Former Alameda County DA Nancy O'Malley Endorses Recall of Pamela Price

Updated 3:35 p.m. Wednesday

Former Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O’Malley is endorsing the recall of her successor, Pamela Price, who faces a contentious election to remove her from office — now less than two weeks away.

“She is not qualified nor competent to hold that position,” O’Malley said of Price at a press conference on Wednesday. “She ignores the rights of victims. She’s used this office improperly. She uses it to intimidate. Of course, she takes any chance to criticize me erroneously for things that I didn’t do.”

The endorsement comes as little surprise from one of Price’s longtime political opponents. Price mounted an unsuccessful campaign to unseat O’Malley in 2018, and in 2022, after O’Malley announced her retirement, Price beat out O’Malley’s deputy, Terry Wiley, with 53% of the vote.

On the campaign trail and in the nearly two years since her election, Price has hammered on O’Malley’s leadership of the district attorney’s office, accusing her of creating a “culture of fear” among employees, sweeping prosecutorial misconduct under the rug and chronically understaffing critical units.

“There were backlogs all over that office. The office was in disarray,” Price said at an Oct. 10 event for her campaign against the recall effort. “The people who were in charge of that office did not care about public safety. They did not care about our community.”

In the face of these accusations, O’Malley, who served as Alameda County’s district attorney from 2009 to 2023, remained largely silent about the recall election until now.

“She blames other people for everything,” O’Malley said, referring to Price. “I know firsthand that she lies constantly. These are not the attributes of an elected district attorney or anyone serving in the district attorney’s office because it is our responsibility to uphold justice.”

In response, Price said O’Malley’s statements were an effort to cover up prosecutorial misconduct that took place during O’Malley’s tenure. Price’s office began investigating allegations that Alameda County prosecutors systemically barred Black and Jewish jurors from death penalty cases last April.

Price’s office announced Wednesday that it has evidence that O’Malley was aware of complaints regarding this alleged misconduct while in office but did not investigate. Price said she thinks O’Malley’s endorsement was timed to counteract this news.

“What the public should know is that this is a sign, apparently, that we must be getting close to uncovering the role that Ms. O’Malley played as the former leader of this office when this prosecutorial misconduct actually was taking place,” Price said. “As in connection with these cases, the prosecutorial misconduct by former Alameda County prosecutors in this office knew no bounds.”

In her endorsement, O’Malley accused Price of violating the state constitution by failing to notify crime victims before key junctures in the cases against those accused of harming them and said she fired experienced victims’ advocates, replacing them with unqualified applicants. O’Malley also said Price cut the number of deputy district attorneys responsible for charging criminal cases, leading to a backlog of uncharged criminal complaints.

“She has taken this district attorney’s office to a place where it cannot function under her leadership,” O’Malley said.

O’Malley added that she’s been working “under the radar” to support the recall effort by door-knocking in the county, talking with community organizations and giving information to recall leaders. She’s donated $6,000 to the recall effort, according to campaign finance filings with the Alameda County Registrar of Voters.

“I’m still very active in the areas that I was active in as a district attorney,” O’Malley said. “Victims rights, working with the governor’s office on other things. And so I make sure that I am speaking out to the people that matter.”

O’Malley’s endorsement is the second by a former East Bay leader in support of ousting their successor from office, following former Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf’s endorsement of the recall of Sheng Thao last week. Thao and Price each won their elections by beating out candidates supported by Schaaf and O’Malley, respectively.

The announcement also follows similar pro-recall endorsements from O’Malley’s former deputy, Rep. Eric Swalwell and 13 Alameda County law enforcement unions. Rep. Barbara Lee and state Sen. Nancy Skinner support Price’s bid to stay in office.

Last week, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Price had allowed more than 1,000 cases to pass the statute of limitations, barring them from criminal prosecution. That came after Price’s high-profile prosecution of Alameda police officers in the 2021 death of Mario Gonzalez — a case that O’Malley’s office declined to charge — was fractured by a judge’s ruling on the statute of limitations, leaving just one of the three officers to face charges.

At a press conference following the Chronicle’s report, Price blamed O’Malley for causing the backlog and then failing to notify her about it during a rushed transition between administrations.

The nature of the transition between O’Malley and Price has been a hot topic of debate. Price claims O’Malley only agreed to meet with her transition team for one hour before she took office.

O’Malley disputed this and said her office did its best to prepare Price to take the helm, adding that any communication shortcomings were due to an alleged lack of enthusiasm from Price.

“I also had every team leader write a write-up of their teams and what they were doing. She gave us one hour, “O’Malley said of Price. “She came with her boyfriend and two other people, and that was the extent of her time learning about Alameda County DA’s office. There’s no question in my mind that she never really intended to be the full DA.”

At the Oct. 10 rally, Price chalked up the opposition from the district attorney’s office’s old guard to discomfort with her work to reform Alameda County’s criminal justice system.

“There were racial disparities, not only in the prosecution but in the provision of services to our community. We are addressing those issues, and people who did not bother to address that are upset about it now,” Price said. “We took a huge step forward in November of 2022, and the people who were behind pushing to hold us back, now they want to pull us back.”