Nate Holden, a Democrat known for his bombast and populist politics, who served on the Los Angeles City Council for 16 years and had a cameo in the 2024 presidential race, when Donald J. Trump confused him with another Black California official, Willie Brown, died on Wednesday in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 95.
His death, in a hospital, was confirmed by his son Christopher, a former State Assembly member and Pasadena mayor.
Mr. Trump told reporters in August about taking a near-fatal helicopter trip with Mr. Brown, the former San Francisco mayor, during which he claimed Mr. Brown told him “terrible things” about Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee.
Mr. Brown vehemently denied having been on such a flight. It turned out that Mr. Trump’s passenger very likely was Mr. Holden, who told reporters that around 1990 he and Mr. Trump had flown in a helicopter headed to Atlantic City, when mechanical problems forced an emergency landing.
In an interview with The New York Times, Mr. Holden said he had telephoned Mr. Brown when he heard Mr. Trump make the claim.
“I said, ‘Willie, you know what? That’s me!’” he recalled. “And I told him, ‘You’re a short Black guy, and I’m a tall Black guy — but we all look alike, right?’”
Mr. Holden’s outspokenness was typical of a long career in Los Angeles politics during which he was known for his attention-getting antics and clashes with fellow Democrats, as well as for delivering services to economically struggling South Los Angeles.
He served one term in the State Senate and four on the City Council. He unsuccessfully sought higher office, losing multiple races for Congress and Los Angeles mayor.
Mr. Holden was drawn to the limelight and to controversies. During his 1989 run for mayor, challenging a popular incumbent, Tom Bradley, he offered to buy assault rifles off the street for $300 each, using campaign funds. The then-novel buyback plan won him national attention.
A decade later, while running for a final term on the City Council, he claimed that Mr. Bradley had endorsed him on his deathbed the previous year. A daughter of Mr. Bradley’s and former Bradley aides expressed skepticism, as the two men had been bitter foes.
Mr. Holden represented the predominantly Black 10th district, a South Los Angeles seat that Mr. Bradley himself had held when he was elected the city’s first Black councilman in 1963. Mr. Holden won the seat when he defeated Mr. Bradley’s handpicked candidate in 1987.
He earned the loyalty of constituents by fighting to fix potholes, paint over graffiti and increase police foot patrols. He berated city managers in public and followed street sweepers to make sure they did their jobs.
At the same time, he was combative in council meetings and often the lone opponent of popular measures. In 2002, his was the only vote opposing William J. Bratton as police chief, which his colleagues viewed as grandstanding.
When Mr. Holden stepped down in 2003 because of term limits, a columnist for The Los Angeles Times, Patt Morrison, wrote that the city had lost “a 16-year franchise on outrageousness, showboating and chutzpah.”
Nathan Nathaniel Holden was born on July 19, 1929, in Macon, Ga. His father, James Holden, was a brakeman on a railroad. His parents separated when Nate was 10, and he moved with his mother, Hilda Holden, to Elizabeth, N.J. In 1946, he lied about his age — he was 16 — so he could join the Army. After World War II, he served in the military police in Europe.
When he returned to the United States, he studied engineering at night school and was hired by Hughes Aircraft Company in Southern California; he worked in the aerospace industry for nearly two decades.
After twice losing races for Congress, he was elected to the California State Senate in 1974. But rather than seeking re-election to a second term, he ran unsuccessfully for Congress once again in 1978.
Mr. Holden’s marriage to Fannie Louise (Mays) Holden ended in divorce. She died in 2013. In addition to his son Christopher, he is survived by another son, Reginald; a daughter, Melissa Hill; eight grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren.
Mr. Holden was in his living room last year, watching a news conference at Mar-a-Lago, when a reporter asked Mr. Trump a leading question about whether Willie Brown, the prominent California Democrat, had boosted Ms. Harris’s political career. (The two had dated in the mid-1990s.)
“Well, I know Willie Brown very well,” Mr. Trump responded. “In fact, I went down in a helicopter with him.”
An astonished Mr. Holden called Mr. Brown to ask if they had both taken near-fatal helicopter flights with Mr. Trump, and Mr. Brown said he had never done so. But Mr. Trump later doubled down, saying he had “flight records” for the trip and threatening to sue The Times for reporting that Mr. Brown had not been on board.
Then Mr. Holden publicly surfaced. He said that, years ago, he had been in New York meeting with Mr. Trump about plans to redevelop a hotel in Los Angeles. Mr. Trump wanted to show him one of his Atlantic City casinos, but the helicopter soon got into trouble.
As the crew worked frantically to land safely, Mr. Holden told The Times, he was thinking of a widely reported 1989 helicopter crash that had killed three executives working for Mr. Trump.
“I just thought, how the hell do you let your staff not maintain your aircraft after you just had a crash that killed some of your staff?” he said. “How could you let this happen again?”
The helicopter he and Mr. Trump were in eventually landed safely in Linden, N.J., Mr. Holden said.
Trip Gabriel is a Times reporter on the Obituaries desk.
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