No on Proposition C: The Insiders Protection Act betrays democratic values
Proposition C on our June 7 San Francisco ballot betrays democratic values. The Supervisors who support it appear not to trust the voters who elected them — that we can’t tell a good recall attempt from a bad one or that we San Francisco Democrats can be fooled by a Kentucky Republican. We should all vote No.
If passed, Proposition C will take immediate effect and deny San Francisco voters our right to vote on the Mayor’s replacement for District Attorney Chesa Boudin should he be recalled. And it will make future recalls more difficult and more expensive.
In response and in defiance to the over 70% of San Francisco voters who recalled School Board members Alison Collins, Gabriela Lopez and Faauuga Moliga, Supervisor Aaron Peskin and some of his fellow supervisors put Proposition C on the ballot. If Proposition C had already been law, it would have prohibited the recall vote despite the overwhelming support to remove Collins, Lopez and Moliga from office.
In other parts of the country, when legislators change the voting laws after their side has lost an election, we call it voter suppression. Here in San Francisco, that tactic is called Proposition C.
Current law already shields incumbents from recall — no matter how unresponsive or irresponsible they are — for six months at the beginning and at the end of their terms. Proposition C would double the number of months they are protected from recall.
Recalls are rarely successful but remain an important part of our democracy. Before this year, the last local recall was in 1983. At that time, the San Francisco Democratic Club, Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council and other progressive groups stated, “The Recall process is a vital part of our electoral system. It ensures that public officials are held accountable. Opponents reveal their contempt for the democratic process.”
Proposition C proponents like to brand recalls as “Republican recalls.” In reality, the recall power belongs to all people. Recalls are not a battle between the Left and the Right. They hold insiders accountable to the people. In 2018, Democrats, progressives, labor and women led the recall campaign against a Santa Clara County judge after he granted a six month sentence to a Stanford swimmer convicted of rape. Among the prominent recall supporters were the then-California State Democratic Party Chair, former national Democratic Party Chair Donna Brazile, Feminist Majority, National Organization for Women, Dolores Huerta, the California Nurses Association, South Bay Labor Council, U.S. Reps. Ro Khanna and Eric Swalwell and dozens of other progressive, labor, liberal and Democratic organizations and leaders.
Similarly, our recent SF School Board recall — an overwhelming victory in every neighborhood led by frustrated parents of all backgrounds — has been described as the most important school board recall since 1959. In that year, Little Rock, Arkansas voters recalled segregationist School Board incumbents and opened the school house doors to Black and white children alike. It would be an inaccurate and unfair stretch to suggest that Proposition C proponents would stand with the segregationists. But it is an important reminder that stripping away the voters’ right to recall reduces everyone’s role in a democracy, not just people they might oppose.
Not only does Proposition C grab power away from voters by limiting the time allowed for a recall, it takes away the Mayor’s authority to appoint a full-fledged replacement official. Currently, the Mayor appoints a replacement who may go before the voters after a four month period so we, the voters, can decide whether to retain him or her or elect someone new. Under Proposition C, the replacement official who has been appointed to clean up the mess left behind by the recalled official is barred from running in that election. The recalled official can run though. If we like the appointee, we can’t keep him or her in office. Moreover, the appointee is an immediate “lame duck” and can be ignored or overridden by the insiders. When voters vote to recall, they are demanding change, not an interim office holder or “caretaker.”
Proposition C represents a now growing and dangerous trend of distrust by incumbents of their constituents, the people of San Francisco. Proposition C proponents want to restrict the recall power simply because, after years of dormancy, it was used successfully in the February election. We overwhelmingly rejected the Governor Newsom recall just last year. So when San Franciscans resort to the recall in 2022, we do not do so lightly. It’s time for the insiders to listen and learn, not strip away the voters’ right to recall and the Mayor’s authority to appoint.
Finally, by weakening the voters’ recall power, Proposition C also strikes at a key supporting argument for district election of supervisors. Those of us who defended district elections from attack in the August 1977 special election will remember a leading ballot argument by Supervisor Nancy Walker, a Bernal Heights progressive’s progressive, emphasizing that district elections make for better government because supervisors represent specific areas and “will be subject to easier recall.”
Recall elections are rare but serve a necessary purpose in our democracy. While the perspectives they advance may vary from election to election and place to place, they provide democratic accountability and uniquely give voters the chance to say Yes or No focused solely on the record of incumbents. Don’t let insiders protect themselves at our expense and diminish our right to recall.
On or before June 7, vote No on Proposition C.
John Trasvina, former Dean of USF School of Law, has served in three Democratic presidential administrations, and is a San Francisco native.
