The Brief

Veterans Affairs administrators and advocates are urging federal officials to change a rule that disqualifies some L.A.-area unhoused veterans from government-funded housing.

The rule has kept hundreds of unhoused veterans with serious disabilities — caused by their military service — from living in apartments on the sprawling 400-acre West L.A. Veterans Affairs campus. Federal housing officials have said their hands are legally tied.

The problem isn’t limited to just Los Angeles. VA officials told LAist that cities across California — and the country — are dealing with the same limitations. They include San Diego, Fresno, San Francisco, Oakland, Reno, Portland, Seattle, Chicago and New Orleans.

The national problem stems from a Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) rule that counts veterans’ federal disability stipends as income. That money, combined with Social Security, can put their income level just high enough to disqualify them from housing.

VA officials and advocates interviewed by LAist, along with several local congressional representatives, say the rule doesn’t make sense and hurts those who have sacrificed greatly for their country.

“We're…penalizing those veterans who need help the most,” said John Kuhn, deputy director of the West L.A. VA Medical Center.

Kuhn said the system "defies logic": The most injured and disabled veterans can’t access federally-funded housing.

While some progress has been made on the issue this year, many veterans remain shut out of VA apartments due to their disability stipends.

Too much income — barely

It is very easy for a veteran to lose out on housing intended for them. Here’s how: The most significantly disabled veteran receives compensation of $43,463 a year for their disability. But to qualify for a HUD housing voucher in Los Angeles, a veteran’s income can’t exceed $44,150.

A disabled veteran can surpass that razor-thin margin of eligibility, $687, if they receive additional income from Social Security benefits, for example.

And some veterans receive extra disability stipends — for example, for the loss of use of body parts, such as blindness or an amputation — that push them over the $44,150 limit.

Previously, the income limit to be eligible for a housing voucher was $26,500, excluding even more veterans from VA housing. The limit was increased in May.

But even with the new, higher limit, VA homelessness executive Keith Harris estimates that at least 230 unhoused veterans in L.A. still have too much income to qualify for the housing.

In an email, a spokesperson for the West Los Angeles VA public affairs office characterized the number of veterans locked out of housing as “small.”

The spokesperson added: “The VA remains concerned and vigilant as the Veterans who are impacted face significant clinical needs that warrant greater attention.”

There are about 3,900 veterans experiencing homelessness in L.A. County, according to the latest point-in-time count conducted in January.

Rob Reynolds speaks with the producer and host of How To LA at the West LA VA campus near the tiny homes.

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Unhoused veteran says he makes too much to qualify

Deavin Sessom, 67, served in the Army shortly after the Vietnam War. He told LAist he experienced serious trauma, leading to PTSD and depression, which in turn lead to a divorce, and losing his family and housing in 2013.

Sessom has been trying to qualify for housing on the West L.A. VA campus.

“The reason they won’t house me is because I make too much money,” said Sessom, who collects both disability compensation and Social Security.

He was one of about 50 veterans who lived in an encampment outside the campus, known as Veterans Row, that was shut down in late 2021. Sessom said he saw two of his friends stabbed earlier this year, in incidents reported by the L.A. Times and KCRW.

When apartments on the campus became available in 2017, Sessom told LAist, he was promised he would be one of the first to get housing. But as others in the encampment slowly trickled into housing, he’s been left in a tiny home — a stopgap measure provided by the VA, similar to a shed — until he gets permanent housing.

Sessom worries about safety issues that come with staying there — last year, 11 of the tiny home shelters burned down, including his own.

Following his divorce, Sessom now leans on the veteran community as his family. He said housing on campus would allow him to be connected to them.

The reading room in newly refurbished building that houses unhoused veterans at the West L.A. VA campus, seen during a grand opening tour on May 2, 2023. Standing in the center of the photo is Jason Pu, the top administrator in California for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

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The case for changing the rules

For years, veterans and their supporters have been pleading with HUD to exclude disability accommodations from income calculations in order to include more disabled veterans.

