In a maelstrom of supporters (and a few protestors), Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, already a known candidate, made it official on Saturday: He is running for mayor of San Francisco.
“I will be a mayor who loves this city, and does not beat it up for political gain,” said Peskin, who made the announcement at 11 a.m. at Portsmouth Square in Chinatown. “I will be a hands-on mayor, using 25 years of governmental know-how to once again make San Francisco the city that knows how.”
Peskin gave a sunny, positive speech, one that declined to mention any opponents in the mayor’s race by name, or even the existence of any opponents beyond such general categories as “this administration” and “a handful of billionaires.” In this, he stands in direct contrast to candidates like Mark Farrell, who announced his run by describing current mayor London Breed as “a mayor without a vision,” and Ahsha Safai, who informed voters that he already has a list of people he’ll fire should he win the election.
Despite protesters and fellow candidates doing their best to sideline the 59-year-old Peskin as a foe of the police, Peskin would not have it. “It’s not enough to make people safe. We have to make them feel safe too. What we’ve seen from this administration and its allies is an effort to make people feel afraid for their own political gain.”
Peskin has voted to increase the police budget, overtime and staffing, as well as an emergency declaration in the Tenderloin, he said. “I support arresting drug dealers and holding them accountable. But arresting drug users and doing nothing more is a cynical and dangerous policy that often results in more overdoses, and not more treatment for addiction.”
Recovery, as a metaphor both for the city and for Peskin’s own experience, was a major theme, to the point where, at times, the announcement felt like an intervention for civic governance at large. “I am so deeply and sincerely grateful to have received the support I needed to recover and become sober,” said Peskin. “I honestly wouldn’t be standing here without it today. And it has inspired me to dedicate the next chapter of my life to the recovery of this city. That is why I am announcing my candidacy for mayor today.”
Before the rally, a few dozen protesters gathered outside of Portsmouth Square. They alternated between the more traditional “Hey hey, ho ho, Aaron Peskin has got to go!” and a more sporty-sounding “Pesky Peskin!” They held up signs ranging from “Aaron Peskin: Not in My Backyard” to “Anybody but Peskin” to, more enigmatically, “Peskin: The Trump of the West.” Many of them carried fly-swatters, which they whacked against their signs for emphasis.
The “Trump of the West” sign was held by J.J. Smith, an affable-seeming guy who said he joined the protest because he “answered a call on Twitter.” He declined to explain further, but on Twitter, he elaborated for his followers. “I was just handed a sign,” he wrote. “I never read it. For all I know, it could’ve said “Kick J.J. in the ass.”
“We’re representing the moderate camp,” said Jade Tu, one of the organizers behind the protest. “Some Mark Farrell people are here. But we are really rallying behind not wanting Aaron to be mayor.”
Tu was also, as it turned out, among the Mark Farrell people who were there — Farrell’s campaign manager to be exact. Before that, she was campaign manager for District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, and chief of staff for Together SF, one of a small but extremely well-funded group of billionaire-adjacent organizations and nonprofits that have recently begun to pour millions of dollars into city elections.
But it wasn’t all protesters. A wide array of San Francisco archetypes gathered for Peskin’s announcement, many of them running around in T-shirts with the logos of different progressive organizations. There were Asian seniors in giant sun hats, a sizeable contingent in matching “San Francisco Flower Market” hoodies (”Peskin worked hard to save our flower market,” says Jeanne Boes, the market’s general manager). Every type of San Francisco bohemian fashion was on display, including an eerie number of nattily-dressed bearded men who looked almost exactly like Peskin himself. Nearly everyone there was holding the identical “We Need Aaron” posters that are the official signage for the Peskin campaign.
In his speech, Peskin also promised to create an inspector general position “with the power of subpoena and investigation” to fight crime within city government. He promised to immediately expand rent control if the statewide initiative to repeal Costa Hawkins (which bans rent control in buildings constructed after 1975) is successful. He promised to build 46,000 units of affordable housing in the next eight years in addition to the state-mandated 36,000 (a clear reference to his being labeled as a NIMBY by some opponents). He promised to launch “a Marshall Plan for the middle class” by issuing tax-deferred bonds to build housing for them and by lowering taxes paid by smaller businesses. He also promised to help the city prepare for sea level rise.
