Nathan Vasquez wins race to be Multnomah County district attorney

Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt has lost his reelection bid. In a Wednesday afternoon statement, Schmidt said he called to concede his seat to opponent Nathan Vasquez, a longtime prosecutor in Schmidt’s office. As of 7 p.m. Wednesday, Vasquez had won 54% of the vote, with Schmidt trailing at 46%. Vasquez joins us to discuss his vision for the future of the criminal justice system in Multnomah County.

Note: The following transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer.

Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. Oregon’s largest county is going to have a new top prosecutor. Nathan Vasquez beat out one-term incumbent Mike Schmidt to become the new Multnomah County District Attorney. Vasquez has been a prosecutor in the office for almost 25 years. He is currently a senior deputy district attorney. Nathan Vasquez, congratulations and thanks very much for coming in.

Nathan Vasquez: Well, thank you. And thank you for having me back.

Miller: We have witnessed an extraordinary shift in public sentiment in just four years. Mike Schmidt won in 2020 with more than 75% of the vote. When I last checked this morning, he was at 46% of the vote. What’s your explanation for that drop?

Vasquez: Well, I mean, there’s been a lot of changes in the past four years. Going out and knocking on somewhere between 15,000 to 20,000 doors and talking to folks, people are ready for change. They wanted to see something different and particularly, they wanna feel safe in the community.

Miller: If, a year from now, there are still tents on a lot of Portland sidewalks, if there are significant numbers of drug-related overdose deaths and if a lot of people think that they should stay away from Old Town Chinatown, downtown – all things that you and others have said that Mike Schmidt should be held at least partly responsible for – would you hold yourself responsible?

Vasquez: Well, I want to certainly look at, how do we best influence that? How do we best start to make some inroads and changes? Is it gonna happen overnight? It absolutely is not. But certainly I’m gonna be looking at what are my efforts, what things can I do? And I want to always make sure we set expectations [that] the new law change doesn’t start until September.

Miller:  When you say the new law, [do] you mean public use and possession of drugs?

Vasquez: Yeah, the possession part of it doesn’t change until September of this year. And then I actually don’t take office, under statute, until January. So it’s kind of looking at those timelines. Then just, hopefully, my desire is to start building out right now that process to get us ready to go on day one, and my sincere hope is we will see progress there.

Miller: We can talk about the timeline in a bit. Let’s push it out to January of 2026. So a year after you’re expected to take office. What do you think that it’s reasonable for Multnomah County residents to expect? How are you saying life in Portland or life in the county as a whole will be different?

Vasquez: Well, my work will be directed towards really looking at how do we end open air drug use and have we seen some progress there? How do we end open air drug dealing and have we seen progress there? I certainly am, what I believe, a key player in that, but I’m not alone. And I know that there are many others that are looking to come forward and be a part of that solution. My hope is that with the elections we’re going to see in November, with our new city commissioners, our new county commissioners, that we can all come together to work towards that goal. And it’s something that I really believe that this community wants to see progress on and I’m gonna be dedicated to working in that direction.

Miller: If the U.S. Supreme Court allows cities to ban camping, would you be willing to criminally charge people who live in tents on Portland’s streets or parks?

Vasquez: Well, I want to be very careful and thoughtful here is that, there’s still the state Legislature, which they passed their own set of, kind of laws around this as well, kind of codifying some of that ...

Miller: Saying that the rules – it’s complicated – have to be reasonable in terms of time and place, in terms of how cities or jurisdictions crack down on camping.

Vasquez: Yes.

Miller: OK. I hear that and there’s a lot of pieces here. There’s questions of, would a city’s ordinance be challenged, would it stand? But, philosophically, do you think that it would be right – let’s say you could – to charge people who live in tents on Portland streets?

