The Stranger

Katie Wilson Is Seattle’s Next Mayor

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 12 Nov 2025 16:29:00 -0800

Somewhere, Bruce Harrell is slamming a table. Katie Wilson is up by 1,976 votes and 0.72 percent of the vote. It’s tight, but we’re outside of recount territory, and it’s mathematically impossible for Harrell to catch up. Katie Wilson will be Seattle’s next mayor. by Stranger Election Control Board

Wilson has not declared victory yet—on Wednesday night, when her win was all but certain, her team told The Stranger that they’re doing the graceful thing and waiting for Harrell to concede. The Mayor’s office announced that he would be addressing the city at noon on Thursday, so we should expect Wilson to do her victory lap then.

“We’re thrilled with the latest drop, which continues to trend in our direction,” Wilson’s campaign told The Stranger, calling their lead “insurmountable” at this point. “We’re tremendously grateful for everyone who has supported and guided our vision for the City of Seattle. This campaign was driven by a deep belief that we need to expand the table to include everyone in the decisions that impact their lives. That is what we will be working to do every day as we set up this new administration.”

Even the people who took their time getting on board with the progressive “upstart” campaign sang her praises when the results came in today. “A huge congratulations to Katie Wilson for reminding people of what is possible and running a terrific, grassroots campaign focused on making Seattle a city where everyone can afford to live,” Congressmember and Harrell endorser Pramila Jayapal said in a statement. “I am excited to partner with Mayor-Elect Wilson on delivering results to tackle transit, housing, childcare and ensuring that our city remains equitable and welcoming to all people.”

This means we can officially say that progressives made a clean sweep of Seattle’s election this year. We get a new City Council President! We get two new council members! We get a new City Attorney, and she isn’t even a Republican!

We still have some knuckleheads hanging around, but we’ll see if they play nice. And even if they don’t, for the first time in years, we have a chance of getting something done around here.

Katie Wilson is Likely Our Next Mayor

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 11 Nov 2025 16:26:00 -0800

She's probably the mayor, folks. Goodbye, Bruce? by Stranger Election Control Board

Katie Wilson has 50.08 percent of the vote. The political consultants say this race is over, and she’s won. So is this over?

After yesterday’s drop, Wilson only needed about 50 percent of the remaining vote to win. Today, she got more than 60 percent. She’s up 1,346 votes with 1,355 ballots left uncounted.

Before we peace out of Brucelandia, we’re technically still within machine recount territory. Would that recount change the outcome?

CONSULTING THE CONSULTANTS

We returned to the crystal ball to speak with our political experts for a final (?) time this election (maybe not, this is endless.) They call it for Katie.

Crystal Fincher, political consultant and the host of the Hacks & Wonks podcast: “I’ve seen enough. Congratulations, Mayor-elect Katie Wilson.”

Stephen Paolini, who is affiliated with Katie Wilson’s PAC: “What?!?! … There are simply not enough ballots left to count for Bruce Harrell to recover and I’m comfortable saying definitely that Katie will be the next Mayor of Seattle … The only remaining question today is whether she will get above the 2,000 vote threshold and save us all the unnecessary drama of a machine recount. Which I can't stress enough will absolutely not change the result of this election.”

Ben Anderstone, who worked on Sara Nelson’s campaign: “It’s over. Wilson wins. No way challenged ballots could make up that margin, even if there are technically more of them.

Michael Fertakis, who is busy with Girmay Zahilay’s transition team: “Katie is going to win this … She’ll get out of the automatic recount range, they’re at a 0.49 percent difference now. It’s over.”

BALANCING A BALLOT’S FOUR HUMORS

Let’s talk about the outstanding votes. As of blog time, there are a little more than 1,500 challenged ballots. Those ballots with signature problems can be “cured.” Follow these easy instructions to make sure your ballot was counted.

So far, according to King County Elections, 33 percent of challenged ballots have already been cured. In a typical election, around half of voters with challenged ballots resolve their ballot issues. Halei Watkins at King County Elections says it’s hard to tell how many voters will fix their ballots in a race that’s this close with campaigns reminding voters to check their ballots.

In recent memory, the highest response rate for challenged ballots came in the 2024 Primary Election, where King County Elections ended up doing a recount on the Public Lands Commissioner race.

“Sixty-nine percent of voters responded to resolve their challenge in that election,” Watkins says.

A similarly charged, tight race happened in December 2021 during the Kshama Sawant recall election. During that election, 67 percent of voters with challenged ballots responded to challenges.

Those signature challenge resolutions will keep coming in until November 24.

“Just like voting itself, we do tend to see a wave of folks responding on the final day,” Watkins said.

Regardless of all these challenged ballots, people like Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, are already calling Wilson mayor-elect.

The Monday Ballot Drop Is Here

Stranger Election Control Board — Mon, 10 Nov 2025 16:18:00 -0800

Ahhhhhhhhh by Stranger Election Control Board

Alright gooners, big news.

