Last night, 96 percent of the workers who keep SoFi running voted to authorize a strike. That means SoFi's cooks, bartenders, and dishwashers could walk off the job at any moment, just one week from the first World Cup match. Negotiations will continue on Monday, but that's cutting it extremely close for union representatives to reach an agreement with FIFA and SoFi concessionaire Legends Global on pay raises, hospitality packages, and a promise to keep ICE out of the stadium — which the union says constitutes an unsafe work environment.
"What good is the World Cup for Los Angeles when workers don't earn enough to pay the rent and must choose between showing up and being kidnapped by ICE?," asked Unite Here Local 11 co-president Kurt Petersen. "If we're forced to strike, those $100,000 FIFA suites will have nothing but bottled water and Doritos."
Contributing to the uncertainty is confusing and contradictory messaging emitting daily from the federal government, LA's host committee, and local leaders who don't seem to have a unified understanding of whether or not ICE will be there and what exactly ICE will be doing. (Inglewood forever-mayor James Butts refuses to take a public stance on ICE, period.) And Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has specifically said the agency will be focusing on cracking down on counterfeit merchandise — which is not particularly reassuring! Strike or no strike, venues are going to be confronting similar staffing issues over the next few years. As Petersen alluded, many venue employees have told me their eagerness to work these megaevents evaporated when Trump was elected, and they'd rather lose the money than take the risk.
Which is why a huge rapid response network will be working together to protect everyone in SoFi's orbit — bacon-wrapped hot dog vendors, luxury suite bartenders, even fans making that long, long walk to the stadium. After the past 12 months, LA has to be ready for anything, Gochez told The LA Local. "We have to prepare for the worst." 🔥
Welcome to the primary election hangover Hot Links! Paid subscribers get the latest headlines, commentary, and analysis — updated daily! All subscribers will see the final version in their inbox each weekend. Bluesky users: 🦋 will always take you to a thread I reported there.
Early and often
Democracy in action
Believe it or not, it's still too early to call a few elections,but that doesn't mean we're "cheating." For everyone else who doesn't live here and has taken a fleeting interesting in our politics, here's why it takes awhile for us to count every vote. Bass will face off against either Spencer Pratt or Nithya Raman in the fall; we won't know for a few more days, but Raman is surging. All LA's incumbent councilmembers won their elections outright, for better or for worse, and in Council District 9, Estuardo Mazariegos, an outspoken Olympics critic in the district most impacted by the games, is advancing to the runoff. In other election-related megaevent news, Measure TT, the tax hike on hotel rooms for 2028 that councilmembers tried to pass — "tried" is generous, as I didn't see much campaigning for this — is poised to fail, which would leave yet another hole in LA's budget. This was also a McOsker family feud, with dad Councilmember Tim for and daughter Central City Association's Nella against.
The IOC was in town again to check in on LA's preparations for 2028 and gave LA28 a glowing report, because of course they did. LA28 chair (still, for now) Casey Wasserman was asked directly about stepping down and confirmed, once again, that he would not, and also that he now talks "weekly" to LA Mayor Karen Bass, who had previously called for his resignation. He said the federal government was going to provide funding "every step of the way" and also spoke for the first time about the Cultural Olympiad, "spanning fashion, film, food, music, performance, and visual art." When asked by LAist's Libby Rainey about the very late, very delayed service agreement with the city of LA, LA28 CEO Reynold Hoover said, "I wouldn't characterize it as late, and I wouldn't characterize it as delayed." Outside the meeting, which was held at the JW Marriott at LA Live, members of the Fair Games coalition protested and gave a list of their demands to journalists heading into the press conference.