Vasquez: Well, for me, I don’t think it’s right to just criminalize someone for being houseless or homeless. That’s not the approach. For me, philosophically, it is looking at the behaviors. And it’s things like, are there situations where they have not just put up a tent but completely blocked the sidewalk and prevented people that are suffering with various physical ailments or perhaps have certain disabilities from using the sidewalk and really enjoying our community? And so for me, it’s more about the behaviors. It’s not ever going to be a question of, are you houseless or not? That should not be the deciding factor. It’s the behaviors.

Miller: How do you plan to prosecute more cases? I mean, for example, you were talking about cracking down on public use and dealing, for drugs. How do you plan to bring more cases when a lot of folks in your office currently say they have significant caseloads. 75% of people said in a recent survey that their job is more stressful than it used to be. The County Commission, also, they’ve already granted the current D.A., Mike Schmidt, his budget request to add prosecutors. So that’s already happened. There are a fair number of prosecutors now and some of them it seems are saying we’re maxed out. How do you bring more cases?

Vasquez: Well, there’s a few things that haven’t been done and I think really need to be and that’s going to the County Commission for some very specific asks, [for] things such as paralegals. Our office, we have some senior legal assistants, but we haven’t really maximized our efficiency there. With more paralegals, we’ll be able to really have our attorneys be more dedicated to the legal work as opposed to kind of more of the staff-oriented work. And it’s something I know that the attorneys want in particular and I want to see our support staff in that conversation as well, because it’s really an opportunity for us to be more efficient in our work. And I know that those attorneys are going to feel more supported in how they do it.

Miller: So partly, it’s a political question of going to the commission and getting more money in your budget once again.

Vasquez: It is. But it’s one that, when we talk particularly about things like paralegals, the cost-to-benefit ratio is fantastic because what you’re looking at is you’re not paying the wages for an attorney, it is for a paralegal, but it really allows a lot of maximizing of efficiency. In fact, there was a study that was done and presented and the county commissioners have seen that and they’ve looked at that particularly and they’ve asked those questions of, “why aren’t you asking for more of this?” And that’s where I’m going to come in and look to make our office as efficient as possible.

When we talk about more cases, a lot of those end up being in the misdemeanor level. So they’re not the same heavy lifts that you get with, for example, like a murder case. So it’s there, there are lots of opportunities there. And then my goal is to absolutely bring back the community court system and that is a way in which you can efficiently move cases through the system with a lower kind of impact.

Miller: Is the community court system you’re talking about there different from the deflection and diversion programs that are going to be a part of most counties’ approaches to the recriminalization of drugs?

Vasquez: So the original community court that we had for years, yes, that was different than deflection and diversion. However, I think there’s lots of opportunities, now that we’re gonna be bringing that online, to really look at how do we create efficiencies? Can those things evolve together? So there’s a lot of opportunity here.

Miller: So I want to turn more squarely to the question of drugs. What do you think it’s going to take to get this program, the deflection and diversion programs, recriminalization, all of it together, to work specifically in Multnomah County?

Vasquez: Well, it’s going to take a really combined effort. It is from, certainly the law enforcement component of it, but it’s also really those community-based organizations, the treatment centers, looking at all of those and how do we work together to really meet people where they are?

Miller: We talked with County Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards not too long ago, last month, about her effort to once again have a sobering center in the state’s largest county.

There finally seems to be some momentum for it, but a lot of pieces still have to fall in place. What’s the timeline for that in your mind? And how much is it going to be a challenge for you if once again, it’s delayed?

Vasquez: It’ll be a huge challenge. I’ll tell you it’s something that’s desperately needed in our community. I really, really appreciate Commissioner Brim-Edwards efforts in this area because quite frankly, we should have had it years ago. And it is a key piece to how we move forward. I think when we talk about deflection, diversion, all of that, if we’re really doing this well, it starts with having that sobering center because we need people that have a safe place to go. It will alleviate a lot of burden on our first responders like firefighters, paramedics. So it is a critical component and I’m very hopeful.

Miller: Hopeful. So, what’s the timeline that you’ve heard from people that you actually trust?

Vasquez: Well, they haven’t given me specific timelines and in the midst of all of the campaign and election things, it’s one of those things I’ve been keeping an eye on. But certainly, now that I’m going to be coming into office, I’m going to dig into [it].

