Jerry Brown, Governor

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Brown

Edmund Gerald "Jerry" Brown, Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American politician who has previously served and is currently serving as the Governor of California. He is the son of Pat Brown, the 32nd Governor of California.

Brown served as Governor between 1975 and 1983, and again from 2011. Both before and after his first two terms as governor, Brown has served in various state, local, and party positions. Brown previously served as a member of the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees (1969–1971), Secretary of State of California (1971–1975), chairman of the California Democratic Party (1989–1991), Mayor of Oakland (1999–2007) and Attorney General of California (2007–2011).

Brown sought the Democratic nominations for President of the United States in 1976, 1980, and 1992, and was the Democratic candidate for the United States Senate in California in 1982 but was unsuccessful in these attempts.

Early life, education, and career

Brown was born in San Francisco, California, as the only son of four siblings born to Bernice Layne Brown, and District Attorney of San Francisco and later Governor of California, Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, Sr. Jerry Brown is Irish through his paternal grandfather and German through his paternal grandmother. He was a member of the California Cadet Corps at St. Ignatius High School, where he graduated in 1955.

In 1956, Brown entered Sacred Heart Novitiate, a Jesuit seminary, intent on becoming a Catholic priest. However, Brown left the seminary and entered the University of California, Berkeley, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Classics in 1961. Brown went on to Yale Law School and graduated with a Juris Doctor in 1964. After law school, Brown worked as a law clerk for California Supreme Court Justice Mathew Tobriner. Brown later went to study in Mexico and Latin America

Returning to California, Brown took the state bar exam and passed on his second attempt. Brown then settled in Los Angeles and joined the law firm of Tuttle & Taylor. In 1969, Brown ran for the newly created Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees, which oversaw community colleges in the city, and placed first in a field of 124.

Secretary of State (1971-1975)

In 1970, Brown was elected California Secretary of State. Brown argued before the California Supreme Court and won cases against Standard Oil of California, International Telephone and Telegraph, Gulf Oil, and Mobil for election law violations. In addition, he forced legislators to comply with campaign disclosure laws. While holding this office, he discovered the use of falsely notarized documents to earn a tax deduction by then-President Richard Nixon. Brown also drafted and helped to pass the California Fair Political Practices Act, which established the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

Governor of California (1975-1983)

First term 

In 1974, Brown ran in a highly contested Democratic primary for Governor of California against Speaker of the California Assembly Bob Moretti, San Francisco Mayor Joseph L. Alioto, Representative Jerome R. Waldie, and others. Brown won the primary with the name recognition of his father, Pat Brown, whom Democrats admired for his progressive administration. In the General Election on November 5, 1974, Brown was elected Governor of California over California State Controller Houston I. Flournoy; Republicans ascribed the loss to anti-Republican feelings from Watergate, the election being held only ninety days after President Richard Nixon resigned from office. Brown succeeded Republican Governor Ronald Reagan, who had planned on retiring from office after serving two terms.

After taking office, Brown gained a reputation as a fiscal conservative. The American Conservative later noted he was "much more of a fiscal conservative than Governor Reagan." His fiscal restraint resulted in one of the biggest budget surpluses in state history, roughly $5 billion. For his personal life, Brown refused many of the privileges and perks of the office, forgoing the newly constructed governor's residence and instead renting a modest apartment at the corner of 14th and N Streets, adjacent to Capitol Park in downtown Sacramento. Instead of riding as a passenger in a chauffeured limousine as previous governors had done, Brown drove to work in a Plymouth Satellite sedan.

As governor, Brown held a strong interest in environmental issues. He appointed J. Baldwin to work in the newly created California Office of Appropriate Technology, Sim Van der Ryn as State Architect, Stewart Brand as Special Advisor, John Bryson as chairman of the California State Water Board. Brown also reorganized the California Arts Council, boosting its funding by 1300 percent and appointing artists to the council and appointed more women and minorities to office than any other previous California Governor. In 1977, he sponsored the "first-ever tax incentive for rooftop solar" among many environmental initiatives. In 1975, Brown obtained the repeal of the "depletion allowance", a tax break for the state's oil industry, despite the efforts of lobbyist Joe Shell, a former intraparty rival to Richard M. Nixon.

