George Gascón oversaw 9,000 officers as the Assistant Chief of the LAPD. In 2006, he famously squared off against Joe Arpaio and anti-immigrant groups as the Chief of the Mesa Police Department. And In 2011, after District Attorney Kamala Harris vacated her seat, he was tapped by Gavin Newsom to be the District Attorney of San Francisco.
Since his appointment, George has earned a national reputation as a visionary in criminal justice reform. He has been named among the Top 100 Lawyers in California by the Daily Journal, and the Anti-Defamation League honored him with its prestigious Civil Rights Award.
He joins us to talk about criminal justice reform, investing in education, and his vision for the future of Los Angeles.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Art of the Hustle is a production of I Heart Radio.
You're listening to the Art of the Hustle, the show
that breaks down how some of the world's most fascinating
people have hustled and learned their way into achieving great things.
(00:21):
I'm your host Jeff Rosenthal, co founder of Summit, and
today on the show, I had the great pleasure of
chatting with George Gascone. George is a candidate for District
Attorney in the city of Los Angeles. George oversaw nine
thousand officers as the assistant chief of the l A
p D, and in two thousand eleven, after District Attorney
Kamala Harris vacated her seat, he was tapped by Gavin
(00:42):
Newsom to be the District Attorney of San Francisco. Since
his appointment, George has earned a national reputation as a
visionary and criminal justice reform. He's been named among the
top hundred lawyers in California by The Daily Journal, The
Anti Defamation League honored him with his prestigious Civil Rights Award,
and today he joined us to talk about criminal justice reform,
investing in education, and his vision for the future of
(01:04):
Los Angeles. So please enjoy my conversation with George Gascon. George,
thanks for coming on the podcast. Hey Jeff, how's it going.
It's going great all things considered. How about yourself? How
how are you? How are you holding up? You know
what we're holding up? Well, Um, this is a final stretch,
(01:27):
so it's almost NonStop, you know, sleeping as we're coming
almost optional. But it's all good. You know, we got
a lot of momentum, a lot of support. We've now
built up somewhere around silunteers and our campaign. We have
reached out one million l A County voters either via
(01:48):
text or or a phone call directly, you know, one
on one basis from volunteers. So I feel very fortunate
the passion and the support for the movement has grown
in the last few months. But as a real race,
you know, it's very tough. You know, we have unfortunately,
prison guard unions and police unions have put a lot
(02:10):
of money against this campaign, but almost seven million dollars
and uh and we recognize that, you know, we are
questioning the status quote. We're talking about, you know, taking
the criminal justice system in a way that there should
have been done a long time ago. You know, we're
talking about really prioritizing results for victims and community and
(02:33):
taxpayers instead of just simply punishing people. And and unfortunately
the system has been fueled by punishment for the last
three decades and a lot of a lot of interests
has been developed into that. And you know, we're seeing
money coming from very interesting places, you know, people that
have been major supporters of the Trump administration putting hundreds
(02:54):
of thousands of dollars. So it's just it's a very
interesting experience because it clearly shows two very different options
as to how do we want to move forward in
l A County and probably the rest of the country
because all economy in so large and all the impact
that I will have on criminal justice for the years
to come is a very substantial effect that this campaign
(03:16):
will have. Well, assuming that the listeners aren't experts on
you know, district's attorneys offices and you know criminal justice
reform movement. You mentioned the movement. Do you mind diving
in a little bit further on what the sort of
national movement is and stands for and sort of the
things that you know, you find to be the most
(03:36):
pragmatic components across the aisle ideas. Yeah, you know, I mean,
so you know, this is really about beginning to sort
of dismantle systemic racism from the criminal justice system. It's
really about bringing communities together to really find how safety
should be created. It's really about you know, using some
(04:00):
lions and using data to make sure that we are,
for instance, that we're not incarcerating children as adults, because
we know that that not only it doesn't work. What
you do is you create a life of criminality that
you know, for a young person, because then they can
get out of it. You know, once they get criminalized,
it's very hard to get out of that. Basically, what
(04:21):
you're doing is by given the felony consequences, you are
taking away their ability to get employment, to get housing. So,
you know, a major component of homelessness, certainly in California,
has been you know, three decades of disproportional locking up
so many people. L A County has led the way there.
We like l A County criminalizes more people than any
(04:44):
other counties or countries in the world. Oh, you know, unquestionably,
I mean, and you know, it's a it's an interesting
point because you know, some people push back and said, well,
you know, l A County is the largest county, so
therefore follows that you should be the most whatever. But
we'll often people don't realize that we're talking about proportionately proportionately.
(05:06):
This county criminalizes people at a higher rate than seventy
percent of all the other counties in the state, which
is a lot to say because you're you're in a
place you're comparing yourself to very very conservative counties like
you know, Riverside, San Berndine, Orange County four times or
eight to San Francisco. And yet at the same time
(05:26):
we have seen uh you know, violent crime grew up
by under the current administration in La County, where we
saw a violent crime proportionately decrease in San Francisco with
a quarter of the rate of incarceration. You know, I
tell people that if incarceration was the currency of safety,
l A County will be the safest county in the country.
(05:47):
But it is not right. So it's it's that that
you know, where where a jail happy county, where a
death penalty happy county, And that's not a good thing.
You know, we incarcerate more people, we put more people
in the throad, and we're very focused on punishment as
supposed to get in results, and you know, the taxpayers
are paying for that with the resources that could be
(06:09):
applied to education and housing and other things. And certainly
we're breaking up the social fabric of so many parts
of our community and that process totally, we're like paying
the equivalent of what it would take to send people
to college or great mental counseling and keeping them locked up.
And we certainly have lost the narrative of the thread
(06:30):
of you know, people paying their debt to society are
trying to you know, better themselves in order to become
valuable members of society, and have very much gotten stuck
in the punishment component and not the rehabilitation component, which
is just you know, an unfortunate signal to all of us,
right Like how we are with anyone is how we
are with everyone. How we treat those that have hurt
(06:52):
us and those that have at the worst in our society,
you know, like definitely has a uh you know, it
speaks volumes about what our priorities are. And I'm just
you know, for you, you you know, you being a former
assistant chief of police here in l a former chief
police in Santa Fe, correct, San Francisco. Oh, you're a
chief police and sant I'm sorry I thought, and were
you a cop in Santa Fe or were you know?
(07:14):
I was a chief of police in Mason, Arizona, and
then police in San Francisco. Yeah, I got Arizona and
New Mexico mixed up because that's that's that's such a
that's such a rookie move. But the reason, the reason
I mentioned is you can tell that the people in
Arizona and New Mexico, they come off to you. Yeah. Yeah,
that's just really rude. Um, you know, similar scenery. I
(07:36):
don't know, it's like it's like calling a Gilliants fan
the dog your fan, right, yeah, listen, you know what,
it just shows that you don't play a lot of baseball.
So so ultimately, yeah, the reason I brought it up
in the first place, George is just because, like you know,
you you have experience on the police side of the aisle.
You were a cop here in in l A. You
(07:57):
were you know, chief of police, and like you said,
police unions are one of the groups that are funding
your opposition. So I'm curious, like you know, just from
your perspective, how how does this help police well, I mean,
you know, unfortunately it doesn't really help police, right. I Mean,
what we see is we see prison guard unions and
police union is really very focused on on on a
(08:19):
very limited portion of their work and and very motivated
by the by the ability to you know, to continue
to maintain the political influence that they have. Are the
major cost to all of us as taxpayers and as
members of our community, right, we we don't benefit from
that political influence on those you know, that money that
(08:41):
is being used in a very very selfish, very money
power motivated way, and it's not you know, really at
the end of the day, doesn't even help the men
and women and police forces because you know, the more
that you create a division between the officers in the
street and many of the community is that they serve
the more insecurity that we have, and also that the
(09:04):
more unsafe that the word becomes for the officer. That's
a very narrow and I would say, a very um,
you know, just a very unwise way of trying to
exercise political power. But you know, power it blinds people.
