By Jared Evan

Karen Bass — L.A.’s Radical Mayor Governing by Ideology, Not Reality

Los Angeles isn’t just burning in the hills — it’s unraveling in the streets. And at the center of the collapse stands Mayor Karen Bass, who has proven again and again that her loyalty lies not with public safety or civic leadership, but with ideology, optics, and a deeply rooted radicalism that’s now bleeding into every corner of city governance.

As anti-ICE riots erupted across Los Angeles, Mayor Bass didn’t condemn the violence — she blamed federal law enforcement for it. With National Guard troops and Marines deployed to restore order after ICE offices were targeted and the LAPD was overwhelmed, Bass issued what sounded more like a threat than a statement: that the violence “won’t stop” until the federal government withdraws. The implication was chilling — that mob violence is somehow the fault of law enforcement simply doing its job.

The threat being made here by Mayor Bass is explicit. The Mayor of LA is effectively saying the mob violence is caused by the mere presence of ICE in the city and the violence against ICE will not stop unless federal law enforcement is withdrawn from the city. This is the… https://t.co/actyYUoxHw

— Stephen Miller (@StephenM) June 10, 2025

White House advisor Stephen Miller wasn’t exaggerating when he described Bass’s posture as “the definition of insurrection.” Her message was unmistakable: federal officers should leave or else the riots will continue. Instead of standing with the rule of law, Bass positioned herself as the political shield for those attacking it.

MAYOR KAREN BASS: “We need to stop the raids.”

“This was chaos that was started by Washington, D.C.” pic.twitter.com/OQS11FqZ5z

— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) June 10, 2025

This isn’t some shocking turn for Bass — it’s a return to form. Her political roots are deeply entangled with Marxist activism. In the 1970s, she joined the Venceremos Brigade, a group with ties to Cuban intelligence and the Communist Party USA.

She traveled to Havana to see Fidel Castro speak, and decades later, upon his death, she referred to the dictator as “commandante en jefe” and called his passing “a great loss to the people of Cuba.”

She never apologized for those words. Nor for the reported eulogy she gave for a senior figure in the Communist Party USA. These aren’t youthful missteps. They’re evidence of a lifelong worldview now shaping how she governs.

And that worldview has consequences.

While Angelenos were choking on smoke from the deadly Palisades Fire, Bass was nowhere near the city. She was in Ghana, attending an inauguration cocktail party. She flew back only after the firestorm — both literal and political — grew too intense to ignore. At least 27 lives were lost, countless homes destroyed, and city leadership was AWOL.

To make matters worse, Bass’s own administration bears responsibility for the fire’s severity. She hired a $750,000-a-year “water czar” at the Department of Water and Power, who insiders say failed to ensure adequate pressure and infrastructure for firefighting. Fire hydrants in key areas ran dry. Equipment malfunctioned. The very basics of emergency response were compromised.

The fire wasn’t an isolated failure — it was the culmination of mismanagement, misplaced priorities, and an obsession with politics over performance. Bass had slashed $17 million from the fire department budget just months earlier, after their union endorsed her opponent. The cuts weren’t just dangerous — they were personal.

Meanwhile, the city’s chronic homelessness crisis continues to spiral, with Bass pouring billions into policies that have done little beyond creating more encampments and less accountability. Her DEI-focused hiring blitz filled high-paying roles with ideologues while sidelining basic city functions like infrastructure, emergency preparedness, and public safety.

In fact, under Bass, public safety has become a dirty phrase. Law enforcement is starved of resources, federal agents are vilified, and violent unrest is excused as an expression of “grievance.” The idea of enforcing immigration law is now framed by the mayor as a provocation — not a necessity.

That’s not leadership. It’s abdication.

She has consistently aligned herself with fringe ideologies while failing to deliver even the most basic services to Los Angeles. Fires rage, police are undermined, streets are unsafe, and institutions are stretched thin — but Bass finds time for symbolic gestures, foreign junkets, and statements of solidarity with every cause except the one her citizens actually elected her to uphold: the safety and functionality of Los Angeles.

Is it possible that Karen Bass is intentionally undermining Los Angeles? Given her well-documented Marxist ties—from her early activism with the socialist Venceremos Brigade to her unabashed praise of Fidel Castro—one must wonder if her handling of the city’s crises is more than mere incompetence.

The unchecked riots, the open defiance of federal law enforcement, and the disastrous management of wildfires all raise the question: is Bass deliberately allowing chaos to consume LA in order to burn it down and rebuild it according to a utopian communist vision?

Her actions—or lack thereof—suggest a leader who sees destruction not as a failure but as a necessary step toward a radical, ideological transformation of the city.

And it’s the people of Los Angeles who are paying the price.