After already surviving two recall attempts in his first term, Los Angeles’s unpopular progressive district attorney, George Gascón, is leading Tuesday’s 12-person primary election, and appears headed to a November runoff against former federal prosecutor Nathan Hochman.
With 50 percent of the vote counted by early Wednesday, Gascón is on top of the crowded field with 174,822 votes, or 21.4 percent, while Hochman was second with 144,757 votes, or 17.7 percent. Hochman ran as an independent in this race after previously running for California attorney general as a Republican.
Jonathan Hatami, a deputy district attorney in Gascón’s office who won support from some conservatives for promising to reinstate sentencing enhancements, is in third with 109,181 votes, or 13.4 percent. Support for each of the other nine candidates was below 10 percent.
Gascón was elected in 2020 promising to bring progressive change to the district attorney’s office, including vowing to abolish cash bail, to lighten sentences for gang members, and to stop prosecuting juveniles as adults, pursuing life in prison without parole, and filing sentencing enhancements in most cases. His critics have accused him of being of being soft on crime.
A late-January poll found that only 24 percent of likely L.A. County voters approved of Gascón’s performance, while a majority, 51 percent, disapproved of the job he is doing.
Gascón survived two recall campaigns during his first term as district attorney.
Sensing his vulnerability, a long list of candidates — including five members of Gascón’s office — lined up to challenge him in the primary. But the crowded field and divided vote may have helped Gascón in the primary.
When announcing his re-election bid in November, Gascón said the campaign was not about him, according to a local NBC report.
“This is a community movement,” he said. “This is about looking at the criminal justice system of the 21st century not with a rear-view mirror but looking forward.”
Other candidates in the field included: Maria Ramirez, the head deputy district attorney; Eric Siddall, a deputy district attorney who had won the support of the deputy DAs’ union; and Los Angeles County Superior Court judges Debra Archuleta and Craig Mitchell.