Repaying a political ally from his failed presidential bid, U.S. Sen. John Kerry on Saturday endorsed mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa in the race to lead the nation's second-largest city.
The 2004 Democratic presidential nominee said Villaraigosa had worked to put more police officers on the streets and provide health care for more residents.
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"I'm not here against anybody," Kerry told hundreds of Villaraigosa supporters at Los Angeles Valley College. "I'm here for somebody who has a set of hopes and dreams."
Villaraigosa, a city councilman and one of Kerry's national campaign co-chairs last year, "will be a mayor for all the people of Los Angeles," the senator said.
Villaraigosa, who is challenging Mayor James Hahn in a May 17 runoff election, alluded in his remarks to fund-raising questions that have dogged his campaign in recent days, saying politics was "too much about charges and countercharges ... too much about derision and not enough about vision."
Villaraigosa depicted Hahn as a leader of "limited horizons" and said, "If you accept mediocrity, you better be prepared to live with it. I won't accept mediocrity."
Villaraigosa announced this week he was returning $47,000 in donations from at least 20 workers of two Florida-based companies with possible interests in gaining concession contracts at Los Angeles International Airport.
The county district attorney said Friday he was launching a preliminary investigation of the donations, following reports that several of the workers appeared confused when asked about their $1,000 checks.
It is not illegal for multiple employees from a company to donate to a campaign; it is illegal, however, for anyone to reimburse employees for their contributions.
"The key thing for all of us is it appears that from these news reports, people didn't seem to know they had made a contribution to somebody running for mayor, or didn't know when they'd made it," said Hahn, who has long faced ethics questions and investigations regarding so-called pay-to-play contributions in his administration.
"The fact that an investigation has begun is going to help get these questions answered," Hahn, also a Democrat, said Saturday.
Kerry, a Massachusetts senator, is one of several high-profile Villaraigosa supporters. The councilman has also been endorsed by basketball legend Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Rep. Maxine Waters, a Democratic icon in the city's black community.
© 2005 Associated Press
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