Today’s The Day for Spencer Pratt

Can Spencer Pratt pull it off? 

You don’t normally think of races for mayor, even in major cities, as important barometers of larger political trends. 

But recently they have turned out to be. Zohran Mamdani’s victory in New York (and, to a lesser extent, Katie Wilson’s in Seattle) signaled the ascendance of the communist wing of the Democratic Party, presaged by the rise of The Squad, but was cemented only by Mamdani’s victory over the establishment. 

In a very real way, Mamdani is more powerful than Chuck Schumer now, not because Mamdani is THAT good (he is), but because the organized crime wing of the party is losing out to the communist wing. 

The race for Mayor of Los Angeles is sending similarly important signals about the state of the Democratic Party, although under very different conditions. For all its reputation as a bastion of liberalism, New York City has been pragmatic enough and has enough of a working-class base of residents that the city is harder to kill than any other in America. Mayor Adams, for all his flaws, was a pragmatist and fairly competent compared to most recent Democrats. 

Karen Bass, who straddles the organized crime wing and the communist wing of the Party, has already, quite literally, burned down a decent chunk of her city, thus alienating normally placid ordinary voters. And since Bass is allied with the organized crime wing of the party, she is seen as a sellout by the communists, even though she was communist before communism was cool. 

Hence Bass is facing challenges from both the right and the left, and in her case, the challenge from the right is dominating the conversation. 

WATCH: Four months before launching his campaign against Karen Bass, @spencerpratt attended a Pacific Palisades fire recovery event hoping to ask the mayor whether she supported a congressional investigation into the fire.

Bass was scheduled to attend, but didn’t show up.

When… pic.twitter.com/ARosCZ8zun

— Matthew Seedorff (@MattSeedorff) June 1, 2026

WATCH: Four months before launching his campaign against Karen Bass, @spencerpratt attended a Pacific Palisades fire recovery event hoping to ask the mayor whether she supported a congressional investigation into the fire.

Bass was scheduled to attend, but didn’t show up.

When I asked Pratt about her absence, he responded:

“Maybe she’s in Ghana.”

(Interview: Aug. 26, 2025. Pratt announced his mayoral campaign Jan. 7, 2026.)

Now, less than a year later, Pratt and Bass are facing off in Tuesday’s Los Angeles mayoral primary.

The rise of Spencer Pratt stems from unique circumstances. He entered the race after Karen Bass blew off a meeting with residents who were burned out of their homes in the Palisades fire, and his campaign has tapped into the well-earned sense that Los Angeles is being turned into a hellscape of homelessness and government neglect. 

https://t.co/yGfBiS9GgE

— Jim Geraghty (@jimgeraghty) June 2, 2026

Nithya Raman was trying to tap into the left-wing momentum that threatens the organized-crime Democrats’ hold on power, but in the face of actual civilizational collapse in a city that once symbolized the American Dream, her campaign didn’t take off. Of course, she doesn’t have the charm and charisma of Mamdani, but she outshines Katie Wilson by a long stretch. But a candidate who wanted to campaign on free stuff and bike lanes didn’t exactly meet the moment in Los Angeles. 

Spencer Pratt drags Bill Maher out of his liberal bubble and brought him back down to earth.

Maher was annoyed that Pratt didn’t know the specifics about taxes on solar powered energy, but Pratt humbled him with the REAL problems Angelenos care about.

MAHER: “This is a state… pic.twitter.com/OvfHVkVzCh

— Overton (@overton_news) June 1, 2026

Spencer Pratt drags Bill Maher out of his liberal bubble and brought him back down to earth.

Maher was annoyed that Pratt didn’t know the specifics about taxes on solar powered energy, but Pratt humbled him with the REAL problems Angelenos care about.

MAHER: “This is a state that is constantly overthinking everything, and over regulating everything.”

“Trust me, I know. I did whole bits about how it took me three years to get the solar turned on.” 

“Solar! Something they want you to have!” 

PRATT: “But now they’re taxing you, I think, for having it.”

MAHER: “They are?”

PRATT: “I think so.”

MAHER: “What do you mean you think so?! You have to know!”

PRATT: “I don’t need to know about solar, you know?” 

“I need to focus on making sure the moms are safe and the animals are not being abused. That’s my party.” 

MAHER: “I know. but if you’re the mayor…”

PRATT: “Solar panels, that’s going to be somebody I’m hiring. That’s my deputy mayor who’s going to worry about the solar panels.”

MAHER: “No, Spencer. I got bad news. If you’re the mayor, you are going to have to learn some of these issues more intricately.” 