Miller: Because what we’ve heard in the past, there are still questions about where it’s even going to be and who’s even going to run it.

Vasquez: Those are all gonna be the questions that need to be sorted out – Is it going to be the Department of Health, is it going to be a community-based organization? Those are all the issues, from my perspective, while I’m not necessarily going to be the one that’s going to get to make those decisions, I wanna make sure that I’m being a partner and being thoughtful, being involved, and that when we’re talking about things like deflection, working with local law enforcement, is [asking], how does that fit within that approach?

Miller: One of the things that Mike Schmidt has done is post a lot of data on the office’s website, everything from the number of days it takes to contact victims of person crimes, to how long it takes to complete cases. It’s an effort at transparency that not every D.A.’s office has done or has prioritized. Will you continue that practice?

Vasquez: Yeah, absolutely. I have no plans on ending that. I am a firm believer, not just in transparency but really into leaning into hard conversations with folks. And I want them to have the information that we’re looking at and so that we can, if issues arise, we can have those conversations.

Miller: I want to talk about timing here. When Mike Schmidt won overwhelmingly four years ago, then District Attorney Rod Underhill stepped down early and that paved the way for Governor Kate Brown, at the time, to appoint Mike Schmidt to take over early. So far, Mike Schmidt has said that he is going to stay on through the end of his term. Have you considered asking him, directly, to step down early?

Vasquez: Where we’re at here, just a day or two after the election, I am, one, trying to absorb all of what has just transpired. And I’m trying to certainly give D.A. Schmidt an opportunity for that as well. Then he and I can have conversations. At this point, he’s made it pretty clear that he intends to stay until the end of his term. There’s pluses and minuses to that, right? I mean, yes, I want to get in there right now and do the work. But at the same time, it also allows for some real thoughtful planning, some thoughtful transition teams to be formed and for hopefully some good conversations, where when we do this transition, that he and I can talk about them.

Miller: What kinds of things do you plan to talk about? Let’s assume that he does stay on. It seems like you’re a little bit ambivalent about that. I mean, maybe not, you just said that you’d like to take over as soon as possible, but let’s say he does stay. What are you imagining those conversations are going to be like?

Vasquez: I mean, it’s a wide range of topics. It’s everything from stuff like the mundane, like the budget and talking about where this money goes and what for this program, to more difficult questions, like structural ones. I’ve said kind of throughout the campaign that I’m a big firm believer in the strategic prosecution approach and I intend to kind of take that office wide. And so that’s gonna be a bigger structural change. And I’m certainly happy and willing to take a lot of input on that.

Miller: For those of us who aren’t in the nitty gritty world of prosecution, what is a strategic prosecution approach? And you have two minutes to answer that question.

Vasquez: Well, it’s one where you use data you combine that with a data analyst, a prosecutor and oftentimes with law enforcement on the front end, to help identify where you can find people that are what we call high volume system users, the people that are out committing a lot of crimes and you can dedicate resources to them, or also areas of high crime and then dedicate resources to it. And then on the back end, it allows you also to look at what’s happening with my efforts? Are they successful? And are we getting people out of the criminal justice system in the way that we want? So it really combines, I think, the best of both worlds of data with very thoughtful decision making.

Miller: Will you have a regular docket of cases of prosecutorial work over the next seven months or are you more free to ramp up into your new position?

Vasquez: I have a regular docket of cases currently. I have three major homicide cases. Not all of them are scheduled to go to trial right now, but I’m going to continue to work on those. I’m dedicated to the victims and the victims’ families, so that’s going to be my day job. Then I’m going to, as much as I can, during the day … and it’ll be something that I’ll need to work out with D.A. Schmidt. How much during this time I can do transition work or will that be my evening and weekend job?

Miller: Nathan Vasquez, we will talk again. Thanks very much.

Vasquez: Thank you.

Miller: Nathan Vasquez will soon become the Multnomah County district attorney.

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