Eight candidates so far have made it onto next year’s ballot for the Council District 14 race.
As of Thursday, the list includes current CD14 councilmember Kevin de León, state Assemblymembers Wendy Carrillo and Miguel Santiago, science teacher Eduardo “Lalo” Vargas, tenants rights attorney Ysabel Jurado, litigator Teresa Hillery, community advocate Genny Guerrero and healthcare professional Nadine Diaz.
Applicants were required to obtain either 1,000 resident signatures to qualify with no filing fee required, or 500 signatures with a $300 fee.
The deadline to submit all signatures was Wednesday, Dec. 6 but some signatures have yet to be processed. The elections division of the LA City Clerk’s office has ten business days to verify resident signatures for all LA City Council election races. Individuals who don’t qualify for the ballot can still encourage residents to submit write-in votes.
Several of the candidates shared their qualification news on social media. Kevin de León announced his candidacy on November 16. “I’m excited to be the first candidate to submit signatures to get on the ballot in CD14,” De León said.
In a TikTok, Ysabel Jurado recorded her excited reaction to receiving confirmation she had made it onto the ballot. “I want to thank all of our volunteers for getting us here and getting over 1300 signatures,” Jurado said in the video. “Now we have to win this race.”
Former CD14 Councilmember Nick Pacheco also campaigned to make it onto the ballot but was forced to drop out, claiming signature theft.
“Unfortunately last week someone broke into my campaign manager’s assistant’s car and 200 signatures were among things taken,” Pacheco wrote in a text to Boyle Heights Beat. “It was random, nobody knew [the signatures] were in there.”
The current candidate list reflects LA politics expert Dr. Fernando Guerra’s predictions for the election. In an interview last month Guerra said there are four candidates he expects to lead the pack.
“It’s gonna be a tough race. You got Miguel Santiago, Wendy [Carrillo]. Obviously Kevin himself and [Ysabel] Jurado. So you have four viable candidates and they’re all gonna take a slice,” said Guerra.
This post was updated Dec. 7 to reflect candidate Genny Guerrero’s status. It was updated again on Dec. 14 to reflect candidate Nadine Diaz’s status.
