The Brief

Austin Beutner, a businessman who was the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District through the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic, is planning to run for mayor of the city of Los Angeles.

Beutner’s plans, which he officially announced Monday, complicate Mayor Karen Bass’ bid to retain her position in the 2026 election. Beutner is the first high-profile competitor officially facing off with Bass, who, since the Palisades Fire, has faced a barrage of criticism over her capability to lead the second-largest city in the United States.

His intention to run was first reported over the weekend.

In an interview with LAist last week, Beutner characterized L.A. as a city “adrift” that he wants to help get “back on track.”

“ How long have we been talking about the same problems? A long, long time,” Beutner, who has lived in the city for 26 years, said. “Let's get beyond talking about the same problems and start solving them.”

In response to Beutner's entry into the race, Doug Herman, the spokesperson for Bass' re-election campaign, said the mayor's "administration has proven it can deliver" on key issues like homelessness and crime.

"Mayor Bass is committed to building on this historic momentum in her second term," Herman said in the statement.

The 2026 race gets a shake up

Bass announced her intention to run for re-election last year.

The L.A. City Ethics Commission website currently lists a total of eight candidates for the 2026 mayoral race. Apart from Bass, only Asaad Y. Alnajjar, a civil engineer who has worked for the city for more than 35 years, has raised money, according to the website.

Beutner's experience in local government could set him apart from the pack and position him as a serious challenger to Bass.

Beutner, born to German immigrant parents in 1960, founded an investment bank early in his career before transitioning to work in the public sector. He became L.A.’s first deputy mayor in 2010, serving under Antonio Villaraigosa, briefly ran for mayor in 2013 and later served as superintendent of L.A. Unified between 2018 and 2021.

Before becoming superintendent, Beutner was the publisher and CEO of the L.A. Times for a year.

More recently, Beutner authored and successfully campaigned for the passage of Proposition 28, which secured arts education funding in California’s public schools.

Beutner also founded Vision to Learn, a nonprofit that since its inception in 2012 has provided free eyeglasses to hundreds of thousands of kids across the country.

Beutner said he knows how to lead through crisis

Whether it’s earthquakes, civil unrest or fires, L.A.’s no stranger to crises. With 17 years in public service, Beutner said he’s the kind of leader who knows how to prepare and overcome whatever challenges the city might face.

“At the end of the day, the buck stops with the mayor,” Beutner said.

Beutner recalled his time leading the second-largest school district in the country through the early years of the pandemic as an example of how he leads. Under his direction, Beutner said the district provided 140 million meals to children and adults, provided computer and internet access to every student and offered on-campus vaccinations when they became available.

“That’s the type of leadership I bring, which is problem solving focused on getting results,” Beutner said.

Beutner on the issues facing Angelenos

Beutner said one of the “greatest challenges” the city is grappling with is homelessness.

“ We've got to find a way to make sure people who are on the street get the support they need, get the services they need and start moving things in the right direction,” Beutner said.

Beutner criticized Bass’ efforts to block an independent audit of Inside Safe, the mayor’s landmark homelessness initiative that her office said has provided shelter to thousands who were living outside in street encampments.

“ Let's start with the facts,” Beutner said. “Let's start with what we know about where the money's being spent.”

Herman, the spokesperson for the Bass campaign, said official counts over the last two years show homelessness decreasing in the city.

Beutner said he's not sure he trusts point-in-time counts because they  don't show "the true dimension of the problem."

On the federal government’s immigration enforcement, Beutner said he would “fight  to make sure that everybody's safe.”

A DACA recipient died in ICE custody in the Imperial Valley earlier this month, marking the second reported death of an immigrant in ICE custody in the state in two weeks.

“The Trump administration's attack not only on our values, but on our neighbors, is absolutely unacceptable,” Beutner said.

Driven in part by labor negotiations, soaring legal liability costs and lower-than-expected tax revenue, Bass and the City Council agreed to slash jobs and services to make up for a billion dollar shortfall in this year’s budget.

Beutner sees the city’s budget crisis as a result of a series of “bad decisions.”

 ”Who's surprised that we're still spending more in legal settlements on sidewalks than to actually fix the broken sidewalk? That shouldn't be a surprise to anybody,” Beutner said. “It's an unfortunate set of circumstances, but ultimately it's the decisions that were made and the consequences of those decisions.”

