Along with your ballot and piles of campaign literature, you may have received in your mailbox a petition from the campaign to recall L.A. County District Attorney George Gascón.
He is not on the June 7 primary ballot, but his opponents are trying to collect 566,857 signatures to place Gascón’s recall on a future ballot. That’s 10 percent of registered voters in L.A. County. In fact, the campaign likely will need to collect more than 700,000 signatures because of the number likely to be disqualified.
The mailer includes a petition for as many as 14 people to sign, along with a prepaid return envelope.
A campaign spokesman said they have collected about 500,000 signatures so far, including those gathered in person and via the mail campaign. This is the second attempt to recall Gascón; the first attempt failed last year.
Recall proponents have until July 6 to collect signatures in order to get on the November general election ballot.
Only two recall efforts across the country needed more signatures — both against Governor Gavin Newsom.
In much-smaller San Francisco, the recall of DA Chesa Boudin qualified for the June 7 primary with 51,325 signatures of registered voters. His opponents there also used a direct mail effort to boost their campaign.
Like Boudin, Gascón has sought more lenient sentences for people who break the law and has not prosecuted some lower-level crimes. The recall campaign says those policies have contributed to an increase in crime — though there is no empirical evidence to support that.
(Gascon’s agenda suffered a setback on June 2 when an appellate court partially upheld a preliminary injunction against some of the DA’s policies, including one that prohibited his prosecutors in some cases from seeking longer prison sentences under the state’s three strikes law.)
“Since the day that George Gascón was elected, he has been at war with common sense, crime victims, and true justice,” Desiree Andrade states in a letter being mailed with the petitions. She is angry Gascón won’t seek life without the possibility of parole or the death penalty for her son’s alleged killers. Andrade is a co-chair of the recall organizing committee.
Gascón has said the campaign is a right-wing effort to undermine his attempts to reduce mass incarceration and racial disparities in the justice system.
“The move seems desperate,” said Jamarah Haynor, a spokesperson for the campaign against the recall. “They are throwing every single dollar at this to try to cut through the noise during a very busy primary season.”
