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Critiques of first-term Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price have continued to amp up in the weeks ahead of the November election in which voters will decide whether she should be removed from office two years after she was first elected — all while large sums of money pour into, and out of, the pro-recall campaign.
Many of those critical voices are echoing throughout the Tri-Valley in recent days, with several high-profile endorsements of the recall campaign emerging from Congress to local police unions and thousands of dollars in campaign contributions pouring in from Tri-Valley donors.
U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Livermore) – a former deputy district attorney under Price’s predecessor, Nancy O’Malley – escalated the calls for Price’s removal from office last week in a press conference in Hayward in which he formally endorsed the recall campaign.
“District Attorney Pamela Price has failed the victims of violent crime, and their families,” Swalwell said in a press release in conjunction with his appearance at Hayward City Hall on Oct. 2. “Public safety is the paramount concern of Alameda County residents. Yet, under Price, the cops catch the criminals and Price puts them back into our community to re-offend.”
Swalwell’s remarks and endorsement came days before another press conference announcing that every city police union in Alameda County, including Pleasanton and Livermore, endorsed the recall, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. The move came following a $20,000 campaign contribution to the recall campaign from the Alameda County Deputy Sheriff’s Association PAC.
The Alameda County Prosecutors Association also previously voted to support the recall.
Livermore Police Chief Jeramy Young took to social media this week with his own critiques of Price in the wake of a recent sentencing.
Young said he was “deeply disappointed with the outcome” of a felony case against Colby Berry, a 21-year-old Fremont man who received a five year and eight month prison sentence upon pleading guilty to two counts of second-degree robbery for attacking two women at Arroyo Shopping Center in Livermore, robbing one of them for her purse at gunpoint in May 2023. In the sentencing, Berry was granted 460 days for time already served.
“This is a case where the punishment does not fit the crime,” Young said in a social media post from the Livermore Police Department. “People who use firearms to commit violent crimes must be held accountable. In this case, all the firearms charges were ignored.”
Young, who earlier this year announced a conservative bid for the State Senate seat representing a district in Central California in 2026, specifically critiqued Price’s decision not to seek special enhancements that he had requested, which would have led to additional prison time. The maximum sentence for second-degree robbery, according to California Penal Code, is five years.
“The public should know that based on our review of the evidence and the law, Chief Young’s request for career criminal and firearm enhancement in Mr. Berry’s case were not legally justified or sustainable,” Price’s office said in a subsequent statement to the media.
The “catch and release” narrative that paints Price as being “soft on crime” has been a throughline in the recall campaign since it was launched last year, months after Price took office in January 2023 – and one that Price and her supporters have consistently challenged, along with the motives of her opponents.
“No surprise the Livermore Police Chief is disappointed that he and the police unions no longer control the Alameda DA’s office,” Price’s campaign said on social media Tuesday. “And trying to bully #DAPamelaPrice is a losing strategy. She has taken on prison wardens and won!”
The anti-recall campaign went on to point to Young’s status as a Republican candidate in the State Senate District 4 race outside of Alameda County, asking “why would he expect (Pamela Price) to allow him to be judge, jury and executioner on any case in Alameda County?”
The campaign was also critical of Swalwell’s press conference last week, calling it “shocking behavior”.
“Can someone tell (Rep. Swalwell) that it’s ok if your candidate lost,” Price’s campaign said on social media on Oct. 2, alluding to Swalwell’s endorsement of Price’s opponent for the DA’s seat in 2022, Terry Wiley.
“In Alameda County (and the Democratic Party) we respect the will of the voters,” they continued. “You’re standing with Republicans on this one!”
In an interview with ABC7 News, Price said that Swalwell was “parroting the same unfounded claims that we’re not prosecuting, that we’re releasing people”.
“I think people expect our Congresspeople to listen to the constituents to really do their research, and you know, to really weigh out with their position should be,” Price told ABC 7.
It remains to be seen until after Nov. 5 whether a majority Swalwell’s constituents in the Tri-Valley will agree with the congressman’s analysis of Price’s tenure and actions in office.
However, campaign finance filings suggest that some Tri-Valley voters are on his side, with multiple donors and thousands of dollars flooding into the pro-recall campaign from Tri-Valley residents and organizations amounting to more than $50,000, compared with $5,600 from two individual donors in Pleasanton to the anti-recall campaign.
Donations from Tri-Valley sources to the recall campaign include $100 from a Livermore resident, $500 from a Dublin resident, $500 from Livermore-based County Builders Construction Inc., $1,000 from Livermore-based Tao Mechanical, and $10,000 from Pleasanton-based Northern California District of Council of Laborers.
However, a majority of the local hefty contributions to the pro-recall campaign come from supporters of the effort on the other side of the county line in the San Ramon Valley, who have donated to the campaign despite not being within Price’s jurisdiction.
The biggest cash contribution from a Tri-Valley resident so far in the campaign is $35,900 to date from John Wayland, a Danville resident and executive director for the Washington-based real estate investment company Holland Partner Group. An additional $150,000 was contributed to the pro-recall campaign from Holland itself.
Another major Tri-Valley donation to the pro-recall campaign was $15,000 from the San Ramon Valley-based Behring Capital CEO Colin Behring, grandson of the late Blackhawk founding developer Ken Behring. Alamo-based Tower Building Investors also donated $5,000 to the campaign, with San Ramon-based engineering consultant firm Engeo contributing $2,000.
A majority of the other donations are smaller contributions ranging from $500 to $5,000 from individual Alamo and Danville residents.
But despite the large amounts of cash and support flowing into the campaign from Tri-Valley residents and other sources, amounting to $996,429 in total as of Sept. 21, the pro-recall campaign has seen dwindling contributions in recent filings, with expenses – amounting to more than $1.3 million – exceeding revenues by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
While the total funds raised by the anti-recall campaign – $242,321 as of Sept. 21 – are dwarfed by the total funds raised by the pro-recall campaign, the anti-recall campaign outpaced the pro-recall campaign in fundraising for the most recent filing period between July 1 and Sept. 21, coming out with $78,000 in that period compared with $70,000 for the pro-recall campaign.
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What happened to the three strikes and your out law?
Just recently reported by the SF Chronicle….misdemeanor charges on 1000 individuals arrested in Alameda County have been dropped, because the expiration date for the Alameda County prosecutor to file charges has passed. Price’s office is trying to blame it on their predecessor.
I was getting the Alameda County District Attorney’s email every month. I deleted them. Today I received it, it was labeled weekly. I clicked on the unsubscribe button, and I was directed to a page that said subscribe. I sent an email stating, that you are required under federal law to provide an unsubscribe bar. I then received an email with an unsubscribe bar. I clicked the unsubscribe bar, I was notified that I was unsubscribed to all Alameda County emails. I replied I wanted to unsubscribe to the DA junk, nothing else. I did not receive a response to that email.