Mayor Karen Bass called on challenger Nithya Raman to retract a debate comment linking former LAPD Chief Daryl Gates to a "gold standard" in immigration enforcement.

Bass held a news conference Thursday, Oct. 15, at her campaign headquarters, surrounded by about two dozen Black community leaders. She said Raman's mention of Gates during their Oct. 13 televised debate showed a lack of knowledge about the city's history of police abuse and the suffering of Black and Latino residents during the former chief's tenure, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Gates led the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. He resigned amid criticism over police abuse and his slow response to the riots that erupted after four officers were acquitted of beating Rodney King, a Black motorist.

"My opponent is not really familiar with L.A., especially the Black community," Bass said. "She doesn't know us."

The clash traces to the candidates' only televised debate before the Nov. 3 runoff, hosted by NBC4 and Telemundo 52 in Universal City. During the exchange on immigration, Raman said the city "used to be the gold standard in terms of noncooperation with immigration enforcement years ago, under the era of Daryl Gates."

Raman said she was referring to Special Order 40, a 1979 directive Gates issued that prohibits officers from stopping people solely to determine their immigration status. The order was aimed at reassuring immigrants they could report crimes without fear of deportation, the Times reported.

Bass called Raman's framing a lie and said Gates inflicted serious harm on the African American community. Speakers at the news conference pointed to the department's use of a battering ram against suspects' homes and police chokeholds under Gates' command.

Raman fired back with a YouTube video the same day, calling Gates an abhorrent and racist police chief and accusing Bass of deliberately distorting her words. She said the mayor owed Angelenos answers about LAPD cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Raman said Bass was twisting her words to distract from questions the mayor is refusing to answer, according to the Times. She also cited a Times report that found the LAPD has sent fingerprints collected during bookings to a national law enforcement database that ICE can access.

An LAPD spokesperson said Oct. 15 that Special Order 40 has never been rewritten or rescinded and that officers don't engage in civil immigration enforcement. Dean Gialamas, commanding officer of the LAPD's Information Technology Bureau, said the department hasn't found evidence that its license plate reader data have been shared with any immigration enforcement agency.

Both candidates have said they want the LAPD to stop working with license plate reader company Flock Safety. The LAPD let its Flock Safety agreement lapse in 2026 over concerns that the Trump administration is using the data to locate immigrants targeted for deportation.

Bass is seeking a second four-year term after being forced into a runoff with Raman in the June 2 primary, where Bass won 34% of the vote and Raman received 29%. A UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll co-sponsored by the Times showed Raman leading among likely voters, 39% to 28%, with a third of the electorate undecided.

Voters head to the polls Nov. 3.