Spencer Pratt is gaining major ground in the Los Angeles mayoral race, according to a new poll.
The former reality TV star had the support of 22% of voters, according to the poll released Wednesday by by Emerson College.
Spencer Pratt is gaining major ground in the Los Angeles mayoral race. Jon Rou/LMUThe independent candidate trailed only incumbent Mayor Karen Bass, who had 30% support, while socialist-linked Democrat city Councilmember Nithya Raman sat in third place with 19%.
The polling by Emerson, conducted May 9-10, found all three candidates seeing huge bumps in support as undecided voters make their pick ahead of the June 2 primary.
“Nithya Raman started this race with high expectations, but she continues to fall short — with the debate a stark example of her not being up to the job and this poll shows Angelenos recognize that,” a spokesperson for Bass told the Post.
“Repeated votes to allow encampments near schools and to shrink LAPD is not what Los Angeles needs. We look forward to winning the general election against either Nithya Raman or Spencer Pratt,” they continued.
The number of undecided voters dropped from a whopping 51% in March to 16% in the latest poll.
Incumbent Mayor Karen Bass had 30% support. Jonathan Alcorn for CA PostIn March, Bass had a comfortable lead with 20% support, while both Pratt and Raman had only half of that.
Pratt saw the biggest increase from March with a 12 percentage point bump. Both Bass and Raman increased by 10 percent.
The TV star, whom Republican voters have coalesced around, has put on an impressive run of ads that have captured a lot of attention and won significant praise for his recent debate performance that even Democrats admitted it was good.
“Unfortunately, my entire life is talking to people in the industry, but I can report that everyone was pleasantly — or unpleasantly — surprised by Spencer Pratt’s debate performance,” Democratic strategist Michael Trujillo told The California Post.
The poll showed an age divide in the race, said Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling.
Voters over the age of 60 preferred Bass more and Pratt second. Voters under 40 years instead wanted Raman but had Pratt ranked last.
Pratt also was the top choice for male voters at 30%, while women supported Bass the most at 36%.
Under the election system, the top two vote getters in June will head off to face each other in the general election, unless one candidate gets the majority of votes outright.
Mike Madrid, a GOP strategist, thinks Bass would benefit from a Pratt and Bass November ballot as opposed to lefty Raman.
“I think the chances of Bass making the runoff are considerably higher than they were before the debate,” he told the Post. “She’s been trying to elevate Pratt. That’s the best way that she can survive. Does Pratt making the runoff benefit him? Of course, it benefits him because he’s the candidate, but it benefits Bass more.”
Madrid says Raman’s campaign has nearly “collapsed,” and Democratic voters will more easily “cave” to Bass against a Trump-like figure in a city as liberal as Los Angeles, no matter how much frustration there might be with Bass.
“There’s absolutely a connection to be made with the tone and tenor and style of his campaign, and there are definitely correlations that can and should be made between him and Trump,” he noted.
“But that is not going to help him win in the election,” Madrid added of the candidate whose personal motivation of losing his own home in the Palisades landed him on the ballot.
The lean toward Democrats in the state is already prominent, but when it comes to Los Angeles County and the city on a micro level, it is even more pronounced, with Republicans making up less than a third of voters there.
“What he’s doing is he’s really creating an intense base of support, but it’s about a third of the voters and it’s very intense, but it has a very strong ceiling,” Madrid, who is not affiliated with any campaign, noted.
Matthew Klink, another Republican analyst, agreed and said Pratt has “nailed the general political dissatisfaction that exists in Los Angeles.”
An earlier UCLA poll in March found a majority of Los Angeles voters disapproved of and were dissatisfied with Bass.