And I think that to a great extent, a lot
of police labor organizations and prison guards have become very
(09:25):
accustomed in the last thirty years or so to bully
their way through the system and really intimidate people, and
they're having a hard time grasping that changes coming. And
regardless of what they do, they can go down and
kicking and dragging. But you know, reform will happen with
or without them. I just I wanted you to get
a little bit more granular though, and help us understand, like,
(09:48):
as a district attorney, what are some of the best
practices that ultimately end up benefiting everybody's public safety. Yeah. Absolutely,
And you know, before I do that, I just kind
of wanted for my you know, from my end, I
wanted to distinguish because I think there's a uniqueness to
police associations that it's different than other unions. I totally
get that you may see sometimes some some other unions
(10:10):
perhaps you know, going in a way that you would
prefer not to be. In the case of policing, in
in prison guards, I view it very differently because this
are the only organizations, especially when talk about policing, is
the only organizations in our democratic system where we relinquish
the authority to take our freedom away under certain circumstances
(10:33):
to sometimes actually make life on this that, you know, decisions.
So I view it, quite frankly in a very very
different plane, just simply because the authority that we grant
police officers in our system is very different than what
we do for you know, for teachers or carpenters or nurses.
(10:54):
So you know, I generally view those unions and yeah,
they're doing what unions do. They're protecting their labor for wars,
and and that they may not have always a good consequence.
But but in the in the case of police unions,
just so outside the process, right, because they are defending
in criminal courts sometimes the behavior of criminal behavior by
(11:15):
police officers, right, they're paying for the lawyers are doing.
Sometimes police officers that took a life away from someone
unnecessarily or incarcerated someone. So it's just sort of proportionate
the authority that they have. Uh. You know, I just
heard today actually a member of the you know, the
Correctional Officers Union. I thought it was very interesting form
(11:36):
remembering he said, you know, we are trading in human
tragedy and in human suffering. And I thought it was
so interesting that someone that came from the walk admitted
that would that they had lost their sort of the compass,
if you will, and move away from public service. So
it's it's just it's just it's very different. But you know,
(11:57):
getting down to that, you know, the rannual or discussion
about what is it about the system and what we
need to do in order to move us away. I
think it's really important to recognize that that this connect
that has been between quite America and certainly African Americans
and probably Latin As to a less extent when it
(12:18):
came to policing and said, well, you're absolutely right that
for most white Americans, you know, police officers has always
been sort of the de night, you know, shining armor. Uh,
you know, the African American community experiences being a very
different one. And I think we're finally the rest of
the community's understanding that, you know, the origins of policing
in this country by and large are deeply and better
(12:40):
in the in the institution of slavery. And I know
that it's hard to swallow that you have to kind
of go back to the history of slavery in this
country and how the the the early iterations of you know,
public safety groups or you know, vigilantism in case we're
really there to support slavery where there to cash runaway slaves,
bringing back, you know, some times punish them. And then
(13:01):
after the Civil War, when slavery was out loud, we
sort of transition into the gine coral era. You know,
there was a short period of time where after the
Civil War, African Americans were beginning to to gain a
foothold on the political arena that we're getting elected to
public office. And then immediately you saw a big shutdown
(13:22):
and you saw the criminalization of a lot of new
behavior or the criminalization of new criminsational behavior that then
policing and prosecutors started to use to basically put those
that were formally slaves now to enslave like conditions, even
though slavery was unlawful, and you saw often people being
(13:42):
you know, prosecuted and incarcerated, losing the right to vote,
so you know, the the ability to like public officials
that started to dissipate, and that moved all the way
through the you know, through the from the nineteenth into
the twentieth century, and you know, you forward into the
War on Drugs and the late nineteen eight nineteen eighties
(14:04):
and nineties and taking us into today. So I think
what has occurred while this was we sort of had
parallel universe, right. The experience for African Americans was one.
The experience with white Americans when they came to the
common justice system was a different one. And I think
what occurred, especially after George Floyd, was reckoning and awakening
(14:27):
of white America that began to see what you know, frankly,
black America has been seeing one generation after the other.
And I think that that's created a healthy conversation which
is good for everyone, and to including the police, because
I think, you know, a lot of the solutions really
need to come. Police needs to be a partner in this, uh,
not necessarily the police labor organization of the police. And
(14:49):
I think that what we're saying is, look, we need
to re imagine how the system works so that it
works for everybody. We need to get rid of the
vestiges in the systemic races and the head help incarcerate
and keep people in slave like conditions for so long.
And we need to take the financial incentives that the
current system enhanced by building more prisons, more jails, more prosecutors,
(15:11):
more cops. I mean, they're huge financial rewards here, And
I find it interesting when you know, people get very
offended sometimes with the term defund the police, which it
means a lot of things to different people. You know,
to me, it really means right sizing the police. But
you know, I tell people often said, you know, you
were not offended when we defunded public education or public health,
(15:33):
or social services or housing to increase sercise or policing. Right,
is it so offensive to have a conversation around defunding
some levels of policing now? And really kind of actually,
I would call it just sort of dialing back to
put us back to put more money into into education,
public health, housing and those things that we sort of
(15:53):
lost our weight about three or four decades ago because
what occurred on the sculptures, we defunded so many of
the services. Look, we've built twenty two prisons in thirty
years in California, one public university that to me was
a huge defunding effort on public education at the expense
of creating a system that actually doesn't doesn't really do
(16:15):
anything for us other than continue to perpetuate, you know,
insecurity and to the point that you have some communities
actually that began to project economically, how many jails am
I going to have to build? How many prisons based
on the growth of population, especially the black and the
brown growth of population, instead of projecting and say how
many public schools do I need to build? You know,
(16:37):
ten fifteen years on the line, which is very very
tragic by product or for weeks down in the last
few decades. We'll be back with more out of the
hustle after the break. I remember learning that some of
(16:59):
the private prisons being developed in the Midwest, part of
the bond financing had guaranteed rates of occupancy by the states.
So we're literally like funding future prisons by guaranteeing a
percentage of criminalization. And perhaps it's just so runaway, but
I just don't think that people turn to anything that
(17:22):
has the types of consequences that crime does, either out
of some sort of like mental health issue or necessity.
You know, So when you talk about you know, these
savage inequalities of education, health, human services, you know, housing,
and the rates of criminality from people that you know,
have those things stable versus those that don't. I guess
(17:42):
just my exposure and you know, with the Anti Recitivism
Coalition and just meeting young people charged with serious crimes.
Is you find pretty quickly from personal exposure that it's situational.
It's not like there's good people and bad people. There's
good situations and bad situations for the most part. Yeah. Mean, look,
if if you took a drug use, you know, and
(18:02):
I always use drugs because I think drug just it's
something that most people can understand. You know, they use
of drugs in this country is its equal across social
and economic and racial lines. But when you look at
our jails and our prisons, who are the people that
they're getting incarcerated for drug possession? And I'm talking about
for personal use, I'm not talking about you know, sales
(18:24):
or any stuff are black and brown people. So you
have it just it becomes very obvious when you look
through just through that track alone, just the racism and
the system where you have a behavior that that is
equally prevalent across the social and economic and racial lines,
but only a small segment or a population tends to
(18:47):
be the one that gets penalized for it. Your critics
in San Francisco, you know, would say that some of
the lighter punishments or ticket the defenses versus criminal offenses
have led to like an increased criminality at a higher level.
Do you mind talking to that a little bit of course? Yeah, So,
(19:08):
I mean, first of all, look, I mean, let's let's
begin by talking about violent crime, and I'm going to
get down to drug use. San Francisco had a net
reduction of proportional rate. Uh, you know, the rate of
violent crime in San Francisco decrease during the time that
I was district attorney, and we incarcerated a quarter or
rate of l A County. The rate of violent crime
(19:29):
in l A County went up by seven percent during
the time that the current has been in office, which
was almost the same I was there a year before
she did. Homelessness in San Francisco during the time that
it was a district attorney went up by thirteent. Homelessness
in l A during the time that Jackie Lacy was
(19:50):
the has been the d A went up by fifty.
