Gustavo Arellano: Rick Caruso's Latino appeal isn't bought — it's real. But is it enough to win?
Telenovela star Kate del Castillo took a lunchtime stroll toward a black GMC Yukon parked on Cesar E. Chavez Avenue in Boyle Heights, cameramen and photographers behind her.
She peered into the massive SUV. Rick Caruso stepped out and gave her a big hug and birthday greetings. The actor and the Los Angeles mayoral candidate walked together for a bit before stopping in front of palm trees to face the press.
Caruso introduced Del Castillo as a "very prominent member of the Latino community" who had decided to endorse him. The announcement was in Boyle Heights — where neither of them live — because that's where his Italian grandparents settled when they came to the United States, he said.
Wearing a mint-condition "Rick Caruso for Mayor" baseball hat, Del Castillo added that the city was "impossible to live in" because of "extreme violence and crime all over" and that Caruso had a "real strategy" to fix these problems.
The political meet-cute was as canned as a double helping of Purina Dog Chow.
Far more real was what happened next.
