordable and predictable.

    The web portal is the latest stop on the report’s road map. It makes it easy for those who lost their homes to pick templates and receive competing bids from builders who have been vetted by Project Recovery.

    “We’re keeping a close eye” on the builders, Horne said. “Buyers are going to have a quality home at a quality price in a time frame they can count on.”

    Horne is head of the Los Angeles chapter of the Urban Land Institute and president of real estate brokerage CBRE for Southern California. Other leaders of Project Recovery include Stuart Gabriel, director of the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, and Richard Green, director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate.

    Homeowners using the portal can match their address to home choices that include pre-designed turnkey residences at costs equal to or below average insurance proceeds, Horne said. Owners can also choose more custom builds.

    The new Builders Alliance consists of 10 licensed homebuilders, ranging in size from small boutique firms to larger companies such as Richmond American Homes and Brookfield Residential.

    Brookfield built more than 200 homes in the La Vina gated community in Altadena, 52 of which burned down, Chief Executive Adrian Foley said.

    “Obviously, we were devastated by all of the loss that’s taken place here,” he said. “We wanted to lean in and do anything we could to help out.”

    Foley said the consortium was devised to get large and small builders working together to “procure the right material costs and procure plans and specifications that would be appealing to the end user so we could collaborate to beat down costs, be more efficient, and hopefully drive a higher percentage of rebuilding.”

    The consortium expects to complete some homes by the third quarter of 2026.

    The foundation of the Builders Alliance portal is a digital representation that maps every residential parcel in the Palisades and Eaton fire areas. It uses AI technology and is powered by Canibuild, which provides site-planning software for the residential construction industry.

    The portal’s map is trained on local zoning regulations and pairs each lot with extensive menus of designs and costs. Property owners enter their address and can filter options by preferences such as square footage, bedrooms, bathrooms and price.

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    Roger Vincent

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  • Developer plans to add a hotel and hundreds of residences to L.A. Live

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    The owners of Crypto.com Arena and L.A. Live in downtown Los Angeles have filed plans with the city to potentially add another tower to their multibillion-dollar sports and entertainment complex.

    AEG last week proposed a 49-story high-rise that would hold a hotel, residences, bars and restaurants.

    The tower would rise across Olympic Boulevard from L.A. Live on a corner lot on Georgia Street now used by AEG for parking.

    Many planned residential and other commercial projects in Los Angeles have stalled prior to construction in recent years as developers face economic headwinds, including unfavorable interest rates and rising costs of materials and labor.

    AEG, too, will not be breaking ground on this project in the near future, a company representative said.

    The company’s recent land-use application, which outlined the plans, is just a “first step for a potential development” on the company’s property at 917 W. Olympic Blvd., spokesman Michael Roth said. “AEG remains optimistic about downtown’s long-term prospects and is positioning the site for future development when conditions improve.”

    The application calls for a large-scale development with 364 dwelling units and 334 hotel rooms.

    The 783,427-square-foot building would also include bars and restaurants on levels 1, 5 and 6, along with a restaurant/nightclub on the eighth floor.

    Residents and hotel guests would share an amenity deck with a restaurant, bar, pool, spa, club room, fitness area and a dining terrace. The complex would have 666 parking spaces.

    In September, the City Council approved a $2.6-billion expansion of the Convention Center despite warnings from its advisors that the project would draw taxpayer funds away from essential city services for decades to come. Mayor Karen Bass and a majority of the council believe that the project will create thousands of jobs and boost tourism and business activity, making the city more competitive on the national stage.

    The new construction will connect the two existing south and west exhibit halls by adding 190,000 square feet of space to create one contiguous hall with more than 750,000 square feet, and will add 39,000 square feet of meeting room space and 95,000 square feet of multipurpose space.

    AEG is a co-developer of the Convention Center project with Plenary Americas.

    Los Angeles-based AEG is one of the world’s biggest venue and event companies, with more than 20,000 employees. The company was founded in 1995 when Denver billionaire investor Philip Anschutz bought the Los Angeles Kings, and in 1999 it opened the downtown arena then known as the Staples Center, now Crypto.com Arena.

    Among AEG’s recent developments is the IG Arena in the outer citadel of Nagoya Castle in Nagoya, Japan, where sports and entertainment events, including sumo wrestling, are held.

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    Roger Vincent

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  • This stylish L.A. rental is designed so they never have to worry about pet hair again

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    Jeffrey Hamilton came to live in an empty condominium, as many do, after a painful breakup.

    “It was a stressful time even though it was an amicable breakup,” says the 38-year-old anesthesiologist. “I had two weeks to move and was desperate to find something.”

    In this series, we spotlight L.A. rentals with style. From perfect gallery walls to temporary decor hacks, these renters get creative, even in small spaces. And Angelenos need the inspiration: Most are renters.

    Hamilton, who is drawn to “gallery-esque white boxes,” ultimately settled in a two-bedroom, two-bathroom Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects-designed condo four blocks away in West Hollywood. With few possessions other than his cats, he proceeded to furnish the unit with secondhand items he found primarily on Facebook Marketplace.

    During the process, he says, he found himself.

