As Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and City Councilmember Nithya Raman position themselves as rivals in the race to lead California’s largest city, their sparring over public safety has largely sidestepped the questions that actually matter for the future of the Los Angeles Police Department.
Consider the debate swirling around Police Chief Jim McDonnell. Raman contends that McDonnell has lost the trust of Angelenos, pointing to what she describes as a widespread perception that the department is cooperating too closely with federal immigration agents. Yet she has offered little concrete evidence to back up either claim, and both assertions are shakier than her campaign rhetoric suggests.
Bass, for her part, bears direct responsibility for McDonnell’s tenure. She appointed him to a five-year term in 2024, backed by a City Council vote that included Raman’s support, and has since stood by his efforts to rebuild a department that had been losing officers to attrition.
Not long after that appointment, the Trump administration’s aggressive push to militarize immigration enforcement arrived in full force in Los Angeles, escalating tensions in a way that mirrored confrontations in other Democratic-led cities across the country. That put McDonnell and his department in a difficult spot. LAPD policy since 1979 has barred officers from making stops based solely on suspected immigration status, a rule designed to encourage victims and witnesses — regardless of their legal status — to cooperate with police without fear.
At the same time, the department has a long-standing duty to protect everyone within city limits, a mandate that has occasionally put LAPD officers in the position of shielding ICE agents from angry crowds. Raman and others have criticized this as creating troubling optics, suggesting it makes local police look like they’re siding with federal immigration authorities over immigrant communities.
That criticism misses the point. ICE’s tactics in Los Angeles have been widely seen as heavy-handed and counterproductive, and city leaders are right to push back against those operations at the policy level. But pushing back doesn’t mean standing by while federal agents are assaulted. The LAPD’s obligation to protect and serve extends even to ICE agents whose presence in the city stems from a political agenda out of Washington.
It’s also worth remembering that federal authorities retain the legal right to enforce immigration law, even if the LAPD isn’t obligated to assist them. A useful comparison is marijuana enforcement: city police can’t block DEA agents from doing their jobs, but that doesn’t mean LAPD officers are required to arrest every person smoking a joint on a street corner.
Whatever one thinks of McDonnell’s overall leadership, decisions about his future shouldn’t hinge on the flawed premise that the LAPD must withhold protection from ICE agents just to send a political message. ICE’s approach in Los Angeles deserves criticism — but leaving federal agents exposed to violence isn’t the answer.
If there’s a real case to be made about whether McDonnell should keep his job, it deserves more scrutiny than a campaign talking point can provide. The proper way to judge a police chief is by looking at crime trends, officer conduct and how seriously the department takes allegations of misconduct. Are officers respecting people’s constitutional rights? Is their work actually making Los Angeles safer?
By that measure, McDonnell has some strong results to point to. Los Angeles recorded 230 homicides in 2025 — a drop of 54 from the previous year and the lowest total since 1966. Violent crime and property crime both declined citywide, signaling real progress on public safety.
But there’s a more troubling trend as well: LAPD officers discharged their firearms more than 45 times last year, a 70% jump that resulted in 14 deaths. When Bass raised concerns about the rise in officer-involved shootings, McDonnell pledged that every incident would undergo rigorous review, both through internal investigations and independent oversight.
That commitment is a good sign, and city leaders should hold McDonnell and his command staff accountable for how officers use force — while recognizing that in police work, some use of force is unavoidable and, at times, justified.
Former LAPD Chief Bernard Parks once observed that the department tends to discipline officers frequently but fires too few of them. His broader point remains relevant: no chief can prevent every improper use of force, but a chief can and must set clear expectations and hold officers to them consistently.
Then there’s the question of money, which the mayoral race has muddled rather than clarified. Bass has called for increased funding for the LAPD, while Raman has pushed back — framing the mayor as the department’s defender and herself as its critic. But that framing oversimplifies a complicated issue.
Slashing the LAPD’s budget isn’t an effective response to legitimate criticism of the department, just as simply pouring more money into it won’t fix systemic problems on its own. Still, adequate staffing matters, and budget cuts can sometimes lead to more chaos and confrontation rather than less. Public safety funding should be driven by strategy — reducing crime while ensuring accountability — not used as a political cudgel to punish or reward the department.
The real question voters deserve to hear addressed isn’t whether Jim McDonnell should be fired or whether he has lost the city’s confidence in some abstract sense. It’s whether Bass and Raman can articulate a clear vision for what they want the LAPD to prioritize and how they intend to hold the department accountable to that vision.
From there, civilian leadership — the mayor and City Council — needs to translate that vision into concrete direction for the department. Only then can the LAPD and its chief fairly be judged on whether they’re carrying out that mission effectively and within the bounds of the law.
A police chief who reduces crime, holds officers accountable and genuinely serves the community deserves to keep the job. One who fails on those counts should be replaced. That’s the standard voters should be asking Bass and Raman to meet — not campaign soundbites about confidence and optics.
Original source: CalMatters
