Oakland mayor and county’s district attorney ousted in historic recall

Voters have ousted Oakland’s mayor and the region’s progressive district attorney, in a major political shake-up for the northern California port city. It’s the first time in modern history that voters here have ousted leadership from either position.

Sheng Thao, the mayor, and Pamela Price, the district attorney for Alameda county, were both the target of recall campaigns, launched amid discontent over the city’s challenges: a spiralling housing crisis, rising costs and the departure of the city’s last remaining major league sports team.

But the recall campaigns particularly centered on residents’ enduring frustrations about the area’s crime rates. Like many cities in the US, Oakland experienced a surge in violent crime during the pandemic, one that took longer than elsewhere to subside. Statistics had shown both violent and non-violent crime finally trending down – before the election, the Oakland police announced a 30% drop in homicides this year compared to 2023. Non-fatal shootings were down 20% and robberies were down 24%. Still, many residents remained deeply frustrated.

The overwhelming support for both recalls came amid a broader sentiment in the state that crime had become out of control. Californians also supported a tough-on-crime measure, Prop 36, to enact harsher penalties for retail theft, property crimes and drug offenses and undo some of the landmark criminal justice reforms from a decade ago. They also voted down Prop 6, a measure to ban forced prison labor. Foundational Oakland Unites, a committee set up to fund signature gathering before the mayoral recall, sent residents a “Common Sense Voter Guide” that encouraged a yes on 36 and no on 6.

While the campaigns tapped into deep frustrations among residents, they were funded in large part by a handful of the region’s wealthy residents. Over the summer, the local news site the Oaklandside revealed that Philip Dreyfuss, a hedge-fund manager who lives in the wealthy enclave of Piedmont, had been the biggest funder to the effort to recall the mayor. Ron Conway, a billionaire tech investor, was another major funder.

Thao, the mayor, came into office just two years ago, the first Hmong American to lead a major city. She faced opposition from the start of her tenure, including from the city’s police department – she fired the police chief early in her term – and her moderate opponent in the mayoral contest.

“People are fed up with crime and homelessness,” Dan Lindheim, a former Oakland city administrator and now professor at UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy, told the Guardian in October. “And they want to hold somebody accountable. It was like: ‘We don’t like what they’re doing, so – symbolically – it’s off with their heads.’”

Criticism intensified after the FBI raided Thao’s home in a sprawling corruption investigation. The agency has neither implicated the mayor in any wrongdoing, nor absolved her of involvement. Thao has maintained her innocence.

“It was just piling one thing on top of another,” Lindheim said. “That was the seal of death for her mayoral position.”

In a statement last week, Thao said she was proud of her administration’s accomplishments and was “committed to ensuring we stay on track by supporting a smooth transition”.

Price, the district attorney for Alameda county, which includes Oakland, was also ousted in a recall campaign that began just months after she took office. She was the first Black woman to hold the job. A former civil rights attorney, Price had come into office promising to reform the justice system, stop “over-criminalizing” young people and hold law enforcement to better account.

The Alameda county board of supervisors is expected to appoint an interim district attorney.

Thao must vacate the office as soon as election results are certified on 5 December and the Oakland city council declares a vacancy at its next meeting, Nikki Fortunato Bas, the city council president, said in a statement.

A special election for a new mayor will be held within 120 days, or roughly four months.

Until then, Bas will serve as interim mayor, unless she wins a seat on the Alameda county board of supervisors. As of Monday, Bas was trailing in that race.