So when you start looking at the by products of
allegedly the behavior of one district attorney, the enforcement and
the prosecutorial stance of one against the other, you see
very quickly that actually what has been going on in
l A hasn't worked now I understand that they are
(20:12):
you know, their political implications to all of this. And
you know, sometimes when you you do your work in
a way that makes people uncomfortable, like in my case
when we started very massive public corruption investiations with the FBI.
You know, it made some people uncomfortable and made the
you know, the mayor of San Francisco very uncomfortable, and
she became a strong enemy. And you know, to those
(20:35):
days she continues to bring that out. But if you
ask her, you know, okay, so would you support incarcerating
those that are mentally ill? She will readily tell you know, so,
then the answer is, or those who have a substance
of use problems, she will readily tell you that she wouldn't.
So you cannot have your cake and eat it in
(20:57):
this in this area. You can't blame me for you know,
what is a an addiction epidemic in this country, which
San Francisco clearly, much like l A, has suffered from it.
And then at the same time understand that you cannot
incarcerate your way out of that. And and you know,
I find it interesting because you even't hear the rhetorical police.
(21:18):
So we make arrest and the d A doesn't do
anything except that when you look down at the reality,
they're not making the arrest right. And I'm not suggesting
this should arrest people that are addicted, But you know,
like in San Francisco, property crime was vastly driven by
car break ins for a period of four years until
we had a new chief of police and the chief
of police I was there at the time, who became
(21:40):
a political enemy, was forced out in disgrace. But there
were eighty one car break ins in nearly four years,
and there were thirteen arrests, one three and we prosecuted
all but one of those two. How is the d
A at fault for an epidemic and car break ins
when there are no arrests made. This is a kind
of stuff that you know, it flies on the face
(22:01):
of you know, the rhetoric, the political rhetoric or you know,
like blaming me for homelessness in San Francisco, which I
think is insane but okay, increased during my time. Would
you blame Jackie Lacy for the fifty percent increasing homelessness
in l A County during her time. It's one of
the things that you know, you have often you have
(22:21):
the critics and said very drawing by police unions because
the other people, they're very uncomfortable because we started investigating
in the San Francisco Police department, because they deserve to
be investigated for all the races practices, but not something
not something that makes you popular in the city. All oh, yeah,
it didn't. And you know, and sometimes you know be
in and I like the prosecutor. It's not about popularity.
(22:44):
I mean, look here, we we've had corruption in l
A City Hall and the fetes has to step in
without any local help. I mean, in San Francisco, the
fetes are doing the prosecution. But it started with work
that I was a partner to hear. The FETs have
to do it all along. So much of this race
has been focused on the type of criminal justice reformed
(23:06):
policies that we're talking about here. From a d AS perspective,
there is a marginalized membership of society that is not
serviced by our security apparatus. Right, And even if you know,
we we want, even if we want to argue that
they are and it's a matter of perspective, it's still
their perspective that they aren't. And I know that keeping
(23:27):
people safe is the key here, and you've spoken a
lot towards you know that that segment of the population
that is, you know, historically marginalized. Say that you know
you are elected, Um, I believe this podcast will come
out the day of the election, So you know one
week from now. What are the sort of things that
you'll immediately start getting after. What are the types of
ways that you do this job that are different from say,
(23:48):
you know, your your predecessor or other das in the country. Yeah, look,
I mean the things and and you know there are
other das that are doing the synchrome of work that
I'm doing. First of all, was to recognize that you
give people that commit low level offenses high level consequences,
meaning felony consequences. What you do is you almost immediately
guarantee that they're going to be jobless, and then they're
(24:12):
going to be houseless, and then they're going to be
out on the streets, and then you know, all the
other things happen. So the first thing that you want
to do is you want to make sure that whatever
interventions that you're making, that you're not creating greater harm. Right.
I often say that if we're wonderful, if if lawyers
took the hypocritic oath. You know, doctors, if you become
(24:33):
a medical doctor, one of the parts of your oath
is do no harm, right, you know, meaning whatever intervention
you're gonna do, don't make it worse than when you
touch that patient. But in in the criminal justice system,
we do harm all day long, and we do it
without any regards. Right. So the first thing is that
you need to understand what is it that you're doing,
and what is it down downstream consequence of that right,
(24:53):
And that requires that you that you become a student
of the trade, that you accept that there there are
scientific norms. It tells you actually if you're the way
B is going to occur, which a doctor will always
a medical doctor will always try to bring into consideration.
But you know, lawyers and certainly prosecutors were never thinking, Okay,
what happens if I take this fourteen year old and
(25:14):
I send them to prison with adults for an offense
that I could intervene without that, what would be the consequence.
Nobody sits down and thinks, okay, that means that this
person is going to get a phone conviction. That means
they're going to be there with adults, you're going to
be victimized in prison. Number one, they're going to become
You foreclose all other opportunities so that they'll actually they'll
(25:35):
get out of prison. Because even if you're given twenty years,
if you go in a fourteen fifteen, you're gonna get
out on your mid thirties. You're going to be meaned
at hell, you're gonna be angry, and you're gonna be
with no many, not many other options other than perhaps
continue to com make crimes or not continue to start
committing crimes in order to survive, because you can get
health and you can get employment. Right, So the first
(25:57):
thing that you need to do is understand that you're
in inventions have consequences beyond the here and now that
you have to figure out what is the right intervention.
The second thing is that you need to start addressing
the root causes of crimes. So when you have, for instance,
if you have an epidemic in car breaking, like we
did the same Francisco, and finally we had an issue
for police, we started doing in my office and created
(26:19):
a crime strategies unit, and we use data to really
understand who were the more prolific players and what was
the motivation, where were the stolen what was the stolen
property traveling? And once we had an insie for police
were able to go after this stuff rings and immediately
had almost decreasing car breaking. So it's understanding the drivers
(26:39):
of crime and then applying the right intervention. Right, organized crime,
you know, we have the tools for that, right. Mental
health is a different tool. Substance abuse is a different tool. Right.
It's just really doing the heavy lifting as opposed to
just sitting there passively and taking whatever the police bring
through your front door and then trying to get the
(27:01):
most punishment that you've had without understanding whether that punishment
is going to actually be a good thing for the
community or actually what you're doing is you're creating coatural
damage that we will be paying for for years to come.
It's also understanding the economic not only the social costs,
but the economic costs of your actions. You know, people
often don't think about this. You know, I said, well,
(27:23):
the NBA's body in l A. Five dollars were big county.
But what they don't understand is that the hundred dollars
and plus people that the prosecutes every year, which more
than do not need to be prosecuted the way they were.
It's costing us billions of dollars that you replies over
the next ten, fifteen, twenty years. You send somebody to
prison for five, ten fifteen years, and if you would
(27:45):
have been able to have the same result with less,
you go from the point that you went overboard, and
you amortize that, and you look at the financial costs
of that, and pretty soon you're you're looking at billions
of dollars on liability, not only to the current budges,
but future budgetes. And that money is coming away from education,
from fixing your potholes, from your parks. You know, all
(28:06):
that stuff has a cost. Right And so the point
that I tried to make is that you know, if
I were to be elected the A, we will achieve
greater level of security, We would have more inclusivity, we
would reduce the racial impact or this proportionality of race
in the system. But at the same time, that will
increase safety for everyone, and it will provide avenues for
(28:30):
us to be able to reinvest in other things that
on the long run create greater security. Look, one of
the biggest predictors that you will become a productive taxpayer,
and that be involving the criminal justice system is having
a college. Agree, but we built twenty two persons on
one one public university in thirty years. Wouldn't be nice
if we did it the other way around. We built
(28:52):
twenty two public universities and make a college education and
trade education more available to everyone. So that's the kind
of conversations that we need to start having. And where
does the A fit into that? Well, that the A
fits into that by being fouthful the way the way
he or she uses that discreation, so that we don't
create greater opportunities for people to continue to con make
(29:14):
crimes because they don't have anywhere else to go, and
then provide the avenues for other players, other stakeholders, other
actors and assistant to be able to then have the
funding necessary to lose their work, which is going to
make us a safer community. Part of the hustle will
be right back after the short break. It's all a
(29:41):
shared sandbox, and we often forget that, especially if you
live in like a nicer part of l A that
has you know, a lower police presence and a lower
crime rate versus you know, more dangerous part of l A.
