Los Angeles City Attorney candidate Marissa Roy described the city attorney as "one of the most important, but often least understood, positions in the city." Most voters don't know who their city attorney is or what that person does. In LA, the city attorney prosecutes misdemeanors, acts as the city's lawyer, advises departments, and writes ordinances. But Roy emphasized that the city attorney is also "the attorney for the people," with power to sue businesses for unlawful, unfair, or deceptive practices.
Roy, a Democratic Socialists of America member and a prosecutor in the California Department of Justice's consumer protection section, believes the office is an untapped resource to fight the Trump administration and protect working-class Angelenos. As outside counsel for LA County during Trump's first term, she worked on cases protecting sanctuary cities and DACA recipients. Recently, she helped secure over half a million dollars for tenants whose landlord was accused of unlawful evictions, illegal rent hikes, and maintaining uninhabitable units.
Roy is challenging incumbent Hydee Feldstein Soto, who has faced allegations of surveilling employees, blocking affordable housing, and attempting to lift restrictions on police force against journalists. Other candidates include Deputy District Attorney John McKinney and human rights lawyer Aida Ashouri.
Why Run Now?
Roy's interest in the office dates back to her time as a prosecutor there after law school, where she built wage theft cases returning tens of thousands to workers. She decided to run after witnessing what she calls abuses by the current administration, including targeting journalists and protesters, blocking affordable housing, and retaliating against employees. "It was really watching the abuses of this office pile up that made me start thinking about jumping in now," she said, citing the need for a city attorney with expertise in suing the Trump administration and fighting corporate abuse.
Specific Concerns About the Incumbent
Roy pointed to several alarming instances. The city attorney sued a journalist for possessing public records provided in response to a lawful request, a meritless lawsuit that cost the city $300,000 in attorney's fees. She also blocked the Venice Dell project, an all-affordable housing project on a city-owned parking lot that had been approved twice by the city council. The project would have created 120 affordable units, but instead, the city attorney spent over a million dollars fighting lawsuits, losing at every stage, while $45 million in state and county funds remain unused. Additionally, after the head of the criminal branch raised concerns about targeting political adversaries, the city attorney fired him, and a whistleblower alleged she used technology to read employee emails.
Fighting the Trump Administration
Roy criticized the incumbent for not joining lawsuits against Trump's birthright citizenship executive order or federalizing the National Guard in LA. She pledged to file lawsuits directly, prosecute rogue ICE agents using state law, and sue companies enabling ICE with mass surveillance technology or running inhumane immigration detention centers. She noted that while ICE agents' actions should be felonies, misdemeanor charges could be brought if the district attorney fails to act.
Tenant Rights and Wage Theft
Roy highlighted that tenants have filed 23,000 harassment complaints in the past two years, but only one landlord has been cited. She plans to create a tenant rights unit dedicated to suing landlords for unlawful evictions, price fixing, illegal fees, and withheld security deposits. She emphasized partnering with tenant unions and grassroots organizations to build cases, citing a successful model in Washington, D.C., where DSA canvassing led to a $41 million judgment against a landlord. On wage theft, she recalled a case against car washes paying undocumented workers as little as $4.50 an hour, which settled within a year, providing workers with $10,000 to $40,000 each in back pay.
Police Accountability
Roy criticized the city attorney's motion to lift restrictions on LAPD's use of force against journalists, calling it a request for a "free pass" that sets the city up for future lawsuits. She argued that the best defense is preventing lawsuits by ensuring compliance with civil rights laws, implementing protocols, and holding officers accountable. She noted that LAPD has been sued repeatedly over crowd control weapons and has lost every time, and the city overspends hundreds of millions on liability, with LAPD as the biggest offender.
DSA Involvement
Roy's DSA membership has informed her approach to organizing and governance. She believes in bringing everyday people into the policy-making process and has built a broad coalition of unions, DSA, the Democratic Party, and grassroots organizations. "DSA's mission is to build power for the working class, and to make sure that workers and tenants have a voice," she said, noting that DSA has brought many new voices into governance.
