There’s so much political mail, and so much TV and online advertising, that I’d need a team of ten people just to fact-check a little of it. But some things are so clearly wrong that it’s worth doing what we can to correct the record.
Fact-check will be a feature for the next week; if you get mail or see ads that appear to be false or misleading, please send them along (tim@48hills.org).
We will start with District 9, where Trevor Chandler is sending out hit pieces about Jackie Fielder. There are numerous candidates in the race, but Chandler clearly sees Fielder as his chief opponent, since he’s not attacking anyone else.
Chandler describes himself in mailers and on his website as a “progressive.” I’m going to fact-check that because, although these days I may be old-fashioned, I believe that in politics words should actually mean something.
The number one item on the progressive agenda in San Francisco for the past 50 years has been district elections of supervisors. District elections are the only way people can run for the board without the massive amounts of money it takes to run a citywide race (every candidate for mayor this year will spend at least $2 million). They are the last protection against total oligarchy in San Francisco. There is nobody who can factually be defined as a “progressive” who doesn’t support district elections.
Chandler has said repeatedly that he thinks at least some supes should be elected at-large.
He has also said he doesn’t support expanding rent control. There are no progressives in San Francisco who oppose expanding rent control.
By definition that means he’s not a “progressive,” if that word has any meaning at all.
Chandler also said he would not have voted for the rather mild cease-fire resolution that the supes passed 8-3. Nobody who is actually a progressive on the board or in the city opposed it.
And Chandler worked for five years for AIPAC, which helped elect Republicans to Congress.
So there’s that.
But let’s go to the attacks on Fielder.
From a recent mailer:
“Fielder’s so out of touch she has a ’10-point Defund the Police plan“
That references Fielder’s 2020 state Senate campaign platform. I would like to remind folks that in the wake of the 2020 shooting of George Floyd, political activists and leaders all over the country talked about redirecting some money from the police to social services—including Mayor London Breed.
In this campaign, in public statements, Fielder has said that she supports what many progressives support: Putting more cops on the beat, instead of in squad cars, and using trained community professionals for lower-level crimes so that the sworn, armed officers (who cost the city a lot of money) can focus on serious, violent crime. She has said she would crack down on police overtime, which almost everyone, including big supporters of the cops, agrees is a problem.
Fielder even supports decriminalizing prostitution, enabling a Red Light District in the Mission.
The source for this is “Harvey Milk Club Nov. 2024 Endorsement Questionnaire,” which you can read here. It makes no mention of a Red Light District in the Mission.
We all know that considerable literature and research that says that decriminalizing or legalizing prostitution would help end human trafficking and forced sex work. But in the Mission?
In an SF Standard interview, Fielder made her position clear:
Another District 9 candidate Jackie Fielder, said she believes sex workers and johns shouldn’t be in residential areas at all. A long-term solution, Fielder said, would be to create a regulated area away from homes where sex work could take place safely.
Chandler said in the same story that “The sex workers should be directed to job training and not be criminalized.”
So I guess he’s in favor of decriminalizing prostitution, too.
Endorsed by Hillary Ronen and will continue the failed policies that brought us here.
That’s true: Ronen has endorsed Fielder. So have both David Campos and Tom Ammiano, who held the D9 seat before Ronen. Here is a list.
Among those who have endorsed Chandler: GrowSF, TogetherSF Action, and ConnectedSF, all funded by tech and real estate billionaires. Here is the list.
The voters in D9 can decide who better represents their political interests.
Next: District 5.