Kuhn pointed out that these benefits are not considered income when veterans file their taxes. “So why are we calling it income for the purposes of housing?" he said.

Service-connected disability compensation is directly tied to the level of injury suffered by veterans during their military service. This includes injuries such as PTSD, traumatic brain injury, amputation or gastrointestinal issues. Finding employment and housing are just some of the challenges faced by veterans with disabilities.

Veterans with PTSD are especially prone to isolation and distrust of others, which can further strain their housing situation.

The inside of a living area and kitchen at new housing for unhoused veterans at the West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs campus, during a tour on Tuesday, May 2, 2023.

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Congressmembers, including Rep. Mark Takano (D-Riverside), the top Democrat on the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, share the concerns of VA officials like Kuhn.

In March, Takano wrote in a letter to VA leaders: "Veterans who are homeless are often on the streets not as a result of extremely limited income, but severe trauma directly related to their military service."

Takano emphasized that the current practice of creating permanent supportive housing across the VA system for extremely low-income veterans inadvertently limits access to quality, subsidized housing for high-needs veterans who may have more income as a result of disabilities from their military service.

To address this issue, Takano has called on HUD and the Treasury Department to exclude veteran disability compensation when determining HUD voucher eligibility.

But HUD has said its hands are tied because of the way the law is written.

In 2016, Congress passed the Housing Opportunity Through Modernization Act, which directed HUD to exclude two other types of veteran compensation as income. HUD has interpreted the law to mean that disability compensation — which is not one of the two exclusions — should be included as income.

Additionally, HUD officials have said that such a change would result in veterans with disabilities paying much less toward their rent than non-veterans with disabilities, despite receiving much higher disability compensation.

That concern stems from the fact that people who live in HUD-funded housing pay a percentage of their income as rent.

“Veteran disability benefits can in some cases be significantly higher than other disability benefits,” wrote Kimberly A. McClain, HUD’s assistant secretary for congressional and intergovernmental relations, in a May letter to Congressman Mike Levin.

“Excluding all veteran disability benefits would result in those families paying little or nothing for rent while [non-veteran] disabled families with a much smaller benefit would still be required to pay a substantially higher amount as their share of the rent,” McClain added.

Kuhn said the root of the problem is that the HUD rules were designed for the general population, and rely on an income threshold to ensure that affordable housing is prioritized for people who need it most.

But Kuhn said veteran housing doesn’t need the same kind of rationing because the VA has sufficient resources to serve every homeless veteran. "To create these artificial barriers only makes it more difficult to serve homeless veterans,” he said.

“We need to have somewhat different rules because veterans have served their country and are getting this disability income for their service because of what they experienced,” Kuhn said.

Rep. Brad Sherman, a Democrat whose district includes the West L.A. VA campus, said legislation is being developed to direct HUD to exclude disability compensation when determining eligibility for veteran housing vouchers. Working alongside Reps. Takano and Ted Lieu (D-Santa Monica), Sherman said he is hopeful for progress. To date, no bill has been introduced.

The inside of a bedroom at new housing for unhoused veterans at the West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs campus, during a tour on Tuesday, May 2, 2023.

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Jumbled VA priorities

Veteran Rob Reynolds, who advocates for veterans experiencing homelessness, questions why this income limit problem wasn’t dealt with years ago when the VA was originally planning the housing. He noted VA leaders have historically given priority over department land to “baseball stadiums, oil drilling, parking lot deals, dog parks” that have been allowed to lease the space – which a federal judge found was illegal.

In the 1960s and 70s, the VA stopped housing veterans in need on its land and began renting parts of the property to other entities.

NPR reported in 2012, before a homeless housing master plan was created, that the VA was taking in between $28 million and possibly more than $40 million a year in rent.

A lack of movement on veteran homelessness

VA officials are running about four years behind on promises to create 1,200 homes for veterans at the campus — so far just 233 units have been built.

Those promises were made in 2015 to settle an ACLU lawsuit alleging the VA was illegally renting the land for private purposes like TV set storage, a hotel laundry facility and a parking service.

