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Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor once praised Chesa Boudin as a “great beacon to many.” But that was before San Francisco voters on Tuesday ousted the district attorney, largely over concerns that he did not do enough to hold criminals accountable.
During Boudin’s swearing-in ceremony on Jan. 8, 2020, Sotomayor, the first Latina on the nine-member bench and the third woman elevated to the Supreme Court following her confirmation during the Obama administration, made a rare pretaped appearance to congratulate him on taking over the role as the city’s lead prosecutor. Boudin promised “to immediately begin reforming the criminal justice system.”
Appearing on a large auditorium screen before Boudin’s supporters, Sotomayor said she was sending “this message to tell you how much I admire you and to wish you well in your new endeavors.”
SAN FRANCISCO VOTERS OUST FAR-LEFT DISTRICT ATTORNEY CHESA BOUDIN AFTER TWO YEARS
Sotomayor highlighted Boudin’s upbringing in her speech, noting he “spent his childhood visiting parents incarcerated for committing serious felonies.”
Boudin is the son of Weather Underground criminals Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert. The militant left-wing group, which is now defunct, was deemed a terrorist organization by the FBI following a series of bombings targeting government buildings and banks in the 1970s.
The now-ousted prosecutor was adopted by Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, former leaders of the group, after his biological mother was convicted and incarcerated for murder and bank robbery in 1981, just 14 months after the birth of her son.
“Your personal strength and commitment to reforming and improving the criminal justice system is a testament to the person you are and the role model you will continue to be for so many,” Sotomayor said.
The Democratic-appointed justice also noted that “the road to accomplishing what you have set out to do will be daunting.”
“As you told me, ‘We are all safer when we uplift victims, hold everyone accountable for their actions, and do so with empathy and compassion.’ I wish you much success in all you will do,” Sotomayor added.
But after only two years on the job, voters felt differently in San Francisco, amid soaring crime rates in one of the nation’s most liberal cities.
The recall petition against the Democratic district attorney, which garnered more than 83,000 signatures, became a bipartisan rallying call. Local Democrats sought to contrast sharply their support for police reform with Boudin’s policies, widely seen as sympathetic to criminal suspects.
As a former public defender, Boudin was the most progressive candidate for the district attorney election in 2019 and narrowly won, by just 2,840 votes, in the primary against Democratic candidate Suzy Loftus, who also supported the recall effort.
Boudin decried the recall effort as “scapegoating,” saying the changes the nation faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with rising crime rates across the country, contributed to the recall vote on the ballot.
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“I’m working as hard as I can every day to make the city safer for all of us,” Boudin said in a recent interview with the San Francisco Chronicle. “I can’t blame people … for being frustrated. The last two years have presented us individually and collectively with challenges and changes we never could have anticipated.”
While San Francisco’s overall crime has not increased in the city during the pandemic, there has been an increase specifically in shoplifting and car thefts, as well as a spike in the homicide rate, according to the city’s police COMPSTAT data from 2021.