    “It was the first time I had lived on my own in a long time and it was nice to listen to my own instincts,” says Hamilton, sitting in the living room of his elegant condo, which he now shares with his boyfriend David Poli, his cats Romulus and Remus and Poli’s Husky mix, Janeway (named for Kathryn Janeway, the first female captain on the television series “Star Trek: Voyager”). All the pets are rescues.

    A white dog lies on the carpet in the living room of a condo
    Not to be upstaged by Romulus the cat, Janeway, a husky mix adopted from Hollywood Huskies, makes a statement in the living room.

    black shelves house knickknacks, ceramics and shoes.

    Black CB2 shelves Hamilton found on Facebook Marketplace store artfully arranged ceramics, books and his and his boyfriend’s shoes.

    “Jeffrey likes to say that everything in his apartment is a rescue, including me,” says Poli jokingly.

    When Hamilton adopted his cats six years ago during his medical residency in San Diego, they were kittens; now, as adults, he says, the spotted Bengal cats have not just grown but have influenced his design choices in his new home.

    A den with a sectional and artworks on the walls.

    The den features more pet-friendly choices including a Rove Concepts modular sofa that Hamilton bought on clearance. “It’s a little small for two grown men and three pets,” he says.

    “My original inspiration was to match the furniture to the kitties so I don’t see their cat hair,” he says. “The cats very much informed the color scheme. I find them so handsome; it felt like having matching furniture was practical.”

    In the living room, for instance, Hamilton chose a camel-colored Curvo sofa in velvet by Goop for CB2, which he found on Facebook Marketplace. Similarly, the accompanying swivel chairs from HD Buttercup and the barstool seats in the kitchen are upholstered in Bengal and Husky-durable textiles that camouflage pet hair.

    Actor Kit Williamson, a Hollywood friend who has tackled many of his own interior design projects, says Hamilton and Poli’s home is more than just a safe place to land. “I love that Jeffrey’s design for the apartment was inspired by his cats — and that David’s dog not only gets along with the cats, but complements the color palette,” he says. “It’s not just cohesive, it’s kismet.”

    A bed and desk in a bedroom.

    A second-hand desk from Facebook Marketplace in the bedroom provides a place for remote work.

    A white dog rests on a taupe and white bed in a bedroom.

    No need for lint rollers as Janeway blends in with the furnishings.

    Hamilton grew up in the Bay Area but has moved around the country for his education and medical training, including stints in New York City, San Francisco, San Diego and Seattle. So when he moved to Los Angeles for good in 2022, he found shopping for furnishings on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace to be a great way to get to know the city.

    “It was nice originally because I was new to L.A., and it helped me get a better sense of Los Angeles,” he says. “I ventured to Woodland Hills and Calabasas — I got a lot of vintage stuff in Woodland Hills.”

    Living alone, Hamilton says, is what allowed him to “find space and time to honor” his own interests a little more.

    The exterior of a four-story white architectural condo.
    A rooftop deck offers views of the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood.
    White circular stairs from a patio lead to a rooftop deck

    Hamilton’s condo in West Hollywood, which was designed by Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects, includes an outdoor patio and a rooftop deck with views of the Hollywood Hills.

    “I think with medical school, residency and fellowship training, I didn’t have much time and space or resources to self-examine, as so much of my time was occupied working and thinking about the wellness of others,” he says.

    For him, part of his process for creating a welcoming home was focusing on “sustainable goods — things that were used, vintage or local,” he says.

    That accounts for some of Hamilton’s home decor selections: The CB2 bookshelves from Facebook Marketplace, which store artfully arranged ceramics, books and the couple’s neatly stacked shoes and a travertine dining room table, also from Facebook Marketplace.

    Down the hall, in their bedroom, is a second-hand desk from Facebook Marketplace where Poli can work from home several days a week. “It’s a little beat-up, which I like,” Hamilton says. “I like things that are shiny and nice but also beat-up around the edges. Nothing too perfect. “

    Jeffrey Hamilton's cat, Romulus, reclines on a camel-colored sofa in his living room.

    Romulus reclines on the camel-colored velvet sofa in the living room.

    A vase of flowers, ceramics and books on a wooden coffee table.

    And then there is the art. “It was important to me to have pieces from either local artisans or artists who are L.A.-based,” he says, noting the tall, plaster lamp in the living room by Kate O’Connor and a graphic stoneware bowl by Chad Callaghan atop his marble coffee table.

    In the living room, Hamilton hung a large-scale artwork by Texas-based painter Jason Adkins for General Public, a company developed by Portia de Rossi that licenses and 3D-prints artworks. In the den, another Adkins piece for General Public hangs alongside a vintage print by Cy Twombly. “They feel like real paintings,” he says of the Synographs. “You can’t tell the difference. “

    Elegant, clutter-free and homey, the condominium is a calm place to come home to after working long shifts, including overnights, at Children’s Hospital. “A sense of calm and serenity was probably a very important implicit priority,” Hamilton says. “My work can be very stressful at times, so having a place of refuge came naturally.”

    Luckily, balancing comfort and pets is another thing that came naturally to the couple after they moved in together.

    A modern kitchen with barstools

    The open-concept kitchen is modern and streamlined.

    “We have a nice synergy,” Hamilton says of Poli. “We tend to agree when it comes to interior design.”

