Rob AriasFormer Emeryville City Councilmember John Bauters has been keeping a low public profile since losing an agonizingly close race for the County Supervisor seat.
He recently resurfaced in a new role roughly six months after his last city council meeting that involved the censure of rival Kalimah Priforce.
According to The East Bay Insiders newsletter written by veteran journalist Steven Tavares, Bauters has accepted a new role with the Political Action Committee Revitalize East Bay. Revitalize East Bay (REB) is best known for the recent successful recalls of Alameda County D.A. Pamela Price and Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao.
“Revitalize East Bay plans to professionalize its political advocacy in advance of the 2026 election cycle by hiring Bauters as its executive director,” Tavares details.
REB tends to support more moderate, business savvy candidates who prioritize traditional public safety. They have close ties with another local organization Empower Oakland which was co-founded by former Oakland Councilmember and Mayoral candidate Loren Taylor.
A large source of funding for the organization comes from Piedmont hedge fund manager Philip Dreyfuss. Dreyfuss has become a bit of the “boogeyman” for local progressive activists who have attempted to portray the organization as an “astroturf” and their funding as “dark money.”
During Bauters’ Supervisor run, he was widely criticized by those on the progressive left for taking campaign money from business and developer interests and tacitly supporting Price’s recall.
His opponent, Nikki Fortunato Bas, seized on these criticisms to portray Bauters as “too conservative” and attacked his record on labor and housing issues. She was able to overtake him during the two plus week mail-in and “curing” portion of the ballot counting process.
The role is an appropriate fit for Bauters whose professional career has been in lobbying and advocacy. He’s held previous roles in homeless advocacy and Criminal Justice Reform causes with his most recent role as Arizona State Director for the Alliance for Safety and Justice.
It remains unclear if the 45-year-old Bauters is using this role as a staging ground to reenter politics. Priforce’s term expires next year and Bauters could seek to take him head-on and enact his revenge for his vocal role in his defeat.
The East Bay Insiders also host a podcast with Shawn Wilson and Dan Mendoza where they dish the dirt and provide analysis on local politics throughout Alameda County.
I have watched John Bauters’ activities in Emeryville close up since the start and have honestly never seen a more hard-working, clear-thinking, practical, results-oriented public official. At a time when the fringes and the sloganeers are dominating our politics, it is great news to hear that he is still involved in bettering our communities.
Working for a conservative PAC owned by a Hedge fund manager is not going to better any community. It is just going to better ego driven and opportunistic Bauters. A progressive would never work for this PAC. For someone who claims to support business interests, he sure is hurting the ones on Hubbard by advocating to close that street to traffic from 40th street. He is not a supporter of people nor businesses nor bettering our communities. Just a self-promoting politician who uses rhetoric to serve his own ego and interests.
John Bauters is BAD for humanity! Buyers beware, he’s a SCAM…
Good for Bauters. He almost won the election if it wasn’t for last minute sabotage and smear campaign. Came within hundreds of votes against Bas who wielded a built in voter base and recognition with Oakland.
It’s good he is off the elected bench. He can stop taking the heat for others. He became a piñata during his last few years and absorbed all the hits and became an easy one target to scapegoat.
With him gone, complainants are the same, the complaints are the same, but new scapegoat targets have been found or renewed, Kennedy, Welch, Mourra, Gould, Wax.
Smear campaigns came from both camps. Bauters lost! He voted against labor, against expanding accessibility ordinances, against passing a cease fire resolution. Against working-class, against the disabled, against humanity! Good to know the names of his minions who will no doubt follow in his footsteps.
Emeryville needs to have FPPC investigate and fine Courtney Welch for not timely filing her Form 460 for December 2024. Still not filed as of this date.
Bauters is a progressive but he also understands that if you don’t have public safety or sound financial sense, then other progressive initiatives stall out. Maybe a moderate progressive is what we need. I’m glad he is still working to help the east Bay improve.
Sound financial sense? Bauters ran Emeryville’s finances into the ground for eight years and left us with the biggest deficit in city history. The only thing he balanced was his ego. He had all the financial foresight of the folks behind “One Big Beautiful Bill” – none. And public safety? Crime spiked on his watch. Even the police wouldn’t endorse him. It’s only after he lost his Supervisor race – and finally got out of the way – that the city began cleaning up the financial disaster he left behind. The “progressive reformer” he pretended to be in Piedmont wasn’t the Bauters we lived under.
EGO. PRIDE. GREED. That’s the legacy he left in Emeryville. And now he’s coming after unions and working families through his billionaire-backed PAC? We’re ready. Come get us.
How’s Nikki Bas deficit?
