Bass Allies: Recall Efforts Are Racist and Oligarchical, You Know

How do we know Southland progressives have begun to worry that Karen Bass may get ousted by angry Angelenos? They have begun playing the race and class cards amid the literally smoking ruins of the mayor’s tenure.

News of the recall may not have built much outside of Los Angeles, and perhaps not all that much in the Southern California area either, for that matter. The effort began a couple of weeks ago, when Nicole Shanahan formed a committee to gather signatures to force Bass out of office. And yes, it’s the same Nicole Shanahan that ran with Robert Kennedy on an independent ticket before joining the Trump campaign:

Los Angeles has endured enough. Once a city of hope, it’s now overrun with crime, chaos, and suffering. Today, we begin the effort to revive the City of Angels—for the people. First step: recalling Karen Bass. https://t.co/kKWD15D45a https://t.co/ULd7q6Nkr4

— Nicole Shanahan (@NicoleShanahan) March 4, 2025

It’s not just Bass’ decision to fly to Ghana for a junket just as warnings hit a fever pitch about the potential for wildfires that has Shanahan organizing a recall. The committee website offers several other issues that have either arisen or worsened during Bass’ tenure as mayor:

• Underfunded & Overworked First Responders
• Small Businesses Are Struggling & Leaving LA
• Failure to Address Homelessness with Real Solutiond
• Public Transit is Unsafe
• No Real Progress on Government Reform & Accountability

All of these are real issues, and Angelenos are angry over them as well as with Bass’ absence during the wildfires. The latter has made the other issues more acute with voters, too. So how are Bass’ backers responding to these concerns?

By calling Shanahan an “oligarch,” natch — and racist, too:

In recent days, pro-Bass forces have been pushing back hard, arguing that she is under attack from “wealthy oligarchs,” including real estate developer Rick Caruso and Nicole Shanahan, who is helping to bankroll a campaign to recall her.

Bass’ backers are portraying the attacks as highly partisan, amplified by a hard-right media apparatus and — at least for some — rooted in racism. Those arguments offer a potential preview of the political case that will be made for Bass as she runs for reelection and seeks to fend off the recall in deep blue L.A.

In a recent email to Bass supporters, Joanne Kim, chief of staff to City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, said right-wing billionaires have “weaponized” the Jan. 7 fire, using it to wage a “disinformation campaign” against the mayor. Kim, who worked on Bass’ 2022 campaign, took aim not just at Caruso but also billionaire Elon Musk, who has posted diatribes against the mayor on social media.

Since when is accountability racist? Only when a Castroite incompetent takes the reins of government, apparently. Forget the fact that LA elected Bass in the first place — and that they elected Tom Bradley to five consecutive terms as mayor starting in 1973. And for that matter, ignore the fact that Los Angeles is an epicenter of progressive activism, driven especially by the entertainment industry. 

That’s a measure of desperation among Bass allies; they can’t defend her performance, so they will smear her critics instead. Will it work? That seems doubtful, given the abundant evidence of incompetence at hand now. Neither does it explain why Bass has defied open-government laws and regulations by deleting all of her text messages during her entire tenure as mayor. 

What is Bass hiding? The same issues she’s hiding by playing the race and class cards. It’s either corruption, incompetence, or both. And her allies are clearly worried that Shanahan’s recall campaign will expose it. 

Will the recall succeed? It’s tough to say. DA George Gascón managed to outbox recall organizers, but ended up losing his next election in a landslide even among a progressive electorate. Bass may avoid accountability through a recall, but she’s clearly less adept than Gascón — and she’s not going to avoid it at the ballot box in the next election.