Oakland Mayor Jean Quan’s Protest Background Raises Dilemma

Jean Quan faced a tough first year as the mayor of Oakland after her controversial handling of the Occupy movement. From the New York Times: “For Ms. Quan, 62, a longtime civil rights activist and former union organizer whose husband and 29-year-old daughter participated in Occupy protests, the possibility of being undone by youthful demonstrators poses a painful paradox….’My background has made it emotionally harder’ to order police actions against them, she said. “But I’m the mayor of the city. I have to make decisions based on being the mayor.'”