Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and Alameda County Prosecutor Pamela Price successfully recalled

OAKLAND, Calif. – History was made in Alameda County and Oakland when progressive-minded District Attorney Pamela Price and Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao were recalled by voters in Tuesday’s election.

The Associated Press released the results of this week’s vote on the DA recall on Friday evening. They did not announce the results of the mayor’s recall, but Mayor Thao issued a statement seemingly admitting defeat.

These were the first successful recalls of an Oakland mayor and an Alameda County district attorney in history.

“This is not a great election for incumbents,” Brandice Canes-Wrone, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, told KTVU before the election.

Both recalls mean Thao and Price are out of work.

Both were largely funded by Phillip Dreyfuss, a Piedmont resident who has declined interviews to explain why he supports the effort. And both were cited by critics of progressive politics who complained about crime under both women’s leadership.

The last time a mayoral recall vote was held in Oakland was against Mayor John Davis in 1917, and it was unsuccessful. The city clerk’s office told the San Francisco Chronicle. There were calls to recall Mayor Libby Schaaf and Mayor Jean Quan, but those efforts never came to a vote.

When it came to the price recall, 65% of voters approved of the recall and 34% were against it. Both recalls required a simple majority to pass.

A group called SAFE, which stands for “Save Alameda for Everyone,” organized the recall against Price, arguing that the former civil rights attorney did not pursue the defendants with sufficiently harsh charges and thereby made the community unsafe. Price struggled to fend off concerns that she was not tough enough on crime and failing to support victims of crime.

Price pushed back against those claims, arguing that she was elected on the basis of criminal justice reform.

In 2022, Price won on a post-George Floyd platform, promising not to overcharge or criminalize defendants, particularly black and brown youth.

But the political tides have changed since then.

Assuming this recall vote is certified on December 5th, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors must appoint a replacement district attorney. This person will hold the position for the remainder of the term, which ends in 2026.

A group called Protect the Win for Public Safety, which opposed the prosecutor’s recall, and the ACLU of Northern California fought the recall, countering that it was patently dishonest to blame Price “for crime problems that have been decades in the making.” “.

Now that Price has been officially removed, the highest-ranking official in her position, Assistant District Attorney Royl Roberts, is expected to take over East Bay Times.

It was not immediately clear whether a special election could also be held or whether the interim prosecutor would only hold the post for a year and a half.

KTVU reached out to Price for comment but has not yet heard back.

As for the other recall vote in the East Bay, The San Francisco Chronicle calls the recall of Mayor Thao a success and says voters chose to remove the mayor. The latest results show a similar figure of 63.85% for recall against Thao and 36.15% against.

Mayor Thao issued the following statement saying she would support a smooth transition.

Read her full statement here:

“Oaklanders, thank you for choosing me as your mayor. As the first Hmong American woman to become mayor of a major American city, it was the honor of a lifetime. It was my goal to make Oakland safer, cleaner and more secure. and more lively. And I’m proud of what we’ve achieved together, with a historic 35% reduction in murders. For the first time in over a decade, there was not a single murder in Oakland. Our Work We’ve also dismantled literally hundreds of encampments, developed over 1,500 affordable housing units this year alone, made the largest IT investment in our 9-1-1 infrastructure in two decades, installed 290 flock cameras, made 100,000 people happy and I sent baseball fans to West Oakland and traveled a record number of miles. I am deeply proud of the progress we have made together and I am committed to keeping us on the right track by supporting a smooth transition. It’s not about me. That has never been the case. It was always about Oakland. And the changes we have brought about in these two short years will be felt for generations to come.”

The recall against Thao was first organized by retired Alameda County Superior Court Judge Brenda Harbin-Forte, who has since resigned from the Oakland United to Recall Sheng Thao (OUST) campaign when she ran for city attorney.

Her sister, Gail Harbin, then became speaker. Activist Seneca Scott and former Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce President Carl Chan also advocated for Thao’s removal. On Friday, Scott claimed, “Recalls are part of our democracy.”

Thao’s critics kept up a steady drumbeat at news conferences, calling the mayor incompetent and blaming her for Oakland’s high crime rate, the firing of a popular police chief and the loss of millions in a retail theft grant for which the city missed the deadline.

In her defense, Thao has repeatedly said that she inherited a host of problems from previous administrations and that she has kept Oakland on track. She attributed some of the declining crime trend to her decision to continue the successful Ceasefire strategy, the sale of the municipal half of the Coliseum for $105 million and her plans to redevelop the Hegenberger Corridor.

Last month, former mayor Schaaf spoke out in favor of recalling her successor.

Before the election, Thao told KTVU that her removal would only bring “instability” to Oakland.

With Thao gone, Oakland City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas, who appears to have lost her bid for Alameda County supervisor, would likely step in as interim mayor until a special election can be held.

This election must take place within 120 days of the official disclosure of Thao’s vacancy.

Loren Taylor, whom Thao narrowly defeated in the last election, is one of the people who said he would be interested in the seat.

The Oakland Police Officers Union released a statement declaring a “victory” in both recalls and thanking supporters.

“We support the residents of Oakland in recalling Mayor Sheng Thao for her defunding of the police force and her gross financial mismanagement that has nearly bankrupted Oakland,” said the statement from the Oakland Police Officers president Association, Hay Nguyen, in part.

They said the recalls symbolized a new day but acknowledged difficult work ahead.