In his send-off of disgraced now-former-councilmember Kevin de León last Friday, Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson commended him for hightailing it back to City Hall after a doctor’s appointment so that the Planning and Land Use Management committee meeting – where nearly 300 people were waiting to weigh in on a number of items on the agenda – could finally get underway.
“You could have said, ‘You know what, I'm taking my marbles, I'm going home. I'm going to the beach to enjoy the last few days…’, Harris-Dawson said of the phone call where he told de León he was needed to make quorum. “So, I appreciate you for that and the care with which you handled the city, despite all the controversies that have surrounded the time that you've been here.”
That "meeting attendance" was the highest praise anyone could muster for de León’s record on the council was a fitting epilogue to a chapter that should have ended two years ago.
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Kevin de León had managed to weather calls from practically everyone - including the sitting president of the United States - to resign after an audio recording of then-Council President Nury Martinez, then-Councilmember Gil Cedillo, then-L.A. County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera, and de León talking redistricting in racist, zero-sum terms surfaced in October of 2022.
Taking advantage of the way Martinez’ abhorrent remarks about a white colleague, that colleague’s Black toddler, Oaxacans, and the District Attorney (for being “with the Blacks”) dominated headlines, he suggested he'd been another one of her victims - a bystander cowed into silence by her threatening aura.
His only regret, he told ABC7's Marc Brown at the time, was that he'd been too intimidated to speak up when Martinez insulted Oaxacans.
It was nonsense, of course.
His own seething resentments and anti-Blackness had been the primary drivers of the worst parts of that conversation. But he had stuck to his guns, using his alleged victimhood to justify his refusal to resign.
Among those that had called for de León's resignation in 2022 was now-termed-out Councilmember Paul Krekorian. Krekorian, who took over the council presidency after Martinez stepped down in disgrace, even put it in writing.
He had written the letter in response to de León's request that his absences be excused (so he would not be at risk of losing his seat by default). Per the L.A. Times, the note accused de León of "causing actual ongoing harm" to the council's ability to conduct business. It also declared there was “no path forward" for council which included him.
The lingering sting of that and other public slaps in the face is likely why de León was not present for the celebration of Krekorian's council service that kicked off Friday's session.
Or perhaps he didn't want to be on hand to hear his colleagues praise Krekorian for having shepherded them through the chaos de León's hubris had incited.
And there had indeed been chaos.
In the initial days and weeks after the tape leaked, the protests were so disruptive that Krekorian had those demanding de León's resignation pushed out of chambers by police in riot gear.
As de León began paving the way for his return that December, things got even uglier. He scared elders and immigrants into believing the councilmembers who censured him were trying to deny them much-needed food distributions. And many of the supporters he tapped to serve as human shields downplayed his crimes while voicing the same kind of anti-Black resentments he had.
When he finally did show up, the resulting upheaval forced the council into recess (below). De León subsequently spent the week logging his votes from back rooms.
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De León did not mention any of that when he finally materialized in chambers last Friday to make his parting announcements.
Instead, he thanked his staff. He thanked "the council sergeants that we have here from the LAPD that protect us every single day." He told incoming CD14 Councilmember Ysabel Jurado - whom he had repeatedly referred to as a "liar" and a "whiner" during his failed re-election bid - to give him a "holler" if she was in need of his "expertise." And he ticked off the names of his council colleagues - a few of whom had already left by then - saying he wished them all the best.
He saved the highest praise for himself, however.
He claimed he had done "unorthodox" things like hire consultants to assist his team with grant applications (not an uncommon practice) and that he had left his district flush with "unprecedented" cash for transformative projects. The implication was that Jurado would owe any of her future successes to the foundation he had laid.
In other words, there was no acknowledgement of the pain and upheaval he had caused.
And no parting apology.
The few councilmembers that did speak on his behalf kept their remarks brief. And vague. Councilmember Imelda Padilla, who sits in Nury Martinez' old seat, alluded to the heat she and her colleagues took for signing onto motions with de León. For her, she said, it was not about taking a side but about putting the people of their districts first, which she thanked de León for doing.
Councilmember Curren Price - whose district benefited from the overtly anti-Black campaign de León's supporters waged against Harris-Dawson during the redistricting battle - clumsily lamented "the situation that was unfortunate that occurred on tape." He also said he appreciated de León's "ongoing" attempts to make amends and be of service.
Councilmember John Lee - who is facing his own ethics allegations - praised the loyalty of de León's staff, suggesting it was a positive indicator of de León's character.
And Councilmember Traci Park, sitting in the seat once occupied by Mike Bonin - the white councilmember de León had derisively called "the fourth Black" and whose Black child de León had likened to an accessory - said she would miss de León and thanked him for supporting her leadership.
Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, who had been an ally to de León - even going so far as to accuse protesters of "terrorism" after de León assaulted a protester at a holiday event - closed things out by referencing de León's larger legacy.
But in lauding his important work organizing against Prop 187 and in favor of landmark sanctuary laws, she inadvertently called attention to what might have been.
De León had missed many opportunities for leadership during his tenure. But his failure to lead on street vending - an issue that greatly impacts the marginalized immigrant communities he has always claimed to champion - might be one of the most glaring.
He could have easily been the hero by demanding the city comply with state law and strike down illegal exclusionary zones. It would have given vendors, and immigrant vendors, in particular, immediate relief from the fines, harassment, and lost income incurred over several years. But thanks to his racist scandal, he was nowhere to be found in the fall of 2022. Vendors subsequently filed a lawsuit against the city that December.
The following October, when Council met in closed session with the City Attorney to discuss their legal obligations to vendors, de León had another opportunity to play the hero. But he was not among the five signatories on the motion to remove the exclusionary zones.
Perhaps he was bitter that street vendors had joined protesters in calling for his resignation. Or maybe he was preoccupied with his own scathing lawsuit, filed earlier that month, against the people alleged to be behind the leaked recording. Or maybe he was too busy courting big donors after the launch of his bid for re-election, announced just a few weeks earlier.
Or maybe street vendors had never been on his radar at all.
The astonishing ignorance he demonstrated earlier this year - both of city processes and of the barriers vendors face - suggests any and all of the above could be true.
Ultimately, his failure to lead meant there were only a couple of stragglers present to see him off last Friday.
Paul Krekorian got the USC Marching Band, gifts, platitudes, hugs, and a party.
De León got racist gadfly Armando Herman waving his hands and bursting into spontaneous applause while wearing a t-shirt asking "Who Ate All the P*ssy."