I just think that until it touches your family, it's
very difficult to you know, understand that there's human beings
(30:03):
on the other side of all of these things. So
I mean, I'm just a huge advocate for what you
stand for. Ultimately, I just A'm hopeful that you know,
you one win and uh to you know, continue to
set an example for how, you know, district attorneys can
use their considerate power both the whole corporate bad actors
(30:24):
and traditionally like white collar criminals that don't see punishment
too often accountable. I hope you know that, and I'm
curious if that is something that's part of your agenda
or platform or your thoughts on that. But obviously like
it's you know, it's gone, it's the time is now,
it's there hasn't been you know, it seems like a
time where the ideas that you've been you know, one
(30:44):
of the trailblazers for have been more ripe ever you know. Yeah,
And you know, Jeff, I'm actually glad that you also
talk about the you know, the the corporate criminality right
because unfortunately a colony again it's it's kind of a
poster case is for industrial polluters. Let's just take that
as one example. You know, the fossil fuel industrates has
(31:05):
been damaging the environment and la for generations. But what
we see often is we see on cap or improperly
cap abandoned oil wells that are generally in communities that
are less affluent, and the impact that that has in
the not only the environment, but we see you know,
one generation after another developing upper respiratory diseases that can
(31:30):
be clearly be traced to the quality of the air,
or they're having unusual forms of cancers. So you have
cancer clusters in some communities where increasingly scientists and researchers
can say this is directly attributed to this environmental crimes.
And yet we see a district attorney who could actually
(31:50):
take action someone set but been completely absent. And you say,
like a North County where we had the major explosion
the gas pollutions in and the adjudication of that with
Southern California Gas Company without really looking deeply into the
criminality that went on and actually for closing the capacity
for many homeowners to get the redressed by the way
(32:13):
that the settlement structure. This is the kind of you know,
this kind of stuff that you know, the district attorney
can play a major role on environmental justice or illegal
dumping or you know, frankly consumer related theft that goes
on that is not attended to by the district Attorney's office.
(32:34):
And then you have, of course, you know, corruption in
city hall, and you see completely a complete abandonment if
you will, of the responsibility to play a role in
how to address the district attorney plays so many roles
beyond the traditional with most people see maybe on television,
you know, the kind of the the Perry Mason, you know,
(32:58):
white guy in a blue suit with a white shirt,
you know, bringing you know, justice to the victim, and
they forget that actually prosecutor pays a role in all
the other places and even when it comes to the
victims of crime. How we victimize so many people in
this community by often either not prosecuting their cases or
(33:21):
refusing to take their case if they somehow have perceived
to be involving other other activities, or being enforced to say,
refused to be a witness immediately, never mind that they
have been traumatized and that we have a role in
dealing with that. But because they may not be able
to be fully cooperative because maybe the neighborhood that they
(33:43):
live in that could be a death sentence, and actually
sometimes jelling witnesses or victims to force them to cooperate
with the prosecution without any regards for the harm that
we're doing. She again speaks to the whole concept of
doing no harm. Basically, what happens since you know, we
have a system here that is soul so focused on
(34:05):
punishment that has completely lost sight of getting good results
for our community. Well, there's this example of the CIA
in Pakistan posing as doctors who were going village to
village to do the polio vaccinations. I don't know if
I don't know if you're aware of the story, but
(34:25):
polio polio is on the ropes. It's like one of
the next diseases to be fully eradicated from the whole planet.
In fact, coronavirus has had a huge negative impact on that.
It was like on the last last phases. But that's
by literally in India they vaccinated a billion people, They
did a billion, having a hundred million house calls. It's
just this unbelievable effort that's gone into, you know, ridding
(34:48):
the planet from one of these you know, deadly killers
by posing as doctors. It created a huge backlash that
we still haven't recovered from because all it takes is
one person to share that rumor, and even if only
like a half dozen people experienced it, it's so salacious
that you know, it spreads like wildfire. And so when
(35:10):
you describe these scenarios where you know, a victim is
turned into a defendant or you find the bravery to
take a case to the d A or to the
police and then it doesn't get prosecuted, embolden's bad behavior
in such a huge way because you know it's going
to have a multiplier effect on people not feeling like
(35:30):
these systems are there to protect them. In fact, enforces
the exact opposite, which emboldens these bad actors into thinking
that they can take advantage of people. You know, as
a citizen. A few things that I will say, and
we certainly banned the box with any of our companies
that we work with, and that's a practice of just
not having a check box as to whether or not
(35:51):
someone is or was a felon, the idea being that
you know, they serve their debt to society and should
be able to move on with their lives, and then
I'm just areous what are the other things? Of course
you're going to say a vote for you, But like
as private citizens as we you know, want to get
involved more in criminal justice reform. What do you recommend?
What are resources that we can use to educate ourselves
(36:13):
and who can we support or how can we show up? Yeah, well,
I mean it's certainly Jeff, you you brought up a
really good example of you know, smart business practices right
the ban in the box right with some people father
like crazy and still do in some communities. But when
you insist some people telling you whether criminal history was
before in order to get sometimes pretty non consequential employment
(36:36):
other the fact I mean consequential to the person that
we'll get a paycheck, but not anything. You're not talking
about national security or or risking anything else. What you
do is you foreclosely aboute for those people to have
pay taxes, have a good job, get housing, you know,
all the good things that then actually create a better
environment for all of us. So you know, just creating
or pushing for good public policies that impact all of
(36:59):
us the long run are important. But that you know,
how people can get involved. I mean, you know, obviously,
you know we're have an election up in six days
on a wake up and if you haven't voted yet,
you really need to do so. And you know they're
this is one of those elections that I would say
that you know that there existential issues on the ballot
right all the way from the presidential to certainly if
(37:22):
you're in l a county resident, to how how the
kernel justice system behaves. If you have come to the
conclusion that we need to do something of a systemic racism,
that we need to end mass incarceration, that we need
to invest more in education and public health and all
the stuff, then the c S race will be very
important to use. So voting and telling how this would
(37:44):
be very important. But then past the election is really
to the extent that you can listen. I get that
we are all busy and sometimes there is no bandwidth,
but to the extent that you can always say, admit
them and continue to to stay inform. You know, go
look for for the information out there. You know, nothing
against Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, but don't don't use
(38:05):
that as a as your as your unique your only
source of information. You know, do a little bit of
the heavy lifting beyond the quick sound bites that you
see in social media. Maybe use that as a platform
to say, okay, let me look into this, but you know,
go read another you know, read a newspaper, read a
(38:25):
reputable magazine, or or look at another website that has
a fuller treatment on some of these issues and hopefully
not one that has a absolutely a political lens, but
one that at least provides some level of balance in
their coverage, because that is what we need. You know,
democracy depends I'm having informed voters and inform participants. And unfortunately,
(38:51):
what we often see because I know the issues are complicated,
and I know that we generally don't have time, but
we see people sometimes that the voting, which is is
a really bad thing because then you're giving your you're
your vote somebody also basically your vote to account more
than it should because you're given proportionately, you're your side
(39:13):
of applied to somebody else, or voting and being very
poorly informed, which also is not necessarily conducive to go
public policy and governments. I would say on the low end,
you know, just being an informed voter. On the higher end,
if you can, you know, started maybe engaging in our
organizations that reflect your beliefs. Sometimes it could be as
(39:35):
simple as just being a subscriber to a publication that
you get once periodically, two more in depth, you know,
participation in other things. But George, thank you so much
for taking the time. I know you're back to back
and running at a million miles an hour getting ready
for this election here in one week. And thank you.
(39:55):
Thank you again for listening where you know, all you know,
conspiring together there to build the world that we want
to see. And you know, I think that if there's
any lesson from twenty it's that, you know, like we
all have the capacity to be a part of the
difference making in building the world that we want for
ourselves and for others. And you know, a huge measure
of that is how those who have it worse than
(40:18):
us in our societies are treated, and what opportunities of
forgiveness we provide those that you know are in sort
of these worst situations. I think that you know, starting
at something that is such a foundational component of our
society and has such an outsized impact on so many
millions of families, um is a really important place to start.
