December 25 2020
Sam Yebri has filed papers to run for the Los Angeles City Council 5th District seat in 2022, hoping to become the first Iranian Jew to become a member of the 15-seat council.
“[It is] a very exciting moment for the Iranian Jewish community…. My race is the first step toward the dream of more Iranian-Americans being involved civically,” Yebri told the Jewish Journal.
Within the first 48 hours of his campaign launch, he raised $118,000.
Yebri is vying along with others to replace Paul Koretz—who is Jewish but not Iranian and whose term ends in 2022. Koretz, who has held the 5th District council seat since 2009, plans to run for city controller in 2022.
The 5th District, which covers communities in the Westside, central-eastern Santa Monica Mountains and central-southern San Fernando Valley, is home to many Jewish communities.
The area also covers Westwood, where Yebri currently lives with his wife and four children in the epicenter of Persian life otherwise known as “Tehrangles,” “Little Persia” or “Persian Square.” He and his family have lived there for more than 30 years.
After graduating from Yale University with a degree in political science, Yebri went to USC law school and currently runs his own private law firm in the Century City area.
One of Yebri’s early endorsers for the seat is the Jewish former Democratic Congressman Henry Waxman, who represented the area from 1975 to 2015. Yebri worked for Waxman’s congressional campaign while he was in college.
Yebri, 39, was a year old in 1982 when his family left Iran to settle in Los Angeles. “I think being an immigrant refugee informs the way you look at the world,” he said. “I think it creates empathy for other people who are disadvantaged here or abroad and creates a desire to give back to the country for the opportunities we have had.”
Someone who can offer some insight into the road that lies ahead for Yebri is the former Iranian Jewish mayor of Beverly Hills, Jimmy Delshad. Delshad told the Journal he has been aware of Yebri’s interest in running for the LA City Council seat for over a year. “I have encouraged him,” he said.
Yebri is the first Iranian Jewish American to run for the LA City Council.
City Council terms are four years. The elections are non-partisan under California state law, though Yebri is a Democrat.