For the first time this election, Katie Wilson is up 49.83 percent to Bruce Harrell’s 49.79 percent. Almost everything is counted, with fewer than 10,000 ballots left. This is a tight race.

WHY VOTING IN LOCAL ELECTIONS MATTERS

Katie Wilson is ahead by 91 votes. She needed 54.7 percent of the vote this drop. She got 55.7 percent of it. She’s barely winning. Though these eggs are looking pretty affordable and renter-friendly, don’t count those chickens.

THIS IS EXQUISITE TORTURE

Our on-call experts this cycle provided their wisdom in the minutes after the drop.

Stephen Paolini, who is affiliated with Katie Wilson’s PAC: First, a point of personal privilege. I said what I said. Bruce is fucking cooked … [Wilson’s] lead will only increase. The final margin will be somewhere between a 800-1200 vote lead for Katie … I believe it's fair to say Katie will be the next mayor of Seattle but we might as well wait one more day to say it officially.”

Michael Fertakis, who worked on Girmay Zahilay’s (officially victorious) campaign: “It’s still too close to call but at this point with the way the votes have been trending every day, Katie Wilson is most likely going to be Seattle’s next mayor.”

Ben Anderstone, who was on Sara Nelson’s campaign: “Still too close to call (because freakish stuff can happen at that margin), but Wilson is definitely favored. She's won late ballots about 55 percent to 45 percent, and she just has to approach tying the remaining vote. The main reason not to call it: The very last ballots processed are often ballots that need to be reconstructed because the voter filled them out strangely, spilled a sandwich on it, etcetera. Those ballots are oftentimes less left, more representative of the overall vote.”

RECOUNT TRIGGER FINGER

Considering these GLP-1-skinny margins, it’s looking pretty certain that we’ll have some sort of recount. An automatic machine recount will happen if a candidate wins by less than half a percent or less than 2,000 votes. A hand recount will happen if there’s a difference of less than 250 votes and 0.25 percent of the vote total.

According to Halei Watkins at King County Elections, the percentage requirements usually “knocks a race OUT of mandatory recount range,” she wrote in an email. Percentages are stingy like that. Right now, the difference between the two candidates is around 0.04 percent, but it may widen with ensuing ballot drops.

If Wilson’s trajectory holds, “there will be a machine recount but not a hand recount,” Paolini says.

“As far as I can tell there has never been an election result changed by a machine recount, there have been a few times where a hand recount has changed the result,” Paolini says. “But no one reasonably expects an 800 vote difference between recounts. That would be an incredible anomaly.”

We have time until we know definitively whether our next stop is Recount City. No recounts can be triggered until King County Elections finishes its certification process by 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 24. That’s the cut off for when voters can amend signature issues with their ballots. Which is a good reminder: Have you checked your ballot?

However, campaigns can request a recount regardless of one being triggered automatically by the vote count. If they do that, they’ll have to pay. For a machine recount, campaigns must pay a deposit of $0.15 per ballot. It costs a deposit of $0.25 per ballot for a hand recount. That may be an appealing option for campaigns with lots of funds left to spend.

Who will be the mayor? We have some strong hunches. But, we’ll have to wait to be sure. Only time—and those straggler ballots—will tell.

Correction: We wrote that the difference between the candidates was around 0.4 percent. It's really 0.04 percent. We dropped the zero, and regret the error.

The Friday Ballot Drop Is Here

Stranger Election Control Board — Fri, 07 Nov 2025 16:01:00 -0800

Wilson Made Important Gains, but When Will This Torment End???

by Stranger Election Control Board

King County Elections has been apparently working with one fucking abacus between them. The ballot drop for Seattle votes was 56,000 strong today.

We kid, King County Elections. We value an accurate count of the ballots. Really, you’ve done enough counting to make a vampire blush. And you’re on track (see below), we’re just so impatient at this point.

KATIE WILSON, OR KATIE WONTSON?

As we wrote yesterday, Katie Wilson needed roughly 55 percent of the ballot count from Thursday onward. Since then, King County Elections has gotten its mitts on more ballots, so she’ll need slightly less than that.

And? Wilson took 54.85 percent.

THE SISKELS AND EBERTS OF POLITICS

These talking heads are not our beautiful house, nor are they our beautiful wives, but they are the ones with their fingers on the pulse. And, they’re willing to opine on the intangible, so we are going to keep talking to them.

Crystal Fincher, consultant and host of the Hacks & Wonks: “Game on. Wilson is currently on pace to overtake Harrell. Of course, counts aren’t predetermined and the percentage could vary. However, historically votes continue to trend more progressive in the in these counts. That’s also why I was saying that a larger count yesterday could have had a larger percentage for Katie.”

