Top 103 Quotes & Sayings by Eric Garcetti

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an Algerian politician Eric Garcetti.
Last updated on September 18, 2024.
Eric Garcetti

Eric Michael Garcetti is an American politician and diplomat serving as the 42nd and current mayor of Los Angeles since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, he was first elected in the 2013 election, and reelected in 2017. A former member of the Los Angeles City Council, Garcetti served as City Council President from 2006 to 2012. He is the city's first elected Jewish mayor, and its second consecutive Mexican American mayor. He was elected as the youngest mayor in over 100 years, having been 42 at the time of his inauguration. In July 2021, President Joe Biden nominated Garcetti as the United States Ambassador to India.

The classic rules of American politics are dying, if not dead, if you look at the last two presidential elections. An African-American could never be president until one was; a TV reality star couldn't become president until one was.
In presidential elections, I think people focus way too much on ideology.
I've always said we need to build resilience locally. — © Eric Garcetti
I've always said we need to build resilience locally.
I don't want to bring a European city or an east-coast city to the West Coast.
As mayor, I've traveled to China, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, and Mexico to meet with heads of state and business leaders to promote trade with L.A. companies and through L.A.'s seaports and airports - because that generates L.A. jobs.
If you want to cut crime, if you want to end homelessness, you have to deal with sexual violence, sexual harassment, and domestic violence.
I don't spend much time on the computer at all, so I do most of my email on my phone if I do any at all.
I think our communication strategy has been very disciplined as being a back-to-basics mayor and about focusing on making City Hall work and jumpstarting our economy.
The Olympics have been an amazing part of Los Angeles' history. In many ways in 1932, they put us on the map when people didn't even know where Los Angeles was. In 1984, they were the first profitable Olympics of the modern era.
I agree with President Trump that we need good jobs in this country, but let's get to that business rather than the distractions of repealing Obamacare or raiding communities and taking otherwise law-abiding, contributing citizens away from their families.
I'm progressive, and I'm practical.
I think connected to poverty is the trauma of poverty. It's not just a material thing; it's a psychological thing that we have no mental health system in this country.
You don't have to be Latino to speak powerfully about how important it is to have a police department that cares for our immigrant communities. — © Eric Garcetti
You don't have to be Latino to speak powerfully about how important it is to have a police department that cares for our immigrant communities.
I have an incredible compass. You can put me back in a country I haven't been in 20 years and say, 'Get me from point A to point B,' and I'll take you there.
There are two Americas: Washington and the rest of us.
I prioritize my daughter and my wife.
No sane person would run for president, right?
If a sanctuary city means that our police department does not enforce federal immigration laws, then we are one. But declaring yourself a 'sanctuary city' also signals to a lot of people that you are protecting hard-core criminals, which I don't, and I don't believe in.
Cities are those laboratories of democracy that states used to be.
I'm a typical mutt American. I have an Italian last name. Half-Mexican, half-Jewish.
Don't run for mayor if you don't want to basically be working all the time.
Los Angeles has all the ingredients of success... but we need to start with our education system.
When President Trump got out of the Paris climate accords, we got 412 cities to say we will do it instead, because we're on the front line with our firefighters dealing with historic fires and floods.
Environment, homelessness, infrastructure and immigration - I'm very focused on all four, which are critical to the success of Los Angeles.
Aggressive government spending during the Great Recession was absolutely necessary.
I'll never stop listening to police officers over politicians.
I think, for me, the biggest issue is poverty in general, poverty in this time of plenty. It's reflected in homelessness. It's reflected in educational gaps. It's reflected in racial disparities.
I think I bring a perspective that local communities are what make this country great, and they are the laboratories of democracy.
I'm in what feels like a pretty transparent fishbowl as mayor. People see you at the market, people see you at the diner, people see you wherever you are, talk to you. You don't shave, they're taking selfies of you. You come back from your jog, they're talking to you.
Tax cuts that actually go to working-class, middle-class people, I'm not opposed to.
The fact is, there are far more customers for American products outside of the U.S. than there are here at home. With open markets and a level playing field, American workers can out-compete workers anywhere in the world.
Cory Booker I've known since 1993. We used to be part of the L'Chaim Society at Oxford University together.
I'm the grandson of immigrants who came across rivers and oceans to get here, some without documentation.
On my mom's side, the Jewish side of the family, I come from a family of musicians who are pianists, so I've always loved cultural expression.
Pete Buttigieg is one of my closest friends as a mayor.
My wife and I are foster parents.
The White House is not where power comes from in this country. The cities and the local communities of this nation are prepared to save Washington - and not vice versa.
Mayors are accountable. Local governments are accountable. — © Eric Garcetti
Mayors are accountable. Local governments are accountable.
In Washington, you have imaginary problems, and they can't even solve the imaginary problems.
If I hear that Quito, Ecuador, is doing something to have a whole area of town that's zero emissions, and we're thinking about that in Los Angeles' downtown, I'm like, 'I better catch up.'
L.A. is a great city to get lost in. The best thing to do is to drive in any direction, find a strip mall, and go from one store to the next. I guarantee you will see a collision of cultures you never imagined.
If you can speak Spanish, then you can have a stronger connection with the residents of Los Angeles.
I'm pretty skinny, and I can sleep at the drop of a hat. So, take that middle seat in economy and save the money for other things you can do.
It sure would be nice to have a Washington that was there for us, but most help has always been local and regional.
You have to listen to your own heart.
When it comes to public safety, I listen to police chiefs and cops, not to a cable-news station.
People will give you the responsibility, even the authority, to go after the big things, the visionary things, the reaching for incredible opportunities, if they trust that you're running a city well. And if you don't run a city well, conversely, you can't do the big things.
I'm very much a California boy. I try to eat healthy and exercise. — © Eric Garcetti
I'm very much a California boy. I try to eat healthy and exercise.
I think everyone has the impression that L.A. is Hollywood and fast lives. That couldn't be further from the truth.
I've worked closely with presidents, especially with President Obama, and I realized that what good leaders do at the national level is no different than what we do at the local level.
Ninety-five percent of my work is being mayor. But that 5% that nags at all of us - of what's going wrong in this country - I think is best thought out not in your own head but by getting out there, being out there, and listening to Americans.
Most people will be primarily getting into autonomous vehicles if we look 20, 30 years out. If we mandate that autonomous vehicles have to be electric, then we will move people into electric vehicles.
The cost of housing in L.A. has increased dramatically because more people want to live here. They come to Los Angeles every day, not just from around the United States but from around the world.
I am a passionate, committed composer, and the guy I used to write musicals with, once he was able to ditch me and get a better composer, actually won the Tony.
I want to turn momentum on traffic. I want to make in a dent in homelessness on the way to eradicating it on our streets. But there's always something else to do tomorrow. And you have to be at peace knowing you're not going to finish it all.
I think it is time for a radical federalism in this country, where people trust innovation coming from the local level and ramp that up.
Mayors are really good at dealing with things practically.
I lived in Burma for a couple of summers in the '90s, working with the democratic resistance that had fled to the jungles.
We need a pro-worker trade approach that puts American jobs - not corporate profits - front and center.
The travel that I've spent around the country, I always come back with ideas for L.A. and vice versa: My experiences in L.A. give me an immediacy to issues that sometimes people in Washington think about but aren't experiencing every day.
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