News Politics

Los Angeles Mayor Endorses Clinton

NPR | By Karen Grigsby Bates

Published June 1, 2007 at 1:00 PM EDT

This week, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa endorsed Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) in her bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Hispanic and black voters were a critical part of the coalition that put Villaraigosa over the top and into the mayor's seat in 2005. But since then, a number of Hispanic activists have wondered whether he is Hispanic enough.

Villaraigosa insists that, although he is Mexican-American, he does not identify himself as a Hispanic politician; rather, he is a politician, who happens to be Hispanic.

Politics

Karen Grigsby Bates

Karen Grigsby Bates is the Senior Correspondent for Code Switch, a podcast that reports on race and ethnicity. A veteran NPR reporter, Bates covered race for the network for several years before becoming a founding member of the Code Switch team. She is especially interested in stories about the hidden history of race in America—and in the intersection of race and culture. She oversees much of Code Switch's coverage of books by and about people of color, as well as issues of race in the publishing industry. Bates is the co-author of a best-selling etiquette book (Basic Black: Home Training for Modern Times) and two mystery novels; she is also a contributor to several anthologies of essays. She lives in Los Angeles and reports from NPR West.