D.A. backers outraising recall campaigners
A political action committee created to keep San Francisco top prosecutor Chesa Boudin in office now appears to be financially outpacing a recall effort against him, new campaign finance records show.
Financial disclosures made public Monday show the camp supporting Boudin edged out the district attorney’s foes by about $20,000.
The San Franciscans Against the Recall of Chesa Boudin committee raised a total of $160,000, while the Committee Supporting the Recall of District Attorney Chesa Boudin raised about $139,800 by the most recent filing deadline.
Antirecall supporters got sizable boosts from criminaljustice reform advocates, including $100,000 from the Real Justice political action committee, a national organization that supports electing progressive prosecutors; and $15,000 from the Smart Justice California Action fund, which supports criminal justice reform policies.
Boudin has also created a political action committee, which has raised just over $41,000, according to a draft financial filing viewed by The Chronicle.
The recall campaign is based on the belief that Boudin’s policies intended to stem mass incarceration have made the city less safe. Boudin, a national figure in a growing progressive prosecutor movement, has ended cash bail, gang enhancements and use of a threestrikes rule — all policies that reform advocates say have excessively ratcheted up time behind bars.
Boudin supporters point to police data that show crime has largely fallen over the past few years, including in 2020, the first year Boudin was in office.
The largest donation to the prorecall campaign came from Daniel O’Keefe, a Chicago investor for Artisan Partners who contributed $50,000. David Sacks, a San Francisco tech investor, handed over $25,000 during the last reporting period.
Recall committee spokesman Richie Greenberg said Boudin’s supporters across the country are in “panic mode, seeing that a viable, legitimate authorized effort to put the vote to the people of San Francisco to have them choose whether Boudin should be recalled or not.”
Greenberg said the recall campaign was made up of largely local donors, and that O’Keefe is a former San Francisco resident who was “disgusted by what he saw” in the city.
Julie Edwards, a spokesperson for the larger committee supporting Boudin, said the recall was funded by wealthy donors and special interests “committed to the status quo.”
“We’re proud of the D.A.’s work and are committed to supporting the work he’s doing on behalf of all San Franciscans,” she said. “We are not going to let farright operatives and billionaires who make their money from oil and defense contractor profits overturn the choices of San Francisco voters.”
The recall campaign raised about $63,000 more since its last reporting in late March. Monday’s financial disclosures are the first statements filed by the antirecall effort.
Recall supporters must collect 51,325 signatures, or 10% of the city’s registered voters, by Aug. 11 for the campaign to qualify for a special election.