Friday, May 16, 2014

Did Chad Griffin Pen a Letter Promoting 'Forcing the Spring'?

Another public records request has produced more emails from the San Francisco City Attorney's office.


Author Jo Becker on March 28 wrote to deputy city attorney Therese Stewart and the email subject line was "The letter from chad [sic] is going out today", but there is no text included and no attachment. We can assume she is referring to Human Rights Campaign president Chad Griffin, the star of her controversial book "Forcing the Spring".

Stewart replied with a word of thanks and then Becker emailed back saying, "THANK YOU, For everything. Big hug, Jo".

Well, considering how Dennis Herrera and his staff including Stewart were knocking themselves on City time to conduct public relations for Becker and host a reception for her at City Hall, yes, the New York Times reporter had lots of reasons to shout her thanks.

There are no emails with the contact of Griffin's letter unfortunately. Was it to promote the book and did it circulate from HRC's press office?

We don't know and the City Attorney's office has made it clear to me they won't answer my followup questions related to all this, because they are adhering strictly to public records laws which do not require them to address questions.


However, a previously unreleased email from Stewart, who herself lobbied Judge Vaughn Walker to appear at the City Attorney's photo-op for Becker on May 1st (at Becker's request), shows that Dennis Herrera personally spoke with Walker about the reception presumably to be a media draw with his presence.

If anyone knows what Griffin said in that March 28 letter that so excited Stewart and Becker, please clue me in.

Previous posts in my effort to hold the City Attorney accountable for his role in using City infrastructure and City employees' time to promote Jo Becker's book "Forcing the Spring" and related concerns are here and here and here and here and here and here and here.

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