There was precisely one moment of levity during Mayor Daniel Lurie’s somber-yet-satisfying noontime press conference Thursday afternoon. The Standard’s deputy politics editor, Hannah Wiley, asked the blue-suited, straight-faced mayor if his noncombative approach to dealing with President Donald Trump helped him broker an agreement to keep federal troops out of San Francisco.
Lurie, as his wont, plunged into his list of talking points, including that he is “laser focused on San Francisco every single day.” Did it help, though, Wiley pressed on, that he had taken a less antagonistic stance toward Trump than, say, California Gov. Gavin Newsom?
“That’s for you to talk about,” Lurie said, to gentle chuckles and smiles around the room, before he returned robotically to his rehearsed lines. “I know what I know,” he said. “And if I focus, and everybody standing here focuses, on ‘How do we cooperate? How do we communicate with the public? How do we keep people safe?’ That’s what San Franciscans want.”
Well, let’s talk about what we want. And let’s give credit where it’s due.
Since taking office, Lurie has famously refused to utter the name “Trump” in his public pronouncements. (He kept up the jig on Thursday, both in his prepared statement and his comments to the news media. While he referenced his call with “the president of the United States,” he literally never uttered the words “Donald” or “Trump.”)
This has been Lurie’s astute way of signaling that he doesn’t want to comment on issues outside his lane — or, more importantly, to incur the wrath of a punitive autocrat already predisposed to loathing liberal San Francisco, launchpad for the careers of so many sworn enemies, from Nancy Pelosi to Kamala Harris to Newsom.
Lurie is still a newbie politician, two months shy of his one-year mark in office, yet his focus and discipline in dealing with one of the most dangerous and volatile presidents in the history of the republic has to be commended.
It could have gone much, much worse, especially after the tsunami of unwanted attention sparked by Marc Benioff’s call in an out-of-town newspaper (opens in new tab) two weeks ago for a federal invasion of San Francisco. By the time Trump noted on Truth Social Thursday morning that Lurie had persuaded him to call off the dogs, the mayor’s strategy had been vindicated. By steadily staying on message, while ceaselessly cheerleading for the city — yet reminding everyone involved that there’s “more work to do” — Lurie has succeeded in convincing Trump, for now, to leave San Francisco alone.
The details Lurie and Trump revealed about their exchange help fill out our understanding of the mayor, a man who before taking office was dismissed as a wealthy dilettante. Lurie said he regaled Trump with the progress San Francisco is making on metrics like violent crime and tent encampments (down) and hotel and convention bookings (up). He also worked in a nugget certain to get Trump’s attention: “I spoke about more office space being leased than vacated for the first time,” Lurie said. It was a smart bone to toss to the one-time office tower developer.
Trump, in turn, noted on Truth Social that Lurie had asked “very nicely” to give him a chance to fix San Francisco’s problems. No matter how much Trumpian vanity that comment contains, it says even more about Lurie. In my June column praising Lurie for his tactics with Trump, I noted, “San Franciscans didn’t choose a moral crusader to lead them. They opted for a nice guy who promised to clean up their streets and be a booster for the city he loves.”
This easily could have gone the other way. San Francisco could have seen the ugliness that Trump has visited on Chicago and Los Angeles, for example, where he has been egged on by ambitious governors in their states’ biggest cities. And, to be clear, Trump could change his mind at any moment. But for now, at least,, Lurie can keep plugging away at his policy agenda while Trump presumably will lose interest, as he often does.
Lurie’s attestations to Trump notwithstanding, it’s not like San Francisco is all fixed. Lurie said he told Trump, “Retail is back,” which you wouldn’t know by visiting San Francisco Centre or Union Square. And while tent encampments are down, people who travel around the city know that tragically drug-addled homeless people abound. That’s the “there’s more work to do” element of Lurie’s patter.
Still, Lurie’s popularity is sky high, a 67% favorability rating as of July, (opens in new tab)per the moderate advocacy group Grow SF (opens in new tab). With his triumph over Trump, Lurie is about to become even more popular. At the end of his press briefing Thursday, he said he hoped “people can take a breath and focus on taking care of their children and their families.”
Lurie, too, is entitled to a sigh of relief and even a victory lap. Sometimes nice guys finish first. At least for one day.