‘Little Monkey’: Los Angeles City Council Members Under Fire Over Leaked Racist Remarks
City council president on Koreans: “I was like, I don’t know where these people are from, I don’t know what village they came [from], how they got here.” She then described them as “ugly.”
The Los Angeles Times released damning audio of two city council members and a union leader unleashing racist remarks towards blacks, Koreans, and whites. Columnist Erika Smith remarked that the comments are something “you might hear at a Trump rally.”
Weird. That is not true, but alas. Have to take a shot at Trump at the right whenever possible!
City Council President Nury Martinez, L.A. County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera, and Latino Councilmembers Gil Cedillo and Kevin de León appeared on the tape.
The four held the meeting in October 2021 about the “maps that had been proposed by the city’s 21-member redistricting commission.”
Martinez and the other Latino leaders present during the taped conversation were seemingly unaware they were being recorded as Martinez said a white councilmember handled his young Black son as though he were an “accessory” and described Councilman Mike Bonin’s son as “Parece changuito,” or “like a monkey.”
During the conversation with Councilmembers Gil Cedillo and Kevin de León and Los Angeles County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera, Martinez described Bonin at one point as a “little bitch,” according to a recording of the meeting reviewed by The Times.
Martinez also mocked Oaxacans and said “F— that guy … He’s with the Blacks” while speaking about Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón.
De León appeared to compare Bonin’s handling of his child to Martinez holding a Louis Vuitton handbag.
De León said Bonin is the council’s “fourth black member,” alleging he “won’t f*cking ever say a peep about Latinos.”
They brought up Bonin’s son because of a dispute between two other council members:
Bonin’s son was brought into the conversation as the group discussed a dispute between Councilmembers Curren Price and Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who were at odds last year over whose district would represent USC and Exposition Park once the new maps were finalized. Both men are Black and represent parts of South Los Angeles.
Martinez told the group she had a conversation with businessman Danny Bakewell about the situation, and argued that if Harris-Dawson was seeking an economic asset for his district that he should seek to move Los Angeles International Airport out of Bonin’s Westside district and into his.
“Go get the airport from his little brother — that little bitch Bonin,” Martinez recalled advising Bakewell.
Appalling how they speak about the child:
Martinez said that Bonin appeared with his son on a float in a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade that featured a number of politicians. She also said the child was “an accessory.”
De León seemed to compare Bonin’s handling of the child to “when Nury brings her Goyard bag or the Louis Vuitton bag.”
“Su negrito, like on the side,” Martinez said, using a Spanish diminutive term for a Black person that can be considered demeaning.
Martinez suggested the child was misbehaving on the float and might have tipped over the float if she and the other women on the float didn’t step in to “parent this kid.”
“They’re raising him like a little white kid,” Martinez said. “I was like, this kid needs a beatdown. Let me take him around the corner and then I’ll bring him back.”
Martinez’s reference to Bonin’s child as changuito occurred during that part of the conversation.
The discussions about redistricting showed it’s all about them, and they only see a person’s skin color:
Martinez voiced frustration that the panel had proposed removing a number of economic assets from her San Fernando Valley district, including the Van Nuys Airport and the Anheuser-Busch brewery.
“If you’re going to talk about Latino districts, what kind of districts are you trying to create?” she asked. “Because you’re taking away our assets. You’re just going to create poor Latino districts with nothing?”
At one point, Cedillo said there were certain councilmembers who do not merit “rescuing” during the redistricting process. He then made clear that he was referring to Nithya Raman, who had been fighting to ensure her Hollywood Hills district was not moved to the west Valley.
“She is not our ally. She is not going to help us,” he said.
I guess Martinez doesn’t like Koreans:
The group then questioned whether Shatto Place, a small street, and Lafayette Park are in Koreatown.
“I see a lot of little short dark people,” Martinez said of that section of Koreatown, employing stereotypes long used against Oaxacans in Mexico and in the United States.
“I was like, I don’t know where these people are from, I don’t know what village they came [from], how they got here,” Martinez said, before adding “Tan feos” — “They’re ugly.”
Then Martinez brought up recently indicted Councilmember Mark Ridley-Thomas’s future. If they suspended Ridley-Thomas, “City Controller Ron Galperin would decide whether he still gets paid.”
“You need to go talk to that white guy,” said Martinez. “It’s not us. It’s the white members on this council that will motherf— you in a heartbeat.”
Martinez claimed the African Americans would “come after us” if Ridley-Thomas resigned. Herrera said the council needed to get rid of him because of the severity of the charges, but they needed someone to support the three council members in the room.
De León suggested nonprofit director Irma Muñoz because she’s “married to an African American and she lives up in Baldwin Hills.”
The council eventually suspended Ridley-Thomas, who faces a “trial on bribery and other federal health charges.”
Martinez tried to brush aside her cruelty by promoting the work she’s done as a city council member:
On Sunday, after this article was published online, Martinez issued a statement apologizing for her comments, saying: “In a moment of intense frustration and anger, I let the situation get the best of me and I hold myself accountable for these comments. For that I am sorry.”
“The context of this conversation was concern over the redistricting process and concern about the potential negative impact it might have on communities of color,” she added. “My work speaks for itself. I’ve worked hard to lead this city through its most difficult time.”
De León described the comments as “wholly inappropriate.” He also reached out to his colleague to express his regret.
Cedillo claimed ignorance: “I don’t have a recollection of this conversation.”
Herrera played martyr: “And I didn’t step up to stop them and I will have to bear the burden of that cross moving forward.”
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Comments
Total loser. She is Putting people into categories and then insulting them.
Every child goes through a monkey stage, they constantly climb and jump off of stuff. Parents routinely refer to them as little monkeys.
