0
1
Embattled L.A. City Council member Nury Martinez on Tuesday said she would take a leave of absence after resigning from her position as president in the fallout of leaked audio from a meeting where she and two other councilmembers were recorded making racist remarks, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The latest: Protesters interrupted the City Council's Tuesday meeting with chants of "Resign now!" The Times also reported Tuesday that Martinez used derogatory language and stereotypes to refer to Jews and Armenians in the same leaked recording.
Details: Martinez referred to a white councilmember's child, who is Black, as "ese changuito," or that little monkey, during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade, according to the leaked audio of a nearly year-old conversation.
Martinez also reportedly said that the councilor, Mike Bonin, handled his son as though he were an "accessory." She also referred to Bonin as a "little b---h."
Herrera suggested that Bonin puts his young son out in public like a lawn jockey, the racist statues used to invoke the antebellum South.
After former Los Angeles County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera said, "I’m sure Katz and his crew have an agenda," referring to the Jewish former state Assemblymember Richard Katz, Martinez is heard saying the "judíos" — which means Jews in Spanish — "cut their deal with South L.A.," per the Times.
"They are gonna screw everybody else," she continues in the recording.
Martinez also said at one point that she didn’t know whether Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian, who is Armenian American, could get elected in a "pretty white" district.
"If a white, a reputable white businesswoman was in that district ... [it] is still pretty white. But that’s on them," she said. "I’m not — I’m not cutting that deal with anybody because I don’t know. I don’t know that he can win."
Martinez also describes Nazarian as “the guy with the one eyebrow” later on.