Stephen Paolini, who is affiliated with Katie Wilson’s PAC: “That’s enough for Katie to win. This race will end within a quarter of a percent with Katie ahead. Bruce now needs Katie to win a smaller share of remaining even more progressive votes in order to hold on. Press F to doubt.” (Before the drop, he was not as happy: “Instead of an I voted sticker I think King County Elections should start handing out tums for voting to help with my nausea.”)

Michael Fertakis, who works with the Girmay Zahilay and Steffanie Fain campaigns: “[Wilson is] not out of the woods but this is definitely a very positive sign and further evidence of this race likely coming down to a few hundred votes.”

Ben Anderstone, who worked on Sara Nelson’s campaign: “Katie got basically exactly what she needed today, maybe a nudge more.” After a (text) pause. “Actually, more than she needed probably. I think Katie probably wins. I don’t want to call it impulsively, but.”

A LITTLE MORE ROCK SOLID ANALYSIS FROM MR. ANDERSTONE:

This is our life now. Anderstone texted us at 10:29 p.m. last night to tell us that a ton of the late ballots were from “Katie-friendly” neighborhoods (renters, less affluent, etc.), so the leftward swing could be “even stronger than usual.” It’s a good omen for her.

FIX THAT FUCKING BALLOT!

This election is going to be close. It could come down to those challenged ballots riddled with signatures either messed up or missing. At blog time, 1,920 Seattle ballots were in approval limbo due to these issues. Of those, 66 percent belong to voters 44-years-old and younger. According to polling, that age group likely voted for Wilson. Here’s how you can fix your fucked up ballot.

GIR-MAY I HAVE THIS DANCE? (WE KNOW HOW GIRMAY IS PRONOUNCED)

Girmay Zahliay is at 53.27 percent. That’s a 1.52 percent gain from yesterday.

We’re unsurprised. Zahilay’s campaign has not officially declared victory, but it has released a press release saying his transition team was getting to work right away. We think that’s basically the same fucking thing, but his campaign disagrees. They’ll probably definitively declare victory after this. Balducci is stuck in 45.53 percent hell.

UPDATE: Balducci conceded after this story initially published.

KICK ROCKS KEVIN

Good news, everyone. Rep. Edwin Obras has officially left Burien Mayor Kevin Schilling in the dust. Sorry, Burien, you’re stuck with this guy. Today, Obras is at 50.57 percent. Yesterday, he was 0.88 percent lower. Schilling sunk. Funny how that works. He’s at 47.72 percent, almost a full percentage point less than his total yesterday. Bye, bye, Schilling.

THE COUNTING HAS BEEN SLOWER THAN USUAL, RIGHT?

Wrong. Apparently this isn’t slower than normal, according to Halei Watkins at King County Elections. Normal? Three days since the election and no mayor?

Our fickle, short term memories can only recall 2024, a presidential, even-year election when people voted steadily, earlier. In odd year elections, people tend to hoard their ballots until election day. And because of that, King County Elections has to deal with a “crush of Election Day ballots.” This year is actually on pace with the returns of 2021 and 2023, according to Watkins. The main difference is turnout sucked those years. In 2023, it was 38 percent. This year, county turnout is 45 percent. In Seattle, it’s at 55 percent.

“With over 650,000 ballots returned in this election, it takes time to get them all verified and processed and through all of the steps,” Watkins wrote in an email.

We believe that. We believe women. But it still feels so slow and that makes us complain-y. We are rotting in purgatory. In a city-wide will-they-won’t-they between a good future and a bad one.

At this point, we just want to know. Maybe the groundhog that Bill DeBlasio didn’t kill can help us with this. Or that TikTok “bones day” pug, Noodle. (Fuck! He’s dead, too!!) After today, 45,000 Seattle ballots are left.

Thursday's Ballot Drop Is Here

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:19:00 -0800

The Thursday ballot drop is here!!! by Stranger Election Control Board

The younger, more progressive votes come in late. Longstanding trends tell us that the second ballot drop doesn’t mean shit, but the third and fourth drops are a tell all in a tight race.

And … Fuck! King County Elections only counted 30,000 more ballots in Seattle. What’s normally a revealing ballot drop isn’t as decisive (fewer votes counted=less revealing) and it’s also not clear when this batch of votes came in and where they came from. This might drag into next week.

AND OUR NEXT MAYOR IS?

Ha! Good one. We don’t know yet.

Wilson shrank the gap between her and Harrell by almost 2.5 points in this ballot drop. She now has 46.93 percent of the vote to Bruce Harrell’s 52.64 percent. But the overall total isn’t going to tell you as much as the percentage of the vote with each drop.

To beat incumbent Mayor Bruce Harrell, Katie Wilson needed just over 54 percent of the votes counted after Wednesday. She pulled in more than 51 percent of today’s drop. That’s less, obviously. Wilson needs roughly 55 percent of all remaining votes to win.

Where are the big leaps? The bounds? From anyone! This is all very unsatisfying. We wanted a gladiatorial finish. This feels like Risk.