(40:38):
So thank you. Thank you for your for your lifetime
of public service, George, and you know best luck in
this election. Jeff. Thank you so much for the opportunity
and your friendship and look forward to uh maybe doing
another podcast if you decide to come back out of
it again. All right man, thanks again, Think yeah. For
(41:12):
more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Art of the Hustle is a production of I Heart Radio.
You're listening to the Art of the Hustle, the show
that breaks down how some of the world's most fascinating
people have hustled and learned their way into achieving great things.
(00:21):
I'm your host Jeff Rosenthal, co founder of Summit, and
today on the show, I had the great pleasure of
chatting with George Gascone. George is a candidate for District
Attorney in the city of Los Angeles. George oversaw nine
thousand officers as the assistant chief of the l A
p D, and in two thousand eleven, after District Attorney
Kamala Harris vacated her seat, he was tapped by Gavin
(00:42):
Newsom to be the District Attorney of San Francisco. Since
his appointment, George has earned a national reputation as a
visionary and criminal justice reform. He's been named among the
top hundred lawyers in California by The Daily Journal, The
Anti Defamation League honored him with his prestigious Civil Rights Award,
and today he joined us to talk about criminal justice reform,
investing in education, and his vision for the future of
(01:04):
Los Angeles. So please enjoy my conversation with George Gascon. George,
thanks for coming on the podcast. Hey Jeff, how's it going.
It's going great all things considered. How about yourself? How
how are you? How are you holding up? You know
what we're holding up? Well, Um, this is a final stretch,
(01:27):
so it's almost NonStop, you know, sleeping as we're coming
almost optional. But it's all good. You know, we got
a lot of momentum, a lot of support. We've now
built up somewhere around silunteers and our campaign. We have
reached out one million l A County voters either via
(01:48):
text or or a phone call directly, you know, one
on one basis from volunteers. So I feel very fortunate
the passion and the support for the movement has grown
in the last few months. But as a real race,
you know, it's very tough. You know, we have unfortunately,
prison guard unions and police unions have put a lot
(02:10):
of money against this campaign, but almost seven million dollars
and uh and we recognize that, you know, we are
questioning the status quote. We're talking about, you know, taking
the criminal justice system in a way that there should
have been done a long time ago. You know, we're
talking about really prioritizing results for victims and community and
(02:33):
taxpayers instead of just simply punishing people. And and unfortunately
the system has been fueled by punishment for the last
three decades and a lot of a lot of interests
has been developed into that. And you know, we're seeing
money coming from very interesting places, you know, people that
have been major supporters of the Trump administration putting hundreds
(02:54):
of thousands of dollars. So it's just it's a very
interesting experience because it clearly shows two very different options
as to how do we want to move forward in
l A County and probably the rest of the country
because all economy in so large and all the impact
that I will have on criminal justice for the years
to come is a very substantial effect that this campaign
(03:16):
will have. Well, assuming that the listeners aren't experts on
you know, district's attorneys offices and you know criminal justice
reform movement. You mentioned the movement. Do you mind diving
in a little bit further on what the sort of
national movement is and stands for and sort of the
things that you know, you find to be the most
(03:36):
pragmatic components across the aisle ideas. Yeah, you know, I mean,
so you know, this is really about beginning to sort
of dismantle systemic racism from the criminal justice system. It's
really about bringing communities together to really find how safety
should be created. It's really about you know, using some
(04:00):
lions and using data to make sure that we are,
for instance, that we're not incarcerating children as adults, because
we know that that not only it doesn't work. What
you do is you create a life of criminality that
you know, for a young person, because then they can
get out of it. You know, once they get criminalized,
it's very hard to get out of that. Basically, what
(04:21):
you're doing is by given the felony consequences, you are
taking away their ability to get employment, to get housing. So,
you know, a major component of homelessness, certainly in California,
has been you know, three decades of disproportional locking up
so many people. L A County has led the way there.
We like l A County criminalizes more people than any
(04:44):
other counties or countries in the world. Oh, you know, unquestionably,
I mean, and you know, it's a it's an interesting
point because you know, some people push back and said, well,
you know, l A County is the largest county, so
therefore follows that you should be the most whatever. But
we'll often people don't realize that we're talking about proportionately proportionately.
(05:06):
This county criminalizes people at a higher rate than seventy
percent of all the other counties in the state, which
is a lot to say because you're you're in a
place you're comparing yourself to very very conservative counties like
you know, Riverside, San Berndine, Orange County four times or
eight to San Francisco. And yet at the same time
(05:26):
we have seen uh you know, violent crime grew up
by under the current administration in La County, where we
saw a violent crime proportionately decrease in San Francisco with
a quarter of the rate of incarceration. You know, I
tell people that if incarceration was the currency of safety,
l A County will be the safest county in the country.
(05:47):
But it is not right. So it's it's that that
you know, where where a jail happy county, where a
death penalty happy county, And that's not a good thing.
You know, we incarcerate more people, we put more people
in the throad, and we're very focused on punishment as
supposed to get in results, and you know, the taxpayers
are paying for that with the resources that could be
(06:09):
applied to education and housing and other things. And certainly
we're breaking up the social fabric of so many parts
of our community and that process totally, we're like paying
the equivalent of what it would take to send people
to college or great mental counseling and keeping them locked up.
And we certainly have lost the narrative of the thread
(06:30):
of you know, people paying their debt to society are
trying to you know, better themselves in order to become
valuable members of society, and have very much gotten stuck
in the punishment component and not the rehabilitation component, which
is just you know, an unfortunate signal to all of us,
right Like how we are with anyone is how we
are with everyone. How we treat those that have hurt
(06:52):
us and those that have at the worst in our society,
you know, like definitely has a uh you know, it
speaks volumes about what our priorities are. And I'm just
you know, for you, you you know, you being a former
assistant chief of police here in l a former chief
police in Santa Fe, correct, San Francisco. Oh, you're a
chief police and sant I'm sorry I thought, and were
you a cop in Santa Fe or were you know?
(07:14):
I was a chief of police in Mason, Arizona, and
then police in San Francisco. Yeah, I got Arizona and
New Mexico mixed up because that's that's that's such a
that's such a rookie move. But the reason, the reason
I mentioned is you can tell that the people in
Arizona and New Mexico, they come off to you. Yeah. Yeah,
that's just really rude. Um, you know, similar scenery. I
(07:36):
don't know, it's like it's like calling a Gilliants fan
the dog your fan, right, yeah, listen, you know what,
it just shows that you don't play a lot of baseball.
So so ultimately, yeah, the reason I brought it up
in the first place, George is just because, like you know,
you you have experience on the police side of the aisle.
You were a cop here in in l A. You
(07:57):
were you know, chief of police, and like you said,
police unions are one of the groups that are funding
your opposition. So I'm curious, like you know, just from
your perspective, how how does this help police well, I mean,
you know, unfortunately it doesn't really help police, right. I Mean,
what we see is we see prison guard unions and
police union is really very focused on on on a
(08:19):
very limited portion of their work and and very motivated
by the by the ability to you know, to continue
to maintain the political influence that they have. Are the
major cost to all of us as taxpayers and as
members of our community, right, we we don't benefit from
that political influence on those you know, that money that
(08:41):
is being used in a very very selfish, very money
power motivated way, and it's not you know, really at
the end of the day, doesn't even help the men
and women and police forces because you know, the more
that you create a division between the officers in the
street and many of the community is that they serve
the more insecurity that we have, and also that the
(09:04):
more unsafe that the word becomes for the officer. That's
a very narrow and I would say, a very um,
you know, just a very unwise way of trying to
exercise political power. But you know, power it blinds people.
