tough-on-crime politician

SACRAMENTO — Change, it seems, is in the air. And not just because the days are shorter, the nights are cooler and the leaves are blazing in bursts of yellow, red and gold.

Gavin Newsom’s eight-year reign in Sacramento is nearing its end. The era of Xavier Becerra will soon begin.

President Trump, if not exactly humbled — Trump doesn’t do humble — has been soundly repudiated in an election blowout of epic proportion. Democrats, with much to prove, are preparing to take over Congress and promise to bring a new assertiveness and agenda to Washington.

After taking it all in, our columnists Mark Z. Barabak and Anita Chabria offer some thoughts, looking forward, backward and sometimes askance.

Barabak: Let’s start with our headline-grabbing governor, who’s once more drawing national attention. This time for his sweeping decision to commute the death sentences of all 548 inmates on California’s death row.

I’ll confess to a certain ambivalence about the bold and politically risky move. (If, that is, anything short of utter certitude is allowed in this line of work; I may risk losing my pundit’s license.)

On the one hand, I respect Newsom for taking a principled stand. On the other, I think our columnizing colleague, George Skelton, may have been onto something when he suggested the governor should have put the matter on the ballot and gone forth to make his case to voters, as opposed to acting unilaterally.

All power to the people!

Chabria: Haven’t I read a couple columns in this paper about the horror of California’s proposition process, that puts literally everything and anything in front of voters instead of being handled by the leaders we elected to legislate?

But I think your ambivalence is the point. Most people, no shame, don’t put that much time into considering the inherent problems of the death penalty. Just writing that sentence bored most of our readers.

At the same time, over decades, victims of violent crime have been embraced by tough-on-crime politicians who have mined their pain to promote a vision of public safety based on harsher laws. That has left an equally valid group of crime survivors — the ones who want to focus on repairing their lives, and prevention rather than punishing — largely marginalized until recent years when they began to organize.

Every time we ask voters to weigh in on issues such as the death penalty, politicians pit these two groups against each other. One side will bring out heart-wrenching photos of victims, the other will bring out survivors who say another killing won’t quell their grief. How many of us feel about the death penalty comes from these stories.

Public policy based on emotion is not ideal, though — especially when it involves life or death.

We elect legislators to make decisions. Newsom is in a long line of governors — and even a president — who also commuted death sentences because it turns out we are really bad at using capital punishment fairly, and without bias. He’s not breaking new ground, and no one is getting out of prison — they will now serve life without parole.

Frankly, I don’t think the majority of voters care that Newsom did this, but his political foes will use it relentlessly. He seems to have done it solely because he believes it’s the right thing to do.

Which brings me to Pete Hegseth, who seems to do things only because they are the wrong thing to do. Eleven Democrats, including three from California, failed to vote on his impeachment last week. What are your thoughts?

Barabak: As you note, one reason the (highly merited, richly deserved) impeachment of Hegseth failed is because of those 11 absentee Democrats. Their failure to show up on the House floor allowed lame-duck Republicans to shunt the matter off to committee, effectively killing the effort. For now, anyway.

Those AWOL Democrats had various excuses: They were stuck in traffic, traveling or tending to some “personal emergency.”

But it seems pretty straightforward. Lawmakers shirked their responsibility. As New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told CNN, “The people send us here to do a job … and the same way I had to clock in when I worked at a restaurant, we’ve got to clock in and do our work here.”

Funny. I thought we’d just had an election where voters expressed their unhappiness with politicians who seem more preoccupied with their own needs than those of the folks they supposedly represent.

You think Democrats have caused themselves lasting damage, am I right?

Chabria: Maybe. I think they took an incredible windfall of goodwill from voters and threw it out the window. It’s certainly brought questions about New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries’ leadership front and center, as well as fears that the party is too divided to be effective, despite the fact he’s on track to be the next speaker.

It also shows a real disconnect from voters’ expectations. Voters understand that Democrats are not yet in power. They understand this particular impeachment attempt may not have been successful because of that. But they also want to see Democrats trying.

Now, Democrats are on the defensive — again. It’s a fumble, of strategy and communication.

Barabak: I don’t share your despair.

Yes, it was a fumble. A bad look. Dumb. Needless. A self-own.

But, sticking with that football analogy, it was the first snap of the game. I wouldn’t make too much of it. There is a long season, er, scratch that. There are two years for Democrats to prove they can address voters’ concerns and turn their majority status into something more than a short-term rental.

How do they do that? Sure, impeach Hegseth once Democrats take control in January. (Note to lawmakers: Be sure to mark your calendars once the vote is scheduled. Set an egg timer! Put a sticky note on the bathroom mirror!)

But more important than that, Democrats need to address the affordability crisis, which they can do by restoring healthcare subsidies the Republican-run Congress allowed to lapse. Roll back Trump’s inflation-boosting tariffs and use the power of the purse to force an end to Trump’s reckless, price-spiking war with Iran.

Hold the president and his lawless henchmen to account. Not by blowing off steam through futile gestures like impeachment. Use the investigative and subpoena powers of Congress to expose the criminality along with the rot and corruption at the administration’s core. Pass legislation to keep any future president from emulating Trump and his actions as a would-be dictator.

And start to clean up lawmakers’ own House (and Senate) by passing legislation banning congressional stock trading.

Closer to home, meantime, our governor-elect Xavier Becerra is working on his transition. What do you see as the major challenges facing him when he takes over in January?

Chabria: He’ll be coming into office just as more federal cuts hit — up to a million Californians could lose Medi-Cal coverage starting in January — which is going to be an immediate challenge. Does California try to backfill any of that, or just live with the fallout of so many losing access to healthcare?

Trump has also promised he’ll be pursuing more fraud investigations in blue states including California, which is sure to cause problems.

On top of that, Becerra has floated the idea of freezing utility and home insurance rates. That would be politically difficult and out of character for a guy who likes to be slow and cautious, but would also be popular with voters.

So even if Becerra is known for his low-key approach, he’ll face a lot of urgent issues from the get-go.

Barabak: It certainly won’t be easy, notwithstanding that new, friendlier Democratic majority in Congress.

I’ll confess to being disappointed with the meh campaign Becerra ran after securing the Democratic nomination and, with it, his virtually certain ascension to the governor’s office.

I don’t necessarily fault him for refusing to be pinned down on any number of issues. The fewer promises, the more flexibility that Becerra will enjoy when it comes to the inevitable hard choices he’ll have to make as governor. But he could have done more, as I suggested back in June in another of our informative, effervescent conversations, to build a mandate and also to prepare California voters for the rough road ahead.

I suggested he was smart enough not to “spend the time between now and Nov. 3 at some swank beach resort, sipping one of those colorful cocktails with a little paper parasol while musing over his inaugural address.”

At this point, however, maybe Becerra should escape to one of those resorts for a bit of down time between now and his swearing-in on Jan. 4.

It’s probably the last chance for relaxation he’ll have in the next several years.