DEMOCRACY IN ACTION

Erika D. Smith is a columnist for the Los Angeles Times writing about the diversity of people and places across California. During the 2022 election cycle she helped moderate the mayoral and sheriff’s debates at the Skirball Cultural Center. Here she shares the meaning and memory of that night.

I’M A WRITER. TV ISN’T REALLY MY THING. But one evening in late September, I found myself sitting under bright lights in the packed auditorium of the Skirball Cultural Center, anxiously waiting for about a half-dozen cameras to go live.

In that moment, I was worried about all sorts of things that didn’t matter. Not smudging the makeup that I never wear. Not rolling backwards off the makeshift platform and into a row of seats.

So I remain forever grateful for what happened next. Jessie Kornberg, President of the Skirball, walked on stage and said a few words to remind us why we were there — for a celebration of American democracy and, by extension, a sharing of Jewish culture.

Five journalists, myself included, were about to co-moderate two pivotal political debates. First, between the candidates running for Los Angeles County sheriff, Alex Villanueva and Robert Luna. And second, between the candidates running for Los Angeles mayor, Karen Bass and Rick Caruso.

It was to be the latest event in a series of them at the Skirball, all focused on the importance of voting, politics and overall civic engagement. Voter education with the League of Women Voters, an exhibition celebrating citizenship and political speech, a film series curated by a constitutional scholar, and now these debates—the series would soon culminate with actual voting at the Skirball.

The cultural center, Kornberg told us, was built to break down barriers, to open minds and to embrace differences. And indeed, as she spoke those words I recalled how that’s exactly what I had experienced.

Most people don’t know just how much preparation it takes to pull off a televised debate. Suffice it to say it’s a lot. Like a lot, a lot.

This was especially true for these debates, because there were so many news organizations and institutions involved. In addition to the Skirball, there was the Los Angeles Times, Fox 11, Univision 34, KPCC, the Los Angeles Urban League, and Loyola Marymount University.

Representatives from each had met over Zoom for weeks, trying to hammer out the logistics and basic power-sharing of the unwieldy partnership. Then some of us huddled in person for a few days, taking over a conference room at the Skirball.

Our job was to come up with questions, from the wording to order in which we’d pose them to the candidates. While we agreed that much about L.A. is broken, we quickly realized that we didn’t always share the same priorities for repairs. Like a lot of Angelenos, we had differing views on how to address homelessness, housing affordability, crime and public safety, policing, guns, climate change and economic development.

We each came from different communities, with different races and ethnicities, and with different concerns. So we argued — well, debated. We got irritated with one another, as we made our respective cases on this point or that point.

We laughed, too. We took lunch breaks in the Skirball’s courtyard, which, with that magnificent pond, I’m convinced is the most calming place in Los Angeles. Then we got back to work. We compromised. And we learned.

I thought about this on the evening of the debates when Kornberg, in her speech, joked with the audience that if they didn’t understand what’s so Jewish about a political debate, they could “join me for a family meal this weekend and see just how Jewish a political debate can be.”

I’m immensely proud of the questions we asked all four candidates and the sometimes contentious process by which we cobbled them together in that conference room. Taken together, the questions offered a window into the needs and dreams of diverse Los Angeles.

That carries even greater importance, knowing what has happened in the months since.

First, came the leaked audio of three members of the City Council and an influential labor leader having a crass, racist conversation, pitting Latinos against Black people and Jews and framing politics in L.A. in zero-sum terms. And then the surge of antisemitism, culminating with a group of people raising their arms in Nazi salutes and hanging a hateful sign over the 405 Freeway.

Los Angeles is better than that. Or, at least, we should be. We can be.

The Skirball was built by a Holocaust survivor who, Kornberg told us, “imagined this space as one good place, for everyone.” I will always think of my time there as a reminder that, by doing the hard work of collectively participating in our diverse democracy, it’s possible to make that true for L.A. as well.