“I have no doubt that this is going to be a difficult campaign,” said Peskin, clearly winding things down and heading for closure. “Most of my opponents have at least one billionaire on their side, if not more. This handful of billionaires pouring billions of dollars of dark money into ugly smear campaigns threatens to destroy much of what makes this a unique, vibrant and magical city. And while I think we don’t have to deal with the billionaires on my side, I have you!” Big cheers erupted. The speech ended with an ask for donations, but also for everyone to take five “We Need Aaron” signs (“One for you, and four for your neighbors”) and to sign up to be precinct captains.
And with that, by 11:40 a.m, it was over. The crowd dispersed into the sunny afternoon, leaving behind a sea of white folding chairs.
You can read Aaron Peskin’s full campaign kick-off speech here.
Re: showing up at an event just to disrupt it, in an effort to spread anger and animosity, the great Taylor Swift said it best:
“…all you’re ever gonna be is mean.
Why you gotta be so mean?”
We could do worse than Peskin as mayor.
But we don’t have to.
Satric moment of the rally: when counter protesters silently, “stood with“ Garry Tan’s tiny group of paid protesters; the counter counters held funny signs with slogans like “Neuroscientists” for “Democracy”, “Make America Gentrified Again”, “Will Bully for Billionaires” , “The Rent is Too Damn Low”, and “I ❤️ Disinformation.” Jade Tu (who is Mark Farrell’s current campaign manager, and DA Brooke Jenkins’ former campaign manager and a new elected to DCCC) was angrily shrieking into a bullhorn. Onlookers cringed when Forest Liu took the bullhorn and told all “non whites” present to “get down on their knees and bow” to Peskin; starkly tone deaf. It’s not lost on anyone that Jade Tu literally makes her living by stirring the toxic shit in the campaigns she is paid handsomely to work on. Tu and her fly swatting rabies could not be heard from within the rally of about 1000 people. Maybe Garry Tan shouldn’t drink or drug up and post on social media. Rehab for Garry?Looking forward,hopefully Jade Tu and her boss Mark Farrell will come to their senses and realize that performances like this only alienate voters.
JJ Smith is of course a straight-up duplicitous propagandist masquerading as an altruist.
First off, I generally don’t like the guy. But, listen to the logic: The biggest problem we have is homelessness and the difficulty of living on a low budget. The BIGGEST source of that isn’t actually a lack of housing. It’s a lack of *affordable* housing. Adding a 20story building full of luxury apartments literally RAISES the cost of living in an area. We call it “Gentrification”. And all these YIMBY people used to know that. They can’t name a SINGLE proposition in Peskin’s area where he blocked an affordable housing unit. But, there are literally hundreds he’s approved.
But why they hate? Go look at sfethics and guess what? There’s literally a million dollars in campaign money going against him from billionaires. He’s not being hyperbolic, there are literally 2 billionares who got kneecapped by his waterfront density law because they bought little commercial buildings, kicked out the tenants, filed for a “conversion” with a 4 story and THEN filed for a modification to 20story luxury condos. And Peskin shut them down. One of the guys who lost a chance to make millions is the Chair of sfstandard.com (actually a decent guy BUT, pissed off)
So, before you go rail against this a-hole politician. Think about this: Breed sucked up to billionaires and every single pile of money or political threat in existance because she was terrified of losing her job. The supervisors stopped her from doing a LOT of really stupid stuff, and probably a lot of good stuff that simply was written up terribly. These PACs literally write the programs that she proposes, it’s not her staff. She doesn’t have a pile of lawyers to write this (congress works exactly the same way, it’s not a slam on breed).
So, the real question is: If Peskin’s “let’s keep our neighborhoods charming, not do things to raise the cost of living, help renters out, make new low cost housing and SROs that can be used by the poor, and working-class to STOP even more homelessness and crime” is a good direction, then you need to decide if the guy who’s -by far- the most politically adept, who has a reputation for not bending to the will of money, who knows every single little law and ordinance in the city, who knows all the good people AND all the bad people, is going to be an effective leader, then you probaby agree that it’s like hiring an attorney:
I’m sure you’ve all heard this: yes, he’s an a-hole, but he’s my a-hole attorney.