And I think that to a great extent, a lot
of police labor organizations and prison guards have become very
(09:25):
accustomed in the last thirty years or so to bully
their way through the system and really intimidate people, and
they're having a hard time grasping that changes coming. And
regardless of what they do, they can go down and
kicking and dragging. But you know, reform will happen with
or without them. I just I wanted you to get
a little bit more granular though, and help us understand, like,
(09:48):
as a district attorney, what are some of the best
practices that ultimately end up benefiting everybody's public safety. Yeah. Absolutely,
And you know, before I do that, I just kind
of wanted for my you know, from my end, I
wanted to distinguish because I think there's a uniqueness to
police associations that it's different than other unions. I totally
get that you may see sometimes some some other unions
(10:10):
perhaps you know, going in a way that you would
prefer not to be. In the case of policing, in
in prison guards, I view it very differently because this
are the only organizations, especially when talk about policing, is
the only organizations in our democratic system where we relinquish
the authority to take our freedom away under certain circumstances
(10:33):
to sometimes actually make life on this that, you know, decisions.
So I view it, quite frankly in a very very
different plane, just simply because the authority that we grant
police officers in our system is very different than what
we do for you know, for teachers or carpenters or nurses.
(10:54):
So you know, I generally view those unions and yeah,
they're doing what unions do. They're protecting their labor for wars,
and and that they may not have always a good consequence.
But but in the in the case of police unions,
just so outside the process, right, because they are defending
in criminal courts sometimes the behavior of criminal behavior by
(11:15):
police officers, right, they're paying for the lawyers are doing.
Sometimes police officers that took a life away from someone
unnecessarily or incarcerated someone. So it's just sort of proportionate
the authority that they have. Uh. You know, I just
heard today actually a member of the you know, the
Correctional Officers Union. I thought it was very interesting form
(11:36):
remembering he said, you know, we are trading in human
tragedy and in human suffering. And I thought it was
so interesting that someone that came from the walk admitted
that would that they had lost their sort of the compass,
if you will, and move away from public service. So
it's it's just it's just it's very different. But you know,
(11:57):
getting down to that, you know, the rannual or discussion
about what is it about the system and what we
need to do in order to move us away. I
think it's really important to recognize that that this connect
that has been between quite America and certainly African Americans
and probably Latin As to a less extent when it
(12:18):
came to policing and said, well, you're absolutely right that
for most white Americans, you know, police officers has always
been sort of the de night, you know, shining armor. Uh,
you know, the African American community experiences being a very
different one. And I think we're finally the rest of
the community's understanding that, you know, the origins of policing
in this country by and large are deeply and better
(12:40):
in the in the institution of slavery. And I know
that it's hard to swallow that you have to kind
of go back to the history of slavery in this
country and how the the the early iterations of you know,
public safety groups or you know, vigilantism in case we're
really there to support slavery where there to cash runaway slaves,
bringing back, you know, some times punish them. And then
(13:01):
after the Civil War, when slavery was out loud, we
sort of transition into the gine coral era. You know,
there was a short period of time where after the
Civil War, African Americans were beginning to to gain a
foothold on the political arena that we're getting elected to
public office. And then immediately you saw a big shutdown
(13:22):
and you saw the criminalization of a lot of new
behavior or the criminalization of new criminsational behavior that then
policing and prosecutors started to use to basically put those
that were formally slaves now to enslave like conditions, even
though slavery was unlawful, and you saw often people being
(13:42):
you know, prosecuted and incarcerated, losing the right to vote,
so you know, the the ability to like public officials
that started to dissipate, and that moved all the way
through the you know, through the from the nineteenth into
the twentieth century, and you know, you forward into the
War on Drugs and the late nineteen eight nineteen eighties
(14:04):
and nineties and taking us into today. So I think
what has occurred while this was we sort of had
parallel universe, right. The experience for African Americans was one.
The experience with white Americans when they came to the
common justice system was a different one. And I think
what occurred, especially after George Floyd, was reckoning and awakening
(14:27):
of white America that began to see what you know, frankly,
black America has been seeing one generation after the other.
And I think that that's created a healthy conversation which
is good for everyone, and to including the police, because
I think, you know, a lot of the solutions really
need to come. Police needs to be a partner in this, uh,
not necessarily the police labor organization of the police. And
(14:49):
I think that what we're saying is, look, we need
to re imagine how the system works so that it
works for everybody. We need to get rid of the
vestiges in the systemic races and the head help incarcerate
and keep people in slave like conditions for so long.
And we need to take the financial incentives that the
current system enhanced by building more prisons, more jails, more prosecutors,
(15:11):
more cops. I mean, they're huge financial rewards here, And
I find it interesting when you know, people get very
offended sometimes with the term defund the police, which it
means a lot of things to different people. You know,
to me, it really means right sizing the police. But
you know, I tell people often said, you know, you
were not offended when we defunded public education or public health,
(15:33):
or social services or housing to increase sercise or policing. Right,
is it so offensive to have a conversation around defunding
some levels of policing now? And really kind of actually,
I would call it just sort of dialing back to
put us back to put more money into into education,
public health, housing and those things that we sort of
(15:53):
lost our weight about three or four decades ago because
what occurred on the sculptures, we defunded so many of
the services. Look, we've built twenty two prisons in thirty
years in California, one public university that to me was
a huge defunding effort on public education at the expense
of creating a system that actually doesn't doesn't really do
(16:15):
anything for us other than continue to perpetuate, you know,
insecurity and to the point that you have some communities
actually that began to project economically, how many jails am
I going to have to build? How many prisons based
on the growth of population, especially the black and the
brown growth of population, instead of projecting and say how
many public schools do I need to build? You know,
(16:37):
ten fifteen years on the line, which is very very
tragic by product or for weeks down in the last
few decades. We'll be back with more out of the
hustle after the break. I remember learning that some of
(16:59):
the private prisons being developed in the Midwest, part of
the bond financing had guaranteed rates of occupancy by the states.
So we're literally like funding future prisons by guaranteeing a
percentage of criminalization. And perhaps it's just so runaway, but
I just don't think that people turn to anything that
(17:22):
has the types of consequences that crime does, either out
of some sort of like mental health issue or necessity.
You know, So when you talk about you know, these
savage inequalities of education, health, human services, you know, housing,
and the rates of criminality from people that you know,
have those things stable versus those that don't. I guess
(17:42):
just my exposure and you know, with the Anti Recitivism
Coalition and just meeting young people charged with serious crimes.
Is you find pretty quickly from personal exposure that it's situational.
It's not like there's good people and bad people. There's
good situations and bad situations for the most part. Yeah. Mean, look,
if if you took a drug use, you know, and
(18:02):
I always use drugs because I think drug just it's
something that most people can understand. You know, they use
of drugs in this country is its equal across social
and economic and racial lines. But when you look at
our jails and our prisons, who are the people that
they're getting incarcerated for drug possession? And I'm talking about
for personal use, I'm not talking about you know, sales
(18:24):
or any stuff are black and brown people. So you
have it just it becomes very obvious when you look
through just through that track alone, just the racism and
the system where you have a behavior that that is
equally prevalent across the social and economic and racial lines,
but only a small segment or a population tends to
(18:47):
be the one that gets penalized for it. Your critics
in San Francisco, you know, would say that some of
the lighter punishments or ticket the defenses versus criminal offenses
have led to like an increased criminality at a higher level.
Do you mind talking to that a little bit of course? Yeah, So,
(19:08):
I mean, first of all, look, I mean, let's let's
begin by talking about violent crime, and I'm going to
get down to drug use. San Francisco had a net
reduction of proportional rate. Uh, you know, the rate of
violent crime in San Francisco decrease during the time that
I was district attorney, and we incarcerated a quarter or
rate of l A County. The rate of violent crime
(19:29):
in l A County went up by seven percent during
the time that the current has been in office, which
was almost the same I was there a year before
she did. Homelessness in San Francisco during the time that
it was a district attorney went up by thirteent. Homelessness
in l A during the time that Jackie Lacy was
(19:50):
the has been the d A went up by fifty.
So when you start looking at the by products of
allegedly the behavior of one district attorney, the enforcement and
the prosecutorial stance of one against the other, you see
very quickly that actually what has been going on in
l A hasn't worked now I understand that they are
(20:12):
you know, their political implications to all of this. And
you know, sometimes when you you do your work in
a way that makes people uncomfortable, like in my case
when we started very massive public corruption investiations with the FBI.
