Los Angeles City Councilman Joe Buscaino is entering the 2022 mayor’s race, saying he will use his background as a police officer to tackle the city’s urgent issues of homelessness and rising crime.
Buscaino, a Democrat who represents a district stretching from Watts to San Pedro, plans to launch his campaign Monday. He told The Times in an interview that the city is facing an emergency as thousands of people live on the streets, trash piles up in neighborhoods across the city and violence surges in South L.A.
“This isn’t the city I know and love,” Buscaino said.
Buscaino said that when friends and family members have questioned whether a police officer could be elected to the city’s highest office, he pointed to Tom Bradley, who served two decades with the LAPD before joining the City Council and, in 1973, becoming L.A.’s only Black mayor to date. Buscaino said his role as a senior lead officer in San Pedro was “focused on problem solving, on creating partnerships to improve the quality of life here.”
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