The theories Chesa Boudin brought into the San Francisco district attorney’s office were not his. They pour out of the universities, resonating in the media and popular culture. Boudin’s adoptive parents did not go to prison for their terrorist schemes; they were welcomed into the academy with distinguished professorial chairs that vested them with enormous influence over school curricula and the “social justice” vanguard of the legal profession. Columbia University rolled out the red carpet for his mother when she finished serving her 20-year prison sentence. His father was just released from prison having been granted clemency, the last official act of disgraced former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo as he left office. Nothing unusual about that. President Bill Clinton pardoned terrorists of the radical Left. President Barack Obama pardoned terrorists of the radical Left. Retired terrorists are not pariahs. They are liberal icons.

Boudin has been booted, but the latest reports indicate that the vote was tighter than initially thought. It is worth remembering: He didn’t sneak up on anyone. He ran on who he is. San Franciscans embraced him. They’ve now turned him out. But, to take a different example, there’s an East Coast version of Boudin, Philadelphia’s Larry Krasner. He won election with just 38% of the vote in a crowded field. He cleaned house, purged prosecutors who wanted to prosecute, and assiduously implemented the no-enforcement agenda. In 2021, Philadelphia had a record-high 562 murders — seven dozen more than New York, a city five times its size. Krasner was also reelected with a whopping 65% of the popular vote.

San Francisco’s Chesa Boudin is gone. His replicas around the country are thriving, even as their cities implode. The liberal prosecutor phenomenon is a symptom. It will be with us until we grow the spine to deal with its underlying cultural causes.