Opinion: The permanent campaign of Jerry Brown

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

California Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown makes no bones about the fact that he’s a career politician, but his current campaign website blurs Brown’s roles as campaigner and public servant to a degree that seems ... unusual.

Most officeholders take pains to separate the work their campaigns do from the work done by their taxpayer-funded staff. But on the website for Brown’s gubernatorial bid, press releases written by the office of attorney general are mixed freely with those from Brown’s campaign. As I’m writing this, the site’s news section leads off with ‘Brown’s Elder Abuse Bureau Seeks Other Victims of Home Health Care Worker Who Stole Thousands from Elderly Client’ and ‘Hate Crimes in California Drop 20% in 2009’ (two releases from the AG’s office) before getting to a campaign piece titled ‘Fake Ad, Fake Plans, Fake Candidate.’

Brown’s accomplishments in office are fair game for his campaign. Brown’s campaign spokesman, Sterling Clifford, noted that the AG’s press releases are public documents. ‘It’s free information that’s out there for anyone to post anywhere,’ he said, adding, ‘It’s not like they’re doing extra work for us.’

But by treating the official releases the same way it does campaign pronouncements, Brown’s site suggests that there’s no distinction between the public servant and the campaigner. Granted, many voters already believe that every step politicians take is meant to advance their prospects at the polls. But in truth, the good ones aren’t that cynical.

‘We would be foolish not to present that information,’ Clifford said. I agree; Brown’s site should trumpet what Brown does as AG. But it should do so in its own words, just to make abundantly clear that there is a line between Brown’s current job and his aspirations for a new one.

-- Jon Healey