The Democrat Socialists of America-Los Angeles have big plans to take over the governance of Los Angeles, and they are taking no prisoners. Someone from this political org is probably involved in the leaking of the LAtinX Scandal conversation, and the online site Knock-LA has just unveiled a few more.
Another taped conversation has been released, this time between former California Federation of Labor (Cal Labor) President Ron Herrera (who resigned this week after the racist and homophobic slurs from the LAtinX Scandal conversation were exposed) and Hannah Cho, a former City Council aide to Mitch O’Farrell who recently became a part of Cal Labor’s staff. According to Knock-LA, one of the recordings is dated September 30, 2022. The LatinX Scandal conversation happened on October 18, 2021.
The focus of the Herrera/Cho conversation cements Herrera’s allegiance to the current City Council leadership and support of the status quo while blunting the DSA-LA inroads that do not support Cal Labor’s power dominance.
In another leaked recording, now-former LA County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera talks with Hannah Cho, who left the office of Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell earlier this year to join the Federation. Among other things, the two discuss their enmity for O’Farrell’s opponent in the Council District 13 race, labor organizer Hugo Soto-Martinez, and an effort to “buy” the endorsements of several Democratic clubs.
“Well, that’s it for my first house of labor meeting,” Cho at one point tells Herrera, who resigned earlier this week. “Other than,” she switches to a whisper, and appears to say, “A lot of Black people.”
At 4:48 of one of the recordings, Ron Herrera addresses the second person on the recording as “Hannah.” A number of sources, and an audio analysis comparing Cho’s voice on these recordings to her voice on other meetings, have confirmed to Knock LA that the voice belongs to Cho. Cho has not replied to Knock LA‘s request for comment.
Cho would do well to watch her back, especially since her desire to come to work at Cal Labor was so she could be mentored by Herrera, and Herrera has been dispatched. Whoever at Cal Labor is complicit in leaking this audio knows her name and may have plans to put her on the unemployment rolls, or worse.
Here is one bit of this conversation between Herrera and Hannah Cho about consolidating power.
Herrera warns Cho to be ready for war. There is much revelatory conversation about how the party (Democrat) is not meant to be its own independent entity or a “check,” but an outgrowth of Cal Labor.
As if it’s not that already. But according to Herrera and Cho, there is still a ways to go to cement this reality. This should be good news to those fighting to return governance of the city back to the people–it can be done, but DSA-LA’s inroads have to be stopped as well.
Cho talks about how the DSA operatives are experts at working on online campaigns and virtual endorsements. She makes the disparaging comment, “That’s why they are so pale,” to Herrera. As we now see, to Herrera’s and Cho’s detriment, they underestimated the power (and dollars) behind the DSA machine, as well as their intent. Herrera thought his role was to bring DSA into the fold and teach them how things are done at Cal Labor. Instead, DSA wiped Herrera out of the equation in their power consolidation efforts.
These leaked conversations are a means to an end.
Hugo Soto-Martinez is the DSA-LA endorsed candidate running against Mitch O’Farrell for CD-13. I lived in CD-13 for seven years, and it encompasses a lot of prime (and not-so-prime) real estate, including Silverlake, Los Feliz, Atwater Village, and parts of East Hollywood. We lived in Atwater Village, and it went from a gang-infested sleepy stop off the 5 and 2 freeways, to a high-rent (but still gang-infested) hipster and young family enclave. Lots of rampant construction of high-rent condos, and lots of homelessness along the L.A. River. So, it was inevitable that the tensions between renter and high-mortgage payers would erupt into CD-13 skating between capitalism and socialism.
There is no love lost between Herrera and Soto-Martinez, mainly because Herrera expressed his intent to install a hybrid candidate that would suit the purposes of Cal Labor, and not this straight-up DSA operative.
LISTEN:
Both Cho and Herrera expressed disbelief that Soto-Martinez didn’t follow the “order” of political transition in order to subtly solidify that Labor power. Herrera alleged that he attempted to encourage Soto-Martinez to wait his turn, apprentice under O’Farrell in CD-13, and when O’Farrell moved on, he would be handed his seat. After all, this is the path O’Farrell walked when he succeeded Eric Garcetti after Garcetti was termed out of the L.A. City Council and ran as a candidate in his first L.A. Mayor’s race.
Soto-Martinez posted a statement on Twitter expressing his disdain over this revelation.
You see with DSA, it’s not about Labor and it’s not about alliances, it’s about the movement. DSA may appear to make alliances, but if you read their language in their candidate endorsements, it’s about endorsing people who will further the worker class and the DSA movement, and anyone who doesn’t is expendable.
As socialists in Los Angeles, we believe that it’s important to contextualize the choices on our election ballots. Who are these candidates and how did they build power? What are the dynamics of the races they’re running in? Will their priorities build socialism, or at least help Los Angeles’ working class? Now you may have noticed we’ve written… a lot for many of these races. That’s by design. We hope this guide will function as an educational tool to understand what it takes to bring working class power to the county, as well as help you fill out your ballot.
If the socialist movement is not served by these alliances, then the alliances have to be destroyed. What the LatinX Scandal conversation exposed is that the alliances touted by the old guard in Labor and the L.A. City Council were simply smoke and mirrors, used to perform sleight of hand. Behind the scenes, the LAtinX Scandal quadrumvirate consolidated their own power, while removing power from others.
These DSA operatives running as candidates are eschewing this, showing their full face and focused on grabbing power by any means necessary–with no apologies. Oh, they make claims that it is for the good of the worker and the movement, but slavering after power only works one way. Ultimately, it’s about power for themselves and their chosen alliances, and those are inconstant, at best.
The intention of these leaked conversations (and apparently there are more to come) is to destroy the old alliance/power guard between Cal Labor and the Los Angeles City Council. Herrera was the first head to roll, Nury Martinez followed. Kevin DeLeon, and ultimately Mitch O’Farrell are next in line. Should Karen Bass be elected as L.A. Mayor, and any more of their DSA-LA endorsed candidates win the positions for which they are running, then DSA-LA will have furthered their work of embedding socialism into the political structures of Los Angeles.
Consider yourself warned.