Like his father, Brown strongly opposed the death penalty and vetoed it as governor, which the legislature overrode in 1977. He also appointed judges who opposed capital punishment. His appointee as Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court, Rose Bird, was recalled in 1986 by voters angry at her opposition to the death penalty. She and two other Brown appointed justices were the first such removals in California history.

Brown was both in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment and opposed to Proposition 13, the latter of which would decrease property taxes and greatly reduce revenue to cities and counties. When Proposition 13 passed in June 1978, he heavily cut state spending, and along with the Legislature, spent much of the $5 billion surplus to meet the proposition's requirements and help offset the revenue losses which made cities, counties, and schools more dependent on the state. His actions in response to the proposition earned him praise from Proposition 13 author Howard Jarvis who went as far to make a television commercial for Brown just before his successful reelection bid in 1978. The controversial proposition immediately cut tax revenues and required a two-thirds supermajority to raise taxes. Proposition 13 "effectively destroyed the funding base of local governments and school districts, which thereafter depended largely on Sacramento for their revenue". Max Neiman, a professor at the Institute of Government Studies at University of California, Berkeley, credited Brown for "bailing out local government and school districts" but felt it was harmful "because it made it easier for people to believe that Proposition 13 wasn't harmful."

Second term 

Brown won re-election in 1978 against Republican state Attorney General Evelle J. Younger. Brown appointed the first openly gay judge in the United States when he named Stephen Lachs to serve on the Los Angeles County Superior Court in 1979. In 1981, he also appointed the first openly lesbian judge in the United States, Mary C. Morgan to the San Francisco Municipal Court. Brown completed his second term having appointed a total of five openly homosexual judges, including Rand Schrader and Jerold Krieger. Through his first term as Governor, Brown had not appointed any openly gay people to any position, but he cited the failed 1978 Briggs Initiative, which sought to ban homosexuals from working in California's public schools, for his increased support of gay rights.

In 1981, California Governor Jerry Brown, who had established a reputation as a strong environmentalist, was confronted with a serious medfly infestation in the San Francisco Bay Area. He was advised by the state's agricultural industry, and the US Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection service (APHIS), to authorize airborne spraying of the region. Initially, in accordance with his environmental protection stance, he chose to authorize ground-level spraying only. Unfortunately, the infestation spread as the medfly reproductive cycle out-paced the spraying. After more than a month, millions of dollars of crops had been destroyed and billions of dollars more were threatened. Governor Brown then authorized a massive response to the infestation. Fleets of helicopters sprayed malathion at night, and the California National Guard set up highway checkpoints and collected many tons of local fruit; in the final stage of the campaign, entomologists released millions of sterile male medflies in an attempt to disrupt the insects' reproductive cycle.

Ultimately the infestation was eradicated, but both the Governor's delay and the scale of the action has remained controversial ever since. Some people claimed that malathion was toxic to humans, as well as insects. In response to such concerns, Brown's chief of staff, B. T. Collins, staged a news conference during which he publicly drank a small glass of malathion. Many people complained that, while the malathion may not have been very toxic to humans, the aerosol spray containing it was corrosive to car paint.

During the week of September 9, 2007, adult flies and their larvae were found in Dixon, California. The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) and cooperating county and federal agricultural officials started eradication and quarantine efforts in the area. Eradication was declared on August 8, 2008, when no "wild" (i.e. non-sterile) medflies were detected for three generations.

On November 14, 2008, four adult flies were found in El Cajon, California. The San Diego County Agricultural Commission implemented a treatment plan, including distributing millions of sterile male flies, local produce quarantines, and ground spraying with organic pesticides.

Brown proposed the establishment of a state space academy and the purchasing of a satellite that would be launched into orbit to provide emergency communications for the state—a proposal similar to one that was indeed eventually adopted. In 1979, an out-of-state columnist, Mike Royko, at the Chicago Sun-Times, picked up on the nickname from Brown's girlfriend at the time, Linda Ronstadt, who was quoted in a 1978 Rolling Stone magazine interview humorously calling him "Moonbeam". A year later Royko expressed his regret for publicizing the nickname, and in 1991 Royko disavowed it entirely, proclaiming Brown to be just as serious as any other politician.

Brown chose not to run for a third term in 1982, and instead ran for the United States Senate, but lost to San Diego Mayor Pete Wilson. He was succeeded as Governor by George Deukmejian, then state Attorney General on January 3, 1983.

