LOS ANGELES — Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Thursday that he plans to remain mayor, an announcement aimed at ending speculation that he might join President-elect Joe Biden’s administration.
He also announced at a briefing Thursday that his 9-year-old daughter, Maya, had tested positive for the coronavirus. Both Garcetti and his wife tested negative, he said.
Garcettti said he told the Biden team this week that he wanted to remain in Los Angeles. “There were things on the table for me,” Garcetti said. He declined to name the positions available to him. He also did not definitively rule out leaving office before his term ends in 2022.
Garcetti was a co-chair of Biden’s presidential campaign, helped vet vice presidential candidates and was widely viewed as a contender for a Cabinet position, perhaps leading the Department of Transportation or the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Instead, former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg was tapped this week for the transportation spot, while Ohio Rep. Marcia L. Fudge was announced as the nominee last week to lead HUD.
That left a dwindling number of available posts for Garcetti, who was also eyed as a possible contender to head the Environmental Protection Agency, Bloomberg reported.
But on Thursday, Biden picked Michael Regan, a state regulator in North Carolina, to head the EPA.
A source familiar with those discussions told the Los Angeles Times that Garcetti was informed this week that he didn’t get the EPA administrator post. The source, who wasn’t authorized to speak to the media, asked to remain anonymous.
A Garcetti spokesman declined to comment. A Biden transition representative didn’t immediately respond to questions from the Times.
Any nomination to a Cabinet position for Garcetti could have brought unwanted scrutiny to allegations made against him by his former bodyguard.
The bodyguard, a Los Angeles police officer, alleges that Garcetti’s longtime adviser sexually harassed him and that Garcetti failed to intervene. Garcetti denies witnessing any harassment and the adviser has said he didn’t harass anyone.
A judge on Thursday ordered Garcetti to be deposed in the case.
Meanwhile, Black Lives Matter and other activists have gathered regularly outside the mayor’s official residence, the Getty House, to protest any Garcetti appointment.
Garcetti’s decision to remain in Los Angeles comes as the city faces several crises, including the ongoing pandemic, a fiscal emergency at City Hall and rising crime.
The availability of open intensive care unit beds throughout Southern California dropped Thursday to 0%, bring fresh alarm about the region’s ability to cope with the surging number of COVID-19 cases.
Garcetti was praised for his handling of the pandemic in the spring, including his support for widespread coronavirus testing and his being a calming presence for anxious Angelenos.
More recently, he’s faced criticism over the city’s messaging on restrictions and for supporting the ban on outdoor restaurant dining.
With Garcetti staying in Los Angeles for now, he’ll have two more years to grapple with the immediate challenges facing the city, an economy battered by the pandemic.
In an interview with KNBC-TV last month, Garcetti acknowledged the tough moment facing the city but pointed to the 2028 Olympics and new rail lines that are being built across the region.
“I would never bet against Los Angeles long-term,” Garcetti said. “This is going to be a powerful economy and a powerful place with prosperity, for I believe the work we’ve done for the next two decades.”
Garcetti, meanwhile, said Thursday that his daughter is doing “fine” and that he and his wife are quarantining following Maya’s positive test.
“I will continue to conduct the business of our city every day, but I’ll do it remotely.”
(Times staff writer Anna Phillips contributed to this report.)