VA officials have said they would speed up construction if Congress authorized money for it and that they currently don’t have the authority to move forward.

Reynolds expressed doubt about the government's ability to address homelessness given the four-year delay.

Why the lack of movement? He thinks it’s primarily a lack of will by elected officials. “There’s no shortage of infrastructure,” Reynolds said, “and look at how difficult it is to get them housing.”

He pointed out that the VA possesses vast amounts of land and empty buildings, and said if Congress allocated funds specifically for housing construction, it could eliminate the need for income restrictions altogether.

It’s a real contrast, he said, to how quickly he saw the U.S. government build infrastructure when he served in the Iraq War.

“If you can do this in a theater of combat, and set up housing and take care of people right away, why can you not do this in the United States?" Reynolds said. "It's ridiculous.”

It's spring break season in the U.S. — and travelers are facing long airport lines as security screeners work without pay while the Department of Homeland security is shut down.

Congressional Democrats have declined to fund the agency in an attempt to force reforms of federal immigration enforcement practices.

Wait times at major hubs in Houston and Atlanta reached two hours on Friday, while New Orleans's Louis Armstrong International Airport advised passengers to arrive at least three hours before their scheduled departures. In Philadelphia, airport officials closed three security checkpoints entirely this week because of short staffing.

On Saturday, President Trump threatened to send Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to staff airport security lanes if Democrats don't "immediately" agree to fund DHS. A bipartisan group of senators has been negotiating with the White House over immigration enforcement and ending the shutdown.

"I will move our brilliant and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will do Security like no one has ever seen before, including the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country," Trump posted on Truth Social. In a follow-up post he said he told ICE to "GET READY" to deploy to airports on Monday.

Why are wait times so long?

Officials say wait times are unpredictable and can fluctuate sharply as airports struggle with Transportation Security Administration staffing shortages.

TSA staffers are considered essential workers, so about 50,000 have been working without pay due to the shutdown that started Feb. 14. Last week, they missed their first full paychecks. The Department of Homeland Security says more than 300 TSA officers have quit. More than half of TSA staff in Houston called out sick and nearly a third called out in Atlanta and New Orleans last week, DHS said.

The staffing shortage comes as travel has also been disrupted by severe weather, and as schools across the country close for spring break.

Some 2.8 million people were projected to travel on U.S. airlines each day in March and April, adding up to a record 171 million passengers, according to the industry group Airlines for America.

What do officials say?

Transportation officials are warning the situation could get worse if the shutdown isn't resolved. A second missed paycheck would put even more strain on TSA workers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told CNN on Friday.

"If a deal isn't cut, you're going to see what's happening today look like child's play," Duffy said. "Is it still safe as you go through the airport? Yes, but it takes a lot longer because we have less agents working." He added that some smaller airports may be forced to temporarily close if more staff calls out.

In the U.K., Foreign Office officials are also warning travelers of "travel disruption" caused by "longer than usual queues at some U.S. airports," and recommended passengers check with their travel provider, airport, or airline for guidance.

On Saturday, billionaire Elon Musk weighed in with an offer to personally pay TSA staff.

"I would like to offer to pay the salaries of TSA personnel during this funding impasse that is negatively affecting the lives of so many Americans at airports throughout the country," Musk posted on X early Saturday morning.

U.S. law generally bars government employees from receiving outside compensation for their work.

Even with disruptions, travel demand is still high

On top of long security wait times and weather impacts, travel is being affected by the war in Iran, which is driving up global oil prices.

On Friday, United Airlines said it would cut some flights over the next six months after jet fuel prices doubled in recent weeks. Capacity cuts are likely to send airfares even higher, even as ticket prices are already rising, said Clint Henderson, a spokesperson for the travel website The Points Guy.

Still, he said, none of that seems to be deterring Americans from flying.

"The appetite for travel is insatiable," he said. "People seem willing to endure a lot of stuff to travel. And I don't see any signs of that decreasing."

How can travelers prepare?

