Who’s Afraid of the JCRC? Sausalito Police Report Points Finger At Councilmember and JCRC/BANJO Member Melissa Blaustein for SPD’s Unlawful Conduct at Candidate Forum
Meanwhile, in Emeryville, California’s first Haitian-American elected official isn’t afraid to stand up for the First Amendment. And: Marin’s white progressives virtue signal at “Truth Act” forum
Editor’s Note: In recent weeks, Israel’s slaughter of Palestinians has returned to pre-ceasefire levels, with the evidence delivered to our screens daily. And yet most of Bay Area “progressive” politics and media carries on as if the destruction of an entire population in Gaza using our tax dollars is only “sad” and possibly “racist” – but in the end somehow not our responsibility. And thus the attention has turned back to local fights about zoning, developers, and YIMBY vs. NIMBY.
This is not how the matter is viewed in the rest of the world, and that disconnect should give Bay Area “progressives” pause. Pankaj Mishra’s revelatory new book, “The World After Gaza” doesn’t spare readers the reality that Israel’s butchery has cost the US its reputation across much of Asia, Latin America, and Africa (an interview with Mishra can be found here.) And investigative reporter Peter Byrne’s new 10-part series at Project Censored (the first installment is linked here) should jolt anyone out of complacency; the AI-based killing machines and surveillance already being lab-tested by Israel in Gaza will not stay in Gaza.
I. Sausalito Police Report Points Finger At JCRC/BANJO Member Blaustein
As many readers are aware, on September 26, 2024, nearly four months before President Biden left office, Sausalito Police officers unlawfully and violently removed me from a League of Women Voters public candidate forum for civilly raising the issue of war costs at the end of the event. (In Marin, the First Amendment applies to wealthy restaurant patrons who drink too much and scream at their waitress, but not to any of their ex-waitresses who civilly ask questions about how tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Israel will impact local budgets.)
I reported on the incident shortly afterward in a substack article, and had hoped to write a followup after Sausalito finished its police report. But in the last few weeks of the election, there were so many other, vital stories I needed to report. These include stories ignored by both legacy and “independent” local media about the impact of the local Israel lobby on everything from millions in dollars of state educational grants to local elections.
I admit that another part of the delay in producing a followup was related to the impact of the incident on my own well-being, and the disconnect I experienced reading the police report. The Sausalito Police Department report of the incident contained at least 36 points of misinformation, which I had to counter in a formal complaint. Aside from so many police errors, the underlying premise of the police report – that the police action was justified because I posed some sort of threat or was engaged in any unlawful activity – is easily disproved simply by reviewing the available video – both my own and the officers’ own bodyworn cameras (BWC).
But another aspect of the report should have garnered attention from local media and First Amendment watchdogs: police claimed they were working at the behest of councilmember Melissa Blaustein. Blaustein is a prominent member of the Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council’s BANJO group, a de facto lobbying group for the State of Israel. (At the time of the incident, the Bay Area JCRC’s CEO Tyler Gregory was spinning off its own de jure lobbying group, called BAJA.)
In other words, Sausalito police claim they acted on the orders of a councilmember who serves a dual role as a lobbyist for a foreign state, in this case, Israel. But if it were any country other than Israel, Blaustein and the other JCRC/BANJO members would long ago have been required to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
The Sausalito BWC recordings of the incident also indicate the possibility that the terms of Sausalito’s costly 2024 settlement with photographer Jeremy Portje have not been met in good faith. I contacted Jeremy Portje’s attorney, Charles Dresow of Ragghianti Freitas, with questions about the incident. In multiple replies over multiple months, Dresow has declined to acknowledge that the incident on September 26 even happened.
Dresow’s refusal to acknowledge, over such an extended period of time, that the September 26 incident occurred seems consistent with the reflex in Marin and much of the Bay Area to ignore abuses of power linked to the local Israel lobby. None of Marin County’s elected officials have acknowledged the incident, either – to do so would require acknowledging the issue I had raised about the local budget impacts of US support for Israel’s genocide.