Senate defeat and public life

In 1982, Brown chose not to seek a third term as governor, instead, Brown ran for the United States Senate for the seat being vacated by Republican S.I. Hayakawa. He was defeated by Republican San Diego Mayor Pete Wilson by a margin of 52% to 45%. After his Senate defeat, Brown was left with few political options. Republican George Deukmejian, a Brown critic, narrowly won the governorship in 1982, succeeding Brown, and was reelected overwhelmingly in 1986. After his Senate defeat in 1982, many considered Brown's political career to be over.

Brown traveled to Japan to study Buddhism, studying with Christian/Zen practitioner Hugo Enomiya-Lassalle under Yamada Koun-roshi. In an interview he explained, "Since politics is based on illusions, zazen definitely provides new insights for a politician. I then come back into the world of California and politics, with critical distance from some of my more comfortable assumptions." He also visited Mother Teresa in Calcutta, India, where he ministered to the sick in one of her hospices. He explained, "Politics is a power struggle to get to the top of the heap. Calcutta and Mother Teresa are about working with those who are at the bottom of the heap. And to see them as no different than yourself, and their needs as important as your needs. And you're there to serve them, and doing that you are attaining as great a state of being as you can."

Upon his return from abroad in 1988, Brown announced that he would stand as a candidate to become chairman of the California Democratic Party, and won against investment banker Steve Westly. Although Brown greatly expanded the party's donor base and enlarged its coffers, with a focus on grassroots organizing and get out the vote drives, he was criticized for not spending enough money on TV ads, which was felt to have contributed to Democratic losses in several close races in 1990. In early 1991, Brown abruptly resigned his post and announced that he would run for the Senate seat held by the retiring Alan Cranston. Although Brown consistently led in the polls for both the nomination and the general election, he abandoned the campaign, deciding instead to run for the presidency for a third time.

Presidential bids

1976

Brown at the 1976 Democratic National Convention in New York City Brown first ran for the Democratic nomination for President in March 1976, after the primary season had begun, and over a year after some candidates had started campaigning. Brown declared, "The country is rich, but not so rich as we have been led to believe. The choice to do one thing may preclude another. In short, we are entering an era of limits."

Brown's name began appearing on primary ballots in May and he won in Maryland, Nevada, and his home state of California. He missed the deadline in Oregon, but he ran as a write-in candidate and finished in third behind Jimmy Carter and Senator Frank Church of Idaho. Brown is often credited with winning the New Jersey and Rhode Island primaries, but in reality, uncommitted slates of delegates that Brown advocated in those states finished first. With support from Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards, Brown won a majority of delegates at the Louisiana delegate selection convention; thus Louisiana was the only southern state to not support Southerners Carter or Alabama Governor George Wallace. Despite this success, he was unable to stall Carter's momentum, and his rival was nominated on the first ballot at the 1976 Democratic National Convention. Brown finished third with roughly 300 delegate votes, narrowly behind Congressman Morris Udall and Carter.

1980

In 1980, Brown challenged Carter for renomination. His candidacy had been anticipated by the press ever since he won re-election as governor in 1978 over the Republican Evelle Younger by the largest margin in California history, 1.3 million votes. But Brown had trouble gaining traction in both fundraising and polling for the presidential nomination. This was widely believed to be the result of the more prominent candidate Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts. Brown's 1980 platform, which he declared to be the natural result of combining Buckminster Fuller's visions of the future and E. F. Schumacher's theory of "Buddhist economics", was much expanded from 1976. His "era of limits" slogan was replaced by a promise to, in his words, "Protect the Earth, serve the people, and explore the universe." Three main planks of his platform were a call for a constitutional convention to ratify the Balanced Budget Amendment, a promise to increase funds for the space program, and, in the wake of the 1979 Three Mile Island accident, opposition to nuclear power. On the subject of the 1979 energy crisis, Brown decried the "Faustian bargain" that he claimed Carter had entered into with the oil industry, and declared that he would greatly increase federal funding of research into solar power. He endorsed the idea of mandatory non-military national service for the nation's youth, and suggested that the Defense Department cut back on support troops while beefing up the number of combat troops. He described the health care industry as a "high priesthood" engaged in a "medical arms race" and called for a market-oriented system of universal health care.

