L.A.'s Black-Latino tensions bared in City Council scandal
Protesters showed up outside L.A. Councilman Kevin De León's home and members of local indigenous communities marched in downtown, demanding the resignation of De León and Gil Cedillo.Cross-cultural coalitions have ruled Los Angeles politics for decades, helping elect both Black and Latino politicians to top leadership roles in the huge racially and ethnically diverse city.
The recording, released anonymously a year after it was made, stunned and hurt many in the Black community, which makes up a little less than 9% of the city's roughly four million residents. Concerns inside that group, which has long counted on council seats and other city posts in heavily African American neighborhoods, have been growing in recent years as the Latino share of the population has swollen to nearly half and Hispanic politicians have started assuming more high-ranking roles.
Riots erupted across the city the following year when three of the officers were acquitted on excessive force charges and the jury failed to reach a verdict on the fourth. The rioting lasted six days and killed 63 people, underscoring racial tensions in the city, especially between the Black community and Korean Americans, whose businesses were often targeted.
Pastor called for a moment of reflection, saying "there's an interesting opportunity here for the Latino community to examine anti-Blackness and colorism, in the Latino community." "There was a real plan of Black erasure, of people who have been here a long time building this city," Anderson said. "At a time when our nation is grappling with a recent rise in hate speech and hate crimes, these comments have deepened the pain that our communities have endured," said Sen. Alex Padilla, who earlier served as the council's youngest president.