He set aside a decent amount of money that is helping the city continue recovering from the pandemic without cutting city sevices
Using city reserves as a bailout fund after years of poor planning isn’t “fiscal responsibility” – it’s the municipal equivalent of maxing out your credit card and calling it “savings.” Building reserves only to rely on them because you ignored long-term sustainability is not financial foresight. It’s failure with a cushion.
Nikki Bas was acting mayor for a few weeks, not eight years. John Bauters was mayor three times and chair of the Budget and Governance Committee for nearly a decade. He shaped Emeryville’s finances, steered them into the red, and left the biggest deficit in city history.
He had the wheel for eight years. We saw where he drove us. I’m not getting back in that car, no thank you.
Using city reserves as a bailout fund after years of poor planning isn’t “fiscal responsibility” – it’s the municipal equivalent of maxing out your credit card and calling it “savings.” Building reserves only to rely on them because you ignored long-term sustainability is not financial foresight. It’s failure with a cushion.
Nikki Bas was acting mayor for a few weeks, not eight years. John Bauters was mayor three times and chair of the Budget and Governance Committee for nearly a decade. He shaped Emeryville’s finances, steered them into the red, and left the biggest deficit in city history.
He had the wheel for eight years. We saw where he steered us – right into a ditch. No thank you.
Ah, there it is – Sam Gould’s ghostwriting again, desperate to keep himself relevant by clinging to the coattails of John Bauters. But anyone operating in his shadow is bound to be just as corrupt, just as self-serving, and just as eager to gaslight a community they’ve already failed. If Bauters is your “faithful leader,” then Emeryville desperately needs a leadership detox.
Let’s talk facts. Bauters didn’t “almost win.” He was rejected – because voters finally saw through the PR machine. And let’s not pretend he was a martyr. John threw a bike celebration party thinking he already won. What a joke and embarrassment!
The “piñata” metaphor only works if the candy inside wasn’t lead dust and deficit spending. I live with the fallout – literally. My apartment unit is filled with lead dust thanks to the negligence of Bauters and his cronies, who prioritized developer profits over public health and basic accountability.
If Gould, Welch, and the rest of that political boy band think they’re untouchable now that Bauters is off the bench, they better think again. Did any of these asshats come see about the dust we are choking on? Only one councilmember did and he’s the only one who has ever put his ass on the line for us in Emeryville.
The city is wide awake. We’re done with scapegoats and sycophants – we want real leadership, not cosplay reformers.
Show the full Wareham report. If the report said what you say it does, you would have posted it publicly already instead of just “showing” it to Donahue for him to write about it.
Brian, why did you postpone your temporary restraining order court hearing? The city was ready to protect its employees and staff from harassment and ready to argue for a permanent restraining order in May. Why did you delay?
Bauters should definitely run for Mayor again. We need somebody to get rid of Priforce– unless of course Priforce goes to jail for bribery/corruption first! (Hopefully the FPPC complete their investigation soon!)
Bauters could run for council again if he wishes. But one does not run for mayor in Emeryville in a voter election, one can run for council seat in elections. Mayors are selected from and by the sitting council. The mayor is a Councilmember AND mayor as an additional office. It’s usually one year term. The next mayor will probably be Sukhdeep Kaur since she’s currently vice mayor.
The rampant confusion nowadays in Emeryville about “running for mayor” came from the rhetorical tactic and “mayoral campaign” instigated by Priforce in 2024 who sent mailers and announced he was “running for mayor.” As a voter I found that misleading and unethical.
Mayors are mainly ceremonial anyway in Emeryville. They run meetings, cut ribbons. They don’t get any additional voting power. Never understood why Priforce got so upset the other council members didn’t select him to be mayor that a whole mayoral campaign needed to be fabricated.
Tell us more! Give us the deets!
Isn’t it a little creepy that Bauters and Gould live in the same building tho? Sam sneaks away from his wife and meets up with John so they can scheme against Kalimah. Wierd shit man. Wierd shit.
It is a lot very creepy that Priforce supporters like you track, know and announce where private citizens live. These are textbook intimidation tactics. Why are Priforce supporters targeting private citizens like Bauters and Gould’s wife at their places of residence? This culture of intimidation has only gotten worse the past couple years. It’s no wonder the Emeryville City Attorney was forced to file a restraining order request against Priforce’s supporter to protect the city’s staff, but who’s going to protect private citizens from unhinged supporters?
It’s wild how every time someone brings up Kalimah Priforce, a mysterious comment pops up defending Sam Gould or bringing up that race he lost – again. Let’s be real: nobody’s thinking about Sam like that. Most of us didn’t even know who he was until he lost.
And didn’t he get on the Planning Commission because no one else even applied? I considered applying, but after seeing how Mia, Calvin and Priforce were treated, I realized how toxic it all is. The whole setup feels like a vampire coven – you get bit by Bauters, and suddenly you’re attacking anyone who challenges their clique.
