SAN DIEGO — A new campaign ad from the Peace Officers Research Association of California is out, and it’s against Former San Diego City Councilmember Georgette Gómez. Gomez is running for the 80th Assembly District against David Alvarez. The PORAC and San Diego Police Officers Association are backing Alvarez.
The ad shows Gómez calling to defund police back in 2020 when she was on the San Diego City Council, at the same time she was getting special protection by police at her house.
CBS 8 spoke with the police officers association and they provided us the same papers in the ad. They say they show several calls to dispatch, when someone requested police to come to Gomez’s home .
When CBS 8 spoke with Gómez, she said public safety is not just about cops or guns. But the police union says, the calls are for cops and their guns to come to her house.
President of the San Diego Police Officers Association Jared Wilson says, “It's just hypocrisy that she is asking for less cops for all us who are suffering from high crime rates, an increase in murders in parks, and she is still calling to defund the police when she got special police protection that a normal resident in her district or anywhere else in San Diego would not have gotten.”
Wilson says the call log shows officers were sitting in front of her house for 30 minutes at a time. “When you get a black and white sitting in front of your house, that's a special thing that most of us do not get," Wilson said.
Wilson admits Gómez was not the only council member who had special protection at the time, but she was the most vocal about defunding police.
“It's one thing to have a different position and to hold true to what you believe in. To then ask for extra police protection while you are denying it to others is awful,” Wilson said.
CBS 8 spoke to Gómezto find out what the calls were about. Gómez says there was a Defund the Police protest, and they were targeting her house. When asked if people were actually protesting outside her house. Gómez said, “They were coming to my house.”
According to Wilson, police don’t just show up a house, someone has to call them.
“Typically what someone would do they'd have one of their staffers call the police chiefs in that area and ask for extra enforcement or extra patrols or extra things,” Wilson said.
Wilson says union members were the ones dispatched to Gómez's home, and once Gomez moved from that address a couple months ago, they requested the public documents to show officers were dispatched to her home.
Gómez tells CBS 8 she did not call the police, and she doesn't know if anyone on her staff called the police.
She also says public safety is more than cops and guns. “It's about investing in our youth. It's about investing in better education. It's about housing in our communities that's affordable,” Gómez said.
When asked if Gómez supports hiring more police in San Diego as violent crime rates soar. She would not give a yes or no answer but she did say, “As a victim's advocate for domestic violence and sexual assault, I understand first hand what it means to not have public safety to not respond to those activities and what it means to the victims.”
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