As his campaign began to attract more members of what some more conservative commentators described as "the fringe", including activists like Jane Fonda, Tom Hayden, and Jesse Jackson, however his polling numbers began to suffer. Brown received only 10 percent of the vote in the New Hampshire primary, and he was soon forced to announce that his decision to remain in the race would depend on a good showing in the Wisconsin primary. Although he had polled well there throughout the primary season, an attempt to film a live speech in Madison, the state's capital, into a special effects-filled, 30-minute commercial (produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola) was disastrous.

1992

When Brown announced his intention to run for president against President George H.W. Bush, many in the media and his own party dismissed his campaign as having little chance of gaining significant support. Ignoring them, Brown embarked on an grassroots campaign to, in his own words, "take back America from the confederacy of corruption, careerism, and campaign consulting in Washington". In his stump speech, first used while officially announcing his candidacy on the steps of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Brown told listeners that he would only be accepting campaign contributions from individuals and that he would not accept over $100. Continuing with his populist reform theme, he assailed what he dubbed "the bipartisan Incumbent Party in Washington" and called for term limits for members of Congress. Citing various recent scandals on Capitol Hill, particularly the recent House banking scandal and the large congressional pay-raises from 1990, he promised to put an end to Congress being a "Stop-and-Shop for the moneyed special interests".

As Brown campaigned in various primary states, he would eventually expand his platform beyond a policy of strict campaign finance reform. Although he focused on a variety of issues throughout the campaign, he highlighted his endorsement of living wage laws and opposition to free trade agreements such as NAFTA; he mostly concentrated on his tax policy, which had been created specifically for him by Arthur Laffer, the famous supporter of supply-side economics who created the Laffer curve. This plan, which called for the replacement of the progressive income tax with a flat tax and a value added tax, both at a fixed 13 percent rate, was decried by his opponents as regressive. Nevertheless, it was endorsed by The New York Times, The New Republic, and Forbes, and its raising of taxes on corporations and elimination of various loopholes which tended to favor the very wealthy, proved to be popular with voters. This was, perhaps, not surprising, as various opinion polls taken at the time found that as many as three-quarters of all Americans believed the current tax code to be unfairly biased toward the wealthy.

Due to his limited budget, Brown began to use a mixture of alternative media and unusual fund raising techniques. Unable to pay for actual commercials, he used frequent cable television and talk radio interviews as a form of free media to get his message to the voters. In order to raise funds, he purchased a toll-free telephone number, which adorned all of his campaign stances. During the campaign, Brown's repetition of this number combined with the moralistic language used, led some to describe him as a "political televangelist" with an "anti-politics gospel".

Despite poor showings in the Iowa caucus (1.6%) and the New Hampshire primary (8.0%), Brown soon managed to win narrow victories in Maine, Colorado, Nevada, Alaska, and Vermont, but he continued to be considered a small threat for much of the campaign. It was not until shortly after Super Tuesday, when the field had been narrowed to Brown, former Senator Paul Tsongas of Massachusetts, and frontrunner Governor Bill Clinton of Arkansas, that Brown began to emerge as a major contender in the eyes of the press. On March 17, Brown forced Tsongas from the race when he received a strong third-place showing in the Illinois primary and then defeated the senator for second place in the Michigan primary by a wide margin. Exactly one week later, he cemented his position as a major threat to Clinton when he eked out a narrow win in the bitterly-fought Connecticut primary. As the press focused on the primaries in New York and Wisconsin, which were both to be held on the same day, Brown, who had taken the lead in polls in both states, made a gaffe: he announced to an audience of various leaders of New York City's Jewish community that, if nominated, he would consider the Reverend Jesse Jackson as a vice-presidential candidate. Jackson, who had made a pair of anti-semitic comments about Jews in general and New York City's Jews in particular while running for president in 1984, was still despised in Jewish communities. Jackson also had ties to Louis Farrakhan, who said Judaism was a "gutter religion," and with Yasir Arafat, the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Brown's polling numbers suffered. On April 7, he lost narrowly to Bill Clinton in Wisconsin (37%–34%), and dramatically in New York (41%–26%).

Although Brown continued to campaign in a number of states, he won no further primaries. Although overwhelmingly outspent, Brown won upset victories in seven states and his votes won to money raised ratio was by far the best of any candidate in the race. He still had a sizable number of delegates, and a big win in his home state of California would deprive Clinton of sufficient support to win the Democratic nomination, possibly bringing about a brokered convention. After nearly a month of intense campaigning and multiple debates between the two candidates, Clinton managed to defeat Brown in this final primary by a margin of 48% to 41%. Although Brown did not win the nomination, he was able to boast of one accomplishment: At the following month's Democratic National Convention, he received the votes of 596 delegates on the first ballot, more than any other candidate but Clinton. He spoke at the convention, and to the national viewing audience, yet without endorsing Clinton, through the device of seconding his own nomination. There was animosity between the Brown and Clinton campaigns, and Brown was the first political figure to criticize Bill Clinton over what became the Whitewater controversy.

