More than 200 people packed the pews at Dolores Mission Church in Boyle Heights on Wednesday, and they all had one question on their minds:

Where was Kevin de León?

It was 5 p.m., and the debate was about to start. His opponent, Ysabel Jurado, was in the parish hall, where she had talked to reporters from Boyle Heights Beat.

Where was he?

The L.A. City Council member was just pulling into the parking lot, as it turned out.

He stayed in his white electric SUV, chatting with a campaign consultant, while other staffers gathered nearby. After finally getting out of the car, he went inside a school building for a few minutes before ambling across the street to the historic church.

For the last two years, De León has insisted to anyone who’ll listen that he learned his lesson from the racist City Hall audio leak that upended L.A. politics and torpedoed — but didn’t sink — his career.

On the recording, he mocked Black political power and schemed with former council president Nury Martinez, former council member Gil Cedillo and ex-L.A. County Labor Federation head Ron Herrera to get back at their adversaries.

Attendees listen to Kevin de León and Ysabel Jurado debate at Dolores Mission Church.

(Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

The conversation, revealed by The Times exactly two years ago that Wednesday, captured the De León that political insiders have long known: a man with a huge chip on his shoulder eclipsed by an ego as large as the General Sherman tree.

Ever since, he has strained to remake himself as a municipal Daddy Warbucks, handing out Christmas gifts to kids and groceries to poor families.

Now, he was 10 minutes late.

As De León stopped to pose for photos on the church patio, I thought: same old Kevin. He sees himself as a picaresque hero in the novel that exists in his mind — and forces the rest of us to deal with it.

Supporters roared and yelled his name when he finally walked into the church. They booed Jurado — but her supporters countered with “Y-sa-bel!”

Father Brendan Busse welcomed everyone before letting church volunteer Delmira Gonzalez speak.

“It’s a church and sanctuary, and we want it to be respected,” she told the audience in Spanish before laying out the ground rules. No cheering, clapping or booing. Don’t talk while the candidates are talking.

Attendees give their approval during a debate between Kevin de León and Ysabel Jurado in Boyle Heights.

(Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

The two sat at tables on the altar. Next to De León was a statue of the church’s namesake, Our Lady of Sorrows, hands clasped and face frozen in misery. Jurado was near a painting of Maria del Camino — Our Lady of the Way, the patron saint of the Jesuits who run Dolores Mission.

They took gulps of water simultaneously, as the moderators began.

That would be the last time they agreed on anything.

Jurado, who wore a surgical mask because of a recent bout with COVID, used her one-minute opening remarks to say she was happy to return to Dolores Mission, where she had participated in two candidate forums during the primary.

“Unfortunately, some other people were absent,” she said, a playful dig at De León.

He wasn’t playing.

“There’s a clear difference in this campaign,” De León replied in Spanish. “I’ve dedicated my life to public service, for the well-being of our people. My opponent, to date, has never done a single thing for the good of our people.

“I’ve committed my errors,” he admitted a few seconds later. “But I don’t lie. And my opponent …”

He grinned. “She has lied a lot.”

City Council candidate Ysabel Jurado is challenging incumbent Kevin de León.

(Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

In the previous weeks, the candidates had barnstormed across District 14 in their own version of the Lincoln-Douglas debates — but even more bitter.

Jurado, a Highland Park native, has promised an Eastside free of corporate influence and the scandals that have cursed the area’s councilmembers for decades.

De León — who has raised more money, while Jurado has secured more prominent endorsements — focused on his accomplishments at City Hall during his first term and in the state Capitol last decade. He dismissed Jurado as a dilettante whose ties to the L.A. chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America make her dangerous to public safety.

Throughout his 18 years in elected office, De León has positioned himself as a progressive champion standing against conservatives. That night, he took a page from the Donald Trump playbook to blast Jurado.

He accused her of lying six times, while offering few concrete examples. He mentioned socialism four times. He spoke almost entirely in Spanish and said “nuestra gente” — our people — at least 29 times to imply that his opponent, the daughter of Filipino immigrants, couldn’t possibly care for the mostly Latino audience.

He ridiculed people who keep bringing up the audio leak scandal, proclaiming that he has moved forward while they “see the scab” from the wound it caused and “continue to scratch and scratch and scratch.”

He claimed that Jurado faked her recent COVID diagnosis, citing “community members” who supposedly saw her at the Glendale Galleria. He even brought up the fact that Jurado — who was eight months pregnant at the time — didn’t vote in the 2008 presidential election and thus didn’t get to pick “the first African American in the history of the United States of America, Barack Obama.”

His face got sweatier and sweatier until he looked like a sinner in the confession booth.

“To this date, you haven’t lifted a single finger to help nuestra gente,” De León later said in Spanish as the moderator kept ringing a bell to let him know his time was up. “You just come with quejas [complaints] y quejas y quejas y quejas y quejas.”

The slightest of silences passed. “Quejona,” he finally muttered. Complainer.

The scene outside Dolores Mission Church in Boyle Heights, where Kevin de León and Ysabel Jurado held their debate.

(Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

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His supporters — many of them men who had hopped from debate to debate like Deadheads — laughed and whooped it up, despite the admonishments of Father Busse and church volunteers. De León never once tried to calm them down.

The barrage shook Jurado. She frequently went over her time limit. She kept delivering lines — quoting St. Oscar Romero, yelling, “Go Dodgers!” while pumping her fist and bringing up De León’s San Diego roots — that fell flat because her supporters followed the rules and largely stayed quiet. She spoke of a school-to-union job pipeline to combat youth violence and of having city staff keep better tabs on broken street lights and parking meters — plans that sounded good but couldn’t get traction against De León’s blitzkrieg.

When the councilmember wasn’t insulting his opponent, he rattled off accomplishments — investments in parks, tiny homes for unhoused people, affordable housing projects — that were an effective counter against Jurado’s critique that he had done nothing for constituents. His quip that he was about “results, not ideology“ was clever.

If he had stuck to his record, De León might have convinced me that he truly was a changed politico. Instead, he sounded like the man the world heard on the leaked audio: someone infuriated that people don’t think he’s “incredible,” a word he used to describe his first term.

Here was a man who had once showed enough promise and ambition to mount a campaign against U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein and to run for mayor in 2022. Now, he was reduced to questioning whether someone faked her COVID diagnosis.

Jurado and De León shook hands at the end of the 55-minute debate. She stepped outside to talk with supporters. He finally had the altar to himself.

De León hugged tearful acolytes and took photos with them, letting his million-watt smile flash. I waited my turn in line to see if De León — whose staff had blocked me from entering his primary night party in March — would take some questions.

“It was a spirited debate,” he said when I commented on the barbed tone.

When I asked how he thought he did, he responded, “I think I spoke to the issues that were important to the community here in Boyle Heights. I think we demonstrated our real body of work.”

What about all the times he called Jurado a liar?

De León smiled even wider.

“Oh, we can sit down, we can go through all of things, if you want. Trust me.”

His followers formed a blockade around him as their man walked to the patio to bask in their love a bit longer.

“It was more decent than before,” South Pasadena resident Jorge H. Rodriguez said of the debate as someone whispered, “He’s the enemy,” while pointing at me. “Both of them got their points across, but Kevin has more experience.”

De León talked to reporters as supporters chanted his name from afar. Suddenly, 34-year-old Stephanie Luna confronted him.

“Why won’t you make a real apology about the tapes?” the lifelong Boyle Heights resident asked. He ignored her as his handlers ushered him to the parish hall. Luna followed until they shut the door.

She then went to the front of the church, where Black Lives Matter Los Angeles members were protesting and waiting for De León to return to his car.

His fanboys cussed them out or went up to their faces and shouted, “Kevin!”

“It’s symbolic of who Kevin is,” said Luna when I asked about her encounter with him. “How can you ask your constituents to vote for you when you run away from them?”

That’s when I looked at the parking lot. De León’s car was gone. The Eastside’s Artful Dodger had sneaked off into the night.

Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, set the record straight on how former President Donald Trump’s and Vice President Kamala Harris’ leadership styles for America’s veterans differ during a campaign stop in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, on Saturday.

The Republican vice presidential nominee’s rally was held at JWF Industries, which supplies “Department of Defense prime contractors with reliable, on-time fabrications and sub-assemblies,” according to its site.

Vance, himself a Marine veteran, asked the crowd, “When our own citizens suffer and our veterans are at the top of that list, [do] you know what a big difference between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris [is]?”

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“Donald Trump wants to put American citizens and American veterans first. He thinks the government of this country exists to serve the people of this country, not people who shouldn’t be here in the first place,” said Vance. “That is one of the biggest differences between the leadership of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.”

Vance’s comments came on the heels of a question from a reporter asking how the Trump-Vance ticket would prioritize ending veteran homelessness in America, as Pennsylvania has the fourth-highest rate of veteran homelessness in the country.

In late August, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced it would award over $800 million nationwide in grants through the Supportive Services for Veteran Families and Homeless Providers Grant and Per Diem programs, with $17 million of the overall grant going to Pennsylvania. 

According to nonprofit Mission Roll Call, an average of 35,574 veterans experienced homelessness per diem in 2023. Veteran homelessness increased 7.4% from 2022 to 2023 during the Biden administration, according to the VA.

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“Let’s be honest here, $17 million,” Vance said. “While it will help, it is not nearly enough to meet the challenge of the homeless veteran population in this country.

“These guys went off to war. Some of them came back with wounds, some of them with wounds you cannot see. But all of them came back with the pride that they served their country and did what our country asked them to do,” he added. “How disgraceful is it that millions of our veterans are getting left behind in some form or another, and thousands of them are homeless? When we’re housing illegal aliens in first-class hotels, it’s a disgrace.”

In New York City alone, 119 migrant shelters contracted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are hotels and motels. An additional 38 hotels are contracted through different agencies.

Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, arrives at a campaign event at JWF Industries in Johnstown, Pa., Saturday. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Veterans 4 America First Institute (V4AF), a self-described grassroots policy organization and nonprofit, responded to Vance’s comments on Trump and Harris’ differing approaches toward veterans.