A GREEK CHORUS OF POLITICAL CONSULTANTS

Surely, someone must be able to read these tea leaves. Fuck, where’s Rachael Savage when you need her? Oh, right, rotting away with 19 percent of the vote. We asked these guys (gender neutral) instead.

Stephen Paolini, who is affiliated with Katie Wilson’s PAC: “Sadly today’s drop is the worst outcome. Which is to say, not conclusive or enough to change my perspective that this race currently leans Wilson, but we don’t know for sure. To feel comfortable that Katie is going to win, I needed to see 54 percent of today’s drop go her way… On today’s trajectory she’d fall just shy of winning, but I’d absolutely expect an uptick in tomorrow’s drop of primarily ballot box voters.”

Ben Anderstone, who worked on Sara Nelson’s campaign: “Not quite what she needs … but it’s possible today’s swing might have been slightly muted compared to future days.”

Michael Fertakis, consultant to Girmay Zahilay and Stephanie Fain: “While it’s good that she’s picking up votes, if I were her team I’d much prefer to have seen at least 53 percent. This is going to be a nail biter of an election.”

Crystal Fincher, host of the Hacks & Wonks podcast: “I think it’s fair to say that Katie supporters were hoping for a slightly bigger percentage, and everyone wanted a bigger drop of ballots counted in today’s tally. Getting the latter may have addressed the former. Basically, we still don't know anything, but this looks like it will end up very close (maybe even in a recount) and we won’t know where things stand until next week.”

YES KINGS (OF THE COUNTY)!

Once again, Girmay Zahilay added more votes to his pile in the race for King County Executive. He’s sitting at 51.73 percent of the vote, an increase of 1.17 percent over Wednesday’s numbers. Claudia Balducci lost 1.12 percent of her vote share, sending her back to the shadow realm of 47.05 percent. At this point, it’s really looking like Zahilay will maintain his lead in this tight race. Ballots still to come should lean more progressive and Zahilay seems to be the pick for younger, more progressive, sexier voters (hello, Stranger readers). That’s not super promising for Balducci who’s been trying to appeal to less young, less sexy, suburbanites since the primary.

DON’T LET THIS ASSHOLE WIN, THE ASSHOLE IS NOT WINNING

Oh, happy day! In the race for Legislative District 33, incumbent Rep. Edwin Obras inched ahead of that faux-Democrat and real chump Kevin Schilling. It’s still a dead heat, but Obras has 49.69 percent to Burien Mayor Schilling’s 48.62 percent. His share of the vote increased 1.2 percent Thursday. Schilling lost 1.1 percent. Every vote counts, people! We do not want a ghoul masquerading as a Democrat in the Legislature when it comes time to hard conversations around budgets and possible changes to that pesky regressive tax code. The average Dem is bad enough!

The Wednesday Ballot Drop Is Here

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 05 Nov 2025 16:28:00 -0800

The second ballot drop tells us "almost nothing." by Stranger Election Control Board

The sky is not falling, but Mayor Bruce Harrell gained more ground on Katie Wilson. Put your vomit bag away, this ballot drop is not decisive, as Vivian McCall wrote earlier today. In fact, it tells us “almost nothing,” as one political consultant tells The Stranger. There are more than 115,000 more ballots to count in Seattle alone. And 130,000 more countywide.

THE SEATTLE NAILBITER

We were expecting Bruce Harrell to get a little bump today, and that's exactly what he got. With 139,000 votes counted, Katie Wilson is at 45.69 percent, and Harrell is at 53.84, widening his lead to eight points.

Now, you don't have to stop clenching your asshole, but we do recommend taking a breath. Politicos 'round the city expect to see the big progressive gush starting tomorrow, and it's possible that wave could close this gap. But the Wilson campaign clearly knows this is going to be a tight finish. They're urging voters to check on their ballots and make sure their vote has been accepted by King County Elections.

THE ONE WHERE NOTHING HAPPENED

The King County Executive race is still locked up. Between yesterday and today, Girmay Zahilay added a whopping 0.49 percent to his lead bringing his vote share up to 50.56 percent. Go change your underwear, Zahilay fans.

Claudia Balducci dipped down 0.27 percent and is still hanging in there at 48.17 percent. While the gains are infinitesimal, they are still in Zahilay’s favor, as predicted. But, really, can we read into something this small? We can damn well try!

THE DUCK HUNT

At this point, Adonis Ducksworth is in a situation that is best described by the key and catchy words of that tune by Mike + The Mechanics: “All I need is a miracle." Indeed, he may need even more than that—devine intervention, at this point, might not cut it. On the second drop, Eddie Lin continues to lead by 36 points (his 68.02 percent to Ducksworth's 31.58 percent). And that margin is likely to grow.

