Chesa Boudin was successfully recalled as San Francisco district attorney on June 7, 2022, about 16 months after the February 2021 podcast, with roughly 55–60% of voters backing his removal. Analyses of the recall link it directly to public frustration over crime, visible disorder, property crime, homelessness, and drug issues, and to a perception that Boudin’s progressive policies were too lenient on offenders.(en.wikipedia.org)

Following the recall, Mayor London Breed appointed Brooke Jenkins—who had actively campaigned for Boudin’s removal on a “soft-on-crime” critique—as interim DA, and she was later elected in her own right. Jenkins publicly promised to “restore order,” be tougher on repeat offenders, crack down on open-air drug use and property crime, and reassert more traditional prosecutorial discretion.【(latimes.com) Subsequent data show a clear policy shift under Jenkins: misdemeanor prosecutions rose to their highest level in over a decade, diversion into treatment programs dropped markedly, and the office increased charging and incarceration for low‑level offenses—moves widely characterized as a tougher, more traditional public‑safety stance compared with Boudin’s reforms.【(sfchronicle.com)

More broadly, San Francisco politics have continued to move in a similar direction, with voters later electing Mayor Daniel Lurie in 2024 on a platform of restoring order, tackling crime and homelessness, and replacing officials viewed as unwilling to prosecute quality‑of‑life crimes, reinforcing the sense of a backlash against the prior, more progressive approach.【(washingtonpost.com)

While the actual impact of these changes on crime and “lawlessness” is contested, Friedberg’s prediction was specifically about a political pendulum swing: that public reaction to rising crime and Boudin’s policies would soon trigger a reversal toward tougher public‑safety politics, exemplified by recall or election of more traditional prosecutors. The successful recall of Boudin and the subsequent policy shifts under Jenkins (and later mayoral politics) match that forecast closely in both substance and timing, so the prediction is best judged as right.