“Senator Vance is 100% correct, more needs to be done for our homeless veterans, especially at a time under VP Harris when the Department of Veterans Affairs dropped the ball as veteran homelessness went up over 7% last year,” Darin Selnick, V4AF founder and Air Force veteran, told Fox News Digital. 

“Meanwhile, the VA gives special treatment to illegal immigrants by processing and paying their ICE medical claims and to special interests over veterans, such as what is happening at the West L.A. campus where VA has turned its back on homeless veterans while giving illegal leases to UCLA, Brentwood School and an oil company,” continued Selnick.  

The VA was recently ruled against during a case in Los Angeles after it had been discovered that the organization had “quietly sold off” land deeded in 1888 as an Old Soldiers’ Home to private interests instead of building housing units for veterans.

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Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, gestures while speaking at a campaign event Saturday. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

U.S. Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., introduced a bill last December that would block VA funding for illegal immigrants nationwide called the “No VA Resources for Illegal Aliens Act” after reports came out of the DHS using VA funding for illegal migrants in ICE detention.

Selnick added: “It is time for VP Harris to walk the walk instead of just talking, and to do what is right for veterans instead of using veterans as a political prop.”

The Republican National Committee’s official platform for 2024 includes a subsection titled “Take Care of Our Veterans,” saying, “Republicans will end luxury housing and Taxpayer benefits for Illegal Immigrants and use those savings to shelter and treat homeless Veterans.”

“We will restore Trump Administration reforms to expand Veterans’ Healthcare Choices, protect Whistleblowers, and hold accountable poorly performing employees not giving our Veterans the care they deserve,” the document continued.

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Representatives for Vance and the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

With just 23 days left until election day and voters already casting ballots, former President Trump is returning to California on Saturday for a rally in the Coachella Valley.

The event is scheduled to take place at 5 p.m. on a polo field at Calhoun Ranch, located just outside the desert city of Coachella.

Trump’s visit to the home state of his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, offers him a chance to bash the liberal policies of the Bay Area native as well as California itself — one of his favorite refrains on the campaign trail.

And the Coachella Valley, home to a thriving agricultural industry and a large population of Latino farmworkers, provides a backdrop for Trump to highlight the region’s water and agricultural needs, as well as immigration. Latinos comprise almost 98% of Coachella, according to the U.S. Census.

The rally venue is located just outside the 41st Congressional District, where Democrat Will Rollins, a former federal prosecutor, is challenging Republican Rep. Ken Calvert. The region will be critical in determining who wins that seat, and potentially which party wins control of Congress.

The visit marks Trump’s second trip to the Golden State in a month, after making a stop to talk to reporters at his Rancho Palos Verdes golf course in September sandwiched between two high-dollar fundraisers in Beverly Hills and the Bay Area.

Trump has announced that he will hold an Oct. 27 rally at Madison Square Garden in New York, another deeply Democratic state. California GOP strategists granted anonymity to discuss the former president’s motivation included the notion that he wanted to increase his share of the popular vote — and despite California’s Democratic tilt, it is home to more than 5 million registered Republicans.

Trump held a rally in Aurora, Colo., on Friday — a state he lost by more than 13 points in 2002. He has falsely claimed that Aurora had been taken over by Venezuelan gang members. He also paid a visit Friday night to Nevada.

On Thursday, while speaking at the Detroit Economic Club, he insulted the city and warned that it foreshadowed what would happen to the nation if Harris is elected president.

“Our whole country will end up being like Detroit if she’s elected president,” Trump said. “We’re not going to let her do that to this country. We’re not gonna let it happen.”

Democrats in Michigan — one of the states likely to determine which party wins the White House — were apoplectic.

“Detroit is the epitome of ‘grit,’ defined by winners willing to get their hands dirty to build up their city and create their communities — something Donald Trump could never understand,” Gov. Gretchen Whitmer wrote on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter. “So keep Detroit out of your mouth. And you better believe Detroiters won’t forget this in November.”

Republicans from the state were stunned by Trump’s remarks as well.

“Michiganders haven’t been this proud of the city of Detroit since Henry Ford put the world on wheels. The Lions and Tigers are flying high, the city has come back to life, and in comes Donald Trump to crap all over that progress,” said an exasperated GOP strategist who reached out to a Times reporter after hearing the remarks, and was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “I think he shouldn’t be surprised when they reward his comments by giving Kamala Harris their votes. And it won’t just be Detroit residents. It will be hundreds of thousands of voters who are deeply proud of their city.”

Harris said Trump’s remarks about Detroit represent a trend.

“My opponent, Donald Trump, yet again, has trashed another great American city when he was in Detroit, which is just a further piece of evidence on a very long list of why he is unfit to be President of the United States,” Harris told reporters on Thursday in Las Vegas.

Trump similarly criticized Milwaukee in a meeting with House Republicans shortly before the Republican National Convention was held there, in the battleground state of Wisconsin, earlier this year. He has also disparaged Philadelphia and Atlanta, both of which are in states that will determine which party wins the White House.