Austin Beutner, a Los Angeles civic leader who has run the city’s school system and major daily newspaper, said Thursday that he was dropping out of the mayor’s race after suffering profound grief from the sudden death of his 22-year-old daughter.
Mr. Beutner, 65, was once a supporter of Mayor Karen Bass but decided in October to challenge her, saying that he felt the city was adrift after a devastating wildfire and as it prepares for the 2028 Olympic Games.
The announcement, which had been anticipated since the death in January of the youngest of Mr. Beutner’s four children, came days before the city’s filing deadline for mayoral candidates on Saturday and appeared likely to shake up the field of contenders.
“My family has experienced the unimaginable loss of our beloved daughter Emily,” Mr. Beutner said in a statement. “She was a magical person, the light of our lives. We are still in mourning. A successful campaign, and more importantly the job of Mayor, requires someone who is committed 24/7 to the job. Family has always come first for me. That is where I need to be at this time.”
Officials at the Los Angeles County medical examiner’s office have not yet determined the cause of the death of Mr. Beutner’s daughter, a junior and arts major at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles who was rushed to the hospital by paramedics on Jan. 6, shortly after midnight. They responded after a passerby on a highway near the city of Palmdale, north of Los Angeles, reported seeing a woman by the side of the road in apparent medical distress.
Her death came nearly a year to the day after a wildfire devastated Pacific Palisades, the community where the Beutner family had lived for decades. Although their home withstood the flames, it was rendered uninhabitable by toxic smoke.
Mr. Beutner is a former Wall Street investment banker who had enough leadership skills to serve in posts over the years that ranged from publisher of the Los Angeles Times to superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District. In announcing his campaign, he had criticized Mayor Bass not only for her handling of the Palisades fire, but more generally for her management of various civic crises.
“She did good work in the Legislature, good work in Congress,” he said. “But the job of a mayor is a different job, and L.A. is adrift. Ultimately, that’s a function of leadership.”
Mr. Beutner’s decision appeared likely to revive interest from a number of potential candidates who had earlier indicated that they would remain on the sidelines.
On Wednesday, Rick Caruso, a Los Angeles billionaire who lost to Ms. Bass in 2022, told a local radio station that he might reconsider an announcement he made just weeks ago in which he ruled out running this year for public office.
Lindsey Horvath, a Los Angeles County supervisor whose district includes the Palisades fire zone, said in an interview on Wednesday that she, too, has been considering a potential run.
Ms. Bass, a nationally known Democrat who is seeking re-election to another four-year term, has also been challenged from the right by Spencer Pratt, a Republican reality television star whose home burned in the Palisades fire. She also faces challengers from the left, including Rae Huang, a community organizer and a progressive, and Adam Miller, a tech entrepreneur and co-founder of a nonprofit focused on homelessness and affordable housing.
A candidate can win the race outright with more than 50 percent of the vote in the June primary. Absent that, the top two primary contenders will head to a runoff in November.
Jill Cowan contributed reporting.
Shawn Hubler is The Times’s Los Angeles bureau chief, reporting on the news, trends and personalities of Southern California.
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