Villaraigosa's Support Goes Beyond Latinos
Backing from his ethnic group made the mayor- elect's win a landslide. But, compared to 2001, his share of voters grew across the board.
By Michael Finnegan and Mark Z. Barabak
Times Staff Writers
May 19, 2005
Antonio Villaraigosa won a crushing victory in the Los Angeles mayoral race by spurring a record Latino turnout and broadening his support across the city among voters of every stripe, who deserted incumbent James K. Hahn in droves.
For all the significance of the victor's breakthrough as the first Latino elected mayor of modern Los Angeles, ethnic pride was just part of what powered his 17-point win.
By overwhelming margins, Villaraigosa captured Democrats, liberals and younger voters, according to a Times exit poll. He also won a majority of San Fernando Valley residents, union members and Jewish voters. His support among blacks more than doubled from what he won in his 2001 mayoral contest against Hahn ?- although it fell just shy of half.
But it was Villaraigosa's huge support among Latinos that turned his victory into a landslide, ushering Hahn out of office ?- effective July 1 ?- after a lone term. The city councilman sparked a surge in Latino turnout and won 84% of those voters.
For the first time in modern Los Angeles, the Times Poll found, the Latino share of the city's electorate reached 25% ?- up from 22% in the Villaraigosa-Hahn contest four years ago, and up from a mere 10% in the 1993 mayoral race.
The city's heavily Latino Eastside produced the strongest turnout in the city, preliminary election results show. Although the city clerk expects the final tally to show citywide turnout at about 33%, on the Eastside it ran as high as 38% and could climb further as the last batch of votes are counted. [..]
For Hahn, the election marked a collapse in support across the spectrum of voters. Even among groups that clearly favored him over Villaraigosa ?- Republicans, conservatives, Asian Americans and voters age 65 and older ?- Hahn ran weaker than he did four years ago, according to the exit poll.
Voters had a strongly favorable view of Villaraigosa, but even those who backed Hahn were unenthusiastic about their choice. Two-thirds of Villaraigosa supporters voted for the councilman because they liked him and his stands on issues. But for Hahn, about 6 in 10 supporters said they saw him as "the lesser of two evils." Nearly 3 in 10 Hahn backers offered no positive reason for their vote.
"Doing nothing but smearing Antonio might have persuaded conservatives that he was the lesser of two evils, but it didn't give anyone a motivation to vote for him," said Villaraigosa strategist Parke Skelton, referring to Hahn's decision to run television ads attacking his rival instead of promoting his own record. [..]
Among Hahn voters, the most important factor driving their decision Tuesday was concern about crime and gangs. That reflected Hahn's sharp criticism of Villaraigosa's past opposition to legal injunctions against gang members.
Among Villaraigosa supporters, the top concern was education ?- a view reinforced by his commercials, which cited the job of his wife, Corina, as a schoolteacher and his promise to salve the Los Angeles Unified School District's woes. [..]
Among the survey's more striking findings was its confirmation of Hahn's loss of support among African Americans and Valley voters, the once-sturdy coalition that drove his 2001 triumph over Villaraigosa.
The mayor, whose father, Kenneth, built an African American political base for the family decades ago as a county supervisor, won 80% of the black vote four years ago. But on Tuesday, he captured just 52% of those voters.
Among blacks who supported Villaraigosa, nearly two out of five cited the ouster of Police Chief Bernard C. Parks, an African American, as a main reason for their vote. Also, 59% of the blacks who voted for Parks in the first round of mayoral voting in March shifted to Villaraigosa in the runoff. Parks had endorsed and actively campaigned for Villaraigosa.
Yet the survey found sharp distinctions within the black community. Black voters 45 and older ?- those most apt to fondly remember the legacy of Hahn's father ?- strongly favored the mayor over Villaraigosa. Younger blacks leaned heavily toward the challenger.
Also, black men favored Villaraigosa, while black women strongly supported Hahn.
Villaraigosa, who won 48% of the black vote, had campaigned aggressively for African American support. A large group of black leaders who backed Hahn in 2001 ?- among them former basketball star Magic Johnson, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and various church pastors ?- abandoned the mayor this year and vouched for Villaraigosa. An ebullient Johnson helped introduce the winning candidate at his victory party.
"The really interesting and intriguing question is what happens to relations between Latinos and blacks now," Sonenshein said. "Because by no means is this the sign of a full-scale coalition. But it is certainly a bridgehead in what could have been a purely competitive relationship."
In the Valley, as among blacks, Hahn suffered a sharp reversal of fortune. In 2001, the Valley favored Hahn over Villaraigosa, 55% to 45%. The election Tuesday flipped that precisely: The Valley opted for Villaraigosa over Hahn by the same 10-point margin.
A key problem for Hahn, the poll confirmed, was his 2002 campaign to kill the proposed secession of the Valley from the rest of Los Angeles. Nearly three in 10 of the Valley voters who supported Villaraigosa cited secession as a main reason for their vote.
The preliminary election returns showed that Hahn carried the predominantly white parts of the Valley that he targeted heavily in his campaign, including Granada Hills, Chatsworth, Porter Ranch, West Hills, Tarzana, Sunland and Tujunga. Many of the city's Republicans are concentrated in those areas.
Villaraigosa swept the central and eastern Valley, much of it populated by Latinos and white liberals. Among the areas he won were Studio City, North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Canoga Park, Sylmar and Pacoima.
Outside the Valley, Hahn's strongest performance was around San Pedro, where he lives, along with scattered pockets of support in areas such as Brentwood, Bel-Air and downtown.
Another source of strength for Villaraigosa was union members: 60% backed him over Hahn even though the bulk of organized labor leadership endorsed the mayor's reelection.
It was another sharp turnaround for Hahn from four years ago. In the 2001 campaign, when organized labor endorsed Villaraigosa, a majority of union members supported Hahn. [..]
Villaraigosa's standing with a host of other voting blocs also rose sharply from four years ago. Among whites, his share of the vote grew from 41% to 50%. Among Asian Americans, it jumped from 35% to 44%.
On the Westside, his support grew from 52% to 57%. In South L.A., the jump was from 33% to 51%. In the central and eastern portions of Los Angeles, from the Fairfax district to Boyle Heights to Eagle Rock, Villaraigosa's share of the vote surged from 58% in 2001 to 71% on Tuesday.