Travel experts say it's not just long wait times that travelers should prepare for — it's the uncertainty.

"Every day this goes on, it's getting worse and worse and worse," Henderson said.

Here are some tips on how to prepare for upcoming air travel:

1. Know before you go

Many airport websites list estimated security wait times. That should be the first place you check to get a sense of how long lines might be, Henderson says. (TSA also estimates wait times on its website and app, but that's not being regularly updated because of the shutdown, he added.)

"Knowledge is power," Henderson said. "You should know what's going on at your local airport."

He noted there are 20 U.S. airports where security screening is done by private contractors, not the TSA — and they are not experiencing staffing shortages or long waits. Some are smaller regional airports, but the list also includes some larger hubs, including San Francisco International Airport and Kansas City International Airport.

"There's big, big, big metropolitan areas where it's not an issue at all," Henderson said.

2. Budget extra time

If you're someone who shows up at the airport when your flight starts boarding, think twice, says travel writer Chris Dong.

"I'm the type of traveler who usually arrives pretty last minute," Dong said, "but I think that that advice would not be sound for the current situation."

Even if wait times are listed as short, things can change on a dime. Dong recently flew out of John F. Kennedy Airport in New York and found the TSA PreCheck line unexpectedly closed.

"So then everyone that was funneled through the regular line, it was an extra like 20, 30 minutes," he said. "I was sweating it out because I usually arrive super last-minute. And those levels of uncertainty are just higher now with the shutdown."

3. Consider biometric screening

Henderson typically recommends signing up for TSA PreCheck or the Global Entry program to move through airport security more quickly — and to opt in to biometric screening. That has to be done in advance, and travelers also have to choose biometric screening in their airline apps.

"Make sure if that's an option that you're opted in for that, because that will save you so much agita," he said.

For those who haven't signed up in advance, there is a last-minute alternative: the private CLEAR program, which allows people to enroll at the airport. Henderson notes it's pricey — annual membership costs $209 — but that some credit card companies will refund that fee.

"For me to skip a three-hour line is probably worth the membership fee, especially if you know your credit card will pay you back for it," he said.

That said, expedited screening lanes are not always faster than regular screening, both Henderson and Dong warned. Always check what all the lanes look like when you arrive at the airport.

4. Make a plan B

If you miss a connection or your flight is canceled, be proactive about rebooking. "Have all the tools available to you in the toolbox in case things go wrong," Henderson advises.

That includes installing your airline's app on your smartphone and writing down their customer service number, so you aren't scrambling to find it.

"And then, you know, obviously have a plan B," Henderson said. "Know what other airlines fly the route that you want to take in case, you know, you missed your Delta flight and American is offering a flight you can take later that day."

He says while airlines don't generally like to rebook passengers on competitors' flights, it's worth asking. He also recommends having the information at hand to give to customer service agents, including flight number, airline and departure time.

And if an airline cancels your flight in the U.S., you're entitled to a refund, according to the Department of Transportation.
Copyright 2026 NPR

Updated March 21, 2026 at 17:36 PM ET

Robert Mueller, the former FBI director and special counsel who led the high-profile investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and the possible obstruction of justice by President Trump, died on Friday at 81.

"With deep sadness, we are sharing the news that Bob passed away," his family said in a statement Saturday shared with NPR. No cause of death was given.

Mueller had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease four years ago, his family told The New York Times in August.

Trump, who openly despised Mueller and his investigation, celebrated his death on Saturday.

"Good, I'm glad he's dead," the president posted on social media. "He can no longer hurt innocent people!"

WilmerHale, the law firm where Mueller served as a partner, remembered Mueller as a "friend" who was "an extraordinary leader and public servant and a person of the greatest integrity."

"His service to our country, including as a decorated officer in the Marine Corps, as FBI Director, and at the Department of Justice, was exemplary and inspiring," a spokesperson for WilmerHale told NPR in a statement. "We are deeply proud that he was our partner. Our thoughts are with Bob's family and loved ones during this time."

