Los Angeles DA Race: Eric Siddall Joins Gascon Challengers

Long time deputy district attorney Eric Siddall has joined the race to become Los Angeles’ next District Attorney.

Siddall, the Vice President of the Los Angeles Association of Deputy District Attorneys for the past decade until he stepped aside last week to run, has been an unrelenting critic of current District Attorney George Gascon.

In the past, Siddall has hammered Gascon for basic incompetence, running the “office like a TV show,” and being guided by “ideology and politics” rather than by the law or ethics.

“The time for real change–actually fighting crime and restoring the public trust with the DA’s office—is now,” Siddall said.

Three other candidates have already announced their candidacies: Nathan Hochman, former federal prosecutor and Republican candidate for state Attorney General last year, John McKinney, a 25-year veteran of the office and fierce critic of the “chaos” Gascon has brought to the city and the office, and Jon Hatami, a child abuse prosecutor most recently known for handling the stomach turning torture/murder of Anthony Avalos.

Originally, the DA’s office sought the death penalty for Avalos’ mother and her boyfriend, but Gascon, whose policy is to never seek the death penalty no matter reprehensible the crime, nixed that and the two ended up with life in prison.

All four candidates have been intensely critical of Gascon, his policies, his management of the office, his incredibly soft on crime approach including his flat refusal to file charges for “quality of life crimes” like open drug use, and his disregard for the rights of victims.

The litany of Gascon’s abhorrences is seemingly endless – alleged ethics violations pointless ideological spending, lost legal malpractice lawsuit after lawsuit, and his pathological need to keep people who should be locked up out of jail by pushing “no cash bail.”

An example of his general incompetence can even be seen on his campaign website.  While clearly trying to claim he has reduced overall crime, this sentence actually reads rather differently – “I have reduced violent crime in every leadership position I’ve held while pioneering reforms to reduce racial disparities and end mass incarceration.”

To emphasize: it says he has “reduced violent crime in every leadership position I’ve held…”  So all of his predecessors personally were violent racist criminals and he’s not…well, good for you George.

Clearly, any of the four people running would be a vastly better district attorney – and that’s where the politics comes in.

Gascon won in 2020 with a boatload of progressive cash from Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and the ever woke “west side” of LA.  This time, those people will not be there in force for Gascon; in fact many former donors – realizing that it’s because of Gascon that they can’t wear a watch or carry a fancy handbag in public anymore – funded the suspiciously thwarted recall campaign against him.

While he will have far less money and be facing a hostile public, campaign watchers should be on the lookout for the actions of non-profits, the homeless-industrial complex, unions, and woke non-governmental organizations and “charities” like the California Endowment and others to play an active – if quiet – role in the election by paying for things like putatively non-political “get out the vote efforts” that clearly are meant to get out only a very certain kind of vote.

The primary will be next March and is what is called a jungle primary – everyone runs on the same ballot and if no one gets more than 50% of the vote the two face each other in November.  Poling data conducted during the recall effort showed that if it made it to the ballot it would have passed overwhelmingly, with about two-thirds of county voters wanting Gascon out.

The office is technically non-partisan and the county is overwhelmingly Democrat, but Hochman – as the lone Republican – may have a built-in base of about 20%. If Gascon somehow – shudder – manages to keep the support of about 30% of the public, that could make the race for second – and the right to challenge Gascon directly –  very tight.  

What that means from a tactical standpoint is that Gascon will “focus his fire” on Siddall, Hatami, and McKinney to make sure Hochman – who, due to the party registration disparity, may be seen as easier to defeat in November – skates through the campaign until the primary.

Therefore, expect to see Gascon heavily criticizing – which could impact prosecutions –  and/or retaliation against his own employees.

It’s not as if George has ethical limits.