Message to Michael

Boudin, Schmidt.

The district attorney in San Francisco, a criminal justice reformer by the name of Chesa Boudin, just got himself recalled from office after two years and change. It wasn't close.

As much as people want a fairer system, they aren't content to live in a crime-infested dump, and when the politicians let it get too bad, which they surely have in San Francisco, one or more elected officials are going to pay the price. As the New York Times tells it:

Ultimately the election was a contest between progressive Democrats who saw Mr. Boudin as a key leader of a national movement to address mass incarceration and a backlash by more politically moderate San Franciscans — a coalition of Democrats, independents and Republicans — who grew agitated by persistent property crimes and open drug use during the pandemic. The backlash won....

The vote was seen by many as an accumulation of frustration by city residents over squalid street conditions, including the illicit drug sales, homeless encampments and untreated mental illness. During the campaign Mr. Boudin repeatedly pointed out that he was not responsible for many of the street conditions that San Francisco residents are decrying but he recognized that he had become a vessel for their anger.

The parallels to Portland are obvious, of course. The boy wonder D.A. here, Mike Schmidt, is more or less Boudin's policy twin, and our crime, drug addiction, and homeless picture is just as bad as San Francisco's, if not worse. Aside from the far, far left, people here are fed up, too. I don't think a recall is in the offing, but four more years for Schmidt seems like an unlikely outcome when he comes up for re-election, which I believe is in two years.

The cops in San Francisco are no doubt celebrating tonight. They seem to have gone on unofficial strike, letting the city rot, until they got rid of the guy they never wanted. Will they go back to work now? Maybe, maybe not. Again, the parallels to Portland are striking.