Former President Barack Obama on Saturday called Mueller "one of the finest directors in the history of the FBI, transforming the bureau after 9/11 and saving countless lives."

"But it was his relentless commitment to the rule of law and his unwavering belief in our bedrock values that made him one of the most respected public servants of our time," Obama wrote on social media. "Michelle and I send our condolences to Bob's family, and everyone who knew and admired him."

Path to public service

Born on Aug. 7, 1944 in New York City, Mueller was raised in Philadelphia and graduated from Princeton University in 1966. He received a master's degree in international relations from New York University.

Mueller, throughout his career, ran toward tough assignments. Following the lead of a classmate at Princeton, Mueller enrolled in the Marines and served in the Vietnam war. He earned the Bronze Star for rescuing a colleague. Mueller said he felt compelled to serve during that conflict, an idea he returned to throughout his life.

Law professor and former Justice Department lawyer Rory Little knew Mueller for many years.

"Bob is kind of a straight arrow, you know, wounded in Vietnam," Little said. "You keep wanting to hunt for where is the crack in that façade — 'Where is the real Bob Mueller?' — and after a while you begin to realize that's the real Bob Mueller. He is exactly who he appears to be. This kind of sour-faced, not a lot of humor, sort of all-business guy. That's him."

But with his closest friends, Mueller let down his guard. They teased him — saying Mueller would have made an excellent drill instructor on Parris Island, where Marine recruits are trained.

Instead, Mueller went to law school at the University of Virginia. He joined the Justice Department in 1976. There, he prosecuted crimes, big and small, for U.S. attorneys in San Francisco and Boston. He was a partner at Hale and Dorr, a Boston law firm now known as WilmerHale.

He later became a senior litigator prosecuting homicides at the U.S. attorney's office in Washington, D.C.

Head of the FBI

In 2001, President George W. Bush nominated him to serve as the director of the FBI. Mueller was sworn in a week before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"I had been a prosecutor before, so I anticipated spending time on public corruption cases and narcotics cases and bank robberies, and the like. And Sept. 11th changed all of that," Mueller told NPR during an interview in 2013.

He shifted the bureau's attention to fighting terrorism. He staffed up the headquarters in Washington. He pushed those agents to try to predict crimes and to act before another tragedy hit.

"He directed and implemented what is arguably the most significant changes in the FBI's 105-year history," said his former FBI deputy, John Pistole.

Along the way, Mueller drew some criticism when his agents erred. During the investigation of the deadly anthrax attacks, the bureau focused on the wrong man as its lead suspect.

Mueller left the bureau in 2013.

Return to the national spotlight

After Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, Mueller in May 2017 was appointed by then Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein as special counsel to oversee the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and possible connections to Trump associates.

Trump called the investigation "a witch hunt" and Republicans in Congress started to attack the investigators.

When then the investigation eventually concluded in March 2019 with the more than 400-page "Mueller report," the special counsel said the investigation did not establish that Trump's campaign or associates colluded with the Russian government to influence the 2016 election. The report did not take a position on whether Trump obstructed justice.

Mueller said the report spoke for itself. But Democrats wanted more and insisted he testify. A reluctant witness, Mueller once again fulfilled his duty. He was visibly older than at the time of his appointment and kept his testimony restrained.

He said Justice Department guidelines would not allow him to charge a sitting president with criminal wrongdoing. But he also refused to exonerate Trump.

"If we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so," Mueller later told Congress.

In the end, the team charged 37 people and entities, including former campaign chair Paul Manafort, national security adviser Michael Flynn and 25 Russians.

Trump went on to grant clemency to or back away from criminal cases against many of the people Mueller's investigators had charged.

Copyright 2026 NPR

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice. 

“She would always be there first,” said conductor Eun-young Kim. “If she couldn’t come, she would tell me ahead of time. This time, I didn’t receive any messages from her. I thought, something isn’t right.”

Kim tried calling and sending messages. She didn’t get a response.

Members of the center later learned that Lee, 73, was critically injured in a hit-and-run crash while biking home in Koreatown after attending early morning prayer at her church. She died in a hospital March 13 from her injuries, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.