So, Lin is the winner in a world we assume to be godless; but when he officially takes the seat for District 2, he must stay there for the whole term. Those who voted for you don't want here what Zimbabweans call “stories” down the road (not naming names, of course). So, no matter how stressful or rough the job gets, never let it enter your mind that you can just up and bounce. Assholes are going to asshole. This is what some call "real talk."

THE SAVAGE TAKEDOWN

Alexis Mercedes Rinck continued running circles around MAGA Republican Rachael Savage. It’s almost sad. But remember that she sucks, and her politics are “more cruelty, please.” So, save your pity for another day and race. In case you are into humiliation porn, Rinck has a bodacious 78.86 percent of the vote and Savage is at a dismal 20.44 percent.

ANN BECOMES HERSTORY

Opening the ballot update for the City Attorney race felt like rewatching a favorite film—you already know the ending, but it still hits. Erika Evans wiped the floor with incumbent Ann Davison last night and she’s still wiping. Evans sustained her lead at 62.4 percent over Davison’s 37.3 percent. We’re headed for that happy ending. (Not that kind, you pervs. Unless there’s something really wrong with you.)

THE FULL NELSON

Dionne Foster squashed incumbent Council President Sara Nelson last night. That has not changed. Foster sustained her lead with 57.8 percent of the vote. Nelson remained at 41.8 percent. Ooof, the consequences of one’s actions!

THAT’S WORTH AT LEAST A SCHILLING

In the state race for District 33 in South King County, Rep. Edwin Obras is now taking baby steps to (we hope) overtake no good Burien Mayor Kevin Schilling.

Obras is at 48.45 percent—up a full 1.25 points from yesterday and Schilling is down to 49.78, which is a scant 0.42 decrease, but a decrease nonetheless.

This is perhaps an overzealous and overly optimistic read into a small increase for Obras, but the gap between the two has narrowed, Schilling is sitting below 50 percent, and we hate that guy. It’s the little things. We need this.

LORDS OF THE KIDS

The Stranger’s candidates for school board are winning. Schooling their opponents, even. In many ways, they are taking them back to school.

In District 4, School Board Director Joe Mizrahi has 76.45 percent of the vote. In District 5, Vivian Song has 76.71 percent of the vote. We hope she’ll stick around this time. Things are a bit tighter in District 7, but Jen LaVallee still has 55.72 percent of the vote, leading the more conservative challenger Carol Rava. The tightest margin is in District 2. Our pick, Kathleen Smith, is leading with 51.95 percent of the vote. Incumbent Sarah Clark has 47.41 percent of the vote.

NICE HATS FINISH LAST

Fedora man Jude Anthony was trounced by conservative incumbent Reagan Dunn in the race for King County Council District 9.

THE REICH LIVES ON

Pete von Reichbauer retains his King County District 7 seat once again. Maybe they’ll have a parade on the street named after him.

THE UNCONTESTED RACES

All winners!

General Election Night 2025 Live

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 04 Nov 2025 17:00:00 -0800

The Stranger's election night blog. by Stranger Election Control Board 📌 Election Day is finally here. Let’s make sure it doesn’t suck.

When all the ballots are counted, if we’re lucky, we’ll have a new mayor, a new city council president, and a progressive caucus in City Hall. The dust won’t settle for a few days. The results may be unclear. And if trends hold, the earliest voters are the most conservative. If our polling bears out, at least in the mayor’s race, this will be a lot tighter than the primary.

Progressives really kicked ass in the primary. Presumed underdog Katie Wilson walked away with more than 50 percent of the vote. Mayor Bruce Harrell finished more than 9 points behind her. Embarrassing. City Attorney candidate Erika Evans took home almost 56 percent of the vote. City Council candidate Dionne Foster snagged 58 percent. County Executive Candidate Girmay Zahilay took home 44, compared to Claudia Balducci’s 30 (that race has really tightened up). City Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck swept her race with more than 70 percent of the vote. It was a great night for gloating.

But since then, political spending in the city’s moderate and conservative wings shot through the roof. Between Bruce Harrell’s campaign and his PAC, he’s packing more than $3 million. In a metaphysical sense, the political bones are hard to read. Dick Cheney is dead, but, also, Kamala Harris is here. What does it mean?

If you’re reading this and it’s not 8 p.m. yet, there’s still time to vote. But when the clock strikes 8 p.m., there won’t be time to vote. The deadline is 8 p.m. 8 p.m. is the deadline. Grab our cheat sheet and vote like the wind. Hi-yo, Silver. Here’s where all of the ballot drop boxes are. Bring a friend. Friends don’t let friends who voted in the primary not vote in the general election. Seriously. The winners are not guaranteed to stay winning. The losers will remain losers, but they may not lose.

While you agitate the citizenry, the Stranger Election Control Board will be scattered around the city, haunting candidates' election parties, eating their snacks, eavesdropping on their conversations, and calling them at their homes as they (probably) lose surrounded by their friends and family.

9:22 p.m. From A Strangermobile

WHAT HAPPENED? ARE WE WINNING?

