With two days left before election day, a new poll shows Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón has cut slightly into challenger Nathan Hochman’s lead in the race for the incumbent’s seat.
But Gascón is still down 25 points in the closely watched contest. While that’s an improvement over the 30-point deficit he was staring down in the same poll on Oct. 8, it’s still no better than the 25-point margin he faced in the survey on Aug. 18.
If the election were held today, 50% of likely voters would vote for Hochman, a former federal prosecutor, and 25% would cast a ballot for Gascón, a former LAPD assistant chief who swept into office in 2020 on a progressive platform of criminal justice reform. That leaves 25% undecided, according to the poll of 1,205 likely L.A. County voters from the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies, co-sponsored by The Times.
The poll comes near the end of a period of intense politicking by both candidates and their supporters. Since the last Berkeley-LA Times poll results were released on Oct. 8, Gascón and Hochman have held a series of campaign events across the county, addressed hundreds of voters, and faced off in a contentious debate.
Mark DiCamillo, director of the poll conducted online in English and Spanish between Oct. 22-29, said the slight narrowing of the gap between Gascón and Hochman shouldn’t offer much hope to the incumbent.
Asked about a list of factors in the D.A.’s race, 54% of voters selected “ability to prosecute cases involving violent crimes” as influencing their decision; 48% cited “making reforms to the criminal justice system.”
But that hasn’t translated into similar levels of support for the incumbent, whom Hochman has repeatedly slammed as soft on crime. Gascón has countered by arguing that Hochman wants to return to mass incarceration and pull back on police reform and accountability.
Asked if Gascón should have any reason for hope on election day, DiCamillo said: “Unless the polling world is turned upside down, I would say no.”