“I was shocked,” said Jin-soon Baek, who has played with Lee for years. “We’ve been friends for a long time. We ate together, practiced together. She was like a sibling to me.

“She was so hardworking. Always the first one there to sign in for class. She’d walk ahead of me and I’d follow behind. That’s how it always was.”

Baek, who is in her 80s, said the two also shared something more personal: Both had cancer.

“I had cancer years ago, and she was going through treatment recently,” Baek said. “We understood each other.”

In January, Lee played with the harmonica ensemble at an LA Kings game. Lee spoke with a journalist about undergoing surgery and chemotherapy, and what the group meant to her. 

“I think I’ve almost fully recovered,” Lee told journalist Chase Karng at the hockey game. “Even while receiving chemotherapy, I felt encouraged when I heard that I could perform here.”

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice.

Lee was born in 1952 in South Korea and immigrated to the United States in 1998. She was an elder at Saehan Presbyterian Church in Pico Union and is survived by her husband, Sang-rae Lee, and son, Young-jo Lee.

The senior center, where Lee was a fixture and known as a reliable friend, has designated March 20 as a day of mourning.

On Friday, Lee’s church held a funeral service, where members of the harmonica ensemble performed the hymn, “Nearer My God to Thee,” in her memory.

“I usually don’t attend funeral services, but I had to come for hers,” said Alice Kim. “Whenever I came to church, I would see her watering the grass, bent over, and she would smile and say, ‘You’re here, Alice,’ and hand me the Sunday bulletin.”

In her eulogy, elder Gyu-sook Lee said the sudden loss has hit the congregation hard.

“She always greeted everyone with a warm smile,” she said. “She was the kind of person who always stepped forward first to do the hard work that no one else wanted to do. And when she took something on, she saw it through to the end.”

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice.

“She still had so many years ahead of her,” Baek said. “She was younger than us. Full of hope. It feels like it should have been me instead.”

According to police, Lee was riding through a crosswalk when a white Dodge Ram truck turning right struck her around 6:40 a.m. near Olympic Boulevard and Vermont Avenue. The driver briefly stopped, then drove away, authorities said.

Investigators found the truck and are looking into whether the driver was impaired on drugs or alcohol. The truck was seized and there was no information about the driver.

Kim, the conductor, said Lee was the first person to reach out to her when she started to lead the ensemble in September. 

“She sent me a message saying thank you for coming,” Kim said. “She was such a special person to me.” 

At Friday’s service, speaker after speaker described Lee as someone who was a light in every community she was part of. 

“The way she served the church behind the scenes became a lesson in faith for all of us. There isn’t a single part of this church that hasn’t felt her touch. Her warmth, her love, her dedication — I can still feel it,” Gyu-sook Lee said.

When Gilbert Lindsay became the first Black person elected to Los Angeles City Council in 1963, it gave the residents of the predominantly Black District 9 someone who understood the challenges they faced living in South Central. 

This area was the center of Black political power in LA because it was one of the few places in the city Black people were allowed to live and thrive due, in part, to housing restrictions. For the next 63 years, voters in this district — which includes historic South Central, Exposition Park and a small portion of downtown Los Angeles — consecutively chose a Black representative. 

That will end with Curren D. Price Jr., the current District 9 councilmember who can’t run again due to term limits. 

Twelve candidates announced campaigns in February to replace Price. Of them, six candidates have qualified to be on the June 2 primary election ballot, none of whom are Black. They include: Estuardo Mazariegos, Elmer Roldan, Jorge Hernandez Rosas, Jorge Nuño, Martha Sánchez and Jose Ugarte. 

The list is a reflection of the demographic shift of the area, but candidates also told The LA Local that it shows the strength of the district’s Black-Latino political coalition. And with the civil rights gains since the 1960s, while some locals are concerned that issues facing Black voters won’t get the attention they need, others who live in the district said they’re less concerned with what their representative looks like. Instead, they said they want someone who listens and gets things done. 

