Brandon Harami’s official title is Policy Director to Oakland Mayoral candidate and City Council member Sheng Thao, but he’s much more than simply a guy who writes memos on housing and garbage to his boss. He’s Thao’s hatchet man on social media.
A longtime professional leftist who led San Francisco Berniecrats, Harami defended the now-recalled San Francisco School Board member Allison Collins, who had attacked Asian-Americans in a tweet. Here in Oakland, Harami is known as a fierce progressive who will stop at nothing to help his boss, Thao, climb the slippery slope to power.
As is well known, the Coalition for a Better Oakand did not support Sheng Thao for Mayor. We, and I in particular, wrote strong words against her, in order to educate the voters that Shao, despite her reassuring words about public safety during the campaign, was in reality a City Council person who had repeatedly tried to undermine funding for the Oakland Police Department. We—the Coalition and I—simply disagreed with Thao’s views of social justice, and how the taxpayers’ money ought to be spent in order to reduce crime and encampments.
We, the Coalition and I, published our endorsements for the Nov. 8 election. We did not, obviously, support Thao.
The step that Thao’s Thug has now taken was to file an ethics complaint with the City of Oakland against me, Seneca Scott (the former Mayoral candidate and a CBO member) and Jack Saunders, our Recording Secretary. This complaint, copies of which were forwarded to the three of us by Simon Russell, Acting Chief of Enforcement of the City of Oakland Public Ethics Commission, states that Brandon Harami has accused us of violating the Oakland Campaign Reform Act (OCRA). Harami’s specific allegation is [The] “Coalition for a Better Oakland is not a political committee yet made endorsements during the last election.” OCRA is a sweeping political reform act that, among other things, prohibits false representation in campaign literature. It leans heavily toward regulating campaign finances, including contribution limits. It’s not clear, from his complaint, what Harami’s problem is with our endorsements. He may not understand the difference between a 501(C)3 nonprofit and a 501(C)4 nonprofit. There’s a big difference: the former, 3s, are not allowed to endorse political candidates. The Coalition for a Better Oakland is a registered 501(C)4 organization. According to the Internal Revenue Service, in answer to the question, “Can a tax-exempt organization endorse candidates for public office?”, the answer is:
“The type of tax exemption determines whether an organization may endorse candidates for public office. For example, a section 501(c)(3) organization may not publish or distribute printed statements or make oral statements on behalf of, or in opposition to, a candidate for public office. Consequently, a written or oral endorsement of a candidate is strictly forbidden. The rating of candidates, even on a nonpartisan basis, is also prohibited. On the other hand, a section 501(c)(4), (5), or (6) organization may engage in political campaigns, provided that such activities are not the organization's primary activity.”
Although we did endorse in the last election, such activities are not, and never have been, “the organization’s primary activity.”
Our primary activity, as our readers understand, is education and offering opinion on the great social, legal, moral and cultural issues of our day—issues that, under the progressive leadership of people like Sheng Thao, have been so destructive to the city we love, Oakland. We have never spent a penny on our political endorsements (aside from generic expenses, like the monthly cost of operating a website). On the other hand, the unions that have so generously donated millions of dollars to Thao’s campaign have done so, I’m told, through their own 501(c)4 committees.
The City of Oakland has not yet made any decisions on Harami’s complaint, except to acknowledge its filing. It seems clear to me that Brandon Harami never would have attacked us in this way without Thao’s explicit consent, and perhaps at her direction. Sheng Thao has a thin skin and a vengeful nature. We’ve been tough on her, yes, but fair—and accurate. What she is doing is nothing less than trying to cancel-culture us out of existence, which is exactly what I would expect from a woke bully like Thao and her thug, Brandon Harami.
Steve Heimoff