After giving a gut-wrenching speech on the Los Angeles City Council floor on Tuesday, Councilman Mike Bonin informed his colleagues before a Wednesday City Council meeting that he had tested positive for COVID-19.

This has, of course, raised some eyebrows.

Bonin felt sick, but didn’t bother to COVID test before going to a City Council meeting he knew would be filled with people?

— rabidnarcissists (@rabidnarcs) October 12, 2022

From The Los Angeles Daily News:

Los Angeles City Councilman Mike Bonin, whose 2-year-old Black adopted son was the target of racially charged remarks caught on tape in an October 2021 conversation released over the weekend, said Wednesday he has tested positive for COVID-19.

Bonin attempted to take part in Wednesday’s City Council meeting remotely. However, vocal protests from activists calling for the resignations of council members Nury Martinez, Kevin de León and Gil Cedillo — who all took part in the 2021 conversation — forced a cancellation of the meeting.

Prior to the meeting’s start, Bonin appeared by video and addressed his colleagues and the audience, saying he tested positive for COVID-19 Tuesday night.

He said “the show must go on” so he was prepared to participate in the meeting from home. But that ended when protesters refused to disperse from the council chamber, prompting interim City Council President Mitch O’Farrell to adjourn the meeting.

On his Twitter page, Bonin later repeated his call for Martinez, de León and Cedillo to resign.

Nury Martinez, Kevin de Leon, Gil Cedillo:

Governance of this beautiful city is untenable as long as you are on the council.

Healing is impossible as long as you remain in office.

Resign. Now. pic.twitter.com/0uMjiAXnre

— Mike Bonin (@mikebonin) October 12, 2022

“Governance of this beautiful city is untenable as long as you are on the council,” he wrote. “Healing is impossible as long as you remain in office. Resign. Now.”

Bonin has been under a great deal of stress lately with the discovery on Saturday of the racial ugliness his colleague Nury Martinez directed at his adopted Black son. With the outcry and protests since Tuesday’s City Council meeting, Martinez finally fell on her sword and resigned her CD 6 seat, so one of his stressors has been alleviated. So, him assuming his exhaustion was a result of the circumstances he was under as opposed to COVID-19 is perfectly understandable and perfectly human.

Despite the efforts by the Biden administration and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (looking at you, Barbara “Not that kind of doctor” Ferrer), to keep the pandemic going in perpetuity, this virus and its new variants is/are fast reaching the endemic stage, where infections occur, but hospitalizations and deaths are minimal.

Like most progressive Democrats in Los Angeles, Bonin was a zealot about masking, vaccines, and showing your papers. Here he is in April 2021, joyfully announcing he had received his second shot of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, and proudly displaying his passport.

Studies have found that the Moderna vaccine in particular has been linked to more adverse side effects, and greater risks of myocarditis and cardiac complications—especially in young men. A recent study reflects that the efficacy of the Moderna vaccine decreases significantly after the second shot, and even more with the third shot—i.e., the booster. So, even if Bonin did get boosted (likely), in his run-down state of late, it’s not terribly surprising he nevertheless contracted COVID-19.

Virus is gonna virus.

According to reports, no other council members have reported testing positive. If that does occur, it will continue to add fuel to an already flaming drama of corruption, power jockeying, and accountability in the L.A. City Council.

In January, Bonin announced he would not seek re-election to his District 11 council seat, citing taking care of his mental health as the reason for his decision.