Los Angeles County DA Race: Jackie Lacey V. George Gascon

LOS ANGELES, CA — Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey Lacey has had the fight of her political career on her hands Tuesday as she squared off against challenger criticising her progressive bonafides and her handling of police shootings.

George Gascon, the former San Francisco district attorney racked up endorsements from the Los Angeles Times, Sen. Kamala Harris, and the Los Angeles and California Democratic parties in his bid to unseat Lacey. She finds herself in an unusual position; it's the first time she has faced challengers since her election in 2012. She faced candidates positioning themselves to her left in liberal Los Angeles. Also ran former public defender Rachel Rossi. Both challengers vowed to implement reforms to end mass incarceration.

Rossi focused on reforming L.A. jails and how probation. According to KTLA, she is the first former public defender to run for L.A. County DA, and she won the support of the Westside Young Democrats and the Latino Coalition of Los Angeles.

SEE ALSO DA Jackie Lacey Apologizes After Husband Points Gun At Protesters

Though Lacey may not have faced challengers before, she's survived challenges, namely a recall effort in 2017. The county's first female and African American DA, she has also won a mass of endorsements from labor unions and elected officials including Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

In endorsing Gascon, the Times editorial board wrote: "In 2012, Jackie Lacey defeated a traditional tough-on-crime prosecutor to become Los Angeles County district attorney. Voters seemed to appreciate her cautious openness to new thinking, and indeed some of her policies -- especially her program to divert some mentally ill people from prosecution to treatment -- were refreshingly forward-looking. She was reelected in 2016 without opposition."

But in the intervening years, added The Times, many voters here and elsewhere in California have moved further. They have embraced criminal justice reforms that call on law enforcement leaders and prosecutors to focus their resources on the most serious and dangerous crimes while recognizing the corrosive effect that excessive enforcement targeting more petty crimes has on communities already bearing the burden of racial bias. They have called on their leaders to reject fear-based prosecution and instead look to evidence: What policies promote public safety, justice, reduced recidivism and healthy communities?

Lacey's caution, once comforting, now sometimes looks more like resistance to change, according to The Times.

She opposed Proposition 47, a landmark reform measure to convert simple possession of small amounts of drugs and some petty thefts from felonies to misdemeanors. When it passed, she was slow to embrace the changes it brought, and could not adequately report how the decrease in felony prosecutions affected her office's budget and workload.

She initially opposed any change to the money bail system that keeps poor people in jail before trial while freeing those who can buy their way out; and when she later became more open to bail reform, she used her considerable clout to block an early legislative version of a money-bail ban. She continues to support the death penalty, despite moral and practical overwhelming arguments against it. Although she merits respect for launching a mental health diversion program, its progress has been somewhat plodding.

She has increasingly been targeted by activists with Black Lives Matter, who oppose her stances. On Monday, she held a press conference after her husband was seen on video pointing a gun at protesters outside their home in Granada Hills.

"Up until now, I have not really wanted to share with you what it's been like, but I think it's time, because there's a bigger purpose here," Lacey said. "As district attorney of L.A. County, I have received threats, some of them death threats. I have been followed, photographed while with my family, confronted at an art museum, confronted at fundraisers and even at endorsement interviews I've had people crash them and videotape me. And all of this is because I chose to do my job. I'm a human being. I'm a public servant. I've dedicated my life to the profession that stands up for victims of violent crime and I'm not ashamed of that.

"... Believe it or not the Laceys are private people," she said. "We expect people (to) exercise their First Amendment rights, but our home is our sanctuary, and I do not believe it is fair or right for protesters to show up at the homes of people who dedicate their lives to public service."

Lacey's challengers have benefited from activists' disenchantment with her.

Gascon, a former Los Angeles police officer and assistant chief who later became police chief in Mesa, Arizona, and San Francisco, and then San Francisco district attorney, is a more progressive prosecutor, the Times concluded. "He co-wrote Proposition 47, essentially eliminated money bail in his jurisdiction, and authored legislation and instituted policies aimed at reducing the outsize role of poverty and race in criminal justice. He is one of two candidates challenging Lacey.

"Los Angeles County is the nation's largest prosecutorial jurisdiction and its district attorney should be a leader and a trendsetter in the administration of justice."

City News Service and Patch Staffer Paige Austin contributed to this report.