A new poll shows criminal defense attorney Nathan Hochman has a commanding lead over Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón in the race for the incumbent’s seat.
If the Nov. 5 election were held today, 45 percent of likely voters in Los Angeles County would cast their ballots for Hochman, while only 20 percent would cast their ballots for Gascón, according to the new poll from the Institute for Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, co-sponsored by the Times.
As the election approaches, 35% of potential voters say they are still undecided. Candidates have less than 80 days to inform these undecided voters about their platforms and backgrounds, in the hopes of influencing opinions.
But so far, “there is broad support for Hochman across almost every subgroup,” according to Mark DiCamillo, director of the poll, conducted between July 31 and Aug. 11.
Gascón’s image among voters is largely negative: 21% of them have a favorable opinion, 45% an unfavorable opinion and 34% have no opinion. On the other hand, 35% have a favorable opinion of Hochman, only 7% have an unfavorable opinion and 57% have no opinion.
Although the poll results show that Gascón will face a re-election challenge, Hochman remains unknown to many. Fifty-seven percent of the 1,136 likely Los Angeles County voters surveyed said they had “no opinion” about him, compared to 34 percent for Gascón.
A former federal prosecutor and chairman of the Los Angeles Ethics Commission, Hochman has years of experience in the field. Democrats have tried to cast him as a Republican, and while he is an independent in this year’s race, he was the GOP candidate for state attorney general in 2022.
Many seem to blame Gascón for the sense that crime is spiraling out of control, although some statistics contradict that narrative.
In the new poll, 60% of respondents said they believed public safety in the county had declined over the past three years, while only 5% said it had improved. Of those who said it had improved, 28% said Gascón’s policies had “greatly contributed” to the decline, while 53% of those who said public safety had declined said Gascón’s policies had “greatly contributed” to the decline.
That doesn’t bode well for Gascón, DiCamillo said.
“Of those who have an opinion on Nathan Hochman, they’re giving their opinion and they have a positive image of him, which is a good place to start if you’re unknown,” DiCamillo said. “Whereas Gascón has a negative image. In polls, in my experience, one of the hardest things to do is overcome a negative image that’s built up. It takes something major.”
The election will help determine the future of criminal justice and law enforcement in Los Angeles County.
For USC law professor Jody Armour, “this is really a referendum on the vision of criminal justice and public safety” that resonates with the public.
The new poll, which has a margin of error of 3 points, offers a glimpse into how voters view the race as Election Day approaches. Voters will head to the polls four years after the Black Lives Matter and police reform movements elected left-leaning district attorneys in communities across the country, including Gascón.
“This election will be a referendum on whether Los Angeles truly wants to embrace criminal justice reform and the spirit of the progressive prosecutors movement that reimagines safety as not about longer sentences, because the data shows that longer sentences do not necessarily make us safer,” Armour said.
That message doesn’t seem to have been heard by many voters surveyed in the new poll. By some measures, crime has declined in Los Angeles during Gascón’s tenure and in recent decades.
For example, in the city of Los Angeles, violent crime fell nearly 7% from the previous year in October 2023, with 1,650 fewer violent incidents reported to police as of September 30, 2023, compared to the same date in 2022, according to LAPD data. Petty theft increased 14% over the period, but other property crimes, as well as homicides, robberies and rapes, declined in the city.
But crime has increased by other measures, as Gascón’s opponents are quick to point out. For example, Los Angeles County recorded 212 homicides last year, compared with 195 in 2022, an 8% increase, according to the sheriff’s department.
Only a tenth of voters surveyed in the new Berkeley IGS poll said Gascón would do a better job combating organized retail and armed robberies, a hot-button issue in Los Angeles, which has seen a wave of brazen crime in recent years. For Hochman, that figure was 38 percent, about the same percentage who thought he would do a better job prosecuting cases involving violent crime than Gascón.
That doesn’t surprise Hochman, who spoke to the Times about the investigation Thursday.
“This poll is consistent with everything we’ve seen since the March 5 primary,” Hochman said. “Poll after poll shows that Los Angeles voters are fed up with crime and feel less safe today than they did when George Gascón took office in 2020. And they want a prosecutor who will enforce the law fairly and make them feel safe again.”
Gascón’s campaign did not make him available for an interview about the poll, but provided a brief statement via email.
“Mr. Hochman is betting that voters will forget that he was a Republican until 2022 — six years of Donald Trump’s hatred and bigotry,” wrote Jamarah Hayner, Gascón’s campaign strategist. “In Los Angeles, that’s a risky bet.”
Michael Trujillo, a veteran campaign consultant and senior adviser to an anti-Gascón independent spending committee, said he believes the Berkeley IGS poll shows Hochman is striking a chord with voters.
“I think Nathan Hochman has to convince the Democrats in the county that he’s the best choice,” Trujillo said. “And as of today, I think he has a very good chance of doing that, given how weak Gascón is countywide.”
Gascón’s tenure as district attorney has been fraught with problems. Twenty prosecutors have accused him of workplace retaliation, and he has been named in more than a dozen civil lawsuits, most brought by his own employees.
Earlier this year, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced 11 charges against Diana Teran, a high-ranking aide to Gascón who oversaw ethics and integrity in the district attorney’s office, accusing her of illegally flagging the names of several sheriff’s deputies for inclusion in a database of officers accused of misconduct. State prosecutors dropped three of the charges against Teran this month, and she has denied any wrongdoing.
If Gascón hopes to reverse the trends reflected in these latest poll numbers, USC’s Armour said, he needs to change his rhetoric.
“Part of the DA’s job description is not only going to be to develop good criminal justice policy for his office to enforce, but also to communicate to the public a very clear picture of what’s happening with crime and punishment in Los Angeles County,” Armour said. “He has to see his role as being a good communicator who lays out the facts clearly like a good administrator.”