Across the Bay, Another Challenge To The First Amendment, And Another Hit to Local Reporters:
Given the overall contempt for actual reporters in Marin, it was a surprise to encounter, at Alameda County Superior Court last Thursday, a Bay Area elected official so committed to supporting the First Amendment that he stood loyally by a local reporter facing a City Attorney’s efforts to limit his access to councilmembers and city department heads. That elected official is Kalimah Priforce, the first Haitian-American elected to office in the State of California, and the only member of the progressive “Peoples’ Slate” to win a Democratic delegate seat in last February’s election.
The reporter on whose behalf Priforce came to testify is Brian Donahue, who for fifteen years has published the online “Emeryville Tattler”, which tracks the minutiae of Emeryville politics as only someone who truly loves a city or a region can. A self-funded labor of love, the Tattler garners over 20,000 views a month, and has won Donahue wide admiration, sneering contempt, and at least one recent punch in the face from a YIMBY partisan. (It was a punch which may have cost the aspiring pugilist’s preferred candidate their seat, but more on that later.)
Sadly, the case of “City of Emeryville vs. Brian Donahue” has not been without effect. Donahue’s habit was to write at least one article a week, but the burden of responding to the lawsuit has stalled that output. I’ve spoken with Donahue on several occasions and have enjoyed reading his articles. I hope to update you about his case as it proceeds, the next hearing is set for April 21, at 9 am, and yes, there is bike parking at the courthouse in Oakland.
The Self-Described “Wu-Tang Progressive”:
But who was the Emeryville City Councilmember willing to stand up for Donahue? I was lucky enough to catch up with Kalimah Priforce in Emeryville on Saturday and to to ask some light questions about what motivates him (apologies for the handheld video work and the wind):
One thing that impressed me about Priforce is that he won this seat even as he publicly criticized the impact of the Israel lobby on elections, including on the state Democratic party’s delegate election. He was the only member of the progressive “People’s Slate” who named the issue of the Israel lobby’s spending on the Democratic delegate elections during the ADEM candidate presentations.
That might have left Priforce feeling a little lonely at the time, but he’s also the only member of that slate who actually won a seat in AD18 or AD14. There might be a lesson in that. If progressives stand up for what they claim to want, do they stand a better chance at winning?
To be clear, it’s not just the Israel lobby interfering in local elections that Priforce is concerned about. He’s the first candidate in the Bay Area in many months who spoke to me about the anti-caste legislation in Seattle, which created such a backlash from supporters of India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi. And Priforce’s immediate priority is tackling YIMBY lobbyists in Emeryville.
Priforce’s family history is impressive, his grand-uncle was Leon Cantave, the General who challenged the Magloire regime in Haiti. It’s a topic, like many others dear to Priforce’s heart, that deserves a more formal interview. In the meantime, I enjoyed hearing from Priforce about what it means to be a “Wu-Tang progressive.” (I’m not sure a “Wu-Tang progressive” isn’t based on a very ancient idea for greater representation in government – it sounded like a modern take on Pericles’ desire to expand participation to those previously excluded):
All of this seems a lot less complicated than it actually is: Priforce is functioning in a difficult environment, with parallels in Marin County (in San Anselmo and Fairfax, specifically, where council politics have become fiercer), but not exactly in the way you might expect. I’m cheered by the position that Priforce has taken in defense of the First Amendment, and appreciate his directness in addressing various lobbies. As Donahue’s case proceeds, I’ll be checking back in with Priforce, and linking to the Tattler.
Truth Act Attendees Not Entirely Truthful:
Last Tuesday, when the temperatures in Marin danced in the high seventies, Marin County progressives showed up en force in the stuffy Board chambers for Sheriff Scardina’s annual report to the County Board of Supervisors regarding his department’s cooperation with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal law enforcement agency created by the George W. Bush administration.
