OAKLAND, California — Oakland might have been in bad shape when Mayor Sheng Thao was elected to lead it two years ago, but her critics claim she has driven what was left of it into the ground.
Businesses are suffering, retail theft is on the rise, and drugs are being used out in the open. There’s also a massive homelessness problem, corruption allegations, and concerns about her business acumen on a near-daily basis. Then, there’s the summer scandal that involved an FBI raid at her house, her disappearance from the public eye during a time of crisis, a prickly relationship with law enforcement, a looming budget crisis, and the departure of the Oakland Athletics baseball team under her watch.
When Thao was elected in 2022, she was celebrated as the first Hmong American to lead a major U.S. city. Now, she’s the first Oakland mayor in more than a century to face a recall election.
The last time a recall vote took place was in 1917. It was against Mayor John Davis and did not pass. Former Democratic Mayors Libby Schaaf and Jean Quan also faced recall attempts, but neither made the ballot.
Voting Thao out of office can’t come soon enough for Oakland activist Seneca Scott.
“The lifeblood of our city is leaking out with no tourniquet,” he told the Washington Examiner, a sentiment he echoed at a recent rally with local business owners who also supported the recall. “Cities are run on commerce. Failure to protect commerce leads to a dying city. Failure to protect business owners is leading to a dying Oakland.”
Scott said business owners can’t afford insurance. Some have had their stores robbed or vandalized numerous times with no help from the police or the mayor’s office.
“This is very serious,” he said. “We are losing lives. We are losing businesses. Do you know the stress of waking up every day and not knowing if your business has been robbed? Do you know how it feels to sleep on the ground in your store every night because someone is going to cut a hole in your roof? Someone is going to drive a car through your window? We never had cars and trucks stolen and driven through businesses.”
In Oakland’s Little Saigon District, the owner of Lucky 7 Cigarettes, a small store tucked in a shopping plaza near the corner of East 12th Street and 7th Avenue, has been robbed 13 times. The most recent incident took place this week.
“Our community has endured enough,” Tuan Ngo, founder of #AsiansUnite, said in a written statement. “It’s time for decisive action and leadership that prioritizes the safety and well-being of all Oakland residents.”
Derreck Johnson, the owner of the iconic Home of Chicken and Waffles in Oakland, told the Washington Examiner he had to move locations because the crime had gotten so bad. There were regular car break-ins and customers got robbed a lot.
“I feel like the city owes small businesses like myself some type of reimbursement,” he said, though he does not support recalls in general. “You can’t call the police. It’s a waste of time. You can’t make a police report because it’s a waste of time. I guess some people do it for their insurance, but then it just makes your rates go up, or you lose insurance.”
Thao insists crime rates are coming down, even though the police department recently received a $2 million grant to fight crime.
“Crime is down. Crime is down, and you cannot hide bodies, so we know those numbers are accurate,” Thao said. “Due to the reimplementation of our ceasefire strategy, we are seeing a 33% reduction in homicides year-to-date. So far this year, 34 less people have been killed.”
While the mayor is announcing the grant now, days before Election Day, the city was actually notified it received the money one month ago. The Department of Violence Prevention said the money will be used to add three life coaches who will have daily contact for at least a year with 75 of the most vulnerable members of Oakland’s community.
Public safety isn’t Thao’s only problem.
Scott believes her lack of leadership has not only brought Oakland “to the brink of bankruptcy” but that if she is allowed to finish her term, she could ruin the city for good.
“She’s selling the house to pay the credit card bill, and that is just one of the reasons she is being recalled,” he said.
Oakland is almost to the point of slashing funding for public safety services like officers, police academies, and fire engines because it’s so financially off-course.
The city is poised to receive payments from a $125 million deal to sell its share of the Oakland Coliseum to the African American Sports and Entertainment Group. The problem is that Oakland was supposed to receive the money much sooner, but the payments were delayed when it renegotiated the deal. The group agreed to close the deal a year earlier to help Oakland with its debt. However, there’s a provision in the new deal that allows the group to pull out of it by Nov. 6, the day after the recall vote. That has left residents in limbo, worried about possible layoffs and concerned that public safety could take another hit.
The city’s dire straits even had the San Francisco Chronicle calling into question “the wisdom of using a once-in-a-generation asset in a prime location to backfill spending the city couldn’t afford in the first place” as one of the reasons it supports the recall.
Thao critics began gathering signatures to oust her after she fired popular police chief LeRonne Armstrong. They accused her of ignoring the concerns of the black community and blamed her for a rise in violent crime. Those spikes have come down, though recall supporters argue it’s because people have stopped reporting them.
The recall effort has gained some prominent backers in recent days.
Schaaf, Thao’s predecessor, announced she is supporting it. She claimed Thao “is not capable of growing into the job.”
“I am voting to recall Mayor Thao because Oakland can’t afford another two years of continued damage to our fiscal solvency and our public safety,” Schaaf said.
She later added that she “gave this mayor time and grace to grow into the job, but unfortunately, it’s now clear she will not.”
“Looking only over the past year, she repeatedly showed she cares more about her personal narrative than doing the hard work to improve Oakland, and her budget was beyond reckless,” Schaaf said.
Thao has started to push back against the recall in recent weeks, claiming it’s the brainchild of Philip Dreyfuss, a Piedmont, California-based hedge fund billionaire with ties to the coal industry.
In an open letter to Dreyfuss on Wednesday, she asked him to explain why he put in nearly half a million dollars toward the campaign to oust her. The letter also stated that her recall would throw the city into chaos.
If Thao is voted out on Nov. 5, she will lose her job immediately. The issue of who would replace her and how the city will move forward on pressing matters, such as budget woes and crime concerns, would get complicated.
Typically, the city council president would fill in as mayor.
But there’s a problem.
City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas is running for Alameda County supervisor. If she wins, she can’t fill the role of mayor because she would have to vacate her spot on the council. In a normal year, the president pro tempore would be elevated to the council president position. However, President Pro Tempore Dan Kalb was forced to give up his council seat when he ran for state Senate. He lost that race but cannot return to his former job without being elected.
That means when the new council takes its oath in January, it will have to vote for a council president who, in turn, would become Oakland’s interim mayor. A new election for mayor, according to city rules, would have to take place within four months of a November ousting.
“The recall is going to create another year of political chaos in Oakland,” said Jim Ross, a political consultant in Oakland. “Is the current situation in Oakland so bad that voters are willing to put up with at least another year of political instability and leadership change to move forward? That’s the question that voters have to answer.”
Pastor Jim Hopkins from Lakeshore Baptist Church and Bishop Greg Payton of St. John’s Missionary Baptist Church in West Oakland believe Thao should be allowed to stay.
“Those of us who love Oakland need to get with our leadership,” Payton said. “You can’t do anything in a year. It will take time. I love Oakland, and we need to get behind our leadership.”
Hopkins called the recall effort “ill-founded.” “Oakland does not need chaos,” he added.
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For some, like Edward Escobar, the recall is both needed and worth it.
“People who have grown up in Oakland their whole life will tell you it’s never been this bad,” Escobar, founder of Coalition for Community Engagement, told the Washington Examiner. “It’s never been worse than this. Ever.”