That is Not Allowed anymore. Apparently, even leftists aren’t exempt.
She resigned last night.
She didn’t resign from the city council.
Meh that’s normal, except we’re told we must not do it. It was after all a discussion of race-based redistricting, so race was already a topic, and saying Bonin is a “fourth black member” is probably relevant to how he would vote on redistricting.
they will be replaced by people that feel exactly the same, but now know better than voice the truth.
Cosell’s daughter/grand daughter?
“Meth” Bonin is, in a city council that has nothing but loathsome members, the worst of them all. His homeless sidewalk tent villages are beyond being a blight. He is a gay drug addict who has an adopted black son and who has been accused of “sleeping with children” by his opponents.
As usual in LA politics, there are no good guys. Nothing but scum bags being scum bags.
“Martinez said a white councilmember handled his young Black son as though he were an “accessory”
Well, so does Joe, but at least Bonin’s is still breathing.
This is a year old. Someone didn’t get what they wanted.
She called Trump a racist to LA Times headlines…….hmmmm
She sees a racist every time she looks in the mirror.
Well, she’s got the Karen hairdo down.
The inquisitor has been caught with a pentagram.
“Under fire…”
Excuse me while I laugh my ass off. She’s getting headlines. Nothing more. It will go away and she will be on the City Council until she wants to be mayor.
It’s California. And in California, Los Angeles (and SF) are the outliers.
Yawn.
It looks to me like nobody on the LA city council has any room to call anyone else a racist. They all qualify.
Just demonstrates that the council is apparently a bunch of racists and nobody else seems to care. Also, why was the union guy involved in a council meeting about redistricting? That sounds like council business, not union business.
Stakeholder.
Almost everyone in the world is a “racist” too. Either be shocked, shocked by 90+ percent of the human race, or admit that it’s normal and what is abnormal is the standard imposed in this country on certain races, to be super submissive on this issue.
How do we blame white supremacy for this one?
Critical Racists’ Theory (CRT) presumes Diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgment, class-based bigotry)… Inequity, and Exclusion (DIE). One step forward, two steps backward.
Everybody looks like a monkey. You’re just supposed to avoid noticing it for blacks, the politeness being because they’ve noticed it themselves.
Really, I wish we all had the freedom to speak our minds.
I do resent the dems persecuting us while they have all the freedom to be opinionated as they wish.
“Columnist Erika Smith remarked that the comments are something “you might hear at a Trump rally.””
Imagined. The word is “imagined“. We have a recording of the council meeting — they sound like lovely people. We got nothing like it from an Orange Festival.
Those imaginary Trump rallies head sound awful. Agent Smith might want to get some help about that.
“Su negrito, like on the side,” Martinez said, using a Spanish diminutive term for a Black person that can be considered demeaning.”
And isn’t “on the side” a reference to a bastard child, or am I showing my age?
But if it were a black parent and white child I suppose it could be “su blanqueno” (or something like that, my Spanish is even more dimunitive), a diminutive for a child is pretty normal at least in less PC cultures than ours.
What surprised me is that apparently she insulted every other race but her own ethnicity. This fact was not in the mainstream news stories. Is it no big deal to insult Koreans or whites?
Some of the worst racists and racist comments come from latinos towards blacks and vice versa. No one will be held accountable for this, they will continue on destroying their city and California while grabbing everything they can.
As they’re busy griping at each other, those remaining (whites, Koreans, etc.) should be able to get some for themselves. Or make strategic alliances, play one side against the other.
This is what one party rule along tribal lines looks like. Ultimately the d/prog coalition of grievance grifters fight among themselves for a larger share of the spoils.
CA may be a one-party state but that state isn’t the Democrat Party. It’s the Socialist Party which means the unions are the key players. There is alot left to come out on this tape and I hope people notice that blacks and whites are being excluded in the governing LA cabal.
An issue that has emerged among them since this last October is how the Latinos in office are very upset with how their Latino voters are becoming increasingly vocal about their move increasingly conservative leanings. In the end, there will be no new Uniparty. But the Republicans don’t seem interested in playing any role at all in this other than destroying Trump today and the memory of a Reagan California.
Don’t know how this post could be downvoted. But if I lived in LA I’d for sure learn Spanish if I didn’t already know it. Lack of Spanish is not an immutable characteristic.
Can someone update me on the latest woke scoreboard of bizarro and arbitrary definitions of racism? Are these people capable of being racist or no? Have they earned enough woke points to offset their remarks?
This whole thing is like a ponzi scheme cult.
Minorities are born with varying amounts of racial credits, which are like carbon credits. You are not. And unlike carbon credits, you can’t buy any.
I believe the southern part of the state of Oaxaca is where Mexico’s black population mostly lives. So this seems in the same trend as her other comments about black people.
You would never her that a Trump rally. Only a Democrat rally, although there would only be a few people there.
Nice (trashy) drama!
I have read that most “Hispanics” in the USA identify as “white” (but not Anglo). Martinez looks rather pale to me, especially for being from sunny L.A.
Mexicans of Spanish heritage look very “white.” And you’ll find that many of them are virulent racists who look down on indigenous and mestizo people. They’re also very often rich, elitist snobs.
Fun fact: Whitey is no more likely to be racist than anybody else.
This is all typical of any meeting of leftists. Nothing unusual. Have you ever sat in on a discussion by a university hiring committee? This has been going on for decades. How about listening in on the conversations of the city council when they are determining how to dole out the minority set-asides for overpriced municipal work? I’d bet you could hardly tell the difference between those discussions and gangsta rap lyrics.
That comment was not about Koreans, it was about Oaxacans who live on certain streets at the edge of Koreatown. Still racist, of course, just against different people.