People fought really hard to ensure that I didn't win.

I won hamsonly.

George Gascon was elected District Attorney of Los Angeles County in November 2020.

It said the largest county in the country by a long shot.

It was a major victory for criminal justice reformers.

The leading progressive prosecutor in the country taking over the movement's top target.

Here's how Gascon explained it when we met this week in his office at the Hall of Justice in downtown LA.

We're larger than 32 states and because we incarcerate our rates that were higher proportionally,

than even some of the most conservative counties in the state proportionate,

we put more people on death road.

So we were way out there.

Back then, in the summer of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd sparked a new racial justice movement,

being a well-known advocate for criminal justice reform was an asset in this town.

People were putting up BLM signs in Beverly Hills and Gascon leaned into a message of radical reform.

But once in office, as some crimes in Los Angeles spiked, there was a backlash.

In Beverly Hills, the city council passed a vote of no confidence resolution against Gascon.

But it became fashionable for affluent white people to want to be pro-loyalist accountability.

It was kind of the cheek thing to do.

At the time, I actually thought there was a parting of the waters.

I said, for the first time, I'm hearing white affluent people understanding the suffering of black people in this country and poor people.

And I thought, this is a reversal.

This is a, you know, I was wrong there.

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