PRATT: “Solar panels…we’re about three years from worrying about solar panels.”

“We need to get all of the naked drug addicts off of the sidewalks and then I can worry about solar panels.” 

MAHER: “We can’t walk and chew gum at the same time?”

PRATT: “With the state of LA right now, solar panels, you’re gonna spit that gum out.”

Pratt’s groundedness is very appealing to people who are long past worrying about boutique issues. No wonder he is generating so much excitement. 

Everybody is holding their breath to see whether Spencer Pratt’s charisma, excellent campaign skills, focus on the big issues, and the prevailing sense that things have gone horribly wrong will give him enough oomph to overcome the structural problem he faces: a Democratic Party political machine that can turn out votes by the truckload on command. 

No wonder Nithya Raman’s approval is tanking. She is fine with homeless and drug encampments next to your child’s school, but suddenly outraged when fake one shows up near her own home. https://t.co/GPJA4YgWAX pic.twitter.com/VyIuBIEWqZ

— I Meme Therefore I Am 🇺🇸 (@ImMeme0) June 1, 2026

Which is what is really at stake in this election. For all the talk about Karen Bass having “experience” and Pratt being a dilettante, the fact is that ordinary people would agree with him on this. The solar panel issue is, as Maher points out, symbolic of a deep issue with Democrat policies (you really can’t build anything without jumping through a zillion hoops), but the pressing problems are crime, homelessness, and grotesque malfeasance in government. 

Doug Ellin, creator of the hit show ‘Entourage,’ is disgusted by LA’s decline in recent years and says he publicly supports Spencer Pratt in his campaign for LA mayor.

Ellin’s Beverly Hills home was burglarized by masked intruders, and he shares that while 5 years ago he didn’t… pic.twitter.com/PNTYMWcRIK

— Julia 🇺🇸 (@Jules31415) June 1, 2026

Doug Ellin, creator of the hit show ‘Entourage,’ is disgusted by LA’s decline in recent years and says he publicly supports Spencer Pratt in his campaign for LA mayor.

Ellin’s Beverly Hills home was burglarized by masked intruders, and he shares that while 5 years ago he didn’t have to lock his door, now he has “15 cameras,” “2 German Shepherds,” and “3 legal guns.”

“I know they were animals because they invaded my house. I know I don’t care what their excuses are, like a lot of you f*cking care. I know invaders of homes should get 20 years…Everyone in my neighborhood has got the same problem: they’re f*cking all putting cameras and high-end security guards because we’re all getting broken into. It’s not made up, it’s not false, and this city has collapsed in the last 5 years. There is no f*cking denying it unless you have an agenda, and I don’t know what that is,” Ellin says.

“But, you say, ‘Oh, Spencer Pratt has no experience!’…What experience did Karen Bass have?…We want to fix this place because we don’t want to be forced out. I’m one of the people who made this city look great! I did it for years. I glorified it. I meet people all the time that moved here because of the show that I f*cking created—and they hate it here now. HATE!”

Still, for all Pratt’s momentum and the obviousness of Karen Bass’ incompetence and corruption—it’s no accident that Los Angeles has one of the highest concentrations of Medicaid fraud and NGOs that get government money to do politics in the country—she has a built-in advantage: the organized crime that is today’s liberal governance is probably the largest industry in the city. 

Bass is their meal ticket, and that corruption and incompetence pay the bills for the largest voting bloc in the city. 

Pratt is an existential threat to their ability to keep living off the suffering of others. 

The Pratt/Bass/Raman battle isn’t really a battle over who is best to run the city as a city should be run; it is a power struggle between ordinary people, the organized crime Democrats, and the communist Democrats. In an environment where no ordinary person can really believe either Bass or Raman is fit to be mayor. 

Everybody assumes that Pratt will make it out of the jungle primary and into the general election, and bettors on Polymarket are voting with their money that Bass will take the General Election. 

Me? I am waiting to see what the votes show. I genuinely don’t know, because I fear the power of Bass’ organized crime machine, and she would prefer Raman face her in the fall. 

I am rooting for Pratt. He has run a perfect campaign, and in a sane world would win outright. In a less sane world, he would at least come in second place today, and I think he easily could. 

But I worry that the political machine will find a way to kill his campaign. Especially in an environment where the Democrats control the vote-counting machine, and results take days or weeks to get reported. 

Remember, this is California. 

Editor’s Note: President Trump is leading America into the “Golden Age” as Democrats try desperately to stop it.  

Help us continue to report on President Trump’s successes. Join HotAir VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.