I really don’t like the guy, but of the options, he’s clearly the only one who’s not completely full of crap looking for a job. And he’s not going to be weak.
IF – however – you’re looking to build luxury condos and put up franchise restaurants all over the city, he’s going to be a major blocking point.
I agree with a lot of what you’re saying here, but really can’t understand the position that restricting market-rate housing is the way to lower the cost of living. That’s not how the cost of living works whatsoever, and as many “YIMBY people” do know, restricting the supply of either BMR housing or market-rate is a terrible way to create greater access to housing. That’s sort of the entire YIMBY thing; to build more of all of it, for everyone.
It seems growingly obvious that no one considers that the cost of building housing is expensive regardless of whether it’s considered “affordable” or “luxury”. The difference is purely regulatory and subsidy-based. It isn’t a matter of what it costs, but who pays for it (which is by and large taxpayers and for-profit developers).
Access to housing is more than an affordability issue (albeit a fundamental one) and plenty of factors play a role in someone being able to access, let alone keep housing. Ultimately, affordability is only a reasonable concern to toil over if we can manage to build any.
“They can’t name a SINGLE proposition in Peskin’s area where he blocked an affordable housing unit.”
Of course he hasn’t blocked specific affordable units – he doesn’t explicitly have to. He’s spent decades fighting to prevent _any_ sort of development on his particular slice of SF – it’s extremely clear that’s literally the only thing he’s ever cared about in his entire career – and when the biggest source of BMR housing funding is market rate development, you’ve blocked all the BMR housing that would fund too.
BIG thanks to the professional and credible journalists at Mission Local for including the full text of Peskin’s speech here. No spin. No hot takes. No anecdotes. No fly swatters or circus tricks or bear costumes or rainbows. Just the text of the speech. Thank you ML.
You are welcome. Smith is a pro.
No other candidate gets this treatment.
Sorry, but I cannot consider a group calling Peskin the Trump of the west seriously.
These people are unhinged.
I believe that Costa Hawkins bans rent control on builds built after 1995, not 1975.
I’m dismayed that protesters showed up, but I guess that is going to be standard during this election cycle. I hope to return the favor during Farrell’s next campaign event. It’s time for oppo research.
Gary: Some of us have to be grownups. If you are all in for Peskin, I understand your frustration, but escalating is just going to turn this city into a clown show. I would say the same for any candidate.
This is supposed to be an intelligent city. Can we please act like it?
Sleepy, OK, for now I’ll behave. Sadly, there have been too many recent examples where political bullying has been an effective tool.
Let the fearmongers present themselves as frothing hysterics, not allow ourselves to baited down to their level, and let’s keep our eyes on the prize of connecting with San Franciscans to elect a progressive mayor and marginalize the crypto swindlers.
Peskin opposed Chesa Boudin’s recall. SF voted to the contrary. He opposed the school board recalls. SF voted to the contrary. He has been on the losing side of most major propositions in recent years.
We’ll see if name recognition is enough to overcome his being on the wrong side of the voters, repeatedly.
Here is the fact. Peskin has been at the center of San Francisco government for 25 years and in all that time, things have only got worse in San Francisco.
Hi Gigi: Way before 25 years ago, I started as a “community volunteer” in 94124; then met and worked with volunteers in neighborhoods all around the city. I learned that unless we volunteers shared the same goals as city staff (ours being to improve our neighborhood/theirs depending on their career or professional aspirations) they were able to prevent us from accomplishing anything (out of spite they once even did the opposite of what a dozen community groups, commissioners, and the district supervisor asked for–the dept head who instigated that never lived in San Francisco and did not like the city). I was surprised when supervisors and their aides first told me that they were also disdained and ignored by city staff. D10’s supervisor told me that city staff were the permanent government and could delay anything until after a supervisor’s term in office–very little got done for years and a lot of money and opportunities were wasted. So how does anything eventually get done in San Francisco? City staff might not like it but they respond to a persistent (I mean phone calls!) and vocal (news media!) Mayor who could excoriate them, demote them, transfer them, or reward them.