You know, it made some people uncomfortable and made the
you know, the mayor of San Francisco very uncomfortable, and
she became a strong enemy. And you know, to those
(20:35):
days she continues to bring that out. But if you
ask her, you know, okay, so would you support incarcerating
those that are mentally ill? She will readily tell you know, so,
then the answer is, or those who have a substance
of use problems, she will readily tell you that she wouldn't.
So you cannot have your cake and eat it in
(20:57):
this in this area. You can't blame me for you know,
what is a an addiction epidemic in this country, which
San Francisco clearly, much like l A, has suffered from it.
And then at the same time understand that you cannot
incarcerate your way out of that. And and you know,
I find it interesting because you even't hear the rhetorical police.
(21:18):
So we make arrest and the d A doesn't do
anything except that when you look down at the reality,
they're not making the arrest right. And I'm not suggesting
this should arrest people that are addicted, But you know,
like in San Francisco, property crime was vastly driven by
car break ins for a period of four years until
we had a new chief of police and the chief
of police I was there at the time, who became
(21:40):
a political enemy, was forced out in disgrace. But there
were eighty one car break ins in nearly four years,
and there were thirteen arrests, one three and we prosecuted
all but one of those two. How is the d
A at fault for an epidemic and car break ins
when there are no arrests made. This is a kind
of stuff that you know, it flies on the face
(22:01):
of you know, the rhetoric, the political rhetoric or you know,
like blaming me for homelessness in San Francisco, which I
think is insane but okay, increased during my time. Would
you blame Jackie Lacy for the fifty percent increasing homelessness
in l A County during her time. It's one of
the things that you know, you have often you have
(22:21):
the critics and said very drawing by police unions because
the other people, they're very uncomfortable because we started investigating
in the San Francisco Police department, because they deserve to
be investigated for all the races practices, but not something
not something that makes you popular in the city. All oh, yeah,
it didn't. And you know, and sometimes you know be
in and I like the prosecutor. It's not about popularity.
(22:44):
I mean, look here, we we've had corruption in l
A City Hall and the fetes has to step in
without any local help. I mean, in San Francisco, the
fetes are doing the prosecution. But it started with work
that I was a partner to hear. The FETs have
to do it all along. So much of this race
has been focused on the type of criminal justice reformed
(23:06):
policies that we're talking about here. From a d AS perspective,
there is a marginalized membership of society that is not
serviced by our security apparatus. Right, And even if you know,
we we want, even if we want to argue that
they are and it's a matter of perspective, it's still
their perspective that they aren't. And I know that keeping
(23:27):
people safe is the key here, and you've spoken a
lot towards you know that that segment of the population
that is, you know, historically marginalized. Say that you know
you are elected, Um, I believe this podcast will come
out the day of the election, So you know one
week from now. What are the sort of things that
you'll immediately start getting after. What are the types of
ways that you do this job that are different from say,
(23:48):
you know, your your predecessor or other das in the country. Yeah, look,
I mean the things and and you know there are
other das that are doing the synchrome of work that
I'm doing. First of all, was to recognize that you
give people that commit low level offenses high level consequences,
meaning felony consequences. What you do is you almost immediately
guarantee that they're going to be jobless, and then they're
(24:12):
going to be houseless, and then they're going to be
out on the streets, and then you know, all the
other things happen. So the first thing that you want
to do is you want to make sure that whatever
interventions that you're making, that you're not creating greater harm. Right.
I often say that if we're wonderful, if if lawyers
took the hypocritic oath. You know, doctors, if you become
(24:33):
a medical doctor, one of the parts of your oath
is do no harm, right, you know, meaning whatever intervention
you're gonna do, don't make it worse than when you
touch that patient. But in in the criminal justice system,
we do harm all day long, and we do it
without any regards. Right. So the first thing is that
you need to understand what is it that you're doing,
and what is it down downstream consequence of that right,
(24:53):
And that requires that you that you become a student
of the trade, that you accept that there there are
scientific norms. It tells you actually if you're the way
B is going to occur, which a doctor will always
a medical doctor will always try to bring into consideration.
But you know, lawyers and certainly prosecutors were never thinking, Okay,
what happens if I take this fourteen year old and
(25:14):
I send them to prison with adults for an offense
that I could intervene without that, what would be the consequence.
Nobody sits down and thinks, okay, that means that this
person is going to get a phone conviction. That means
they're going to be there with adults, you're going to
be victimized in prison. Number one, they're going to become
You foreclose all other opportunities so that they'll actually they'll
(25:35):
get out of prison. Because even if you're given twenty years,
if you go in a fourteen fifteen, you're gonna get
out on your mid thirties. You're going to be meaned
at hell, you're gonna be angry, and you're gonna be
with no many, not many other options other than perhaps
continue to com make crimes or not continue to start
committing crimes in order to survive, because you can get
health and you can get employment. Right, So the first
(25:57):
thing that you need to do is understand that you're
in inventions have consequences beyond the here and now that
you have to figure out what is the right intervention.
The second thing is that you need to start addressing
the root causes of crimes. So when you have, for instance,
if you have an epidemic in car breaking, like we
did the same Francisco, and finally we had an issue
for police, we started doing in my office and created
(26:19):
a crime strategies unit, and we use data to really
understand who were the more prolific players and what was
the motivation, where were the stolen what was the stolen
property traveling? And once we had an insie for police
were able to go after this stuff rings and immediately
had almost decreasing car breaking. So it's understanding the drivers
(26:39):
of crime and then applying the right intervention. Right, organized crime,
you know, we have the tools for that, right. Mental
health is a different tool. Substance abuse is a different tool. Right.
It's just really doing the heavy lifting as opposed to
just sitting there passively and taking whatever the police bring
through your front door and then trying to get the
(27:01):
most punishment that you've had without understanding whether that punishment
is going to actually be a good thing for the
community or actually what you're doing is you're creating coatural
damage that we will be paying for for years to come.
It's also understanding the economic not only the social costs,
but the economic costs of your actions. You know, people
often don't think about this. You know, I said, well,
(27:23):
the NBA's body in l A. Five dollars were big county.
But what they don't understand is that the hundred dollars
and plus people that the prosecutes every year, which more
than do not need to be prosecuted the way they were.
It's costing us billions of dollars that you replies over
the next ten, fifteen, twenty years. You send somebody to
prison for five, ten fifteen years, and if you would
(27:45):
have been able to have the same result with less,
you go from the point that you went overboard, and
you amortize that, and you look at the financial costs
of that, and pretty soon you're you're looking at billions
of dollars on liability, not only to the current budges,
but future budgetes. And that money is coming away from education,
from fixing your potholes, from your parks. You know, all
(28:06):
that stuff has a cost. Right And so the point
that I tried to make is that you know, if
I were to be elected the A, we will achieve
greater level of security, We would have more inclusivity, we
would reduce the racial impact or this proportionality of race
in the system. But at the same time, that will
increase safety for everyone, and it will provide avenues for
(28:30):
us to be able to reinvest in other things that
on the long run create greater security. Look, one of
the biggest predictors that you will become a productive taxpayer,
and that be involving the criminal justice system is having
a college. Agree, but we built twenty two persons on
one one public university in thirty years. Wouldn't be nice
if we did it the other way around. We built
(28:52):
twenty two public universities and make a college education and
trade education more available to everyone. So that's the kind
of conversations that we need to start having. And where
does the A fit into that? Well, that the A
fits into that by being fouthful the way the way
he or she uses that discreation, so that we don't
create greater opportunities for people to continue to con make
(29:14):
crimes because they don't have anywhere else to go, and
then provide the avenues for other players, other stakeholders, other
actors and assistant to be able to then have the
funding necessary to lose their work, which is going to
make us a safer community. Part of the hustle will
be right back after the short break. It's all a
(29:41):
shared sandbox, and we often forget that, especially if you
live in like a nicer part of l A that
has you know, a lower police presence and a lower
crime rate versus you know, more dangerous part of l A.
