The Atlantic

Eric Garcetti Isn't Expecting Much From Washington

The Los Angeles mayor insists that politics is working fine at the municipal level—and talks about Trump, policing, and his favorite L.A. film.
Source: Mike Blake / Reuters

There are at least two things that bother the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, about Donald Trump’s presidency.

“I am totally opposed to so much of the immorality coming out of the White House right now, but I’d like to also talk about its impracticality,” Garcetti told The Atlantic. “This is a very impractical White House. When it comes to public safety, I listen to police chiefs and cops, not to a cable-news station. When it comes to environment, we’re not engaged in ideological conversation about the merits of climate change. We’re actually dealing with the impact.”

Garcetti’s criticism of Trump comes at a time when chatter about Garcetti as a candidate in the 2020 presidential race is increasing. So is he running? The mayor now gets this question a lot from reporters, but has so far only offered artful dodges. “I don’t ever say no,” he says, “but I’m pretty darn focused on being mayor.”

In , Garcetti speaks with ’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, about how major cities can help the country, how he is trying to insulate L.A. from the whims and scorn of what he says is a very impractical White House,

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from The Atlantic

The Atlantic5 min readAmerican Government
What Nikki Haley Is Trying to Prove
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here. Nikki Haley faces terrible odds in her home state of
The Atlantic8 min readAmerican Government
The Most Consequential Recent First Lady
This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here. The most consequential first lady of modern times was Melania Trump. I know, I know. We are supposed to believe it was Hillary Clinton, with her unbaked cookies
The Atlantic3 min read
They Rode the Rails, Made Friends, and Fell Out of Love With America
The open road is the great American literary device. Whether the example is Jack Kerouac or Tracy Chapman, the national canon is full of travel tales that observe America’s idiosyncrasies and inequalities, its dark corners and lost wanderers, but ult

Related Books & Audiobooks