The votes are in! And they are… mostly good?

Starting with the less-than-stellar, Bruce Harrell leads 53.3 percent to Katie Wilson’s 46.18 percent. That’s not a super ideal position to be in, but turnout was low and old leading into election day. If the procrastinating youth rallied at the last minute, there’s hope! Progressives have clawed their way to victory from bigger initial ballot drop deficits.

Still. Not the sexiest results.

Now, the sexy results: Erika Evans leads 62.5 percent against Ann Davison in the City Attorney race. Davison only came away with 37.1 percent. Math, y’know? Decisive math. Evans is our new City Attorney.

In District 9, Dionne Foster is in a cushy lead against incumbent Sara Nelson. Foster came away with 57.9 percent. Nelson with 41.6 percent.

Over in District 8, Alexis Mercedes Rinck essentially saged the city of Rachael Savage’s presence, winning a dominant 78.7 percent to Savage’s 20.5 percent.

In District 2, Eddie Lin will be the new city councilmember. He left election night with 68.6 percent of the vote. Adonis Ducksworth took 30.9 percent. We’ll still get you that skate park, buddy. Don’t you worry.

And as for the levies, resolutions, and propositions, Seattle continues to love getting taxed. Well, really, Seattle loves funding schools: Proposition 1 to pay for the renewal of the Family, Education and Preschool Promise Levy leads with 76.7 percent.

Seattle also loves changing the B&O tax to help small businesses and create more progressive revenue for services we need: Seattle voted 67.7 percent in favor of approving Proposition 2, or the Shield Tax.

And King County loves surviving heart attacks. We voted an overwhelmingly positive 79.3 percent to approve King County Proposition 1 to keep funding Medic One emergency services.

Over in state resolution land, Washington residents are in favor of investing our long-term care funds in the stock market. The approval is leading with 70 percent of the vote. To the moon, or whatever.

8:57 p.m. Black & Tan Hall

WOMEN!!!!!!

They're saying the lighting is ideal for photos MICAH YIP

Alexis Mercedes Rinck, Dionne Foster and Erika Evans supporters swarmed the stage. We got jostled into an elderly woman. She just laughed. “There’s so many people in here!”

Happy people. A campaign manager read the results: all three candidates swept their races. The numbers were good: Rinck has 78.75 percent of the vote. Foster has 57.92 percent of the vote. Evans has 62.54 percent of the vote.

The venue erupted in cheers and fist-pumps. The trio beamed, hugged each other, screamed. The camaraderie was evident, and dare we say, touching. Evans promised a city “where justice is not just reserved for the powerful, but for all of us.” Rinck pledged to “not compromise on our values.” Foster said she’s watched in horror the Trump administration’s actions, and is “so clear on why I am here and who I am here for.” Three women. Three wins.

8:54 p.m. Darkalino's

HE BUILT IT

Missed opportunity: Put election results on the scoreboard. MARCUS HARRISON GREEN

By the time Luther Vandross and Prince started trading riffs over the speakers at Darkalino’s, you could feel it: joy, relief, exhaustion, and just the faintest whiff of victory. Jam-packed, the place was one fire-marshal visit away from capacity, as King County Council Chair Girmay Zahilay took the mic to thank his team, his supporters, and, just about everyone in the room.
With Zahilay leading County Councilmember Claudia Balducci by a razor-thin 50.07% to 48.44%, the mood was cautiously triumphant.

“Tonight’s results are very encouraging,” Zahilay told the cheering crowd, “but there are still tens of thousands of votes left to be counted.” Still, the grin on his face said what everyone was thinking: it feels damn good.

He called the campaign "a humbling experience," and spoke about his family, about the prayers he and his wife Joyce whisper each night for their daughter that she stays healthy, has a roof over her head, that doors swing open instead of slam shut. "I ran for King County Executive so that every single child in our region can have that same hope," he said.

He then directly addressed the planks of his campaign : “It’s unacceptable for people to be sleeping in the streets. It’s unacceptable for people not to be able to afford housing, food, and clothing. We all know what’s possible in this region.”

If the lead holds, Zahilay will be the first immigrant to ever hold the office.

Community organizer Mohammed Adeeyo leaned against the bar, watching the chaos unfold, and summed it up perfectly: "He's everywhere, man. He's connected to everybody. What you see tonight? This energy? He didn't buy this. He built it."

8:53 p.m. El Centro de la Raza

KATIE LOOKS SHAKEN, SOUNDS HOPEFUL

This is the night Katie Wilson was preparing for on primary night—when she was expected to remind voters that progressives vote late, that they might be behind now, but they had a real chance of catching up. That night, she was two points ahead in the first ballot drop, but tonight she's seven points behind Bruce Harrell.

