It's Gascon V. Hochman for LA DA

November Head to Head Runoff Set

Thanks again to the California Globe for running this piece. You can visit the website at: https://californiaglobe.com/

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Incumbent Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon and former federal prosecutor Nathan Hochman will face off in November to decide who is the county’s district attorney come December.

Gascon and Hochman finished one-two in Tuesday’s primary, earning them tickets to the general election.

There is somewhere between 10 and 20% of the vote still to count, but the two front runner’s places do not appear in jeopardy.

According to the latest count released by the county registrar’s office, Gascon pulled in about 22% of the vote and Hochman about 18% of the million or so ballots counted so far.

Deputy District Attorney Jon Hatami finished in third with 13.3% of the vote with Judge Debra Archuleta coming in fourth at 9%.

Rounding out the field, Maria Ramirez got 7.5% of the vote, Jeff Chemerinsky 7%, John McKinney 6.2%, Eric Siddall 6.1%, David Milton 4.8%, Craig Mitchell 3.5%, Lloyd Masson 2.2%, and Dan Kapelovitiz 1.3%.

Hochman was, obviously, pleased with the results.

“More than three-quarters of Angelenos rejected George Gascon and said enough is enough of playing politics with our communities’ safety,” Hochman said.  “The Golden Age of Criminals is coming to an end.”

Looking at the numbers more closely, Gascon and his two more progressive opponents – Chemerinsky and Kapelovitz – got a total of about 30% of the vote, with 70% going to the “we need a change,” as it were, side.

In theory, this sets up very nicely for Hochman’s chances in November but Gascon does have one card he can play against Hochman: he used to be a Republican, running for state attorney general recently under that banner (he’s ‘no party preference’ now.)

In the coming months, voters can expect to hear very little from Gascon about what his job actually entails: prosecuting criminals. That’s, in part, because he can’t as his adamantine social justice ideology makes him averse to words like “guilty” and “jail” and “arrest” and “accountable.”

What the Gascon campaign will do is try to force feed a steady “Trump! Trump! Trump! Evil Republican! Trump!” diet to the electorate, attempting to tie Hochman to the (at least in LA County) not terribly popular former president.

This is exactly what Gov. Gavin Newsom did during his recall campaign.  Newsom rarely mentioned the state he was governor of during the campaign and just used his $100 million dollars to literally zero campaign fund advantage to yell about Trump. 

Oh, and to make absolutely sure every wealthy white, woke, westside woman knew his main opponent was big and black and scary; honestly, the level of blatant racism of the Newsom campaign hadn’t been seen since Mississippi in the 1960s. 

Exactly how Gascon will play the race card is not yet known, but he unquestionably will at some point in the campaign.

But there is one huge difference between Gascon and Newsom:  favorability rating.  During the meat of the recall campaign, Newsom’s favorable/unfavorable public impression gap was relatively small, which allowed him the space to run such an off-point campaign.

That is not the case for Gascon – his favorable/unfavorable gap is massive with a solid 60% of county residents loathing him. This is Hochman’s main advantage.

In fact, an internal poll conducted over the weekend and released by the Hochman campaign today shows just that.  The poll predicted, pretty accurately, that Gascon would get about 20% and Hochman about 18%.  When voters were asked about a potential fall one-on-one race, Hochman had a large lead: 51% Hochman, 25% Gascon, 24% undecided.

Archuleta was far less sanguine. 

“We will undoubtedly have four more years of Gascon,” Archuleta said.  “He said he was going to buy the election and that’s exactly what he did to the detriment of the residents of LA County.”

Gascon did not reply to the California Globe to a request for comment, but he did indicate to the Los Angeles Times that he’s happy to be running against Hochman.

“Now, we have a clear Democrat vs. Republican choice going into November, which we’re very optimistic about,” Gascon said.

For his part, Hochman seems to be prepared for the coming deflection campaign of Gascon and confident of the November results.

“I look forward to unifying all those who want to restore safety in their communities, in their streets, parks, subways and neighborhoods. I look forward to restoring trust with prosecutors, a partnership with law enforcement, and credibility with victims and the public,” said Hochman.  “The fight to take back Los Angeles County from criminals begins now and continues to November 5 when I will have the honor of becoming L.A. County’s next District Attorney.”