SAN FRANCISCO — Philanthropist and Levi’s inheritor Daniel Lurie has gained the hard-fought race for San Francisco mayor, ushering in a brand new period of management for a metropolis whose voters made clear they’re fed up with brazen retail theft and sprawling tent cities.
It took two days to find out a winner underneath San Francisco’s ranked-choice voting system, which permits voters to pick out a number of candidates by order of desire. The town makes use of a multiround course of to rely the ballots, and it will probably take a number of rounds of tallying earlier than a winner receives greater than 50% of the vote. Although hundreds of votes remained uncounted Thursday night, the hole of assist between Lurie and his opponents was deemed too huge to bridge.
Lurie, a centrist Democrat, outpaced incumbent Mayor London Breed and three different outstanding native Democrats, receiving 56.2% of the full ranked-choice vote in contrast with Breed’s 43.8% as of Thursday’s rely. Lurie’s lead was narrower when it got here to voters’ first-choice picks: He acquired 27.9% of first-choice votes in contrast with 24.5% for Breed.
Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, the one main candidate working as an old-school progressive, got here in third after being eradicated from the working with 21.6% of first-choice votes, and enterprise capitalist Mark Farrell, a average, trailed in fourth place. Supervisor Ahsha Safaí was knocked out of the working early after getting simply 2.7% of first-choice votes.
Lurie issued a quick assertion on social media Thursday night time thanking supporters. At an election night time occasion Tuesday, he summarized his management imaginative and prescient for jubilant supporters gathered at a music venue within the Mission district.
“Our challenge and opportunity is to show how government can deliver on its promise of a safer and more affordable city,” Lurie stated. “And executing on these promises requires us to be courageous, compassionate and honest.
“It’s never been more clear to me that so many people love this city, and it’s time for us to start making people feel like the city loves them back.”
In a press release posted on social media Thursday night, Breed stated she had known as Lurie to congratulate him.
“Being mayor of San Francisco has been the greatest honor of my lifetime. I’m beyond grateful to our residents for the opportunity to serve the City that raised me,” Breed wrote. “During my final two months as your mayor, I will continue to lead this City as I have from Day One — as San Francisco’s biggest champion.”
The transition from Breed to Lurie is a outstanding activate many fronts.
Breed, 50, made historical past six years in the past when she turned the town’s first Black feminine mayor. She was born into poverty within the Western Addition, on the time one in every of San Francisco’s hardest neighborhoods, and raised by her grandmother. She misplaced a sister to a drug overdose and has a brother in jail for theft. Earlier than being elected mayor, she was president of the highly effective Board of Supervisors.
Lurie, 47, was additionally born in San Francisco, the son of a rabbi. His dad and mom divorced when he was a younger boy, and his mom, Miriam Haas, went on to marry Peter Haas. Peter Haas, now deceased, was the great-grandnephew of the Levi’s founder and a longtime govt on the firm. Lurie and his mom are among the many major heirs of the Levi Strauss household fortune. Lurie has by no means earlier than held elected workplace.
All through the marketing campaign, Lurie distinguished himself as a political outsider working in opposition to 4 Metropolis Corridor veterans. He pledged to root out authorities corruption, a priority amongst voters following a collection of political scandals in metropolis departments and nonprofits in recent times.
The election was broadly seen as a referendum on Breed’s efforts to deal with homeless encampments, crime and a flagging post-pandemic financial system that lower at voters’ sense of a secure, well-functioning metropolis.
“This is not an election that was about an ideological or policy-based shift or rejection of Breed,” stated Jason McDaniel, a political science professor at San Francisco State College. “It’s an outsider who is different and who was able to portray himself in that way as someone who will do things differently.”
In a marked shift for San Francisco, the town’s rich tech sector performed an influential position on this yr’s race. Tech titans who’ve put down roots within the metropolis poured tens of millions of {dollars} into marketing campaign contributions, urgent for an final result that might infuse this famously liberal metropolis with extra centrist politics.
That cash overwhelmingly benefited Lurie, Farrell and Breed.
“It’s been the billionaire election,” stated Jim Ross, a veteran Bay Space Democratic strategist.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed confronted a tricky reelection bid in opposition to 4 challengers who stated she had not carried out sufficient to deal with property crime and homelessness within the metropolis.
(Eric Risberg / Related Press)
Breed was first elected in 2018, profitable a particular election after the sudden loss of life of then-Mayor Ed Lee. She led the town by way of a difficult interval that features the unsettling early unfold of COVID-19 and the next exodus of scores of downtown tech employees who, amid pandemic-related shutdowns, discovered themselves in a position to work remotely — and extra cheaply — from different cities.
Breed has by no means been a bleeding-heart progressive, regardless of San Francisco’s liberal status. However the Breed of six years in the past was extra open to experimenting with a progressive reformist agenda when it got here to fixing complicated points corresponding to dependancy and poverty.
Within the final two years, in contrast, she has develop into a number one voice in a motion to crack down on homeless folks and addicts who refuse shelter or remedy. And this yr she efficiently championed two native poll measures that bolstered police surveillance powers and would require drug screening and remedy for folks receiving county welfare advantages who’re suspected of illicit drug use.
Lots of her supporters famous her fast motion to close down San Francisco within the early days of the COVID emergency, a choice credited with saving hundreds of lives.
In making her case for reelection, Breed touted latest knowledge displaying notable reductions in property crime and violent crime during the last yr.
Her opponents dismissed that progress as too little, too late, and seized on voter dissatisfaction to pitch themselves as extra certified options.
Each Lurie and Farrell promised a extra concerted crackdown on crime and homelessness and to reinvigorate the downtown financial system.
Lurie had the benefit of his household’s huge wealth to strengthen his identify recognition. He showered his marketing campaign with greater than $8 million of his personal cash. His mom contributed greater than $1 million to an impartial committee backing his mayoral bid.
He showcased his position as founding father of Tipping Level, a San Francisco nonprofit that funds efforts to raise folks out of poverty, to spotlight his dedication to fixing intractable issues. He stated the group has funneled $500 million to Bay Space organizations centered on early childhood schooling, scholarships, housing and job coaching since its founding practically 20 years in the past.
Farrell entered the race with assist generated throughout his seven years as a supervisor, and made the case that his mix of political and enterprise expertise made him most certified to get San Francisco again on monitor. However his marketing campaign floundered amid moral considerations. This week, he agreed to pay a nice of $108,000 following an ethics investigation that decided he had illegally financed his mayoral marketing campaign with cash poured right into a separate poll measure committee he sponsored to cut back the variety of authorities commissions in San Francisco.
Peskin, a longtime supervisor, organized a strong grassroots marketing campaign centered on conventional liberal beliefs, corresponding to making the town reasonably priced for nurses, academics, and the artists and bohemians who’ve lengthy made San Francisco a inventive hub.
