Mayor’s Use of Disappearing Messages Faces Scrutiny

Mayor Karen Bass and her team have reportedly been using disappearing messages, which raises serious concerns about adherence to rules that mandate record-keeping.

It’s claimed that Bass’s communications occur through WhatsApp, where messages are deleted every 24 hours. A source indicated this to the Los Angeles Times.

This practice prompts questions regarding the transparency of her administration, especially given her role in handling various crises, including the Palisades fire and a recent incident in Boyle Heights.

City regulations stipulate that records should be maintained for a minimum of two years.

Using automatically deleted messages might provide a way to avoid public records requests. The mayor’s office has not commented on the situation.

Additionally, her media team is under scrutiny for allowing former publicist Yusef Robb to continue appearing in WhatsApp group chats, even though he’s now with the Boyle Heights warehouse company. Reports suggest that Robb remains an unofficial adviser to Bass, raising potential conflict-of-interest concerns.

Interestingly, Bass has faced scrutiny before regarding her use of disappearing messages. After the Palisades fire, media organizations requested her text messages. However, her attorney mentioned that her phone settings prevent saving text messages, insisting that there’s no necessity for certain city employees to keep them either.

The legal team argued that texts are merely “transitory” communications and therefore don’t fall under retention requirements, despite some messages eventually being retrieved and released.

Even after facing a lawsuit concerning the deletion of messages, attorneys argued that retaining texts for two years would be unrealistic.

“Following the rules proposed would intrude on the personal lives of city employees, potentially violating constitutional rights,” asserted city attorney Reuben Camper Kahn.