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.
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.
I think I bring a perspective that local communities are what make this country great, and they are the laboratories of democracy.
I prioritize my daughter and my wife.
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.
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.
We need a pro-worker trade approach that puts American jobs - not corporate profits - front and center.
Aggressive government spending during the Great Recession was absolutely necessary.
Environment, homelessness, infrastructure and immigration - I'm very focused on all four, which are critical to the success of Los Angeles.
In presidential elections, I think people focus way too much on ideology.
Cory Booker I've known since 1993. We used to be part of the L'Chaim Society at Oxford University together.
Pete Buttigieg is one of my closest friends as a mayor.
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.
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 don't want to bring a European city or an east-coast city to the West Coast.
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.
Don't run for mayor if you don't want to basically be working all the time.
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 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.
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.
