Whereas he was a Pikachu-costume-wearing, corgi-toting leftist candidate, Kenneth Mejia’s unorthodox type helped gasoline his rebel marketing campaign for Los Angeles metropolis controller.
However lower than six months after Mejia, 32, trounced a profession politician to win the job, two former staff allege that he created an uncomfortable work setting the place private boundaries have been typically blurred each within the controller’s workplace and on the marketing campaign.
They are saying Mejia regularly made feedback concerning the intercourse lives of two younger marketing campaign staff earlier than his election and pressured staff and former marketing campaign staffers to maneuver into his condo constructing after the election.
Mejia’s workplace denied the accusations and stated the alleged points have been by no means introduced up with Mejia or different senior staff members earlier than being shared on social media this week.
“What’s with politicians whose names begin with Ok which are ‘progressive’ however horrible and poisonous bosses?” Shekinah Deocares, a former marketing campaign staffer who spent a number of months because the director of group engagement for the controller’s workplace, tweeted Monday morning.
She paired the query with two pairs of oversize eyeballs and a thinking-face emoji and adopted it up with a sequence of accusations in subsequent tweets.
“To be clear I’m speaking about @kennethmejiaLA @lacontroller who simply pushed out @kyler_chin who made ALL of the assets for his marketing campaign and workplace a pair months after pushing me out as a result of he didn’t worth group work and thought it was a nuisance,” Deocares declared in a Twitter thread that shortly started ricocheting round Los Angeles Metropolis Corridor.
Mejia’s social media savvy performed a key position in his rise from a little-known licensed public accountant to a nationally watched progressive darling, particularly when paired with different unconventional ways, equivalent to billboards exhibiting how a lot of the town finances went towards police spending. Gen Z local weather activists have been additionally a extremely seen a part of his grassroots marketing campaign, with the group even profiled in Teen Vogue.
Now, the outsider candidate is a citywide elected official, managing greater than 160 staff and performing as fiscal watchdog for the nation’s second-largest metropolis.
And a few of those self same younger supporters are attacking Mejia on the very platforms the place they as soon as helped enhance his marketing campaign. It’s a call they describe as troublesome however crucial for the sake of accountability.
Talking to volunteers at his election evening victory get together, Mejia’s marketing campaign supervisor, Jane Nguyen, recalled that she had been requested “over and over” whether or not she would condemn the off-hours actions of the marketing campaign’s younger volunteers, which included divisive ways equivalent to disrupting mayoral boards with shouted profanities.
“ ‘Do you condemn them for protesting? For disrupting a gathering?’ ” Nguyen recalled being requested. “Right here’s what I’ve to say about that: I imply, f— that,” Nguyen continued as Mejia grinned and the group cheered and chanted, “F— that.”
Internecine battle in a neighborhood politician’s workplace is hardly uncommon, but it surely’s atypical to see former staffers air complaints so publicly — significantly simply months after an official has taken workplace.
Deocares, a 26-year-old group organizer, and Kyler Chin, a 19-year-old pc science whiz who constructed Mejia’s marketing campaign knowledge assets, have been amongst his first hires as controller-elect, taking senior jobs on his govt staff. Deocares left the workplace in February, and Chin, the innovation and expertise director, was fired on Monday, he stated.
Each have been additionally paid to work on the marketing campaign, as was Deocares’ boyfriend, 22-year-old local weather activist Sim Bilal.
The trio is a part of a tightknit group of younger activists who’ve been taking part in an more and more seen position in native politics.
“We perceive that they’re feeling offended, harm and disillusioned — and lashing out after a good friend is terminated. However the accusations made merely aren’t true — or [are] so absurdly distorted as to render them false as effectively,” Nguyen, who now serves as Mejia’s chief of employees, stated in an emailed assertion Tuesday night. “None of those accusations or points with Kenneth have been ever introduced as much as him or different govt staff members earlier than. On the finish of the day, Shekinah’s departure and Kyler’s termination have been strictly the product of work-related points.”
Nguyen stated the “departures have been preceded by collaborative, constructive, and respectful efforts to handle an incapability to fulfill the calls for of public service.” She alluded to efficiency points that performed a job in Chin’s termination, in addition to the truth that Chin, a full-time metropolis worker, had determined to return to full-time, in-person faculty courses with out discussing it together with his supervisor.
She additionally described Bilal, Deocares and Chin as buddies who “will all the time be part of our staff’s legacy,” which “makes this case even tougher for everybody concerned.”
Youth local weather activist Sim Bilal photographed within the Japanese Backyard at Kenneth Hahn State Recreation Space in Los Angeles in June 2022.
(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Instances)
Deocares and Bilal say Mejia regularly made feedback about their intercourse life throughout the marketing campaign, typically in entrance of different staffers in his marketing campaign workplace.
Mejia would additionally “make intercourse noises” and typically moan her associate’s title in an obvious imitation of intercourse, Deocares advised The Instances.
“Individuals positively felt uncomfortable and advised him to cease, however then, like, you understand, he simply saved going,” Bilal stated.
Mejia’s workplace denied these accounts.
“Sim and Shekinah are possible mischaracterizing makes an attempt by Kenneth to ask them to tone down their public shows of affection within the marketing campaign workplace,” Nguyen stated by e mail, describing the marketing campaign as a “collegial setting” with many younger volunteers. “There have been no different feedback about Sim and Shekinah’s intercourse life.”
