The East Bay's doomsday scenario

There’s a powder keg in Alameda County politics just waiting to blow

ELECTION 2024

7 days to Election Day

I’ve covered elections in the East Bay since 2010. That’s eight election cycles and I’ve never been more concerned about the tenor and tactics of campaigns and their supporters, and the potential turmoil we may experience in a week’s time.

People are extremely anxious. Walk your downtown, go to the grocery store, pick up a latte at the local coffee shop, you can feel an undertone of uncertainty, dread, along with hopeful, but very cautious optimism about the outcome of the presidential election.

There’s a powder keg in Alameda County politics, too, just ready to explode. Elected officials and candidates are reporting being harassed by other officials and residents.

A candidate in San Leandro triggered a fight with a former councilmember following a candidate forum at the public library. Instead of admonishing Councilmember Bryan Azevedo for his behavior, his online supporters blamed everyone else.

Azevedo even paid a notorious online fixer from Oakland named Zennie Abraham to effectively inject misinformation into the San Leandro’s election.

Oakland Councilmember Carroll Fife allegedly followed Congressional candidate Jennifer Tran to a parking lot because she called her a clown.

After Tran forcefully called out her opponent, Lateefah Simon, to debate her, online supporters of Simon attacked Tran. Keep in mind, Simon is a prohibitive favorite to win the seat in the 12th District.

Last Friday, young canvassers knocking on doors for Fife were shown a gun by a resident who did not appreciate the visit.

Oakland city council candidate Len Raphael said while campaigning over the weekend that his table was allegedly overturned by supporters of Alameda County supervisorial candidate Nikki Fortunato Bas.

In Union City, part of the strategy by establishment Democrats in that city is to stoke corrosive red state versus blue state politics. They assert a conservative-leaning candidate for the city council does not match the values of its residents. Never mind, that two Republicans already sit on the current five-member council, and another is a fairly moderate Democrat running for mayor.

Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price and Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao have also used the specter of Republicans somehow controlling the local electorate, despite a countywide registration of around 15 percent. Removing Price and Thao from office is undemocratic, both argue.

It goes without saying that this all should sound familiar to anyone following the national discourse surrounding the presidential election.

Here’s my worst fear at home. The doomsday scenario goes like this:

• Trump wins the presidential election Protesters flood the streets of Oakland, and other local cities, and they become violent.

• Price and Thao are recalled from office and one or both uses the anger in the streets for their own benefit. One way is to suggest the result was unjust. Perhaps, mimicking the prevailing feeling at the national level.

• Making matters worse, the Alameda County Registrar of Voters again bungles the local election in some way, further undermining the integrity of the vote. Ranked choice voting could be the culprit again.

• But remember, the registrar is also deploying two new procedures this fall, both seemingly on the fly—youth voting in Oakland and Berkeley school board elections, and the early release of cast vote records.

• If the potential for upheaval in our county isn’t enough, keep in mind the FBI’s public corruption investigation could gain full-steam as early as next week.

If you listen to the rumors being passed around about the FBI investigation, its findings may completely reshuffle our politics while at the same time further eroding our trust in local government.

We are living in uncertain times, indeed.

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