| Election Name: | 1989 Los Angeles mayoral election |
| Country: | Los Angeles |
| Type: | presidential |
| Ongoing: | no |
| Previous Election: | 1985 Los Angeles mayoral election |
| Previous Year: | 1985 |
| Next Election: | 1993 Los Angeles mayoral election |
| Next Year: | 1993 |
| Image1: | Tom Bradley, 1989 (cropped).jpg |
| Color1: | c0c0c0 |
| Candidate1: | Tom Bradley |
| Popular Vote1: | 165,599 |
| Percentage1: | 51.90% |
| Color2: | c0c0c0 |
| Candidate2: | Nate Holden |
| Popular Vote2: | 89,184 |
| Percentage2: | 27.95% |
| Image3: | Baxter Ward, 1975.jpg |
| Color3: | c0c0c0 |
| Candidate3: | Baxter Ward |
| Popular Vote3: | 48,923 |
| Percentage3: | 15.33% |
| Mayor | |
| Before Election: | Tom Bradley |
| After Election: | Tom Bradley |
The 1989 Los Angeles mayoral election took place on April 11, 1989. Incumbent Tom Bradley was re-elected over ten candidates in the primary election. It would be the last time Bradley ran for mayor, as he chose to retire after his fifth term.[1]
Municipal elections in California, including Mayor of Los Angeles, are officially nonpartisan; candidates' party affiliations do not appear on the ballot.[2]
Bradley, now in his fourth term, was slowly declining in popularity during his term due to traffic congestion, air pollution, and commercial development threatening residential neighborhoods in the city.[3] He had also run in the 1986 California gubernatorial election, which he lost again to Republican George Deukmejian in a landslide.[4] Despite this, Bradley announced that he would be running for a fifth term.[5] [6] He faced minimal opposition at the start, with councilman Zev Yaroslavsky declining to run because of a private poll that had Bradley in the lead.[7] Bradley was widely expected to easily win re-election.[8] Councilman Nate Holden and former supervisor Baxter Ward filed late into the filing period, giving Bradley two challengers.[9] Holden, who was a newcomer in the City Council, was able to drive up some votes, and in the primary election gained one-third of the vote.[10]