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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC back to election results now. This time local races and ballot issues across the country with a lens on a public safety and criminal justice reform set of issues. There were dramatic results in Buffalo, Minneapolis, Seattle, and elsewhere. The Minneapolis story included a question about whether their city's police force should effectively be reinvented from scratch in the year after the police murder of George Floyd.

With me now is Daniel Nichanian journalist covering criminal justice, voting rights, and local politics and elections. He also runs the website, whatsontheballot.com, a guide to local and state elections across the country. Daniel, thanks so much for coming on. Welcome back to WNYC.

Daniel Nichanian: Thank you. It's great to join you.

Brian Lehrer: Let me get your name right. I think I mispronounce it, is it Nichanian?

Daniel Nichanian: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Okay. Daniel Nichanian from What's On The Ballot. Listeners, we can take your calls on some of these local and state elections. Anybody from Buffalo or Seattle, anybody who went to the polls in Minneapolis, let us know how it went and your reactions as you learn the results. 212-433 WNYC, 212-433 or tweet @BrianLehrer.

Let's start with Buffalo, Daniel, India Walton, Democratic Socialist who won the Democratic primary is down in the race for Buffalo mayor, her opponent Byron Brown, the incumbent who launched a write-in campaign after losing the primary to Walton has declared victory. Has that race officially been called yet?

Daniel Nichanian: I do not believe the race has been called though it does look like India Walton, possibly the most emblematic candidate of the left in yesterday's elections, in terms of the attention she got and the message she had. It does appear that she will lose the election at this moment.

Brian Lehrer: I can't recall a single write-in campaign in which a major party candidate was defeated in a major race. Byron Brown is the incumbent mayor. He's not just a write-in outsider so maybe it's different because of that, but do you know of any precedent for this?

Daniel Nichanian: Well, the precedent that immediately comes to mind is the Alaska Senate race in 2010, in actually similar circumstances where there was a primary upset against Murkowski, and then she came back in the general election with the write-in bid and prevailed. What is interesting in the race in New York with India Walton yesterday, is that the democratic establishment ended up to some degree rallying around her very, very late, for instance, Chuck Schumer endorsed her a couple of weeks ago.

There was definitely many months between late June when the primary was held and October where there was a void in terms of what the Democratic Party was doing, at the most prominent level. That definitely gave room for the incumbent to reenter the race, raise a lot of money, and really spread the word around the write-in that they were bracelets, for instance, being passed around to help people remember to write in the name Brown into the ballot yesterday.

Brian Lehrer: That referendum in Minneapolis did not pass despite the protests in the wake of George Floyd's death at the hands of former police officer, Derek Chauvin. Any early analysis as to why they failed to win the vote on disbanding the Minneapolis Police Department, as it exists and reformulating it?

Daniel Nichanian: I think that was definitely one of the most symbolic losses for the site that really wants to revamp criminal justice and policing. It got so much attention and part because it was obviously where George Floyd was murdered a year ago. On the one side, if you had told someone 18 months ago that more than 40% of major cities' electorate would support replacing a police department that would've been used. On the other hand, it is most certainly a loss given the amount of energy and funding that was poured into it.

I think the messaging around questions of, is the police being entirely replaced? Is it being dismantled? Is something else coming into place that is like policing? I think there was a lot of uncertainty and confusion, not necessarily in the actual substance of the referendum, but at least in terms of how this was being discussed.

Brian Lehrer: I see there were two other referendums related to policing in big-city elections. One was in Austin to increase police funding and another in Cleveland to strengthen police oversight. How did those turn out?

Daniel Nichanian: Yes, that is correct. Those were very interesting, especially the one in Austin because there, it was a bit of the mirror image of the one in Minneapolis, it was a conservative push in Austin to increase the size of the police force and increase police funding, and that lost by a very wide margin about two to one. What's interesting is that this isn't exactly a victory for the status quo because Austin actually made cuts to the police a year ago in 2020. This election was in part framed as a need to reverse those cuts, and reincrease policing and that push lost.

In Cleveland, as you mentioned, there was a measure issue 24 to increase oversight on the police department, create and strengthen a board and civilian oversight effectively on the police. It certainly is not as strong a measure as what we were seeing in Minneapolis, it passed easily and the police union was very strongly against it, or warning of repercussions on police officers and that also passed, yes.