Mayor of Oakland (1999–2007)

What was to become Brown's re-emergence into politics after six years was also the start of the renaissance of Oakland, California, an "overwhelmingly minority city of 400,000." Brown ran as an independent "having left the Democratic Party, blasting what he called the 'deeply corrupted' two-party system." Prior to taking office, Brown campaigned to get the approval of the electorate to convert Oakland's weak mayor political structure, which structured the mayor as chairman of the city council and official greeter, to a strong mayor structure, where the mayor would act as chief executive over the nonpolitical city manager and thus the various city departments, and break tie votes on the Oakland City Council. He won with 59% of the vote in a field of ten candidates. The political left had hoped for some of the more progressive politics from Brown's earlier governorship, but found Brown "more pragmatic than progressive, more interested in downtown redevelopment and economic growth than political ideology".

The city was rapidly losing residents and businesses, and Brown is credited with starting the revitalization of the city using his connections and experience to lessen the economic downturn, while attracting $1 billion of investments, including refurbishing Fox Theater (Oakland), the Port of Oakland, and Jack London Square. The downtown district was losing retailers, restaurateurs and residential developers, and Brown sought to attract thousands of new residents with disposable income to revitalize the area. Brown continued his predecessor Elihu Harris's public policy of supporting downtown housing development in the area defined as the Central Business District in Oakland's 1998 General Plan. Since Brown worked toward the stated goal of bringing an additional 10,000 residents to Downtown Oakland, his plan was known as "10K." It has resulted in redevelopment projects in the Jack London District, where Brown purchased and later sold an industrial warehouse which he used as a personal residence, and in the Lakeside Apartments District near Lake Merritt. The 10k plan has touched the historic Old Oakland district, the Chinatown district, the Uptown district, and Downtown. Brown surpassed the stated goal of attracting 10,000 residents according to city records, and built more affordable housing than previous mayoral administrations.

Brown had campaigned on fixing Oakland's schools, but "bureaucratic battles" dampened his efforts. He concedes he never had control of the schools, and his reform efforts were "largely a bust". He focused instead on the creation of two charter schools, the Oakland School for the Arts and the Oakland Military Institute. Another area of disappointment was overall crime. Brown sponsored nearly two dozen crime initiatives to reduce the crime rate, although crime decreased by 13 percent overall, the city still suffered a "57 percent spike in homicides his final year in office, to 148 overall".[48]

Attorney General of California (2007–2011)

In 2004, Brown expressed interest to be a candidate for the Democratic nomination for Attorney General of California in the 2006 election, and in May 2004, he formally filed to run. He defeated his Democratic primary opponent Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo 63% to 37%. In the general election, Brown defeated Republican State Senator Charles Poochigian 56.3% to 38.2%, one of the largest margins of victory in any statewide California race. In the final weeks leading up to Election Day, Brown's eligibility to run for Attorney General was challenged in what Brown called a "political stunt by a Republican office seeker" (Contra Costa County Republican Central Committee chairman and state GOP vice-chair candidate Tom Del Beccaro). Plaintiffs claimed Brown did not meet eligibility according to California Government Code §12503, "No person shall be eligible to the office of Attorney General unless he shall have been admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the state for a period of at least five years immediately preceding his election or appointment to such office." Legal analysts called the lawsuit frivolous because Brown was admitted to practice law in the State of California on June 14, 1965, and had been so admitted to practice ever since. Although ineligible to practice law because of his voluntary inactive status in the State Bar of California from January 1, 1997 to May 1, 2003, he was nevertheless still admitted to practice. Because of this difference the case was eventually thrown out.