    “I’m more of a minimalist,” Poli says. “Jeffrey likes pillows too much. It’s getting a little busy in here,” he adds, teasing his partner.

    “I do like pillows,” Hamilton says, noting that he recently bought a sewing machine so he can make his own soft furnishings. “I’ve learned that the best outdoor pillows for pets are from Arhaus. They don’t stain, and they are really durable.”

    Like many millennials his age, Hamilton often thinks about buying a home but finds real estate prices, combined with the housing shortage in Los Angeles, daunting. “It’s so expensive,” he says. “I keep doing the math, get approved for a mortgage, then see the interest rates and how much you have to put down — and I just can’t do it. My rent is ridiculous, but it’s more economical than any mortgage I’ve seen in West Hollywood.”

    For now, Hamilton enjoys living in a 30-unit building in a pedestrian-friendly neighborhood with a rooftop deck overlooking the Sunset Strip. “I don’t need a ton of space,” he says. “Maybe a condo in West Hollywood would be a nice starting point someday.”

    After all, he’s learned he’s good at starting over.

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    Lisa Boone

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  • Widespread power outage temporarily impacts more than 30,000 LADWP customers across L.A.

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    More than 30,000 Los Angeles Department of Water and Power customers temporarily lost power Saturday after a widespread outage affected several parts of the city, according to the utility.

    The power loss occurred at about 12:55 p.m., impacting customers in Koreatown, Arlington Heights, Leimert Park, Palms and adjacent areas, an LADWP spokesperson said. LADWP began working on the issue at 1:30 p.m., and as of 4 p.m. power had been fully restored to all areas.

    The cause of the power outage remains under investigation.

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    Kailyn Brown

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  • Taking inspiration from Mamdani, democratic socialists look to expand their power in L.A.

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    The revelers who packed Tuesday’s election night party in L.A.’s Highland Park neighborhood were roughly 2,500 miles from the concert hall where New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani celebrated his historic win.

    Yet despite that sprawling distance, the crowd, heavily populated with members of the L.A. chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, had no trouble finishing the applause lines delivered by Mamdani, himself a DSA member, during his victory speech.

    “New York!” Mamdani bellowed on the oversized television screens hung throughout the Greyhound Bar & Grill. “We’re going to make buses fast and — “

    “Free!” the crowd inside the bar yelled back in response.

    In Los Angeles, activists with the Democratic Socialists of America have already fired up their campaigns for the June election, sending out canvassing teams and scheduling postcard-writing events for their chosen candidates. But they’re also taking fresh inspiration from Mamdani’s win, pointing to his inclusive, unapologetic campaign and his relentless focus on pocketbook issues, particularly among working-class voters.

    The message that propelled Mamdani to victory resonates just as much in L.A., said City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who won her seat in 2022 with logistical support from the DSA.

    “What New York City is saying is that the rent is too damn high, that affordability is a huge issue not just on housing, but when it comes to grocery shopping, when it comes to daycare,” she said. “These are the things that we’re also experiencing here in Los Angeles.”

    City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, appearing at a rally in Lincoln Heights last year, said New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s message will resonate in L.A.

    (Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

    DSA-LA, which is a membership organization and not a political party, has elected four of its endorsed candidates to the council since 2020, ousting incumbents in each of the last three election cycles. They’ve done so in large part by knocking on doors and working to increase turnout among renters and lower-income households.

    The chapter hopes to win two additional seats in June. Organizers have begun contemplating a full-on socialist City Council — possibly by the end of 2028 — with DSA members holding eight of the council’s 15 seats.

    “We would like a socialist City Council majority,” said Benina Stern, co-chair of DSA’s Los Angeles chapter. “Because clearly that is the logical progression, to keep growing the bloc.”

    Despite those lofty ambitions, it could take at least five years before the L.A. chapter matches this week’s breakthrough in New York City.

    Mayor Karen Bass, a high-profile leader within the Democratic Party with few ties to the DSA, is now running for a second term. Her only major opponent is former schools superintendent Austin Beutner, who occupies the center of the political spectrum in L.A. Real estate developer Rick Caruso, a longtime Republican who is now a Democrat, has not disclosed his intentions but has long been at odds with DSA‘s progressive policies.

    In L.A., DSA organizers have put their emphasis on identifying and campaigning for candidates in down-ballot races, not citywide contests. Part of that is due to the fact that L.A. has a weak-mayor system, particularly when compared with New York City, where the mayor has responsibility not just for city services but also public schools and even judicial appointments.

    L.A. council members propose and approve legislation, rework the budgets submitted by the mayor and represent districts with more than a quarter of a million people. As a result, DSA organizers have chosen the council as their path to power at City Hall, Stern said.

    “The conditions in Los Angeles and New York I think are very different,” she said.

    Since 2020, DSA-LA has been highly selective about its endorsement choices. The all-volunteer organization sends applicants a lengthy questionnaire with dozens of litmus test questions: Do they support diverting funds away from law enforcement? Do they oppose L.A.’s decision to host the Olympics? Do they support a repeal of L.A.’s ban on homeless encampments near schools?

    Once a candidate secures an endorsement, DSA-LA turns to its formidable pool of volunteers, sending them out to help candidates knock on doors, staff phone banks and stage fundraising events.

