Source: Politics<\/p>\n
George Gasc\u00f3n was elected district attorney of Los Angeles County in November 2020 with 54 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n
\u201cI won handsomely,\u201d he reminisced Wednesday during a 90-minute conversation at the Hall of Justice in downtown L.A. \u201cI got over 2 million votes.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a big victory for criminal justice reformers: the leading progressive prosecutor in the country taking over the movement\u2019s top target, the largest county in the country and one that has long been hostile to change.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew how challenging LA County was because I had been a police officer here for 27 years,\u201d he said. \u201cThis office had been one of the leading incarcerators, death penalty, put young kids into adult prison. This office actually led the way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Back then, in the fall of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd sparked a new racial justice movement, being a well-known advocate for criminal justice reform was an asset in LA.<\/p>\n
Black Lives Matter signs appeared in Beverly Hills, and Gasc\u00f3n leaned into his message of radical reform. \u201cThis is really about beginning to sort of dismantle systemic racism from the criminal justice system,\u201d he said at the time.<\/p>\n
Gasc\u00f3n moved quickly after he was sworn in. He ended cash bail for misdemeanors and non-violent felonies. He told his deputy district attorneys not to seek the death penalty anymore, to never try juveniles as adults, to stop prosecuting people for first-time non-violent misdemeanors, and to stop using so-called sentencing enhancements, which allow prosecutors to pile on jail time.<\/p>\n
And he did all of that on his first day in office.<\/p>\n
Then came the backlash.<\/p>\n
When certain types of crime spiked in Los Angeles, Gasc\u00f3n got the blame. In Beverly Hills the city council passed a vote-of-no-confidence resolution against him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt became fashionable for affluent white people to want to be pro-police accountability,\u201d he recalled. \u201cIt was kind of the chic thing to do. So you also are going to want to be seen with BLM. They wanted to be in demonstrations, right? \u2026 I\u2019m a little cynical now, looking back. At the time, I actually thought that there was a parting of the waters. I said, \u2018For the first time, I’m hearing white affluent people understanding the suffering of black people in this country and poor people.\u2019 And I thought, \u2018This is a reversal.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI was wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
California makes it relatively easy to recall an elected official. It\u2019s been part of the state constitution since 1911. And in sour times, recalls spike. Gov. Gavin Newsom faced a recall last year that he defeated. San Francisco recalled three school board members in February. More ominously for Gasc\u00f3n, last month, San Francisco recalled its district attorney, Gasc\u00f3n\u2019s friend and ideological kin, Chesa Boudin, who had instituted many of the same policies.<\/p>\n
There was talk of recalling Gasc\u00f3n as soon as he was sworn in. And those calls were coming from inside the Hall of Justice, where many of his deputy district attorneys revolted against the changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe week that I got sworn in, they started talking about recalling me,\u201d Gasc\u00f3n said. \u201cAnd they had to be told you have to wait at least 90 days. So, I\u2019ve been fighting recall since Day 1.\u201d<\/p>\n
In LA the deep state is real. Gasc\u00f3n can\u2019t fire the deputy district attorneys who are so hostile to his agenda that they have publicly endorsed the recall. \u201cThink about Biden coming in and keeping Donald Trump’s cabinet,\u201d he said. \u201cThat’s what it\u2019s like.\u201d<\/p>\n
Voters will know by Aug. 17 whether a recall of Gasc\u00f3n will be on the November ballot.<\/p>\n
In the meantime Gasc\u00f3n\u2019s policies have become a flashpoint in other major California elections. In the Los Angeles mayor\u2019s race, the right-leaning candidate, Rick Caruso has condemned him, and the left-leaning candidate, Rep. Karen Bass, has distanced herself from him. Nationally, Gasc\u00f3n has become a recurring character on Fox News and an unwelcome issue for vulnerable Democrats.<\/p>\n
The backlash against progressive prosecutors even caught the attention of the White House.<\/p>\n
On the day after Boudin was recalled last month, President Joe Biden told reporters, \u201cI think the voters sent a clear message last night: Both parties have to step up and do something about crime, as well as gun violence.\u201d He reminded everyone that his budget called for more money to hire and train more cops.<\/p>\n
Gasc\u00f3n said he\u2019s learned from the Boudin recall.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the mistakes that Chesa made that I learned from it \u2014 and he’ll readily recognize \u2014 is he was trying to talk to people about data,\u201d Gasc\u00f3n said. \u201cPeople don’t care about data. This is about emotions. This is about how you perceive and feel. And you cannot use data to deal with feelings. And I think that was a failure. And by the time he kind of woke up to that, it was too late for him.\u201d<\/p>\n