Brian Lehrer: When you take into account all three of these referendums, do they about sum up how Americans' views of policing are changing, That people are reluctant to rebuild police departments entirely, but are receptive to increased oversight and disinclined to add funding to already massive police budgets?

Daniel Nichanian: I think that sounds roughly right. I would just caution that the battles around this are so ingrained in the type of organizing that's happening in the demands and that people are asking in relationships with City Council. Especially we're talking about here major American cities that it's really an evolving picture. I think we will certainly see organizers continue pushing measures like Minneapolis and Cleveland on parallel tracks in the coming years.

Brian Lehrer: In contrast to Buffalo where the Democratic Socialist Democratic nominee, Indian Walton, appears to have lost things seem to have gone differently in Boston and Pittsburgh, Michelle Wu in Boston, and Ed Gainey in Pittsburgh, both progressives one mayor races against more centrist Democrats. Why might they have fared better than India Walton in Buffalo or Lorena Gonzalez in Seattle who we haven't mentioned yet?

Daniel Nichanian: Right. It was really a mixed bag in terms of the intra-democratic collections yesterday between the more left factions and centrist factions. The Boston race you mentioned really is perhaps the most interesting progressive win because Michelle Wu, who you'll hear about, surely, in the coming years as the new mayor of Boston, has been talked about for a very long time in Boston as a progressive champion. She talks a lot about the green new deal at the local level in reinvestments in transit and housing. She won quite easily in Boston.

In Pittsburgh, the progressive candidate actually won against the incumbent mayor in the primary, the incumbent mayor chose to not press a write-in bid unlike in Buffalo and Ed Gainey who you mentioned won the general yesterday. Another one is Cleveland where the more progressive candidate won yesterday as well. All of them had a lot of ties to local organizing, and it'll be very interesting to see how they govern in the coming years.

Brian Lehrer: Can you talk more about Seattle and Lorena Gonzalez for people around the country who haven't followed that race?

Daniel Nichanian: Yes. That was a race that was evolving fairly late in the night because since it's on the west coast. The more progressive candidate there who ran on being more critical of the police and also in the context of very, very intense battles are on taxes and business there. The more progressive candidate lost there in Seattle. Actually, there were a number of other bad results for the left in Seattle, in the race for city attorney another race that was really fought around matters of approaches to crime. Again, a mixed bag there. Seattle and meaning apple were definitely huge wins for a moderate side of the party and other parts of the country in Ohio or Boston saw a string of wins for the left.

Brian Lehrer: How about Philadelphia DA? I know that's another one you looked at and for people who follow a criminal justice reform and prosecutors, the progressive prosecutor movement, the early star of that movement was Larry Krasner, Philadelphia DA.

Daniel Nichanian: Absolutely. What was very interesting in 2021 is that the progressive DA movement was really new a few years ago and that Larry Krasner, the Philadelphia DA, was really the first major figure of that movement to face reelection. This is a movement that has run on and then implemented measures to decrease incarceration, decrease the footprint of the criminal legal system, and measures like that. There was a lot of attention of whether this DA race this year would be a test of whether that movement is strong, or whether it's facing pushback, a backlash, especially as murder numbers have risen.

Krasner defeated very easily, a very spirited Democratic primary in May that was backed by the police union. Then he again, very easily beat the Republican nominee yesterday. Again, that was not a surprise that he won against Republican yesterday, but given how much of a test this was framed as, it is quite remarkable to see him twice easily defy some people's expectation that there's a backlash against reform in Philadelphia.

Brian Lehrer: How do you see New York City in this context? Because it elected a Mayor who might be considered a more moderate or a centrist or whatever word you want to use, Democrat on criminal justice reform, Eric Adams, but also a progressive prosecutor for Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg.

Daniel Nichanian: That's going to be so interesting to follow in the coming years. I think you're right. There's going to be interesting tensions. On the one hand, as you said, Eric Adams has called himself a conservative on crime, there's no question. He's positioned himself as a critic of the left approach to policing, even though he's emphasized reforms himself. He has also proposed bringing back some of the NYPD's more aggressive practices that have been scaled down in recent years.