    During Tuesday’s party, DSA-LA organizers recruited new members to assist with the reelection campaigns of Hernandez and Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, a former labor organizer. They distributed postcard-sized fliers with the message, “Hate Capitalism? So do we.”

    Standing nearby was Estuardo Mazariegos, a tenant rights advocate now running to replace Councilmember Curren Price in a South L.A. district. Mazariegos, 40, said he first became interested in the DSA in the seventh grade, when his middle school civics teacher displayed a DSA flag in her classroom.

    The crowd at the Greyhound in Highland Park reacts to results on Tuesday.

    The crowd at the Greyhound in Highland Park reacts to results on Tuesday.

    (Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

    Mazariegos hailed the results from New York and California, saying voters are “taking back America for the working people of America.” He sounded somewhat less excited about Bass, a former community organizer who has pursued some middle-of-the-road positions, such as hiring more police officers.

    Asked if he supports Bass’ bid for a second term, Mazariegos responded: “If she’s up against a billionaire, yes.”

    “If she’s up against another comrade, maybe not,” he added, laughing.

    When Bass ran in November 2022, DSA-LA grudgingly recommended a vote for her in its popular voter guide, describing her as a “status quo politician.”

    Councilmember Nithya Raman, who represents a Hollywood Hills district, is far more enthusiastic. Raman has worked closely with Bass on efforts to move homeless Angelenos indoors, while also seeking fixes to the larger systems that serve L.A.’s unhoused population.

    “Karen Bass is the most progressive mayor we’ve ever had in L.A,” said Raman, who co-hosted the election night party with the other three DSA-aligned council members, DSA-LA and others.

    Raman was the first of the DSA-backed candidates to win a council seat in L.A., running in 2020 as a reformer who would bring stronger renter protections and a network of community access centers to assist homeless residents.

    Two years later, voters elected labor organizer Soto-Martínez and Hernandez. Tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado became the fourth last year, ousting Councilmember Kevin de León.

    Stern, the DSA-LA co-chair, said she believes the four council members have brought a “sea change” to City Hall, working with their progressive colleagues to expand the city’s teams of unarmed responders, who are viewed as an alternative to gun-carrying police officers.

    The DSA voting bloc also shaped this year’s city budget, voting to reduce the number of new recruits at the Los Angeles Police Department and preserve other city jobs, Stern said.

    To be clear, the four-member bloc has pursued those efforts by working with other progressives on the council who are not affiliated with the DSA but more moderate on other issues. Beyond that, the group has plenty of detractors.

    Stuart Waldman, president of the Valley Industry and Commerce Assn., said DSA-backed council members are making the city worse, by pushing for a $30 per hour hotel minimum wage and a $32.35 minimum wage for construction workers.

    “No one is ever going to build a hotel in this city again, and DSA were a part of that,” he said. “Pretty soon no one will build housing, and the DSA is a part of that too.”

    The union that represents LAPD officers vowed to fight the DSA’s effort to expand its reach, saying it would work to ensure that “Angelenos are not bamboozled by the socialist bait and switch.”

    “Socialists want to bait Angelenos into talking about affordability, oppression and fairness, get their candidates elected, and then switch to enact their platform that states ‘Defund the police by rejecting any expansion to police budgets … while cutting [police] budgets annually towards zero,’” the union’s board of directors said in a statement.

    In New York City, Mamdani has proposed a series of measures to make the city more affordable, including free bus fares, city-run grocery stores and a four-year freeze on rent increases inside rent stabilized apartment units.

    Some of those ideas have already been tried in L.A.

    In 2020, weeks into the COVID-19 shutdown, Mayor Eric Garcetti placed a moratorium on rent hikes for more than 600,000 rent-stabilized apartments. The council kept that measure in place for four years.

    Around the same time, L.A. County’s transit agency suspended mandatory collection of bus fares. The agency started charging bus passengers again in 2022.

    City Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Eunisses Hernandez celebrate at an election party.

    City Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Eunisses Hernandez celebrate at the election night party they co-hosted with Democratic Socialists of America’s L.A. chapter and two other council members.

    (Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

    In recent months, the DSA-LA has pushed for new limits on rent increases inside L.A.’s rent-stabilized apartments. Raman, who chairs the council’s housing committee, is backing a yearly cap of 3% in those buildings, most of which were built before October 1978.

    Hernandez, whose district stretches from working-class Westlake to rapidly gentrifying Highland Park, is a believer in shifting the Overton Window at City Hall — moving the political debate left and “putting people over profits.”

    Like others at the election party, Hernandez is hoping the council will eventually have eight DSA-aligned members in the coming years, saying such a shift would be a “game changer.” With a clear majority, she said, the council would not face a huge battle to approve new tenant protections, expand the network of unarmed response teams and place “accountability measures” on corporations that are “making money off our city.”

    “There’s so many things … that we could do easier for the people of the city of Los Angeles if we had a majority,” she said.

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    David Zahniser

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  • FBI urges ICE agents to identify themselves after string of impersonators commit crimes

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    Ever since the Trump immigration raids began in Los Angeles in June, local leaders and community activists have criticized agents for sometimes making it difficult to identify them as federal law enforcement officials or refusing to identify themselves at all.

