Los Angeles DA George Gascon’s Ignites More Controversy with Chief of Staff Appointment

Some of the larger cities across the nation have been mired in controversy and escalating crime by virtue of attitudes and policies implemented by Woke law enforcement officials—District Attorneys in particular. The politics of crime has been at the forefront of campaigns at all levels of government and has in two of California’s largest jurisdictions—San Francisco and Los Angeles—led to recall efforts, one successful and one not of their District Attorneys .

San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin was shown the door by voters in a recall election of June 2022 while the recall of Los Angeles DA George Gascon just barely failed to collect the necessary valid signatures to get the recall on the ballot. Speculation was that had the recall made it to the ballot, it would likely have been successful.

There is further speculation based upon recent polls, that with the L.A. District Attorney election looming in 2024, George Gascon’s days as chief law enforcement official for Los Angeles are numbered.

Perhaps Gascon realizes this as well and with a remaining time as prosecutor that could be measured in weeks, the embattled DA will do as much as possible in his remaining days in office to leave a legacy of wokeism behind. Politics be damned, George Gascon appears to be initiating a radical leftist scorched earth policy for Los Angeles County law enforcement.

On Friday, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office released a list of internal promotions that will take effect in the New Year. One of those appointments is Tiffiny Blacknell who will now serve as Gascon’s Chief of Staff. Ms. Blacknell has served in the DA’s office as a Grade 4 prosecutor, special advisor, and Chief of Communications. She will be replacing Joseph Iniguez who will be promoted to the role of Chief Deputy District Attorney. Mr. Iniguez was arrested in late 2021 on suspicion of public intoxication which led to him filing suit in Federal Court claiming that the Azusa Police Department had violated his civil rights. That suit was ultimately settled and the California Attorney General’s office to where the public intoxication charges were referred, chose not to pursue prosecution.

That Tiffiny Blacknell is a notorious pro-criminal, cop hater is no secret. 

She has been a prolific poster on X, which was once known as Twitter. Blacknell first tweeted out in 2019: 

“Prison is obsolete. We need to reimagine America without it,” 

That tweet and many others subsequent to it were posted with the hashtag #AbolishPrisons.

Blacknell’s radical positions on policing and criminal prosecutions became quite prominent back in 2020 when she worked on Gascon’s successful campaign to unseat incumbent District Attorney Jackie Lacey. Following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police in May 2020, rioting and looting broke out across many of the nation’s major cities. Los Angeles was not immune.

While Blacknell has apparently locked her social media accounts recently, Bill Melugin, a Fox News national correspondent out of Los Angeles has documented some of the more radical social media posts off the keyboard of the incoming Chief of Staff during that volatile time. 

After Los Angeles police clashed with rioters in LA’s Fairfax District, Blacknell called the police “barbarians” and “an occupying army”. Also found on her social media accounts were pictures of herself wearing sweatshirts that read “THE POLICE ARE TRAINED TO KILL US” and “THEY CAN’T KILL US ALL.”

NEW: Per sources in LA DA office, DA George Gascon just announced former public defender Tiffiny Blacknell will be promoted to his chief of staff. Blacknell has called for abolishing prisons & defunding police. She called LAPD “barbarians” & an “occupying army”, & said “cry me a… pic.twitter.com/kERdnlC7kT

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) December 15, 2023

A little further digging by Melugin found another 2020 post where Blacknell bragged that she was a looter herself  back in 1992 at the age of fifteen. After the Rodney King verdict, Los Angeles erupted in riots and flames, and Blacknell remembered”

“…so we went out and watched our city burn. And when the opportunity arose, we took some shit. It was one of the most formative moments of my life.”

Turning her thoughts to the looting and arson taking place in 2020, she continued:

“So please don’t come on my page complaining about protesters and looters. Don’t text me SHIT about the Whole Foods in West Hollywood and your beloved Santa Monica. My whole community was leveled. Cry me a river! NORDSTROMS WILL BE OK. All this respectability by Black folks and complaining by Westside white liberals is maddening.”

Here is the post in which Blacknell admits she was a looter in 1992 and tells those complaining about looting in Santa Monica & West Hollywood during the riots over the killing of George Floyd to “cry me a river”. pic.twitter.com/Fmy5I1hcbc

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) December 15, 2023

Additionally, while serving as an assistant prosecutor, Blacknell was evidently involved in secretly offering a gang-related murderer a special 7-year imprisonment deal that purportedly was negotiated without the knowledge of the prosecutor’s office and the victim’s family. After learning of the subterfuge, the judge threw out the plea bargain deal.

Regardless of the size of the jurisdiction, the prosecutor’s office must work side by side with the police in a non-adversarial manner in order to effectively prosecute crimes, put the bad guys and gals away, and ultimately protect its citizenry. One would think that with the very public positions that Tiffiny Blacknell has taken excusing lawlessness, accusing police of barbarism, advocating for defunding law enforcement and even abolishing prisons, that this woman would automatically be disqualified from holding the prominent position to which she has been appointed.

In the realm of George Gascon, think again. These dangerous and radical positions mesh quite comfortably with the L.A. District Attorney’s world view. It has been well documented that Gascon has stacked the Los Angeles prosecutor’s office with former public defenders—which is not illegal, but certainly calls into question where the allegiances of these attorneys rest. Elevating Tiffiny Blacknell to Chief of Staff with all her anti-law enforcement baggage might very well hurt Gascon’s re-election efforts for 2024, but is still very much consistent with Gascon’s previous and continued appointments.

Ultimately, Los Angeles County residents will be the final arbiters in the 2024 District Attorney primary election and then in the subsequent run-off election. Considering what Los Angelinos presently grapple with daily in terms of crime—both petty and serious, to return George Gascon to lead law enforcement for the county would seem, at the very least, counter-productive. Yet if that electoral proposition should occur and Gascon and his new Chief of Staff Tiffiny Blacknell are given the opportunity to impose their law enforcement attitudes and policies for another term, the consequences for quality of life in Los Angeles would seem relatively easy to predict. For those that would then lament the descent into continued lawlessness and diminished quality of life, I would refer you back to Ms. Blacknell’s noteworthy Twitter admonition “Cry me a river!”