Oakland NAACP declares its support for recall of Mayor Sheng Thao, cementing rivalry ahead of election battle

OAKLAND — The city’s chapter of the NAACP has formally declared support for the recall of Mayor Sheng Thao in the upcoming November election, a widely anticipated move that cements a longstanding rivalry between the mayor and one of her most prominent public foes.

Leaders of the chapter, which has come to occupy a more moderate place in the city’s politics, focused their message at a news conference Monday around crime — steering away from more recent issues that have complicated Thao’s tenure, such as Oakland’s financial situation or an ongoing FBI investigation into City Hall.

They pointed to Thao’s firing last year of ex-Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong and a missed opportunity by city officials to apply for a state public safety grant as examples of failed leadership.

The news conference came a day after Thao launched her own campaign to fend off the effort to yank her from office — setting the stage for a showdown on a stacked November ballot that could radically shift the city’s direction.

Thao, who was elected in 2022 to a four-year term, has denounced the recall effort as a power grab by political players from outside of Oakland such as Philip Dreyfuss, a hedge-fund executive in Piedmont who has poured $480,000 into the campaign. The treasurer of Dreyfuss’ committee is Len Raphael, a candidate for City Council.

The Oakland NAACP chapter’s endorsement of Thao’s removal may carry some weight locally, given the name recognition it holds for being tied to a heralded national civil-rights organization.

The local branch has taken aim at Thao so often that little else in Oakland has enticed it to make public statements during her tenure.

Tensions between Thao and the NAACP have often seemed personal. Cynthia Adams, the chapter’s president, accused the mayor on Monday of never having made an attempt to speak to her.

“I don’t think she understands what the NAACP means,” Adams said after listing some of the larger organization’s famed civil-rights successes. “But today she does understand.”

Adams stood alongside the recall’s organizers, including Brenda Harbin-Forte, who in August ceded her role as the campaign’s president so she could run to be city attorney — only for her sister, Gail Harbin, to take up the mantle.

Harbin-Forte still spoke at length during Monday’s news conference, describing the history of election recalls and calling the process fully democratic.

Also present at the event was Loren Taylor, the former council member who lost to Thao in a nail-biting 2022 mayoral race and has indicated he would run in a special election if Thao loses the recall election in November.

The NAACP, which didn’t endorse a candidate in 2022, unsuccessfully tried to pay for a recount of the race after Thao won.

“There are people who support the mayor in our organization — it’s not all of us against her,” Adams said during the news conference. Later, she said the executive committee’s vote to support the recall was unanimous.

Thao’s fortunes took a turn in June when the FBI raided her home and several other Oakland addresses a day after the recall effort qualified for the ballot.

The local NAACP chapter called for her resignation in the wake of the raids, but its leaders did not mention the ensuing federal investigation Monday, choosing instead to focus on public safety.

Thao has said federal investigators told her she isn’t the subject of what appears to be a sprawling criminal inquiry that may involve her romantic partner, Andre Jones.

William Fitzgerald, whose public-relations firm began managing Thao’s campaign strategy last month, directed this news organization to a breakdown of $162 million in grant money the city received during the mayor’s tenure — far more, he pointed out, than the $15 million grant last year that the city didn’t apply to receive.

At her anti-recall campaign launch Sunday, Thao also defended her decision to fire Armstrong, the former police chief who is now running for City Council, as a matter of integrity. Last September, an independent arbitrator said Armstrong probably shouldn’t have been fired.

Asked why the campaign is getting off the ground just four weeks before the election, Fitzgerald said in an interview that the mayor’s “been busy doing her job.”

“The people of Oakland actually want her to focus on improving the quality of life for people living here,” he said.

Shomik Mukherjee is a reporter covering Oakland. Call or text him at 510-905-5495 or email him at shomik@bayareanewsgroup.com.