When she got on stage, she told the crowd that she had 46.18 percent of the vote. She called them "promising numbers," which they are. It's a big leap to make after the first ballot drop, but it's possible. She thanked her team, her volunteers, and the Transit Riders Union, and promised to make sure every vote was counted.

The energy was still big at the party—everyone in the room understands that we could still have a nail-biter ahead of us. At first, the crowd was chanting "Katie!" Then, when Josie started trying to pull down the tinsel, they started chanting "Josie" instead. (Katie eventually shut that down. "Don't want it to go to her head.")

8:41 p.m. The Royal Esquire Club

HARRELL LEADS, RAMBLES, PRAYS

NATHALIE GRAHAM

Harrell took the stage to chants of "BRUCE BRUCE." In a 9-minute long meandering victory speech, Harrell named every family member of his and talked through their family dynamics and celebrated his lead over Katie Wilson. With over 23 percent of the ballots counted at the first drop, Harrell leads 53 percent to Wilson’s 46 percent.

“We know it’s going to be tight. Now this is still a nail biter,” Harrell told the crowd. “We know how votes change. I’d rather be where we are right now than where my opponent is. Let me put it at that.” He invited his pastor up to do a prayer.

Not for him to win—“though slip that in there if you can,” he joked—but for “everyone that needs help.” And, sure enough, we got a prayer. After, the crowd buzzed with cautious optimism. Some other people remarked that if Wilson won then she’d be a target for Trump and the “Seattle would be on fire.”

“We’re going to count each vote,” Harrell said. “We feel pretty good about this.”

8:30 p.m. Baja Bistro

THE FAMOUS SEATTLE TIMES KISS OF DEATH

Rock 'n' roll CHARLES MUDEDE

Eddie Lin has this in the bag. He praised his team, the policy wonks in the room, and mentioned how he has learned so much about affordable housing, and lavishly praised Alexis Rinck, “who [he] is super excited to work with.” He gave a shout out to the Stranger. He didn't get a Seattle Times endorsement, which, “probably would have been the kiss of death.”

With 21.27 percent of the ballots counted, Lin has 68.61 percent of the vote. His opponent, Adonis Ducksworth, is skating far behind with 30.99 percent of the vote.

8:15 Tutta Bella in Bellevue (Tuta Bellevue)

MEATBALLS AND BEER

"We would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet beer." —Homer Simpson. MEG VAN HUYGEN

Balducci's campaign manager announced that the ballot drop had landed. Balducci had 48 percent of the vote for King County Executive. (Her opponent, Girmay Zahilay, was in the lead at this time, but this was left unmentioned).

A few woos came from the crowd, and someone even tapped a glass with a fork, ostensibly because this meant Balducci was still in the game. By god, the Bellevueans have come alive.

Balducci spoke to the crowd a few minutes later. "It's much, much closer than it was on Friday," she said. "There's a small amount [of ballots] that gets counted on the first night. We'll see what happens over the next few days, and we'll be putting out messages, letting everybody know how we're doin'. We really, really changed the trajectory. We'll see what happens next. But: too close to call."

Transit was a hot topic at the party at Tutta Bella tonight, as both Balducci and Zahilay are big public transit boosters. Seattle Subway Board Vice President Eugene Kramer approached the SECB to let us know he endorsed Balducci, and we mentioned that we are also pro-transit and, in fact, took a #500 to the B Line to get here tonight, and it sucked. Kramer offered us a ride back to Seattle. Tempting to do it, just to find out what kind of car he drove. (A bus?? A...Shinkansen?). But we respectfully declined. More breaking news: Turns out, there were pitchers of free beer sitting on the food table the whole time, next to the salads. Stoup IPA and some kind of pilsner. Balducci's supporters fucking destroyed both of the salads, btw. There are still lots of bready meatballs left.

8:13 p.m. Darkalino's

CHEERS

Cheers erupt at Girmay Zahilay's election night party as campaign manager Michael Charles announces that he is leading in the first ballot drop.

7:59 Seattle Central College on Capitol Hill

LAST CALL

BILLIE WINTER

A person with a megaphone announced the final minute before the ballot box closes, “Ok Seattle, you have one more minute to get your ballots in!” A few people literally ran down the street and tossed their ballots in the box action move style.

“I’ve been doing this for five years and I’ve never seen lines this long, not even for the last presidential election!” an election worker says.

7:50 p.m. Still Inside The Royal Esquire Club

BRUCE FEELS CALM

Schrödinger's calm NATHALIE GRAHAM

The ballot results are imminent. Bruce Harrell took the mic to filibuster until results came in. He says this is “nerve-wracking” for him but he feels “calm.” Those feelings are different.

“It’s my family that’s driving me crazy.”

Harrell said he’s proud of the campaign he’s run. He thanked the crowd.“This is sort of an invite-only event,” he said. “You are part of the team.”

We don’t think he realized that we, who were here without an invite, were not part of the team. We don’t think he realized the KUOW and KNKX reporters who also did not receive invites and had to track down the event information for the incumbent mayor’s election night party were here sans-invite either. Harrell decided to stop speaking and wait for the results off the mic. But he’ll be back! He promised.

