Spencer Pratt became a voice for L.A.'s disaffected. Where do his supporters go now?

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When Republican Spencer Pratt burst into Los Angeles politics, venting a torrent of online fury against Mayor Karen Bass’ handling of the Palisades fire, he pitched his mayoral campaign as a full-bore challenge to L.A.’s political status quo.The former reality TV star, who lost his home in the blaze, started as a long shot but emerged as a national story, with the ability to harvest social media attention, rally a base and dominate the news cycle.But in a city overwhelmingly Democratic, where Republicans make up just 15% of registered voters, even some of his supporters wondered how far he could rise.In the end, voters selected Bass, a Democratic centrist, and democratic socialist City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who ran to Bass’ left, to face off in the runoff.Still, for many of the 200,000 Angelenos who voted for Pratt, his brash, social media-fueled campaign was not just a long exercise in trolling.

Pratt gave voice to their discontent with the system of one-party rule and said things they too often felt uncomfortable saying.And now, they face a difficult choice of who to support in November.“I know a lot of people who are disappointed,” said Meghan Daum, an L.A.writer and podcaster and former Los Angeles Times columnist who endorsed Pratt.

“They are saying, ‘OK, now what? What can we do?”’While Pratt did not make the runoff, political experts said his candidacy tapped into Angelenos’ dissatisfaction with the Democratic establishment and resonated with a sizable number of Angelenos who are rarely represented in L.A.politics.“He identified a previously invisible level of anger and frustration,” said Dan Schnur, a longtime politics professor at USC, UC Berkeley and Pepperdine University, of Pratt.

“The question going forward is whether he, or someone else, can shape that raw emotion into a movement.”Pratt has yet to put out a statement conceding the ...