    Now, an unexpected new group has expressed its own concerns: the FBI.

    Citing a string of incidents in which masked criminals posing as immigration officers robbed and kidnapped victims, the FBI recently issued a memo suggesting agents clearly identify themselves while they’re in the field.

    The FBI explained its reasoning in a three-page document sent to police agencies across the country last month.

    In the memo, the FBI says that criminals impersonating law enforcement “damages trust” between them and the community and that law enforcement has an “opportunity” to better coordinate with their local, state and federal partners. It calls for informational campaigns to educate the public about impostors and for agents to show their identification when asked while out in the field.

    Undocumented immigrants and U.S. citizens have been detained by masked people on city streets, in hospitals, courthouses, and outside schools and places of worship over the last several months. California has banned the use of masks among law enforcement agencies, but on Tuesday a cadre of masked agents gathered in an offsite Dodger Stadium parking lot while carrying out more raids.

    A man seeking asylum from Colombia is detained by federal agents as he attends his court hearing in immigration court in New York City.

    (Michael M. Santiago / Getty Images)

    The FBI’s memo, obtained through a records request by the national security transparency nonprofit Property of the People, was prepared by the New York field office and first reported by Wired magazine. It details several instances where people impersonated immigration agents.

    In Florida, a man pretending to be an ICE agent kidnapped a woman who was in the process of becoming a U.S. citizen. The suspect approached the woman on April 21, claimed he was there to pick her up and showed her his shirt that read ICE, the FBI said. The woman got in the suspect’s car and he drove her to an apartment complex, but she was able to escape.

    In August, three men in black clothing and wearing vests robbed a New York restaurant and stole from their ATM. The suspects also beat the employees and tied them up. One of the employees willingly surrendered to the suspects when they heard them identify themselves as immigration agents, the FBI said.

    The FBI also pointed to an April social media post where a man wearing a black jacket with an ICE patch stood outside a hardware store to intimidate day laborers. An image circulating on social media matching the description of the incident showed the man also wearing a red Trump hat.

    “I don’t know if there is federal law that requires a standard police uniform,” David Levine, a professor of law at UC San Francisco said. “It’s good practice to have a distinguishing uniform. Because when you have federal agents dressing as ruffians, with scarves over their faces and glasses in a paramilitary fashion, then it’s so much easier for people to impersonate them.”

    The FBI’s national press office did not respond to requests for comment, citing the government shutdown in an automated email response.

    U.S. Border Patrol march to the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building

    U.S. Border Patrol march after a show of force outside the Japanese American National Museum where Gov. Gavin Newsom was holding a press conference on Aug. 14 in Los Angeles.

    (Carlin Stiehl/Los Angeles Times)

    The FBI’s memo arrives several months after masked agents descended on Los Angeles and other cities across the country at the behest of the Trump White House. Multiple undocumented immigrants have died while trying to flee masked agents during immigration raids, while others have come under gunfire in their vehicles and many more have been beaten by masked agents who did not immediately identify themselves.

    Levine says it’s a person’s constitutional right under the 4th Amendment to ask a masked, federal agent to identify themselves.

    “It takes a cool head under a tense moment to ask someone, ‘What’s your name? I can’t see your badge? Can you identify yourself?’” Levine said. “It’s practically impossible to ask all of that when you’re being thrown to the ground. But you do have the right to ask.”

    There are plenty of examples of people impersonating law enforcement in California in recent years.

    In April 2018, Luis Flores-Mendoza of Santa Ana was sentenced to eight months in prison for posing as a federal immigration officer in an attempt to extort $5,000 from a woman, who reported him to the police. The following month, Matthew Ryan Johnston of Fontana was sentenced to two years in federal prison for impersonating an ICE agent. In 2023 and 2024, police in Southern California announced arrests in two separate cases where men were accused of impersonating police to conduct traffic stops.

    State officials have sounded the alarm as well because of the Trump administration’s approach.

    Earlier this year, after federal immigration raids in the Central Valley, two Fresno men were accused of posing as federal immigration agents and recording themselves harassing local businesses. The Fresno Police Department said the pair, who wore wigs and black tactical vests with letters deliberately covered up so they read “Police” and “ICE,” confronted people at nearly a dozen businesses. The department said the men appeared to have done it for social media purposes and declined to release their names.

    a man places a sign on part of a "No Ice" mural

    Raymond Cruz, 56, places a sign on part of a “No Ice” mural in Inglewood on July 1.

    (Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

    In March, Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta issued a warning to Californians about the rise of ICE impersonators and scammers looking to take “advantage of the fear and uncertainty created by Trump’s mass deportation policies. “

    “Let me be clear: If you seek to scam or otherwise take advantage of California’s immigrant communities, you will be held accountable,” Bonta said.

    In June, two additional local cases popped up that weren’t included on the FBI memo.

    In one, Huntington Park police arrested a man who they suspected of posing as a Border Patrol agent. Police said the man possessed an unlicensed handgun and copies of U.S. Homeland Security removal notices and a list of radio codes for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

    Huntington Park Police Chief Cosme Lozano speaks as he joins officials in a press conference

    Huntington Park Police Chief Cosme Lozano speaks at a press conference after a 23-year-old man from Los Angeles was arrested by Huntington Park Police on suspicion of impersonating a law enforcement officer.

