The long road to adoption by the San Francisco Democratic Party of new rules to prevent and adjudicate incidents of sexual assault and harassment within the realm of politics ended last Wednesday with a unanimous vote of approval. Now comes the challenge to implement the new rules.
“Political spaces have long been rife with sexual assault and harassment due to inherent power dynamics, the temporary nature of political campaigns, reliance on volunteerism, and the nature of power and influence as the predominant currency in the industry,” reads a press release from the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC), the local party’s governing body. “This new policy is an ambitious framework which includes a robust process for reporting, investigation, and repercussions to change the culture that has allowed harassment and assault to persist in the political industry.”
The new rules, drafted by a special committee working in concert with experts and stakeholders as well as California Democratic Party Ombudsman John Trasviña, include processes by which instances of sexual harassment and assault among Democratic activists can be identified and investigated. An independent ombudsperson will hear complaints and decide if an investigation is warranted. A code of conduct will also require Democratic club leaders to undergo training to identify and prevent such offenses.
The rules come in the wake of a political year where allegations of sexual harassment and assault have made headlines at both national and local levels. President-elect Donald Trump’s recent whirlwind of proposed cabinet appointments has included at least two candidates, Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz for Attorney General and television presenter Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense, hobbled by credible allegations of sexual misconduct.
On the local level, the effort to enact the new rules was spurred on by two cases involving progressive political operatives in the local Latine community who are influential in local Democratic and city development politics.
The first case involves Jon Jacobo, a building inspection commissioner, former legislative aide to former Supervisor Jane Kim, a director at the Tenants and Owners Development Corporation (TODCO), a powerful affordable housing provider, and a former board member of the Latinx Democratic Club. Indeed, had multiple allegations not been brought against him, Jacobo may well have been elected as District 9 supervisor last month.
Reports of Jacobo’s behavior first became known to the greater public in August 2021 when another affordable housing activist, Sasha Perigo, made a public accusation that he raped her in April of that year. Jacobo then gave up his seat on the Building Inspection Commission. Perigo did not press criminal charges against Jacobo for ideological reasons, but her public statement eventually compelled three more women to press charges against him.
The rules come in the wake of a political year where allegations of sexual harassment and assault have made headlines at both national and local levels.
Jacobo currently faces charges including one count of rape by force, one count of oral copulation by force, one count of sexual battery by restraint, and one count of domestic violence. Arraigned on Aug. 6, he remains under house arrest pending trial. A motion to ease the conditions of his home detention was denied Nov. 21. Since stepping down from TODCO as a result of the charges, Jacobo has hung out a shingle as an independent consultant, according to his LinkedIn page.
The second involves Kevin Ortiz, a development manager at the Instituto Familiar de la Raza, a nonprofit serving the Latine community that oversees several wellness and cultural programs, a board member of the Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC), and a co-president of the Latinx Democratic Club.
In April, Zahra Hajee, a former aide to Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, filed a police report accusing Ortiz of assaulting her twice in 2021 while he was a field representative for Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi. This was after Ortiz had had a lawyer send cease-and-desist letters to both her and another woman he allegedly assaulted.
Charges have yet to be filed against Ortiz, but he soon stepped away from his board position at CCDC and the Instituto Familiar de la Raza in June. By July he was on leave from his position at the Latinx Democratic Club, which was reportedly still investigating the charges against him as of last week. Ortiz is still active in Mission politics, including attending campaign events during the recent election cycle and reportedly doing outreach work for the Mission-based ISP Monkeybrains.
While support for the new rules at the DCCC was unanimous, they’re still receiving some pushback from some in the activist community, notably, and perhaps predictably, representatives of the Latinx Democratic Club.
During a discussion before the vote on Dec. 4, Michael Rouppet, now an acting president at the club, mentioned “concerns that were raised that there was a lack of representation of black and brown communities” and “challenges in terms of the restorative process that we were looking to hope to implement.” He nevertheless described the new rules as “a foundation” that “we and our club members are willing to try and work with.”
Committee members and others watching the policy workshop process on drafting the new rules told The Voice that the Latinx Democratic Club and allied groups had been aggressively lobbying to include language on “false accusations” to include “consequences” for such allegations. Most members felt such an approach would go against the new policy’s intended “survivor-centric” nature, described by DCCC Chair Nancy Tung before the vote as intended to “empower those who would stand up to abusers with power.”
Lily Ho, DCCC member for the 17th Assembly District and chair of the special committee for drafting the rules, noted they were drafted with consideration for the privacy and confidentiality of all participating “to limit the possibilities for weaponization of accusations while incidents were still under review.”
Next steps include implementing the new rules without subjecting Democratic clubs, which are volunteer organizations, to onerous strain on time and resources. Committee member Trevor Chandler noted that training materials, for instance, would at first be obtained from the California Department of Civil Rights at no cost.
“The end goal sometime next year, using the relationships and the conversation started with stakeholders, is to actually create our own training,” Chandler added. “There’s really no training specifically for the political sphere like we are in. It doesn’t fully address political volunteer power dynamics that we are engaging in right now. But we wanted to move forward and not make the perfect the enemy of the good.”
Meanwhile, the Latinx Democratic Club’s internal investigation of the accusations against Kevin Ortiz is reportedly continuing without coordination from the DCCC. At least one of Ortiz’s accusers has refused to participate, citing the group’s stated focus on false accusations.
We’ve reached out for comment to multiple officers of the Latinx Democratic Club as well as Kevin Ortiz and his attorney, James Quadra. We have yet to hear back.