Bragg is the mirror image in some way, he firmly staked himself on the reform side of the spectrum. That means things that are much more upstream, like improving access to parole for people, but also in terms of policing, he's really been a critic of things like broken windows policing, or more aggressive tactics of policing.

That's really where there could be a tension in coming years, just as one example if Eric Adams pushes a new NYPD leadership to increase the more aggressive tactics associated with broken windows policing, go after smaller offenses more aggressively. That could be intentioned with the DA's, Bragg's vow to not prosecute at all some smaller offenses and be more skeptical of some police claims in the context of possible lies or misconduct. There could be a back and forth in just how they approach these matters.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. One thing that I'll be looking for in that respect is how Adams and Bragg both approach gun crimes. Bragg has said on this show and elsewhere that he doesn't even want to prosecute gun possession in many cases, if the individual was not actually using the gun and not actually hurting anybody, doesn't want to incarcerate somebody over that. Whereas Adams has really hung his hat on going after gun crimes. Now those two may not be opposed to each other, or those two positions may come in extreme conflict with each other. I think that'll be one of the most interesting things to watch.

Daniel Nichanian: We are seeing the exact same opposition you described in Philadelphia that was was really a big theme there as well. It's interesting to see the reckoning around who actually goes to jail and prison for such offenses. What is actually the safety impact of increasing incarceration rates? In New York City Is obviously very important to know the Rikers jail crisis, the very bad conditions there. The overcrowding is part of the background when it comes to thinking about who's being arrested? Where are they being sent? How long are they being kept? That will also very much influence these discussions.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call. Leslie in St. Paul, you're on WNYC. Hi, Leslie.

Leslie: Hi, Brian. We're off-topic now, but a few minutes ago you were talking about the police referendum in Minneapolis and I just wanted to make a quick comment about that. Surprisingly it was a very divisive issue, unlike any others in today's society, but it broke differently than you would have thought. In the fact that most of the people who supported defunding the police were South Minneapolis, from the wider and more privileged areas, while the Northern part of Minneapolis did not support defunding the police, which might be the reverse of what she was saying. It was just a very contentious issue and still is.

I think what happened is that most people are so mistrustful of City Council, that they got cold feet, and when it came down to it, if we defund the police, it'll be up to City Council to come up with a replacement vehicle that will keep streets safe and help reduce crime. The animosity and general dislike of the city council is such that people got scared and said, "We can't trust them to come up with an alternative to the current police force that will keep us safe." That's comment number one.

Also, I didn't think that you mentioned the St. Paul referendum yesterday, which put in place one of the most restrictive rent control policies in the country because our rental situation is out of control. We have not enough housing and the rents are all unaffordable, so there was a very stringent referendum ballot on the ballot to restrict and control too I think something like 3% per year. This has the builders and the contractors all up in arms because they feel like--

Brian Lehrer: That passed in St. Paul?

Leslie: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Very interesting. Leslie, thank you for filling us in on that really relevant and interesting, even though our lens, more narrowly in this segment, has primarily been on criminal justice issues in these various cities. Leslie in St. Paul, thank you very, very much. As we run out of time, Daniel, one, or if we have time, two quick things, the dynamic that she talked about in the Minneapolis reinvent the police referendum with the more white parts of the city supporting it more than the more Black parts of the city.

We saw a similar thing in the New York City mayoral primary, and as it pertained to criminal justice with the more progressive candidate, Maya Wiley, doing better in some progressive white areas than Eric Adams, but Eric Adams doing a lot better in a lot of more Black population areas. I wonder if you see that as a national trend?

Daniel Nichanian: I haven't looked at the Minneapolis map of the results since last night, but I think you're right in how you characterize the New York breakdown. That is not necessarily a national trend. For instance, I was just saying that there was a very contentious primary in Philadelphia with the DA race in May and there Larry Krasner, the progressive candidate actually did very, very well, much better in the areas of towns that are predominantly Black. We saw something similar in LA a lot last year, for instance.

Brian Lehrer: That has to be the last word because we are now fresh out of time. Thanks for going over so many cities with us.

Daniel Nichanian: Thank you for having me.

Brian Lehrer: Daniel Nichanian from whatsontheballot.com. Brian Lehrer on WNYC, thanks for listening today, everybody.

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