    (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

    In the other, police in Los Angeles County arrested a man driving a decommissioned police cruiser with control lights and a siren. Authorities allege he had cocaine, a forged Homeland Security investigator’s badge and a pellet gun in his car.

    In a statement, Property of the People Executive Director Ryan Shapiro said, “It’s rich the FBI thinks ICE has a PR problem in immigrant communities because of impersonators, while masked and militarized ICE agents are waging a daily campaign of terror against those very communities.”

    “Anyone caught impersonating a federal immigration agent will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” a senior Homeland Security official said.

    “Anyone who comes into immediate contact with an individual whom they believe is impersonating an immigration officer, or any law enforcement officer, should immediately contact their local law enforcement agency,” the official said.

    Kash Patel, President Trump and Pam Bondi stand next to each other

    Kash Patel, director of the FBI, left, President Trump, center, and Pam Bondi, U.S. attorney general, during a news conference in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 15.

    (Jo Lo Scalzo/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

    In a statement to The Times, the office of Mayor Karen Bass said it’s unacceptable for law enforcement officers to operate without properly identifying themselves.

    “The Mayor has been supportive of state legislation that would require immigration officers to identify themselves as well as make it a crime for law enforcement officers to wear a face covering while performing their duties, except for specific circumstances such as protection from hazardous smoke.”

    Los Angeles Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, whose district includes MacArthur Park, Cypress Park and Pico Union, said the FBI’s memo simply confirms what locals have known all along, even as they create “confusion, fear, chaos and real danger.”

    “Now even the FBI, under an administration that has aggressively expanded unconstitutional immigration enforcement, has confirmed that when agents don’t clearly identify themselves, it opens the door for violent impersonators to prey on vulnerable families,” Hernandez said in a statement. “That’s exactly why I co-authored the council motion requiring the LAPD to verify the identity of anyone claiming to be a law enforcement officer, and to strengthen penalties for impersonating an officer. When even Trump’s FBI is warning that unidentified agents put us at risk, it’s a clear sign that this problem can’t be ignored any longer.”

    Still, not everyone thinks agents will heed the FBI’s advice. Even if agents were to begin identifying themselves during sweeps, the distrust stemming from the raids in the summer will stay with community members for some time, advocates say.

    “I don’t expect them to all of a sudden start walking around with no mask or start walking around and identifying themselves,” said Leo Martinez of VC Defensa, a coalition of local groups dedicated to protecting the immigrant and refugee populations of Ventura County. “More than anything, I think it’s a way for the FBI to put a little bit of distance between themselves and the ICE agents in the public relations sphere, but not really on the ground.”

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    Nathan Solis, Ruben Vives

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  • California officials push back on Trump claim that Prop. 50 vote is a ‘GIANT SCAM’

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    As California voters went to the polls Tuesday to cast their ballot on a measure that could block President Trump’s national agenda, state officials ridiculed his unsubstantiated claims that voting in the largely Democratic state is “rigged.”

    “The Unconstitutional Redistricting Vote in California is a GIANT SCAM in that the entire process, in particular the Voting itself, is RIGGED,” Trump said on Truth Social just minutes after polling stations opened Tuesday across California.

    The president provided no evidence for his allegations.

    “All ‘Mail-In’ Ballots, where the Republicans in that State are ‘Shut Out,’ is under very serious legal and criminal review,” the GOP president wrote. “STAY TUNED!”

    Gov. Gavin Newsom dismissed the president’s claims on X as “the ramblings of an old man that knows he’s about to LOSE.”

    His press office chimed in, too, calling Trump “a totally unserious person spreading false information in a desperate attempt to cope with his failures.”

    National tension is high as voters across California cast ballots on Proposition 50, a Democratic plan championed by Newsom to redraw the state’s congressional districts ahead of the 2026 election to favor the Democratic Party. The measure is intended to offset GOP gerrymandering in red states after Trump pressed Texas to rejigger maps to shore up the GOP’s narrow House majority.

    California’s top elections official, Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber, called Trump’s allegation “another baseless claim.”

    “The bottom line is California elections have been validated by the courts,” Weber said in a statement. “California voters will not be deceived by someone who consistently makes desperate, unsubstantiated attempts to dissuade Americans from participating in our democracy.”

    Weber noted that more than 7 million Californians have already voted and encouraged those who had yet to cast ballots to go to the polls.

    “California voters will not be sidelined from exercising their constitutional right to vote and should not let anyone deter them from exercising that right,” Weber said.

    Of the 7 million Californians who have voted, more than 4.6 million have done so by mail, according to the secretary of state’s office. Los Angeles residents alone have cast more than 788,000 mail-in ballots.

    Trump has long criticized mail-in voting. As more Democrats opted to vote by mail in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, the president repeatedly made unproven claims linking mail in voting with voter fraud. When Trump ultimately lost that election, he blamed expanded mail-in voting.

    Over the last month, the stakes in the California special election have ratcheted up as polls indicate Proposition 50 could pass. More than half of likely California voters said they planned to support the measure, which could allow Democrats to gain up to five House seats.

