WHEN KAMALA HARRIS ANNOUNCED she would not run for governor of California in late July, the pundit class was quick to appoint another possible candidate: Rick Caruso.
If you live in Los Angeles, Caruso is a familiar fixture, since the sixty-six-year-old billionaire real estate developer has inserted himself into just about every aspect of city life. He has served as board chair at the University of Southern California (LA’s largest private employer), president of the Los Angeles Police Commission, and a commissioner for the Department of Water and Power. Parsing his evolving political affiliations is a local parlor game: When the longtime Republican made his failed bid for mayor in 2022—at a personal cost of $104 million—he did so as a registered Democrat. But beyond his status as political gadfly, Caruso is perhaps best known as a mall-maker, the builder of perpetually popular “lifestyle centers” such as the Grove in Los Angeles and the Americana at Brand in Glendale. One of his newer developments, Palisades Village, which opened in 2018 in Pacific Palisades, grabb…