Los Angeles City Council members Hugo Sotomartinez and Nitya Raman sat cross-legged in the middle of Century Boulevard last month as they marched into Los Angeles International Airport to show solidarity with local hotel workers. helped prevent it.

the demo, and subsequent arrest Sotomartinez, Raman and about 200 others made headlines for obvious reasons. Aside from zip ties and police procedures, the presence of two city council members should not come as a surprise.

In recent months, a string of federal, state and local politicians, including several city council members, have walked the picket line or marched outdoors to TV and film writers, as well as hotel workers’ union Unite Here Local 11. are offering support for Studio and school officials demonstrate outside the Los Angeles Unity Campus.

But in recent weeks, city attorneys for the city of Los Angeles have said that the office of Heidi Feldstein Soto has quietly begun admonishing elected officials of the city to refrain from getting involved in labor disputes, and that such activities have not taken place. said it could lead to a lawsuit against the city.

In a confidential July 3 memo, a copy of which was seen by The Times, Feldstein Soto’s team told elected leaders if they would show up in the picket line or rally with demonstrators. He warned that if he did, he might have to refrain from voting on related issues in parliament. future.

“The participation of multiple legislators in these activities could impact the city council’s ability to meet quorums on issues involving unions and employers, and could expose the city to liability,” the memo said. It is

The advice threatens to dampen Los Angeles’ hot working summer, which has seen a spate of strikes and labor protests in the hospitality and entertainment industries. The memo also runs counter to decades of union activism in the blue city of Los Angeles, where organized workers and city government are inextricably intertwined.

Los Angeles politicians have long expressed support for teachers, janitor, coast workers and a wide range of other unionized professions. City Councilman Kevin De Leon was questioned about the memo last week and said he would not give up his right to free speech or assembly.

De Leon, who ran for mayor last year with more than $430,000 in support from Unite Here Local 11, said he will remain outspoken about workers’ demands for fair wages, even during the strike. Told.

“The legal opinion does not extinguish the constitutional rights of elected officials to speak up and defend the struggle for dignity and respect of hotel employees and Hollywood writers,” he said in a statement. rice field.

Kurt Petersen, co-director of Unite Here Local 11, responded even more strongly, saying the memo was “based on an extreme and unsubstantiated misinterpretation of federal labor law.”

“There is nothing inappropriate for city employees to exercise their individual constitutional right to free speech to join or show support for picket line workers,” he said in a statement. said.

Former Unite Here organizer Sotomartinez has shown a more diplomatic assessment, thanking the city attorney’s advice and using it to “consider the pros and cons” of his future actions. said to do.

“I have worked for the Angelenos all my life and that is why I was elected. I will do everything I can to ensure they are treated fairly,” he said in a statement. “If an issue arises that could lead to cancellation, I will consult with city attorneys and proceed from there.”

A spokeswoman for Raman said her boss could not discuss the memo.

Neither Feldstein Soto nor her spokesperson responded to a request for comment from The Times.

In a memo, the city attorney’s legal team said it provided advice in response to an inquiry from an elected official regarding picketing in support of Unite Here. In their personal capacity, lawyers said, these officials still “retained their constitutional rights to speech and assembly, and were free to exercise those rights in peaceful trade union protests. ” admitted.

Lawyers are speaking to city council members at protests over contract disputes on their behalf, rather than as elected officials, to avoid concerns about “bias and fairness”. proposed to clarify. He also suggested that when city-elected officials stand in the picket line, they act as legal observers rather than participants and avoid wearing clothing with the city’s coat of arms.

Lawyers for Feldstein Soto said many of their concerns were based on a federal law that prohibits the city from using “economic pressure or regulatory authority” to intervene in union disputes. They cite Golden State Transit v. City of Los Angeles, a major case that has twice reached the U.S. Supreme Court, stemming from actions taken by the city council during a labor dispute more than 40 years ago. .

The story begins in 1981, when the city council intervened on behalf of the Teamsters chapter in a strike against Yellow Cab, the city’s largest taxi company at the time. At Teamsters’ request, the city voted to block the renewal of the Yellow Cab franchise on the grounds of the dispute.

The taxi company has since gone out of business, and Yellow Cab’s parent company, Golden State Transit, has sued the city.

The Supreme Court concluded that the city had wrongfully intervened in the labor dispute, twice ruling in favor of the company and later holding the city liable for damages.

The Golden State Transit ruling was a landmark case in labor law, and the lawsuit cost the city millions of dollars. Still, legal experts said they didn’t believe it had anything to do with the type of activity Feldstein Soto assessed.

William B. Gould IV, professor emeritus at Stanford University Law School, said there was no reason to deter city-elected officials from participating in picket lines during labor disputes. Gould, the former chairman of the National Labor Relations Commission, said Golden State Transit’s precedent centered on “decisions by the government, not statements of opinion.”

Irwin Chemelinski, dean of the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, also noted the 1981 council vote to block the renewal of the Yellow Cab franchise, as well as demonstrations of support for hotel employees and Hollywood screenwriters. He pointed out that there is a clear distinction between them.

“There’s a big difference between the coercive action of the city collectively not renewing contracts and the voices of individual city officials,” he said in an email.

Former Los Angeles Police Department. Carmen Tortanich said he did not provide such guidance during his tenure from 2009 to 2013.

“Unless someone in the picket line is doing something stupid, I don’t think it matters,” he said. “But everyone’s definition of stupid is different.”

Feldstein Soto’s memo offered another reason for city leaders to refrain from participating in the Unite Here protests. The city has a deal with the Union Hotel — the LA Grand in downtown Los Angeles to be used as temporary housing for the homeless at a cost of $200,000. About $4,700 per room per month.

LA Grand may argue that the picketing with Unite Here Local 11 employees is evidence of bias against the hotel, or “wrongful interference with the hotel’s contractual rights,” the memo said. has been written.

Katherine Fisk, a professor at the Berkeley Center for Law and Labor, said she had never heard of a government lawyer directing an elected official to avoid speaking out about a high-profile labor dispute. rice field.

Still, Fisk said it wouldn’t be unreasonable for city attorneys to write a letter outlining the litigation risks posed by the Golden State Transit lawsuit.

“To be fair, the organization’s attorney, and the city’s attorney is the organization’s attorney, but their job is to worry about the risk of liability to the organization,” she says.