The 28-Year-Old Who Ran L.A. on 9/11

ALEX PADILLA HAD PLANNED to go to the gym that Tuesday morning, but the famously disciplined politician uncharacteristically hit snooze when his alarm warbled before dawn. 

Then the phone rang. On the other end of the line was a friend who knew Padilla worked in government. Something is happening in New York, the friend said, you should turn on the news. 

The sight on screen was one that would soon sear itself into the retinas of a generation of Americans: a gaping wound of flame near the top of the World Trade Center’s North Tower. The image would eventually become visual shorthand for unbearable losses, a nation’s transformation and decades-long wars. 

But there was no symbolism yet. For now, there was just smoke billowing against the clear blue sky.

Padilla was 28 and had been elected by his colleagues just two months prior to serve as Los Angeles’ City Council president. He watched in horror as a second plane hit the South Tower on live TV.

Two thoughts immediately came to mind as he sat in his Pacoima living room. If the country was under attack, Los Angeles, he thought, would be an obvious target. And Mayor James K. Hahn was out of state, making Padilla the acting mayor of the nation’s second-largest city.