Third Elected Prosecutor Withdraws Endorsement Of Spitzer; Retraction Floodgates Swing Open

Alameda District Attorney Nancy O’Malley is the third elected official to withdraw their endorsement of Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer as fallout from racist statement scandal reverberates across California.

Earlier Friday evening, Riverside District Attorney Mike Hestrin disavowed Spitzer. “The news of the comments and actions of Mr. Spitzer was shocking, disappointing and in the end inexcusable… I must retract my endorsement of Mr. Spitzer in his re-election campaign,” Hestrin told OC Watch through his campaign manager.  

Hestrin, a Republican, rescinded his endorsements just hours after San Diego District Attorney Summer Stephan withdrew her support. These retractions follow a call for Spitzer to resign from Orange County Democratic Party Chairwoman Ada Briceño: “Racism must stop. Spitzer must resign. This is one of many examples why Spitzer is unfit to serve in our halls of justice.”

You can read more about the scandal from coverage in Politico, BuzzFeed, The Los Angeles Times, Voice of OC, New York Daily News, The Orange County Register, and multiple Southern California televisionnews stations, but here is the crux of the controversy: Spitzer recently allegedly opined out of nowhere in the middle of a meeting over whether the office should seek to execute a Black man that “he knows many black people who get themselves out of their bad circumstances and bad situations by only dating ‘white women.’” He also said that while in college, he “knew for sure that this black student did so on purpose to get himself out of these bad circumstances and situations.” People who attended the meeting, as well as anyone who read the comments and has a pulse, have characterized these comments as “racist”.