Beutner was critical of the city's transportation and mobility investments in the past, saying the sloganeering and promises of initiatives like Vision Zero have failed to keep people safe on city roads.

 "We've got to do something different, and it starts with making sure that the investments we're making have pedestrians and cyclists and other forms of transit in mind, not just cars," Beutner said.

The new mayoral candidate was a supporter of Measure HLA, which aims to speed up road safety projects. Michael Schneider, who, along with his nonprofit Streets for All, led the campaign on Measure HLA, said he is excited Beutner entered the race.

"I think he has the leadership chops on both housing and transportation that unfortunately has been sorely missing from our current mayor," Schneider said over email.

Amid all its complexities, L.A. is a city of talented and diverse people, Beutner said. He added that he hopes that he can help elevate the city’s government to meet the standards of the people in it.

Similar to yesterday, low clouds will keep the coast and some valleys cooler in the morning followed by afternoon sun. Come Friday, a warmup will take over the weekend.

L.A. County beaches will see temperatures in the mid 60s to low 70s, while Orange County beaches will be mostly in the low to mid 70s. More inland for areas like downtown L.A. and Hollywood temperatures there will reach upper 70s to low 80s.

Highs in the San Gabriel Valley will stick around the upper 70s to mid 80s. Meanwhile, the San Fernando Valley and the Inland Empire will see temperatures around the low 90s.

In Coachella Valley, temperatures will reach the upper 90s.

Josh Groban reminded audiences of his musical — and comedic — skills when he performed at this year’s Oscars with the Los Angeles Master Chorale, as host Conan O’Brien acted out how ungracious he would be if he won an Oscar himself.

While the “I Won” performance was operatic, if you were wondering if it was a nod to actor Timothée Chalamet’s recent dismissive comments about the cultural relevance of ballet and opera, Groban says it was decided on before those remarks went viral.

“We were ready to do that regardless,” Groban told LAist, adding, “I think that having these moments that were like a tip of a hat, not so much like in the face of Chalamet, but more like in the direction of just supporting these arts and showing these arts on a popular culture stage, I think was great.”

Backstage at the Oscars, Groban said he talked to ballet dancer Misty Copeland, who performed later in the show and whom he counts as a friend.

“She's in her incredible costume that she had this historical, wonderful outfit that she wore for her Sinners piece,” Groban recalled. “And I'm in this, you know, medieval outfit, and I just gave her a hug. And I'm just like, ‘How lucky are we that this is our job?’ Like, this is the best that we get to do this. So wonderful that we got to kind of — her more than me — loosely rep those worlds.”

While Groban is no stranger to awards shows, either as a performer or nominee — he has multiple Grammy, Tony and Emmy nominations and almost one for an Oscar (“Believe,” the song he performed for The Polar Express, was nominated for best original song, but only songwriters are credited in the category) — he’s so far never won.

It’s something that he and his fellow 2018 Tonys co-host Sara Bareilles poked fun at with a musical number dedicated to “the people who lose!” And were he to win now, Groban joked,  “I would probably, at this point, 25 years in, react exactly the way Conan did.”

A new album and ‘a call to keep us where the light is’

The idea for Groban’s new album was inspired in part by another performance of his last year, for AFI’s tribute to director Francis Ford Coppola.

Coppola asked Groban to perform “Brucia la Terra,” the Sicilian ballad from The Godfather Part III, for the event, and it’s now one of the songs included on Cinematic, out May 8.

“To be looking out at many of my cinematic heroes and just to kind of be reminded of the incredible brilliance of that score, that put a spark in my head of like, ‘Oh, these songs are wonderful and I love singing them,’” he said.

The first song Groban has released from the album is “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” from The Lion King, featuring the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles.

That song, Groban said, “which on the face of it is a beautiful hit Disney song, in today's climate, we were really thinking about uplifting and how can we take some of these songs and really use them as a call to action, a call to keep us where the light is, a call to allyship.”

Groban says he felt such a strong connection to each of the songs on the album, from movies like Casablanca and Stand By Me, “that I knew I would sing my face off, I knew they'd be songs people would want to sing in the car, the surprise for me was the depth of the emotion that went into [them].”

“Moon River,” from Breakfast at Tiffany’s, was especially personal for Groban because it features his father, Jack Groban, playing a trumpet solo: “He played trumpet in college and gave it up for 45, 50 years, and I got him to dust it off,” Groban said.