This was a significantly larger crowd than the same Truth Act Forum had drawn the previous year, which is telling. The Biden administration had deported more people, separated more families, and placed more “kids in cages” than Trump had during his first four years. But it is apparently only the spectre of Trump that can draw Marin’s white progressives out in large numbers to complain about ICE. It is akin to the same white progressives who bought Teslas suddenly appearing at Tesla dealerships to boldly protest Elon Musk, whom too many of them had only recently insisted was a “genius”.
I’m working on a longer story with video about what was going on behind the scenes at the forum. But a few things were immediately obvious:
None of the “progressive” speakers seem to have acknowledged in their comments that much of the surveillance technology that the Marin County Sheriff relies on (and which would be involved in any level of cooperation with ICE or other law enforcement agencies), is Israeli tech. This is part of a larger pattern of denial about the relationship between US law enforcement and Israel: A new book about the power of sheriffs popular with the “progressives” who spoke at Marin’s “True Act” is Jess Pishko’s The Highest Law In The Land: How The Unchecked Power of Sheriffs Threatens Democracy. But Pishko’s book makes zero reference in its hundreds of pages to the reality that US law enforcement agencies not only rely on costly Israeli surveillance tech but often receive training from former IDF and Israeli police.
None of the members of the Sheriff Civilian Oversight Working Group (SCOWG) who spoke at the Truth Act Forum identified themselves as such, or conceded that the conflict-of-interest-laden SCOWG had principally served to distract from another nearly $3 million delivered to MCSO.
SCOWG lead Heidi Merchen pointedly and dramatically called out Sheriff Scardina, but once again “declined” to disclose that she herself is a former Marin County and Sonoma County Sheriff deputy who is married to the third most powerful law enforcement official in Sonoma County. Merchen’s husband, Mike Merchen, is the Assistant Sheriff for Sonoma County who runs Sonoma’s deadly and abusive jail. Why was Merchen still not disclosing that relationship as she positions herself as a champion of “social justice”?
Longtime Democratic Party delegate and former Sausalito Marin City School District Board Member Lisa Bennett was first at the lectern. Bennett had been key in promoting the notion that a toothless sheriff oversight group could somehow magically be a substitute for the actual power that the BoS and the DA already hold over the Sheriff, but which neither entity has chosen to exercise. In her comment, Bennett stated that ICE has become the “Gestapo.” But when had ICE become the Gestapo? Was it during the post-2003 years of the Bush administration when ICE worked closely with the Department of Homeland Security to “disappear” Muslims into Guantanamo? Or was the premise for ICE already in place under the Clinton administration when the US hid 45,000 Haitian asylum seekers at Guantanamo?
Marin DSA Co-Chair Curt Ries angrily denounced the Trump administration without identifying that the Biden administration had deported more people than Trump had during his first administration. Ries, whose Marin DSA had promoted the candidacy of former AIPAC Director Yoav Schlesinger for San Anselmo Town Council, left the lectern after only a short statement. Ries had time to make a more detailed argument, or to concede that the problem was deeper than Trump, but he chose not to. (Marin DSA had received funding for its failed rent-control measure from the North Bay Labor Council, which supported an entire slate of pro-Israel candidates, many of whom are JCRC/BANJO members who were instrumental in targeting ceasefire advocates for harassment.)
There were a few silver linings in the comments made at the Truth Act Forum, but overall the self-congratulatory crowd had the whiff of political opportunism, of campaigns in their hatchling stages. For Marin’s white “progressives”, ICE is a terror when Trump is in office, but “meh” when a Democrat holds office. (Linking CPRA’d materials to the actual speakers tells an expanded story; I’ll be sharing that in an upcoming article.)
The obvious problem with that position is that it has permitted ICE to become increasingly “Gestapo” (to use Bennett’s own descriptor) because Democrats themselves refuse to use their power when in office to strengthen and protect the constitutional rights of both citizens and immigrants.
Thanks as always to patient readers for insights and inspiration.
©️2025 Eva Chrysanthe