Lars Larson: A mayor candidate to rescue Portland

By Lars Larson
NW and national radio host,

Of all the candidates running for Mayor, Rene Gonzalez seems the logical and sensible choice, so Rose City voters probably won’t choose him.

Gonzalez vows to make Portlandia the safest city in America.

That would be a change.

Failed leadership for the last decade made it America’s poster-child “riot city”.

Politicians in other towns put up billboards urging, “Don’t let our city become Portland”.

Some of the worst homeless numbers in America, high drug deaths, vacant office buildings. It’s bad.

Gonzalez promises to hire 25% more cops and make it right.

His closest competitor, Carmen Rubio, presents a contrast.

She’s worked in taxpayer-funded jobs for decades and she’s been a traffic scofflaw the last 20 years.

She’s racked up 150 tickets, six license suspensions, doesn’t pay her bills while making a hundred grand a year: apparently the law doesn’t mean much to her.

A week ago, after the ticket story broke, she banged into a Tesla while parking, doing thousands in damage, and just walked away: didn’t leave her number…but Carmen got caught on camera.

Now, she plays the victim, claiming she’s being “exploited”.

Anyone trust Carmen Rubio to overseeing 7-thousand employees and an 8 billion dollar city budget?