Spencer Pratt's Mayoral Dream Fades as Mail-In Ballots Tell Different Story

Spencer Pratt came out of the June 2 primary election for Los Angeles mayor looking strong. But a week of counting mail-in ballots transformed what looked like a second-place finish into a third-place exit—and with it, the end of his unconventional run for city hall.

The reality hit on Monday, June 8, when the Associated Press called the race for his rival, city councilwoman Nithya Raman, who will advance to a November general election showdown with incumbent Mayor Karen Bass. Raman polled at 28.6 percent to Pratt’s 25.8 percent—a fraction of a percentage point difference that evaporated as the mail-in count rolled in. Bass, 72, had already secured her spot with a commanding 34.3 percent, clinching the first position under California’s top-two primary system.

For Pratt, 44, the reversal was jarring. He’d led on election night, only to watch his advantage slip away with each batch of processed ballots. It’s a reminder of why election night doesn’t equal election day in California—a reality that doesn’t always make headlines until someone like a reality TV personality becomes the cautionary tale.

Raman seized the moment with a statement dripping in campaign-speak, thanking her supporters and framing the general election as a fight against“powerful interests”and the“broken status quo.”She’s positioned herself as the outsider challenging both Bass and City Hall’s entrenched power structure—a lane Pratt had been trying to occupy himself.

Pratt didn’t go quietly. On Monday, he tweeted that there were still“hundreds of thousands of votes outstanding”and insisted his campaign staff wasn’t giving up, with LA officials supposedly giving them three more weeks to count. It was a Hail Mary without much runway. Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump—who’d endorsed Pratt the previous month—waded in on Truth Social, claiming without evidence that the race was rigged. Trump, 79, wrote:“Not possible for Spencer Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had. 3rd World Nation. Rigged Elections.”It was Trump being Trump, but it also underscored how Pratt’s candidacy had become a flashpoint in broader political theater, regardless of his own efforts to position himself as a nonpartisan community activist.

For now, the Los Angeles mayoral race is set: Bass versus Raman in November, with Pratt back to whatever comes next.