I just think that until it touches your family, it's
very difficult to you know, understand that there's human beings
(30:03):
on the other side of all of these things. So
I mean, I'm just a huge advocate for what you
stand for. Ultimately, I just A'm hopeful that you know,
you one win and uh to you know, continue to
set an example for how, you know, district attorneys can
use their considerate power both the whole corporate bad actors
(30:24):
and traditionally like white collar criminals that don't see punishment
too often accountable. I hope you know that, and I'm
curious if that is something that's part of your agenda
or platform or your thoughts on that. But obviously like
it's you know, it's gone, it's the time is now,
it's there hasn't been you know, it seems like a
time where the ideas that you've been you know, one
(30:44):
of the trailblazers for have been more ripe ever you know. Yeah,
And you know, Jeff, I'm actually glad that you also
talk about the you know, the the corporate criminality right
because unfortunately a colony again it's it's kind of a
poster case is for industrial polluters. Let's just take that
as one example. You know, the fossil fuel industrates has
(31:05):
been damaging the environment and la for generations. But what
we see often is we see on cap or improperly
cap abandoned oil wells that are generally in communities that
are less affluent, and the impact that that has in
the not only the environment, but we see you know,
one generation after another developing upper respiratory diseases that can
(31:30):
be clearly be traced to the quality of the air,
or they're having unusual forms of cancers. So you have
cancer clusters in some communities where increasingly scientists and researchers
can say this is directly attributed to this environmental crimes.
And yet we see a district attorney who could actually
(31:50):
take action someone set but been completely absent. And you say,
like a North County where we had the major explosion
the gas pollutions in and the adjudication of that with
Southern California Gas Company without really looking deeply into the
criminality that went on and actually for closing the capacity
for many homeowners to get the redressed by the way
(32:13):
that the settlement structure. This is the kind of you know,
this kind of stuff that you know, the district attorney
can play a major role on environmental justice or illegal
dumping or you know, frankly consumer related theft that goes
on that is not attended to by the district Attorney's office.
(32:34):
And then you have, of course, you know, corruption in
city hall, and you see completely a complete abandonment if
you will, of the responsibility to play a role in
how to address the district attorney plays so many roles
beyond the traditional with most people see maybe on television,
you know, the kind of the the Perry Mason, you know,
(32:58):
white guy in a blue suit with a white shirt,
you know, bringing you know, justice to the victim, and
they forget that actually prosecutor pays a role in all
the other places and even when it comes to the
victims of crime. How we victimize so many people in
this community by often either not prosecuting their cases or
(33:21):
refusing to take their case if they somehow have perceived
to be involving other other activities, or being enforced to say,
refused to be a witness immediately, never mind that they
have been traumatized and that we have a role in
dealing with that. But because they may not be able
to be fully cooperative because maybe the neighborhood that they
(33:43):
live in that could be a death sentence, and actually
sometimes jelling witnesses or victims to force them to cooperate
with the prosecution without any regards for the harm that
we're doing. She again speaks to the whole concept of
doing no harm. Basically, what happens since you know, we
have a system here that is soul so focused on
(34:05):
punishment that has completely lost sight of getting good results
for our community. Well, there's this example of the CIA
in Pakistan posing as doctors who were going village to
village to do the polio vaccinations. I don't know if
I don't know if you're aware of the story, but
(34:25):
polio polio is on the ropes. It's like one of
the next diseases to be fully eradicated from the whole planet.
In fact, coronavirus has had a huge negative impact on that.
It was like on the last last phases. But that's
by literally in India they vaccinated a billion people, They
did a billion, having a hundred million house calls. It's
just this unbelievable effort that's gone into, you know, ridding
(34:48):
the planet from one of these you know, deadly killers
by posing as doctors. It created a huge backlash that
we still haven't recovered from because all it takes is
one person to share that rumor, and even if only
like a half dozen people experienced it, it's so salacious
that you know, it spreads like wildfire. And so when
(35:10):
you describe these scenarios where you know, a victim is
turned into a defendant or you find the bravery to
take a case to the d A or to the
police and then it doesn't get prosecuted, embolden's bad behavior
in such a huge way because you know it's going
to have a multiplier effect on people not feeling like
(35:30):
these systems are there to protect them. In fact, enforces
the exact opposite, which emboldens these bad actors into thinking
that they can take advantage of people. You know, as
a citizen. A few things that I will say, and
we certainly banned the box with any of our companies
that we work with, and that's a practice of just
not having a check box as to whether or not
(35:51):
someone is or was a felon, the idea being that
you know, they serve their debt to society and should
be able to move on with their lives, and then
I'm just areous what are the other things? Of course
you're going to say a vote for you, But like
as private citizens as we you know, want to get
involved more in criminal justice reform. What do you recommend?
What are resources that we can use to educate ourselves
(36:13):
and who can we support or how can we show up? Yeah, well,
I mean it's certainly Jeff, you you brought up a
really good example of you know, smart business practices right
the ban in the box right with some people father
like crazy and still do in some communities. But when
you insist some people telling you whether criminal history was
before in order to get sometimes pretty non consequential employment
(36:36):
other the fact I mean consequential to the person that
we'll get a paycheck, but not anything. You're not talking
about national security or or risking anything else. What you
do is you foreclosely aboute for those people to have
pay taxes, have a good job, get housing, you know,
all the good things that then actually create a better
environment for all of us. So you know, just creating
or pushing for good public policies that impact all of
(36:59):
us the long run are important. But that you know,
how people can get involved. I mean, you know, obviously,
you know we're have an election up in six days
on a wake up and if you haven't voted yet,
you really need to do so. And you know they're
this is one of those elections that I would say
that you know that there existential issues on the ballot
right all the way from the presidential to certainly if
(37:22):
you're in l a county resident, to how how the
kernel justice system behaves. If you have come to the
conclusion that we need to do something of a systemic racism,
that we need to end mass incarceration, that we need
to invest more in education and public health and all
the stuff, then the c S race will be very
important to use. So voting and telling how this would
(37:44):
be very important. But then past the election is really
to the extent that you can listen. I get that
we are all busy and sometimes there is no bandwidth,
but to the extent that you can always say, admit
them and continue to to stay inform. You know, go
look for for the information out there. You know, nothing
against Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, but don't don't use
(38:05):
that as a as your as your unique your only
source of information. You know, do a little bit of
the heavy lifting beyond the quick sound bites that you
see in social media. Maybe use that as a platform
to say, okay, let me look into this, but you know,
go read another you know, read a newspaper, read a
(38:25):
reputable magazine, or or look at another website that has
a fuller treatment on some of these issues and hopefully
not one that has a absolutely a political lens, but
one that at least provides some level of balance in
their coverage, because that is what we need. You know,
democracy depends I'm having informed voters and inform participants. And unfortunately,
(38:51):
what we often see because I know the issues are complicated,
and I know that we generally don't have time, but
we see people sometimes that the voting, which is is
a really bad thing because then you're giving your you're
your vote somebody also basically your vote to account more
than it should because you're given proportionately, you're your side
(39:13):
of applied to somebody else, or voting and being very
poorly informed, which also is not necessarily conducive to go
public policy and governments. I would say on the low end,
you know, just being an informed voter. On the higher end,
if you can, you know, started maybe engaging in our
organizations that reflect your beliefs. Sometimes it could be as
(39:35):
simple as just being a subscriber to a publication that
you get once periodically, two more in depth, you know,
participation in other things. But George, thank you so much
for taking the time. I know you're back to back
and running at a million miles an hour getting ready
for this election here in one week. And thank you.
(39:55):
Thank you again for listening where you know, all you know,
conspiring together there to build the world that we want
to see. And you know, I think that if there's
any lesson from twenty it's that, you know, like we
all have the capacity to be a part of the
difference making in building the world that we want for
ourselves and for others. And you know, a huge measure
of that is how those who have it worse than
(40:18):
us in our societies are treated, and what opportunities of
forgiveness we provide those that you know are in sort
of these worst situations. I think that you know, starting
at something that is such a foundational component of our
society and has such an outsized impact on so many
millions of families, um is a really important place to start.
(40:38):
So thank you. Thank you for your for your lifetime
of public service, George, and you know best luck in
this election. Jeff. Thank you so much for the opportunity
and your friendship and look forward to uh maybe doing
another podcast if you decide to come back out of
it again. All right man, thanks again, Think yeah. For
(41:12):
more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
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