Karen Bass, Nithya Raman and Spencer Pratt are in a tight race for mayor of Los Angeles, according to a poll released Thursday, with incumbent Bass holding a statistically insignificant lead ahead of Tuesday’s primary.
According to a UC Berkeley Institute of Government Studies poll co-sponsored by The Times, Bass received 26% support from likely voters, followed by City Council member Raman at 25%.
Pratt, a former reality TV personality making her first bid for elected office, was supported by 22% of likely voters surveyed.
As of this latest poll, Bass had gained enough of a lead over her challengers that analysts predicted she would garner enough votes to face off with Raman or Pratt on November 3. The latest survey suggests that any of the three could take the lead.
“You’ve got three different candidates, each with very different constituencies, all with the potential for error. It’s going to skew turnout,” said Mark DiCamillo, director of elections at Berkeley IGS.
The poll also showed that in a head-to-head race between Bass and Raman, the council member would lead among the city’s registered voters, 32% to 28%, but in this scenario, a quarter of likely voters say they would neither vote nor vote, and 15% were undecided.
The survey of 1,913 registered voters – of whom 1,351 are considered likely voters – is the largest sample of any public survey released before the election. It was held between 19 and 24 May. The margin of error in the survey is about 3% in either direction.
The survey found that only 10% of voters were still undecided, which is down from 26% when the last survey by Berkeley IGS was conducted March 9–15.
Mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt at a campaign block party in South Los Angeles last week.
(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)
Since then, Pratt and Raman have steadily gained ground while support for Bass has remained almost constant.
In March polling, Bass received support from 25% of likely voters, followed by Raman at 17% and Pratt at 14%. Since then, Bass has gained only 1 percentage point, while support for Raman and Pratt has increased by 8 percentage points.
There are 14 candidates running for mayor in Tuesday’s primary and all were listed in the Berkeley IGS poll, but Bass, Raman and Pratt have consistently led the polls. He has also raised the most money in campaign contributions. The latest campaign finance reports filed last week show Pratt with $3.26 million in contributions through May 16, followed by Bass with $3.13 million.
Raman reported a total of more than $931,000 during the May 16 filing period, of which $60,000 came in the form of loans from Raman to her own campaign. He also received the maximum amount of matching funds available in the race, $1.25 million.
Of likely voters surveyed, 9% supported leftist candidate Rai Huang, up 1 percentage point from March, while tech entrepreneur Adam Miller fell from 6% to 5% despite spending $4 million of his own money after the first ballot.
Key issues in the race include the city’s approach to homelessness, housing affordability and public safety.
Pratt, whose home burned in the Palisades fire, has blamed Bass for failing to prepare for the fire and its subsequent response to the fire. Raman has criticized BAS’s Inside Safe program for homeless people, saying that its high costs are unsustainable.
Bass has considered Raman to be an ineffective city council member who struggles to build coalitions on the legislative body, and has said that Pratt has no clue about how to run a city like Los Angeles.
Although Pratt now appears to have a chance to make the runoff, polling shows he faces a steep uphill climb in potential November runoff scenarios with either Bass or Raman. Pratt, a Republican whom Raman has labeled “Trumpian”, is competing in a city where GOP registration is below 15%.
DiCamillo said, “Pratt is an unusual candidate and is generating a lot of excitement in the primary, but he trails Raman and Bass by double digits.”
In the contest between Bass and Pratt, the incumbent mayor was ahead among the city’s registered voters 47% to 29%, with 12% undecided and 12% undecided or saying they would not vote.
Raman also led Pratt in a possible runoff, 45% to 28%, 16% were undecided and 11% chose neither or said they would not vote.
Pratt has repeatedly stated that the mayor’s race is non-partisan. Still, President Trump said last week that he hoped Pratt would do well and that he had heard Pratt was “a big MAGA guy.”
Trump’s unpopularity in Los Angeles could reduce Pratt’s appeal to Democrats, according to a survey by Signal, a national polling group that works for Republican candidates.
Los Angeles mayoral candidate Nitya Raman walks along Olvera Street with business owners on May 19 in Los Angeles.
(Ronaldo Bolaños/Los Angeles Times)
There has only been one debate featuring all three major candidates, during which Raman asserted that Bass and Pratt were working to ensure that he would be ousted in the primary, which Bass and Pratt disputed.
The debate brought a massive influx of campaign contributions to Pratt, who finished second in an Emerson College poll earlier this month.
Raman’s strong showing in Thursday’s polling shows she remains in the race, despite claims by Bass’ campaign and Pratt’s campaign that she is floundering after a weak debate performance.
The survey showed Bass and Pratt with high unfavorability ratings. Of likely voters, 57% viewed Bass unfavorably, which was 1 percentage point higher than the March survey. Pratt’s unfavorable rating in the current survey was also 57% – up dramatically from the 28% unfavorable rating in the previous survey, although in that survey, 55% of likely voters had no opinion about him.
In the May poll, Pratt was given a favorable rating by 25% of likely voters and Bass by 35%.
The survey found that 40% of likely voters gave Raman a favorable rating, while 35% viewed him unfavorably.