“As long as you do good in the community, we’re going to be happy,” said Dennis Anya, who works on Central Avenue and has lived in the district for nearly 40 years.

What the demographic shifts in District 9 mean for the June election

The upcoming election comes as the demographics have changed in District 9 and South LA. The Black population in South Los Angeles was 81% in 1965, according to a special census survey from November 1965 of South and East LA. 

As of 2021, District 9, specifically, is about 78% Latino and 13% Black, according to LA City Council population demographic data taken that year as part of a redistricting effort. 

Officials have predicted the district’s shift for years. Former City Councilmembers Kevin De León and Nury Martinez discussed the district’s future in the leaked 2021 audio — checkered with racist remarks — that the LA Times reported in 2022.“This will be [Price’s] last four years,” De Leon said at one point in the conversation, the transcript of which the LA Times published in full. “That eventually becomes a Latino seat.” 

Erin Aubry Kaplan, a writer and columnist who traces her family’s roots to South Central, told The LA Local that because District 9 has historically voted for a Black candidate, there is some anxiety amongst Black voters about losing Black representation in Los Angeles. 

“I would hope that whoever wins, will carry the interest of Black folk forward,” she said.

Manuel Pastor, a USC professor and co-author of “South Central Dreams: Finding Home and Community in South LA,” told The LA Local that traditionally, voters are older. While District 9 is now home to a younger, immigrant community, they may not vote at the same rate as older generations, and undocumented residents are ineligible to vote.  

Pastor said it’s likely for this reason that the current District 9 candidates are not emphasizing being Latino but are modeling their campaigns after other city leaders and focusing on Black-Latino solidarity. 

“Just because the demographics have changed, doesn’t mean that the voting population has changed,” Pastor said.  

Here’s what the candidates say about the transformation of District 9

Chris Martin, one of the two Black candidates who campaigned for the seat but did not qualify for the ballot, said he believes the city’s Black elected officials should have supported Black candidates in the race. Martin said he will challenge the city clerk’s decision on his nomination petition in court. 

“The story of Black political power in the city of Los Angeles is dying,” Martin said. “I felt like I had a good chance of keeping it alive.” 

When Gilbert Lindsay became the first Black person elected to Los Angeles City Council in 1963, it gave the residents of the predominantly Black District 9 someone who understood the challenges they faced living in South Central.

Michelle Washington, the other Black candidate who also did not qualify, did not respond to a request for comment.Price, the current District 9 councilmember, endorsed his deputy Jose Ugarte in the race and wrote in a statement that this election is about solidarity. 

“As a Black man who has served a majority-Latino district, I know that progress in South Central has always come from Black and Brown families moving forward together,” Price wrote. “We’ve had to fight harder for housing, safety, opportunity and the basic investments every neighborhood deserves. And when we’ve made gains, it’s because we stood united.”  

Five of the six candidates who qualified for the ballot told The LA Local that not having a Black candidate on the ballot doesn’t diminish the place of the district’s Black community. (Candidate Jorge Hernandez Rosas did not return requests for comment.) 

“It has always been a Black community and will always be a Black community. This isn’t about a passing of the baton or one community taking over another. It’s about building a solidarity movement,” Estuardo Mazariegos said. 

Elmer Roldan, who carries endorsements from LA Mayor Karen Bass and City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, said the district needs a councilmember who won’t leave anyone behind.“We have to avoid at all costs contributing to Black erasure and Black displacement,” Roldan said.

Ugarte said that the major quality of life problems — like dirty streets and broken street lights — affecting the neighborhood’s Black and brown communities haven’t changed since he was a child living in the district. 

“The same issues are still here,” he said. 

Here’s what happens next

If you haven’t registered to vote and you want to receive a vote-by-mail ballot, you must register to vote by May 18.

Results from the primary election will be certified by July 2. If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, the top two candidates will move on to the general election on Nov. 3, according to the City Clerk’s website. 

The winner of District 9 will begin a four-year term Dec. 14.