LA City Council President Nury Martinez(LA CD 6), and two other LA council members are facing calls to resign over racist slurs during a conversation in October 2021.
On 9th, LA Times first reported this conversation, initially appeared on Reddit, which later was removed from the site. According to the conversation LA Times revealed, Martinez and Councilman Kevin de León (LA CD 14), Gil Cedillo (LA CD 1), and L.A. County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera made racist remarks while discussing the process of redrawing council district boundaries.
In the conversation, Martinez not only belittled Mike Bonin, her colleagues in LA CD 11, saying “little b—-“, also mentioned his 2 year old black adopted son as “little monkey” in Spanish. Adding to that, councilmembers were in the conversation also referred people in Korea town as ‘little short dark people’, ‘Oaxacan Korean’, and ‘Tan Feo’, very ugly in Spanish.
Councilmembers who were in the conversation immediately apologized on Sunday, and Martinez announced to step down from president of council on Monday, 10th.
However, the leaked recordings erupted the anger of communities, and they are facing pressures to resign after tragic and conscionable remarks. LA City Mayor Eric Garcetti, Both LA mayoral candidate, Karen Bass and Rick Caruso, and many officials and community leaders in L.A. made a statement to ask resignation of three councilmembers, and on Tuesday, 11th, President Biden also joined a growing chorus calling for the resignation of three officials.
While further actions were not made by three councilmembers, on Tuesday, 11th, 7 council members signed onto a motion calling for Martinez, De León, and Cedillo to resign, and also separately called three councilmembers to be censured.
