Kamala Harris’ star-studded transition team

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Atty. Gen.-elect Kamala Harris announced the members of an all-star transition team Wednesday, recruiting former presidential appointees and top police and legal professionals to advise her on a variety of issues as she takes the reins as California’s top law enforcement official.

The five co-chairs of Harris’ ‘Smart on Crime Committee’ are: William J. Bratton, former Los Angeles police chief; Warren Christopher, secretary of state under President Clinton; Connie Rice, co-director of the Advancement Project in Los Angeles; George Shultz, secretary of state under President Reagan; and Kathleen Sullivan, former dean of Stanford Law School.

‘We have brought together California’s best and brightest to help develop smart and innovative policies on how to fix California’s broken criminal justice system,’ Harris said at a San Francisco news conference. ‘From the Silicon Valley to the San Fernando Valley, from biotech to green tech, from climate protection to public safety, California has always been the place where the future is invented first.’

The celebrity team provides a stark contrast to the one assembled by Gov.-elect Jerry Brown, who has been relying on a small group of longtime friends and aides to assist in his transition. Among Brown’s closest advisers: Anne Gust, his wife and former general counsel and chief administrative officer for Gap Inc.; Jim Humes, Brown’s top deputy in the attorney general’s office; campaign manager Steve Glazer; and Tom Quinn, a former aide and political advisor who ran Brown’s first campaigns for elective office four decades ago.

-- Michael J. Mishak in Sacramento