Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon, who promised sweeping reforms to the criminal justice system and later faced intense criticism over public safety concerns, has lost his bid for re-election, according to the Associated Press.
Gascon was defeated by Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor who seized on voters’ concerns about crime and homelessness in the nation’s most populous county and largest law enforcement jurisdiction.
Gascon made national headlines in recent weeks when he announced his support for the pardon Eric and Lyle Menendez, brothers who were found guilty of murdering their parents in 1989. The legal saga is back in the public eye this fall following the debut of a Netflix miniseries and a documentary about their lives.
Gascon was brought into office in 2020 amid national outrage over the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. He rode the political wave that had helped elect crusading prosecutors in cities like Boston, Chicago and Philadelphia in earlier times, harnessing the progressive energy surrounding summer protests against police misconduct and racial inequality.
In office, Gascon quickly began to implement his reformist agenda.
He banned prosecutors in his office from seeking the death penalty and various sentencing enhancements, ended juvenile prosecutions and ended bail for felonies and non-violent crimes.
But many of these initiatives, including, caused a violent reaction some of the county’s senior prosecutors.
Gascon fended off two recall attempts, both of which failed to secure places on the ballot. Meanwhile, opposition to aggressive criminal justice reform continued to grow in California. San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin was recalled from office in 2022 after critics cast her as an anti-crime progressive.
Gascon and other Los Angeles political leaders have tried to refute accusations that the city is dangerous, a perception fueled in part by videos of retail robberies.
Gascon faced 11 challengers in the county’s nonpartisan primary on March 5 and advanced to a runoff against independent Hochman, a Republican candidate for California attorney general in 2022.
Hochman promised to eliminate “lawlessness” and saw his candidacy as a sharp break from the Gascon era.
“DA George Gascón has failed to protect our residents, leading to a spiral of lawlessness that endangers all LA County residents,” Hochman said. statement announcing his candidacy. “It’s time to stop playing politics with people’s lives. It’s time for a DA who fights for victims, not criminals.
Gascon sought to change perceptions about his tenure and emphasized his understanding of the growing concern about public safety. But pre-election public opinion polls showed him lagging behind Hochman. a Survey conducted on September 25 – October 1.for example, Hochman was 30 percentage points ahead of Gascon.
Hochman, 60, was an assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California in the 1990s. He later served as Assistant Attorney General for the Tax Division of the US Department of Justice under former President George W. Bush.
Gascon, 70, was previously San Francisco’s attorney general — a job he once held before Vice President Kamala Harris won the state attorney general’s job. He was also an assistant police chief in Los Angeles, as well as a police chief in Mesa, Arizona, and San Francisco.