    Last month, the Justice Department appeared to single out California for particular national scrutiny: It announced it would send federal monitors to polling locations in counties in California as well as New Jersey, another traditionally Democratic state that is conducting nationally significant off-year elections.

    The monitors are set to go to five California counties: Los Angeles, Kern, Riverside, Fresno and Orange.

    This story will be updated.

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    Jenny Jarvie

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  • Photos: World Series champion Dodgers parade through Downtown L.A.

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    Dodgers fans filled the streets of downtown Los Angeles early Monday morning, to celebrate the Dodgers becoming baseball’s first back-to-back World Series champion in 25 years.

    The celebratory parade is commenced at 11 a.m., with the Dodgers traveling on top of double-decker buses through downtown with a final stop at Dodger Stadium.

    The 2025 Dodgers team has been a bright spot for many Angelenos during an otherwise tumultuous year for the region, after historic firestorms devastated thousands of homes in January and then widespread immigration sweeps over the summer by the Trump administration.

    (Eric Thayer/Los Angeles Times)

    Manager Dave Roberts holds the Commissioner’s Trophy during the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration Monday.

    Fans fill the streets of downtown Los Angeles following the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

    Fans fill the streets of downtown Los Angeles following the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Shohei Ohtani during the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    (Eric Thayer/Los Angeles Times)

    Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Shohei Ohtani during the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    Ramon Ontivros, left, and Michelle Ruiz, both from Redlands, join fans lining the streets of downtown Los Angeles.

    (Kayla Bartkowsk/Los Angeles Times)

    Ramon Ontivros, left, and Michelle Ruiz, both from Redlands, join fans lining the streets of downtown Los Angeles.

    Fans fill the streets of downtown Los Angeles following the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

    Fans fill the streets of downtown Los Angeles following the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    From left, Mike Soto, Luis Espino, and Francisco Espino, join fans lining the streets of downtown Los Angeles.

    (Kayla Bartkowsk/Los Angeles Times)

    From left, Mike Soto, Luis Espino, and Francisco Espino, join fans lining the streets of downtown Los Angeles.

    Mia Nava, 9, waves a flag. "She's skipping school today and her teachers know her passion." Said her mom, Jennie Nava.

    (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

    Mia Nava, 9, waves a flag. “She’s skipping school today and her teachers know her passion.” Said her mom, Jennie Nava.

    Alex Portugal holds onto a championship belt at Dodger Stadium.
    Claudia Villar Lee, poses with a model of the MLB Commissioner's trophy around her neck.

    (Carlin Stiehl/For The Times)

    Alex Portugal holds onto a championship belt at Dodger Stadium. Claudia Villar Lee, poses with a model of the World Series trophy around her neck.

    Young fans line the streets of downtown Los Angeles for the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

    (Kayla Bartkowsk/Los Angeles Times)

    Young fans line the streets of downtown Los Angeles for the Dodgers World Championship Parade and Celebration.

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    Kayla Bartkowski, Allen J. Schaben, Carlin Stiehl, Eric Thayer

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  • Party time: Dodgers’ championship parade and rally on Monday

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    The wait for the first Dodgers parade of the century: 36 years.

    The wait for the second: One year and two days.

    On Monday, in celebration of the Dodgers becoming baseball’s first back-to-back champion in 25 years, Los Angeles will throw another party for the Dodgers.

    The Dodgers’ 2025 championship parade starts at 11 a.m on Monday and runs through downtown, followed by a rally at Dodger Stadium. The rally requires a ticket, which can be obtained starting at noon Sunday at dodgers.com/postseason.

    For fans with rally tickets, parking lot gates will open at 8:30 a.m. and stadium gates at 9 a.m. The event is expected to start about 12:15 p.m.

    The parade and rally will be aired live on Channels 2, 4, 5, 7, 9 and 11 as well as SportsNet LA and AM 570, the team said.

    In last year’s rally, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts and Ice Cube performed next to each other, with Roberts dancing and Ice Cube singing.

    At one point, future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw took his turn at the microphone and hollered, “Dodger for life!”

    In September, Kershaw announced he would retire at the end of the season. In his only World Series appearance, he got a critical out in the Dodgers’ 18-inning victory in Game 3.

    He’ll make his final Dodger Stadium appearance as a player as part of a second consecutive championship rally. He’ll be back: The Dodgers will retire his No. 22 — they retire the number of all their Hall of Famers — and he’d certainly be in line to throw ceremonial first pitches in the Dodgers’ future postseason runs.

    For now, though: Three-time champion Dodger for life.

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    Bill Shaikin

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  • Gov. Gavin Newsom, Kamala Harris rally Californians to vote on Prop. 50

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    Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Vice President Kamala Harris and a slew of other national and California Democrats on Saturday rallied supporters to stay fired up in seeking passage of a ballot measure to redraw the state’s congressional districts ahead of the midterm elections.

    While polling suggests Proposition 50 is likely to pass Tuesday, volunteers must continue knocking on doors, phone banking and motivating voters through Election Day, they said. Newsom told volunteers they ought to follow the model of sprinters, leaving it all on the field.