Four U.S. military "training exercises" were conducted this week in Pasadena, Long Beach, City of Industry, and Irvine. (Plus a SWAT team exercise by LAPD at the Santa Anita racetrack, why not?) There was only a few hours of notice given to residents, who were kept up until 2 a.m. by gunfire and helicopters. Props to Pasadena Councilmember Rick Cole for being appropriately outraged. The LA area is already under a National Special Security Events (NSSE) designation for 2028 which puts federal agencies in charge of the region's safety plans. And sure enough, the FBI confirmed to the LA Daily News that the exercises were, in fact, part of preparations for the World Cup, and that there will be more in the lead up to 2028. (These exercises were also the exact days the IOC was in town.) Meanwhile, local law enforcement officials held a press conference where LA County District Attorney Nathan Hochman held up a red card they're giving out to people who make "bad choices" during the World Cup, but it felt more like a limited-edition TAP card to me. I kind of want one? 🦋
🇮🇷 As teams arrive in the U.S., Iran's team members were granted visas but coaches, trainers, and Iranian soccer federation officials were denied. Iran plays New Zealand at SoFi June 15
🌳 LA's not going to get as hot as other World Cup cities but here's all of ShadeLA's strategies, including much needed permitting reform, to keep us cool
⛵ Long Beach built a new 11,000-seat amphitheater with NO ONSITE PARKING (that's how you do it, folks)
👑 Some Transit app users had reached out to me saying they magically got upgraded to the premium Royale tier. Here's how you, too, can do that
🚊 As part of Frank Gehry's firm tackling the Getty renovation ahead of 2028, they're also redoing the tram
🏖️ Santa Monica inked some pretty sweet deals for 2028: ESPN will take over the pier and Switzerland will occupy the city's beloved Camera Obscura as a hospitality house and renovate the treasured structure. France will be stationed at the Annenberg Community Beach House, as Torched previously reported. Who needs beach volleyball?
At the Los Angeles Times, Patt Morrison writes about Olympic mascots, including one of my all-time favorite videos: when Sam the Eagle bit it on the stairs of City Hall. For 2028, she proposes a mountain lion mascot named P-2028. Torched readers remember that the original P-28 was the brainchild of Devon Manney, which he debuted as host of 2024's JeOOOOOpardy — which we should really do again one of these days! In reality, the RFP for 2028's mascot production, which has to go through the city of LA's procurement process, just like everything else LA28 does, closed about a year ago, so I'd assume we'd be seeing a mascot announcement fairly soon.
What Torched subscribers are reading
"A new phase of the natural El Niño weather pattern could begin in a matter of weeks, the UN has warned, boosting temperatures on a planet already under strain from climate change." Oh, okay
How immigrant rights groups are mobilizing to protect fans and workers: "More than 120 groups issued warning to 10 million visitors about 'serious rights violations' under Trump"
How your neighborhood voted for mayor (keep in mind these are very early returns and won't be updated again for a few more days) and the spreadsheet updated my LA Podcast co-host Scott Frazier that demystifies the daily ballot drops
I highly, highly encourage watching this video by @stephanielizabeth08 attempting to navigate the cracked, inaccessible streets around USC with a walker — including the signs placed by the city IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SIDEWALK to alert everyone of improvements coming to the block
Ready for fans. I stopped by the Farmers Market, checked out some of the LA city parks hosting viewing parties, and will preview several other festivals this week. If you know of an activation or event I should have eyes on, hit me up
Meet me outside
Torched subscribers had a great group huddle yesterday on Zoom — stay tuned for my full guide to LA's World Cup including where I'll be headed each and every day. Earlier this week I was so thrilled to join West Hollywood transportation manager Tamar Fuhrer, Fehr & Peers' Chelsea Richer, and Metro's Marcel Porras for a quite candid transit-focused conversation at the CityONE speaker series. Huge thanks to SPEEDBOAT for hosting us. I also got a preview of Fehr & Peers' new Get on Board documentary series, telling stories about transportation access for LA's Olympians and Paralympians. You can watch a clip from the first short film on Instagram.
Coming up: I'm so excited to be a part of this London Climate Week panel examining LA's wildfire recovery and megaevent goals with Climate Home News journalist Joe Lo and Clean Energy Wire's Carolina Kyllmann, who I met when she was in LA reporting on our World Cup preparations. That's Tuesday, June 23 at 8 a.m. — yep, it's an early one. See you then!
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Instead of South LA losing their lap pool just for the summer of 2028, it sounds like there will be no lap pool from now until then, and possibly long afterwards
Alissa Walker
Alissa Walker
