Honey Mahogany, left, greets Mayor London Breed at a San Francisco Democratic Party event in 2019. Mahogany is the outgoing chairperson of the Democratic County Central Committee.
Arguably the most consequential race on San Francisco’s March 5 primary ballot is for an office that many residents aren’t even allowed to vote for — and still more have no idea what function it serves: the Democratic County Central Committee.
Colloquially referred to as the “D-triple-C,” the DCCC governs the local Democratic Party. It’s made up of 24 elected members — 14 from the 17th Assembly District, which encompasses San Francisco’s east side, and 10 from the 19th Assembly District, which includes the city’s west side. It also has eight “ex-officio” members, consisting of San Francisco Democrats elected to state and federal offices.
Every four years — during the primary election of a presidential election year — all elected DCCC seats are up for grabs and can be voted on by registered Democrats in San Francisco.
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Often, this is a rather dull affair. Although the DCCC can be a stepping stone to higher office, it can nevertheless be a tough sell to potential candidates: The job has no salary, and it’s known for being a cutthroat political environment.
This year, however, the DCCC race is a marquee attraction.
More than $2 million has been poured into the race by backers of the two main groups, or slates, of DCCC candidates — a potentially record sum. Most of that money comes from moderate tech-affiliated and labor groups supporting a moderate slate called SF Democrats for Change, which promises to restore “common sense” to a DCCC that it accuses of taking positions “out of sync with San Francisco voters,” including “defunding public safety initiatives” and refusing to take a stance on the 2022 school board recall. Labor groups, meanwhile, are backing the progressive Labor and Working Families slate, which promises to fight for a San Francisco “that works for everyone, not just the billionaires” and to protect the city from a reversion “back to failed Reagan-era policies.”
There are 30 candidates running for 14 seats in the 17th district and 21 candidates fighting for 10 spots in the 19th.
Most of these candidates are running on the big slates. There are practical reasons for this: It’s extremely expensive for individual candidates to send out campaign mailers and ads. By joining forces and pooling funds, candidates can reach more people at a lower cost and benefit from the name recognition and political expertise of better-known contenders.
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Political heavyweights on the moderate slate include San Francisco Supervisors Catherine Stefani and Matt Dorsey, while the progressive slate includes Supervisor Connie Chan and Jane Kim, a former supervisor who now leads the California Working Families Party.
If you’re a Democratic voter, however, you don’t have to confine yourself to one slate or another; you can choose as many candidates as there are seats in your district.
So what does the DCCC actually do, and why is the race important?
The committee has four main duties, but one of them is key: the power to decide which candidates and ballot measures get endorsed by the San Francisco Democratic Party. These endorsements are coveted not only because they can translate to financial support, but also because they can affect election outcomes in a city where about 64% of voters are registered Democrats.
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The power to decide these endorsements will be especially consequential in November, when San Francisco residents will vote for mayor and multiple open seats on the Board of Supervisors, among other high-profile races.
The DCCC also establishes the local party’s priorities and policy stances via nonbinding resolutions. Last month, for example, it called for a sustained cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war. It charters local Democratic clubs — an issue that made waves last year when the DCCC initially refused to charter a moderate group it baselessly accused of being run by racist Republicans. And it helps register and educate voters.
For the past four years, the DCCC has been helmed by a progressive majority. But amid mounting voter frustration with crime, homelessness, drug use and unaffordability — recent polls show that nearly 75% of residents feel the city is on the wrong track — this year’s DCCC race has come to symbolize a high-stakes front in the proxy war between moderates and progressives over San Francisco’s future.
This binary framing, however, obscures a more complicated reality. It can also exacerbate political divisions by fomenting us-versus-them tribalism.
“It is a bit of, ‘Who’s on the winning team? ’ ” Carrie Barnes, president of the Noe Valley Democratic Club and an SF Democrats for Change candidate, told me.
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It can also propagate reductive rhetoric.
“Of course, the progressives are going to be, like, ‘The billionaires!’ And of course, the moderates are going to be, like, ‘You’re just allowing homelessness and allowing people to get off scot-free in the legal system!’ ” said Janice Li, a DCCC member who isn’t running for reelection.
Janice Li is a member of the Democratic County Central Committee who is not running for reelection in November.
Honey Mahogany, the DCCC chairperson who also isn’t seeking reelection, told me the differences between the slates are being “exaggerated” for political purposes. She’s endorsed candidates from both slates that she feels are committed to “doing the work” of the Democratic Party, including phone banking, door knocking and voter outreach.
“If people were able to pull back their rhetoric a bit and just focus on solutions, they’d find that they have more in common than not,” Mahogany said.
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That’s undoubtedly true. Still, there are real differences between the slates. Bilal Mahmood, a candidate with the SF Democrats for Change slate who’s also running for the Board of Supervisors, told me that he sees housing policy as one of the main distinctions — a point echoed by Daniel Anderson, a consultant for the Labor and Working Families slate.
The moderate slate, endorsed by YIMBY Action, generally supports building more housing at all income levels. The slate has received significant financial support from the NorCal Carpenters Union, a driving force behind new state laws that aim to streamline and accelerate housing development often opposed by other unions that want stricter labor requirements.
The progressive slate, meanwhile, wants to focus on affordable housing development with more stringent labor standards, Peter Gallotta, a DCCC vice-chairperson who’s running for reelection, told me. He pointed out that while San Francisco met previous targets for building market-rate housing, it didn’t do the same for affordable housing.
Michael Lai, an SF Democrats for Change candidate, noted that the current DCCC voted to oppose Proposition C, which could make it easier to convert empty office buildings into housing. The Democrats for Change slate, Lai said, would have endorsed Prop. C.
However, candidates on the same slate don’t always have the same policy views. Mahmood, for example, abstained from taking a stance on the 2022 recall of progressive District Attorney Chesa Boudin, while Lai supported it.
“I would be shocked if they (end up) voting as a bloc,” Todd David, political director for Abundant SF, a moderate group that organized the SF Democrats for Change slate, told me.
But, he added, “I am confident that if this slate wins, we are going to see a change in the tenor and the tone of the way policy and political conversations happen at the Democratic Party.”
There’s no question that the party has suffered from prioritizing rhetoric over results. But it may be a red herring to think that simply replacing one faction with another will solve San Francisco’s problems. Instead, the factions need to learn to actually work together.
Li, who was elected to the DCCC in 2020 as part of a progressive slate, told me, “Part of me wonders if the progressives didn’t sweep in 2020, would there have been more dialogue and more meaningful resolutions or conversations at the DCCC?”
So how can San Francisco Democratic voters find out which DCCC members are focused less on ideology, finger-pointing and political posturing and more on solutions, collaboration and residents’ everyday concerns?
There are a few key tools. First, DCCC meetings are open to the public, and members’ endorsement and resolution votes can be found in meeting records online. SF Democrats for Change candidates also answered a publicly available questionnaire from the moderate political group GrowSF that outlines their stances on issues such as public safety, education, business, drugs and mental health, and housing. Labor and Working Families candidates answered a similar publicly available questionnaire from the Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democratic Club.
Happy voting!
Reach Emily Hoeven: emily.hoeven@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @emily_hoeven
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