And it’s always the same formula: bash Priforce, sneak in Sam’s name, and try to rewrite a race he lost fair and square. Sorry, but people see through it. Emeryville rejected that politics-as-usual game. Kalimah’s got real community love, and no amount of cowardly anonymous trolling will change that.
I like how people say Bauters isn’t a real progressive. What does progressive even mean? Oakland has been run by progressives for decades and that city is in shambles. You want Emeryville to be more like Oakland who have no money for basic city services after wasting it on failed programs like MACRO? Reelect real “progressive” Priforce and more of his ilk. He’ll probably appoint the crazy, angry Tattler guy to the Planning Commission!
I usually don’t post on these online articles – I’ve seen too many arguments and too few honest conversations. But this one is making the rounds in our Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club forum, and I felt the need to say something, especially about how Emeryville is treating City Council Member Priforce. First, I live in Oakland. Born and raised. And I don’t appreciate folks using our city as a punchline just to score political points. You mention MACRO like it’s a failure – but what’s your alternative to harm reduction? Jail? Neglect? I’ve seen what that gets us. I’ve seen families broken and lives lost to the old system. MACRO is trying something different. If you’ve got a better solution, I’m all ears. But don’t just tear things down without offering something real. And about Councilmember Priforce – I may be older now, but I still remember how rare it is to see a Black man who’s already done so much, who could be doing anything, choose to give up his peace to serve the public. That means something. That’s progressive. That’s brave. Maybe Emeryville’s just too small for someone with that much heart and vision. We in Oakland see it. I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up here someday, and if he does – we’d welcome him. Shoot, I think even Berkeley would be happy to have him. Where ever he choose to go, he will be positive, productive, and be a change agent. That’s consistent about him. Now as for John Bauters – no, he’s not a progressive. I don’t know what he is. I’m not sure he knows what he is. But in our circles, we see him for what he’s become: someone who talks the talk while taking checks from the same developers pushing working people out of our neighborhoods. I stomped and knocked on doors for Nikki Bass, but we were all afraid his big money would win, but I heard Mr. Priforce stopped him and thank God for that. The only ones cheering for him now seem to be the YIMBYs who cozy up to the recallers and real estate speculators gentrifying Oakland. We got a few of them at Wellstone making the most ridiculous remarks. Say what you want, but some of us have been doing this work long enough to tell the difference between a real one and a performance.
— Oakland resident, Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club
It is wild to write this while Councilmember Priforce is under investigation for taking real estate money without disclosing it.
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You must really think people are stupid. Saying “under investigation” like it’s proof of wrongdoing is the oldest trick in the book. Do you even know what it takes to trigger an FPPC investigation? If that is the investigation you’re referring to. Practically nothing.
The Fair Political Practices Commission is legally required to open an investigation any time someone files a sworn complaint with enough basic info to identify a potential violation – no proof required. Just allegations and a form. That’s it.
In fact, the FPPC receives over 2,000 complaints every year, and many – sometimes the majority – are dismissed after initial review. Just ask anyone who’s ever run for office in California: if someone doesn’t like you, they file a complaint. It’s weaponized politics 101.
There’s even a whole California Court of Appeal ruling – Eldridge v. FPPC – that affirmed how minimal the threshold is to open an investigation, and how doing so says nothing about guilt or even credible evidence.
So before you try to make “under investigation” sound like a smoking gun, maybe check your facts – or better yet, stop parroting developer-funded smear campaigns. Because out here, we know what time it is.
Kalimah Priforce’s supporter is correct that the latest FPPC complaint about him taking real estate money was just opened. A verdict is still out. Anyone can file a complaint. A different Priforce supporter tried to do so against mayor David Mourra. The FPPC promptly dismissed it as lacking merit.
But, Kalimah Priforce’s supporter fails to mention that there is email thread proof of the real estate backer Buttner Properties personally saying in May 2024 he had already given money to Priforce’s mayoral campaign to his 2022 councilmember committee fund. Buttner has a stake in the outcome of the 40th St Multimodal Project, which the council votes on. Priforce is late on filing his latest finance contributions and in his last one in 2024 (well after May), never disclosed Buttner Properties gave him money.
This is highly unethical.
Saw this posted on reddit with this link. https://www.reddit.com/r/Emeryville/s/pnfsdgApOc
https://samgouldemeryville.substack.com/p/why-councilmember-priforce-is-under?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=36hylu&triedRedirect=true
Saw this posted on reddit:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Emeryville/s/fLXaM46eet
https://samgouldemeryville.substack.com/p/why-councilmember-priforce-is-under?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=36hylu&triedRedirect=true
Truth be told, if John had won against Nikki, Barbara Lee could have lost her mayoral run. I think the people who wanted Loren and John to win know that their campaigns were connected and now John is working for the PAC that supported his and Loren’s.