“There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs — partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.” — Booker T. Washington, My Larger Education (1911)
Washington’s words, written more than a century ago, echo powerfully in Los Angeles today. His warning about those who profit from grievance politics could have been written about the city’s entrenched political class and its nonprofit allies.
In 2015, Los Angeles City Councilman Curren Price hosted a seemingly harmless event for local nonprofits titled “Getting the Competitive Edge to Fund Your Nonprofit.” At the time, it appeared to be a well-intentioned effort to help community organizations secure grant funding. Ten years later, Price is under indictment, facing new public corruption charges involving his own nonprofit, accused of diverting money that was intended for homelessness efforts.
For those unfamiliar, Curren Price is a longtime Los Angeles politician who has represented the city’s Ninth District since 2013. Before that, he served in the California State Senate and the State Assembly. Price has built his career in South Los Angeles politics, often branding himself as a champion for working families, housing initiatives, and social equity. Yet now, prosecutors allege that he funneled taxpayer-backed dollars and nonprofit money into corrupt dealings that benefited himself and his inner circle.
This story would already be big enough on its own, but it is part of a larger pattern that has come to define Los Angeles politics. The corruption cases have become a revolving door at City Hall, with one elected official after another being indicted or investigated. Price is only the latest.
Earlier this year, Mayor Karen Bass’s office faced accusations of what some critics are calling “legalized corruption” in how contracts and funds are awarded. The New York Post reported in January that Bass’s office was operating in a way that blurred the lines between official city business and political favoritism. The accusations may not have yet led to criminal charges, but they revealed a troubling lack of accountability at the highest levels of Los Angeles government.
Meanwhile, Representative Maxine Waters, who has held office in South Los Angeles for over three decades, is not facing criminal charges but has benefited from the same machine politics that enable figures like Price to thrive.
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Waters has often worked with the same nonprofit ecosystem that Price is accused of exploiting. Her district overlaps with Price’s Ninth Council District, and both have leaned heavily on taxpayer-funded programs and nonprofit partnerships that critics say are too often used as vehicles for self-promotion or worse.
The nonprofit sector in Los Angeles has become both a shield and a sword for local politicians. It allows them to hold press conferences, ribbon cuttings, and “training events” that make them look like champions of the community. At the same time, it provides a steady flow of grant money and contracts that can be funneled to allies, friends, or even their own interests.
That is why the 2015 Price event matters in hindsight. It was not just a training session for nonprofits. It was a window into how politicians in Los Angeles have learned to leverage nonprofits as part of their political survival.
Fast forward ten years. Price is accused of siphoning money from his own nonprofit that was earmarked for fighting homelessness. The symbolism could not be clearer. In a city where homelessness has exploded into a full-blown humanitarian crisis, the very leaders who claim to be solving the problem are accused of pocketing the funds.
This is not just about Curren Price. It is about the culture that has been built and maintained by the Democrat machine that runs Los Angeles. Karen Bass rose through the ranks of the California Assembly before becoming mayor. Maxine Waters has been entrenched in Congress for over 30 years. Both operate in the same political ecosystem that has tolerated and even celebrated figures like Price until the indictments come down.
The real scandal is not only the crimes that get prosecuted. It is the legalized corruption that never does. When Bass’s office steers contracts in questionable ways, when Waters’s allies benefit from government-backed nonprofit dollars, and when Price hosts training sessions that serve as political theater while quietly positioning his own nonprofit to benefit, the public gets played.
Taxpayer money that should be fixing roads, cleaning streets, or building housing ends up fueling a machine that enriches politicians and their friends.
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Curren Price should serve as another wake-up call in a long list of many. He is part of the larger rot that has eaten away at Los Angeles government for decades. What started as a “nonprofit training event” has ended in an indictment.
Corruption has become so normalized in Los Angeles politics that many voters shrug it off as business as usual. Homelessness continues to climb. Crime plagues neighborhoods. The cost-of-living drives working families out of the city. Meanwhile, the same politicians who have overseen this decline keep getting reelected.
It’s not enough for the District Attorney to file charges every few years against another corrupt politician. The nonprofit slush funds, backroom deals, and self-serving contracts must be exposed to the fullest extent possible. And those who are guilty must be held accountable not just in court, but in the court of public opinion.
It’s time to shine a floodlight on the grievance machine, reveal the deals, and make sure the cycle of exploitation stops enriching insiders while the city falls apart.
Booker T. Washington warned more than a century ago about those who profit from perpetual grievance. In 2025 Los Angeles, his words resonate louder than ever: The same patterns persist, the same insiders thrive, and the same communities pay the price.
Editor’s Note: Help us continue to report the truth about corrupt politicians like Curren Price.
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