As Attorney General, Brown represented the state in fighting death penalty appeals and stated that he would follow the law, regardless of his personal beliefs against capital punishment. Capital punishment by lethal injection was halted in California by federal judge Jeremy D. Fogel until new facilities and procedures were put into place. Brown moved to resume capital punishment in 2010 with the execution of Albert Greenwood Brown after the lifting of a statewide moratorium by a California court. Brown's Democratic campaign, which pledged to "enforce the laws" of California, denied any connection between the case and the gubernatorial election. Prosecutor Rod Pacheco, who supported Republican opponent Meg Whitman, said that it would be unfair to accuse Jerry Brown of using the execution for political gain as they never discussed the case.

In June 2008, Brown filed a fraud lawsuit claiming mortgage lender Countrywide Financial engaged in "unfair and deceptive" practices to get homeowners to apply for risky mortgages far beyond their means." Brown accused the lender of breaking the state's laws against false advertising and unfair business practices, the lawsuit also claimed the defendant misled many consumers by misinforming them about the workings of certain mortgages such adjustable-rate mortgages, interest-only loans, low-documentation loans and home-equity loans while telling borrowers they would be able to refinance before the interest rate on their loans adjusted. The suit was settled in October 2008 after Bank of America acquired Countrywide. The settlement involved the modifying of troubled 'predatory loans' up to $8.4 billion dollars.

Proposition 8, a contentious voter-approved amendment to the state constitution that banned same-sex marriage was upheld in May 2009 by the California Supreme Court. In August 2010, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that Proposition 8 violated the Due Process and the Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Brown and then Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger both declined to appeal the ruling. The state appeals court declined to order the men to defend the proposition and scheduled a hearing in early December to see if there is "legal standing to appeal Walker's ruling."

Governor of California (2011 - present)

Third term

Brown at an election rally in Sacramento two days before the election Brown announced his candidacy for governor on March 2, 2010. First indicating his interest in early 2008, Brown formed an exploratory committee in order to seek a third term as governor in 2010, following the expiration of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's term.

Brown's Republican opponent in the election was former eBay president Meg Whitman. Brown was endorsed by the Los Angeles Times, The Sacramento Bee, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News, and the Service Employees International Union.

Brown was sworn in for his third term as governor on January 3, 2011, succeeding Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger. He will be up for re-election in 2014. Brown is working on a budget that would shift many government programs from the state to the local level, a reversal of trends from his first tenure as governor.

On June 28, 2012, Governor Brown signed a budget that makes deep cuts to social services and assumes that voters will pass $8 billion in tax hikes in November 2012 to close California's $15.7-billion budget deficit. "This budget reflects tough choices that will help get California back on track," Governor Brown said in a statement.

Electoral history

Main article: Electoral history of Jerry Brown http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_history_of_Jerry_Brown

Personal life

A bachelor as governor and mayor, Brown attracted attention for dating high-profile women, the most notable of whom was singer Linda Ronstadt. In March 2005, Brown announced his engagement to his girlfriend since 1990, Anne Gust, former chief administrative officer for The Gap. They were married on June 18 in a ceremony officiated by Senator Dianne Feinstein in the Rotunda Building in downtown Oakland. They had a second, religious ceremony later in the day in the Roman Catholic church in San Francisco where Brown's parents had been married. Brown and Gust live in the Oakland Hills in a home purchased for $1.8 million, as reported by The Huffington Post.

Beginning in 1995, Brown hosted a daily call-in talk show on the local Pacifica Radio station, KPFA-FM, in Berkeley broadcast to major US markets. Both the radio program and Brown's political action organization, based in Oakland, were called We the People. His programs, usually featuring invited guests, generally explored alternative views on a wide range of social and political issues, from education and health care to spirituality and the death penalty.

Brown has a long-term friendship with Jacques Barzaghi, his aide-de-camp, whom he met in the early 1970s and put on his payroll. Author Roger Rapaport wrote in his 1982 Brown biography California Dreaming: The Political Odyssey of Pat & Jerry Brown, "this combination clerk, chauffeur, fashion consultant, decorator and trusted friend had no discernible powers. Yet late at night, after everyone had gone home to their families and TV consoles, it was Jacques who lingered in the Secretary (of state's) office." Barzaghi and his sixth wife Aisha lived with Brown in the warehouse in Jack London Square; Barzaghi was brought into Oakland city government upon Brown's election as mayor, where Barzaghi first acted as the mayor's armed bodyguard. Brown later rewarded Barzaghi with high-paying city jobs, including Arts Director[citation needed]. Brown dismissed Barzaghi in July 2004.

On April 29, 2011, Brown had surgery to remove a basal-cell carcinoma from the right side of his nose.