Organized labor is heavily favoring incumbent Karen Bass, but Los Angeles mayoral challenger Nithya Raman scored a key endorsement Tuesday from Unite Here Local 11, the powerful union representing hospitality workers in hotels and airports.
Unite Here has emerged as a major player at City Hall, successfully pushing the Los Angeles City Council last year to pass a $30 hourly minimum wage for hotel and airport workers ahead of the 2028 Olympics, although the council later delayed implementation.
In endorsing Raman, union President Kurt Petersen said the group believed in the City Council member’s commitment to fighting L.A.’s housing crisis, supporting the minimum wage hike and willingness to oppose short-term rental giant Airbnb — a key rival of Unite Here. Bass has supported delaying the minimum wage hike and expanding the short-term rental market, saying more beds will be needed for the 2028 Summer Olympics.
“Nithya has stood with us and our members through many fights,” Petersen said, noting that Raman was arrested as she protested with Unite Here workers in 2023 during their contract negotiations. “We believe [she] is the right person to help us solve the city’s problems.”
Petersen said Unite Here had the largest ground operation of any union in the state during primaries in June and knocked on more than 300,000 doors.
“Our endorsement means a lot more than a press release,” he said.
Raman still trails Bass significantly when it comes to the city’s major unions. Bass has more than 30 endorsements from unions across the region while Raman now has five, according to the candidates’ websites.
Labor groups backing Bass include local chapters of the Teamsters, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, L.A. County Federation of Labor and the Police Protective League. The PPL, which represents Los Angeles police officers, has already spent more than $2.5 million against the mayor’s opponents.
But over the last month, the battle between Bass and Raman for union support has tightened somewhat. In addition to Unite Here, Raman scooped up the endorsement of the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters.
The carpenters plan to provide a much-needed bankroll boost of $3 million for an independent expenditure group backing Raman’s campaign.
In its campaign for the $30 hourly minimum wage, Unite Here was up against hotels, airlines and other business groups that argued the wage hike would trigger layoffs and closures of restaurants, hotels and airport concession stands.
Supporters dubbed it the “Olympic wage,” saying the measure was aimed at allowing workers to share in the expected economic boom that will accompany the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles. The council passed the measure but the fight didn’t end there, evolving into a war of dueling ballot measures between Unite Here and a coalition of business groups.
The business groups initially filed paperwork to have Angelenos vote on a referendum on the $30 per hour minimum wage for hotel and airport workers. Then Unite Here fired back with a package of ballot proposals, including a plan that would have forced a citywide election on development of all new large hotels and other facilities — including some 2028 Olympic venues. The union also included a proposed ballot measure that would have extended a $30 minimum wage to all workers in L.A.
Then business leaders went for the jugular, turning in a proposed measure to repeal the city’s gross receipts business tax, which could have lost the city hundreds of millions annually in revenue.
The council eventually agreed in May to delay implementation of the minimum wage increase by 18 months in exchange for the business coalition withdrawing the gross receipts measure. Raman and three other council members initially voted against the delay, but Raman later supported it in a City Council vote, saying it provided “greater fiscal certainty” for the city.
Bass supported the compromise.
Petersen said at the time that the city was giving in to blackmail from the business community. Business leaders said they had simply beat Unite Here at its own game.
In 2022, the hotel workers union qualified a measure for the city ballot that would have required L.A. hotels to lease their vacant rooms to homeless people. The union later withdrew that measure, but only after the council struck a deal to require new hotel projects to go through a more extensive approval process at City Hall.
Unite Here has also been politically at odds with Airbnb.
The union has fiercely opposed allowing Angelenos to rent out their second homes as short-term rentals on sites like Airbnb — something Airbnb has been pushing for years.
Bass proposed legalizing vacation rentals in her budget this year, though the proposal was removed from the budget by the City Council. Raman opposed the mayor’s proposal as did Unite Here.
Airbnb, meanwhile, has supported the mayor in her reelection bid, pouring nearly $2 million into an independent expenditure group on the mayor’s behalf in the primary.
Petersen said that Raman’s “unwavering” support of the minimum wage increase for hotel and airport workers, along with her opposition to the vacation rental expansion, were key to her receiving the union’s endorsement.
If Raman becomes mayor, he said, he would like to see her enforce wage theft laws as well as laws currently on the books to make sure short-term rental owners are paying required taxes to the city.
Times staff writer David Zahniser contributed to this report.
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