    “We cannot afford to run the 90-yard dash. You Angelenos, you’ve got the Olympics coming in 2028. They do not run the 90-yard dash. They run the 110-yard dash. We have got to be at peak on Election Day,” Newsom told hundreds of supporters at the Convention Center in downtown Los Angeles. “We cannot take anything for granted.”

    Hours earlier, Republicans spoke out against the ballot measure at John Wayne Park in Newport Beach, before sending teams into neighborhoods to drum up votes for their side.

    “What Proposition 50 will do is disenfranchise, meaning, disregard all Republicans in the state of California,” state Assembly member Diane Dixon (R-Newport Beach) said. “Ninety percent of 6 million [Californian Republicans] will be disenfranchised.”

    Prop. 50 would redraw California’s congressional districts in an attempt to boost the number of Democrats in Congress. The effort was proposed by Newsom and other California Democrats in hope of blunting President Trump’s push in Texas and other GOP-led states to increase the number of Republicans elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in next year’s midterm elections. But even if voters approve the ballot measure that could flip five California districts currently represented by Republicans, it’s unclear whether that will be enough to shift control of the House unless there is a blue wave in the 2026 elections.

    The party that wins control of the House will shape Trump’s final two years in the White House and determine whether he is able to continue enacting his agenda or whether he faces a spate of investigations and possibly another impeachment attempt.

    The special election is among the costliest ballot measures in state history. More than $192 million has flowed into various campaign committees since state lawmakers voted in August to put the proposition on the ballot. Supporters of the redistricting effort raised exponentially more money than opponents, and polling shows the proposition is likely to pass.

    As of Friday, more than a quarter of the state’s 23 million registered voters had cast ballots, with Democrats outpacing Republicans.

    Newsom was joined Saturday by Harris, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla of California and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, other Democrats and labor leaders.

    Harris, in a surprise appearance at the gathering, argued that the Trump administration is implementing long-sought GOP goals such as voter suppression.

    “This fight is not about sitting by and complaining, ‘Oh, they’re cheating,’” the former vice president said. “It’s about recognizing what they are up to. There is an agenda that we are witnessing which feels chaotic, I know, but in fact, we are witnessing a high-velocity event that is about the swift implementation of a plan that has been decades in the making.”

    Several speakers referred to the immigration raids that started in Los Angeles in June and deep cuts to federal safety nets, including the nutrition assistance program for low-income families and healthcare coverage for seniors and the disabled.

    “We know there’s so much on the line this Tuesday. And a reminder, Tuesday is not Election Day — it’s the last day to vote,” Padilla said. “Don’t wait till Tuesday. Get your ballots in, folks…. As good as the polls look, we need to run up the score on this because the eyes of the country are going to be on California on Tuesday. And we need to win and we need to win big.”

    Padilla, a typically staid legislator, then offered a modified riff of a lyric by rapper Ice Cube, who grew up in South Los Angeles.

    “Donald Trump — you better check yourself before you wreck America,” said Padilla, who is considering running for governor next year.

    Nearly 50 miles southeast, about 50 Republican canvassers fueled up on coffee and doughnuts, united over the brisk weather and annoyance about Newsom’s attempt to redraw California’s congressional districts.

    Will O’Neill, chairman of the Orange County Republican Party, equated this final push against Prop. 50 as the California GOP’s Game 7 — a nod to Friday night’s World Series battle between the Dodgers and Toronto Blue Jays.

    “Orange County right now is the only county in Southern California that has a shot of having more Republicans than Democrats voting,” O’Neill said. “We expect that over the next three days, around 70% of everyone who votes is gonna vote no on 50. But we need them to vote.”

    Ariana Assenmacher, of California Young Republicans, center, organizes during a gathering of Republican Party members pressing to vote no on Proposition 50 in the upcoming California Statewide Special Election at John Wayne Park in Newport Beach on Saturday, November 1, 2025.

    (Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

    O’Neill labeled the measure a “hyper-partisan power grab.” If Prop. 50 passes, it will dilute Republican power in Orange County by splitting communities and roping some residents into districts represented by Los Angeles County politicians.

    Dixon also rallied volunteers — which included a handful of college students from across the state: “Be polite. Just say thank you very much. Just like Charlie Kirk would. Don’t [stimulate] an argument. Just be friendly.”

    “They’re squeezing out what very little representation Republicans have in the state,” said Kristen Nicole Valle, president of the Orange County Young Republicans.

    “We will not be hearing from 40% of Californians if Prop. 50 passes.”

    Randall Avila, executive director of the Orange County GOP, said the measure disenfranchises Latino GOP voters like himself.

    Nationally, Trump managed to gain 48% of the Latino vote, a Pew Research study showed, which proved crucial to his second presidential victory.

    “Obviously our community has kind of shown we’re willing to switch parties and go another direction if that elected official or that party isn’t serving us,” Avila said. “So it’s unfortunate that some of those voices are now gonna be silenced with a predetermined winner in their district.”

    Not all hope is lost for Republicans if Prop. 50 is approved, Avila said. A handful of seats could be snagged by Republicans, including the districts held by Reps. Dave Min (D-Irvine) and Derek Tran (D-Orange).

    “If the lines do change, that doesn’t mean we pack up and go home,” he said. “Just means we reorganize, we reconfigure things, and then we keep fighting.”

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    Seema Mehta, Andrea Flores

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