And being able to have his dad play on a song of his “for the first time ever, was one of the most emotional days in the studio I've ever had.”

‘We need to be reminded of our humanity’

While Groban got his first “big break" at just 17 years old, singing with Celine Dion as a fill-in for Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli during the 1999 Grammy Awards rehearsals, what led up to it was his arts education at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA).

As a shy kid who had a hard time making friends in school, Groban says seeing what his music teachers saw in him, “was so life affirming for me.” And it led him to found the Find Your Light Foundation, that supports K-12 arts education programs in schools.

“ At a time when our humanity is being tested more than ever,” Groban said, “we need to be reminded of our humanity through these programs. And especially our young people, learning about the beauty inside themselves and the beauty inside others through the arts, I can't think of a more vital time than now.”

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Since 1977, Richard Santillan has been to every Opening Day game at Dodger Stadium. 

“The tradition goes from my father, to me, to my children and grandchildren. Some of my best memories are with my father and children here at Dodger Stadium,” Santillan told The LA Local, smiling under the shade of palm trees near the entrance to the ballpark Wednesday morning. He was there to protest the team less than 24 hours before Opening Day.

Santillan, like countless other loyal Dodgers fans, is grappling with his fan identity over the team’s decision to accept an invitation to the White House and owner Mark Walter’s ties to ICE detention facilities.

More than 30 people joined Santillan on Wednesday morning for a press conference held near 1000 Vin Scully Drive to convey a message directly to the team. 

“We are demanding the Dodgers stop participating in funding of inhumane treatment of families and do not go to the White House to celebrate with the criminal in chief,” Evelyn Escatiola told the crowd. “Together, we have the power to make a change.”

Escatiola, a former dean of East Los Angeles College and longtime community organizer, urged fans to flex their economic power by “letting the Dodgers know that we do not support repression.”

Jorge “Coqui” Rodriguez, a lifelong Dodgers fan, spoke to the crowd and called on Dodgers ownership to divest from immigration detention centers owned and operated by GEO Group and CoreCivic.

Jorge Coqui H Rodriguez speaks at a press conference outside Dodger Stadium on March 25, 2026, to demand the Dodgers not to visit the White House following their 2025 World Series win.

(

J.W. Hendricks

/

The LA Local

)

In a phone interview a day before the protest, Rodriguez told The LA Local he did not want the Dodgers using his “cheve” or beer money to fund detention centers. 

“They can’t take our parking money, our cacahuate money, our cheve money, our Dodger Dog money and invest those funds into corporations that are imprisoning people. It’s wrong,” Rodriguez said. 

Rodriguez considers the Dodgers one of the most racially diverse teams and said the players need to support fans at a time when heightened immigration enforcement has become more common across L.A.

The team’s 2025’s visit to the White House drew ire from the largely Latino fan base, citing the Trump administration’s ongoing attacks on immigrants. 

In June, the team came under further scrutiny when rumors swirled online that federal immigration agents were using the stadium’s parking, which immigration authorities later denied in statements posted on social media accounts.

The team again came under fire after not releasing a statement on the impacts of ICE raids on its mostly Latino fan base at the height of immigration enforcement last summer. The team later agreed to invest $1 million to support families affected by immigration enforcement.

When he learned the Dodgers were pledging only $1 million to families in need, Rodriguez called the amount a  “slap in the face.” 

“These guys just bought the Lakers for billions of dollars and they give a million dollars to fight for legal services? That’s a joke,” Rodriguez said. “They need to have a moral backbone and not be investing in those companies.”

According to reporting from the Los Angeles Times, former Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershawsaid last week that he is looking forward to the trip.

“I went when President [Joe] Biden was in office. I’m going to go when President [Donald] Trump is in office,” Kershaw said. “To me, it’s just about getting to go to the White House. You don’t get that opportunity every day, so I’m excited to go.”

The Dodgers have yet to announce when their planned visit will take place. 

Santillan sometimes laments his decision to give up his season tickets in protest of the team. His connection to the stadium and the memories he has made there with family and friends will last a lifetime, he said. On Thursday, he will uphold his tradition and be there for the first pitch of the season, but with a heavy heart.

“It’s a family tradition, but the Dodgers have a lot of work to do,” he said.