LA Native, 3-Time Grammy Winner ‘Disassociated’ From Dodgers After Mark Walter Update
Los Angeles Dodgers owner Mark Walter, whose tenure brought team success and three World Series contentions, now faces significant scrutiny over his business practices. Comedian George Lopez recently disassociated from the Dodgers and Lakers, citing Walter's ties to GEO Group, a private prison company operating ICE detention centers for profit. Lopez also referenced Dodger Stadium's controversial origins in Chavez Ravine. Adding to the controversy, Walter is under federal investigation, with prosecutors probing potential financial improprieties at his insurance companies and Guggenheim Partners, where he is CEO. A search warrant was executed for his mobile phone. These issues highlight how ownership concerns can overshadow on-field performance for a culturally significant franchise.
The Los Angeles Dodgers have enjoyed unprecedented stability under Mark Walter's ownership, building one of Major League Baseball's premier organizations while consistently acquiring the best star talent and contending for three World Series championships in a row.
But the club's ownership group has recently found itself part of a broader public conversation extending well beyond baseball.
And for at least one prominent fan and Los Angeles native, the ties between the team and Walter’s business practices have become too much to support.
Three-time Grammy Award winner George Lopez recently revealed that he decided to abandon a lifelong fandom of the Dodgers over Walter’s business history.
“Mark Walter owns detention centers and runs them for profit,” Lopez said during an episode of “The Big Podcast” hosted by Shaquille O’Neal. “So, as soon as I found that out, I disassociated myself from the Dodgers and (Los Angeles) Lakers, unfortunately. I lost two teams in one week.”
Walter, who also chairs the Lakers, is the CEO of asset manager Guggenheim Partners. He came under scrutiny last year for the firms’ ownership stake in GEO Group, a private prison company that operates detention facilities for United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Walter’s ties to immigrant detention resulted in protests from members of the Los Angeles community, including many Dodgers fans, who felt that ICE inhumanely targeted them.
Lopez also referenced the team’s home stadium — built after the government forcibly removed residents of Chavez Ravine in the 1950s — as a reason why he felt uncomfortable supporting it.
“The idea that Dodgers Stadium was built on a Latino neighborhood that was, people were forcibly removed in the late ‘50s,” Lopez added. “And then when I found out they run that (detention) thing for profit and part of ICE and where they put people, I dissociated myself.”
Aside from the recent loss of at least one prominent fan due to Guggenheim's ties to for-profit detention centers, Walter has found himself at the center of some more recent controversy after news surfaced that the federal government carried out a search warrant for his mobile phone.
“Federal prosecutors in Manhattan have been investigating potential financial improprieties at two of Walter’s insurance companies and at Guggenheim Partners, the financial firm Walter leads,” according to Bloomberg Law. “The warrants formed part of an investigation scrutinizing Guggenheim’s $362 billion money management division and whether revenue information shared with outside parties was accurate, said the people with knowledge of the probe.”
While the Dodgers remain focused on defending another National League title, Lopez's remarks illustrate how conversations surrounding ownership can extend far beyond wins and losses, especially for a franchise that occupies such a prominent place in Los Angeles culture.