The alleged conduct stopped after Mejia’s election, however Mejia’s boundaries together with his younger staff remained blurry, Deocares and Chin stated.
“It was extraordinarily uncomfortable,” Deocares stated. “I feel he crossed the road between private {and professional} quite a bit.”
Mejia inspired metropolis staff and former marketing campaign staffers to lease flats in the identical constructing close to downtown the place he and his spouse lived, Deocares, Chin and Bilal stated.
Chin, the 19-year-old former innovation and expertise director, in the end moved into the constructing, sharing an condo with Vincent de Vera, 36, the director of particular tasks on the controller’s workplace. De Vera advised The Instances that he didn’t really feel pressured to maneuver in.
Nguyen additionally moved into the constructing, Deocares, Bilal and Chin stated.
A property supervisor on the constructing stated the corporate presents residents a $500 referral price for every unit somebody strikes into. Nguyen confirmed that Mejia acquired $1,000 in referral charges.
Nguyen stated through e mail that Mejia knew that Deocares, Bilal and Chin have been trying to stay close to downtown and “offered the kind of recommendation that any shut good friend gives in conditions like this — all the time at their invitation, and with none coercion.”
Bilal stated Mejia saved asking about an open condo within the constructing, which Bilal and his girlfriend didn’t need to transfer into. “He simply, like, saved pushing it,” Bilal stated.
Mejia despatched a number of textual content messages to the couple in late November and early December concerning the condo, in keeping with screenshots reviewed by The Instances, and introduced the subject up verbally, Bilal stated.
“We wanna stay by ourselves Kenneth,” Deocares lastly wrote within the group chat along with her boss and her boyfriend. “We actually want our personal house.”
Shekinah Deocares, second from left, and Sim Bilal, far proper, take part in a second of silence in reminiscence of the taking pictures victims of Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay in entrance of Metropolis Corridor in downtown Los Angeles in January.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Instances)
Chin in the end moved into the unit.
“He was actually, actually pressuring me to take it,” Chin stated of the condo he stated he moved into in January.
The state of affairs was “OK at first,” Chin stated, citing the exercises that Mejia, a former private coach, would help him with within the constructing’s gymnasium a number of evenings every week. He described Mejia as like a “massive brother” who would share his protein powder and let him hang around if he obtained locked out of his personal unit.
However the younger worker in the end discovered it “extraordinarily anxious to have him be on the similar place the place I used to be residing.”
Chin was additionally bothered that his roommate and Mejia hosted a celebration for fellow members of the controller’s govt staff in his shared condo one Saturday afternoon whereas Chin was out, he stated.
He realized of the get together when a photograph of colleagues taking part in beer pong in his front room was uploaded to the controller’s workplace Discord server, Chin stated.
“That is incorrect,” Nguyen stated, explaining that Chin and his roommate have been each allowed to ask folks over to the widespread areas of their shared condo. “No pictures from the occasion have been uploaded to the controller’s workplace Discord server.”
The {photograph} was really posted to somebody’s Instagram, De Vera stated Tuesday. He additionally clarified that members of the controller’s govt staff had been taking part in “water pong,” not beer pong.
Different points raised by the previous staff echo the broader fissures more and more widespread in American workplaces because the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chin and Deocares stated that they had thought their jobs can be distant with versatile hours and chafed on the final 9-to-5 office expectations.
“It was extra informal, however then, like, he would get mad at us for requirements or guidelines that have been by no means communicated to us,” Deocares recalled.
Mejia put in a pingpong desk in a Metropolis Corridor East break room, favors tracksuits and regularly brings his corgis Killa and Kirby to a partitioned space in his govt suite, former staff stated. However in the end, the onetime activist nonetheless runs a authorities workplace.
Deocares additionally bristled at the concept her employer ought to have guidelines governing her private social media accounts, or what sort of political occasions she may attend in her off hours, saying Mejia had requested her to search approval to go to occasions forward of time.
Chin — a university sophomore who stated he had by no means had a paid full-time job earlier than — held a senior place on Mejia’s staff.
He stated that as a programmer he most popular to work when “the artistic juices are flowing” relatively than throughout a steady eight-hour interval, which he stated was not possible for him.
Chin stated that when he was confronted about the necessity to work a conventional 40-hour week he stated he ought to be granted lodging for his melancholy.
“You’re mainly compelled to work, like, each single day. In the event you don’t, they type of scold you for that,” Chin stated, later clarifying that he meant daily throughout the workweek, not weekends.
The truth that he was additionally attending courses at UC Irvine sparked additional rivalry.
Chin stated he took a part-time course load throughout the winter quarter however returned to full-time in-person courses in April. His return to full-time faculty coursework performed a job in his firing, he stated.
“Kyler enrolled in coursework with out discussing this determination together with his supervisor. This determination got here as a shock to everybody on the staff. His enrollment in full-time in-person courses at a college 45 miles away is essentially incompatible with the expectations of his demanding, full-time job,” Nguyen stated through e mail.
Deocares give up in February, however stated she initially stayed quiet about her points due to her hope for the progressive motion in Los Angeles.
She believes {that a} Metropolis Corridor that places folks and group first is feasible, she stated, and doesn’t need Mejia to be “canceled.”
“However on the similar time, I feel he must do a greater job as a boss,” she stated.
Instances employees writers David Zahniser and Dakota Smith contributed to this report.