7:47 p.m. Tutta Bella in Bellevue

CHILI'S HUNG HEAVY IN THE AIR

Ma'am, this used to be a Chili's MEG VAN HUYGEN

Despite running for Executive of the WHOLE COUNTY, Claudia Balducci chose one of the furthest-flung locations in the county for her party tonight, all the fuck out in Lake Hills, Bellevue. Turns out, the founder/CEO of Tutta Bella endorsed Balducci, so…at least it’s not at the Kirkland location.

Everyone in the dining room is white and over 50. This place used to be a Chili’s and it’s all we could think about. The ghost of Chili’s is still spiritually detectable here, although the bar now makes a helluva negroni, which would never happen at a Chili’s.

At the Balducci party in back, the vibe was younger and more convivial, although no emotions were being openly displayed. A guy in a shirt with what looks like an MTA New York City subway sign but says Z O H R A N seemed unimpressed when we told him that Zohran had won. “Oh, yeah, hmm. I saw that.” (What?)

The spread at the party was healthier than expected: Green salad with white beans and red peppers, roasted beet salad with goat cheese, some bready polpetti. The fried potato croquettes were probably the king.

Balducci's bid against Girmay Zahilay to be the new Dow Constantine is a monied race. We’ll admit, we kinda expected…more food. And better food. We know Tutta Bella has more, better food somewhere back there. Half a negroni in and we mistakenly thought a Seattle Times photog worked here. He seemed offended, whoops.

No one spoke one single word on the mic until 7:30 p.m., and it was Lynne Robinson, the mayor of Bellevue—a job Balducci once held—to introduce the woman of the hour. Balducci basically just said she’s grateful for everyone’s support. “If I started saying ‘thank you,’ I’d never stop.”

7:43 p.m. Darkalino's

THE DREAM OF THE 90s IS ALIVE WITH GIRMAY

Shane Gillis jumpscare MARCUS HARRISON GREEN

If democracy has a dance floor, it's at Girmay Zahilay's election night party.

Faith Evans is blaring through the speakers like it's 1997, bass is rattling the walls, and over 200 people are packed shoulder to shoulder in a blur of cheers, hugs, and half-finished cocktails that cost $18 each. You can barely get to the bar without using full-body contact, but you can definitely feel the energy: multicultural, multiracial, and unmistakably hopeful—like a Benetton ad come to life, but with better music and actual political stakes.

Zahilay is visibly nervous but all smiles, as he took the mic to praise his supporters and literally everyone who contributed to his campaign. "Nothing is possible without the people."

Dawn Bennett of the African American Leadership Fund says the packed house represents the community he seeks to serve: "This is what South King County looks like. Every color, every culture—and it's about time we get the attention we deserve instead of just traffic jams and airport noise." Reggie Brown from Skyway adds, "He's got that it factor. People are excited because he brings something new—energy, unity, possibility." You know, all those things we pretend political consultants can manufacture but actually can't.

7:31 p.m. El Centro de la Raza

GET OUT YOUR HARMONICA, THIS PARTY JUST GOT STARTED

Average Katie Wilson voter HANNAH MURPHY WINTER

We looked down at our keyboard for a few seconds, and this party got packed. "Golden" was suddenly bumping over the speakers. Rainier and Bodhizafa flowed. And the campaign upgraded their food situation since the primary: in July, it was crudités and sweaty humus; tonight, there's a whole room set aside for the trays of Indian food they ordered.

Despite what you might expect, not everyone here is wearing secondhand REI. Someone was walking around in full leather gear. Katie Wilson's campaign manager wore a button-up shirt with a poker cards on it. (It's an old gift from a friend, he told us, and what better time to wear it.) Josie, Wilson's two year old daughter, (very, very begrudgingly) wore a red velour dress, her dad told us.

7:30 p.m. At Stranger HQ (An Apartment)

WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING, UNDECIDED VOTER

You have thirty minutes left to vote! RUN TO THE BALLOT BOX!

7:25 p.m. Seattle Central College on Capitol Hill

LOUD SOUNDS

Drums are loud BILLIE WINTER

“WE HAVE A FIRST TIME VOTER!” someone says over a megaphone (and over a live drummer). The voter is from Peru, and became a citizen in 2022.

“My best friend reminded me that today is the last day to drop off my ballot!" they say. "My other friend forgot theirs so we went to a tan salon nearby and borrowed their printer to print the ballot out."

The was a 50 foot line for the ballot box. A person handed out bubbles. It's a vibe.

7:20 p.m. Inside The Royal Esquire Club

THE BAR IS NOT OPEN

Are the trays ... necessary? NATHALIE GRAHAM

Whew. We made it inside ... only to find there isn’t an open bar? A cash bar??

Over $1 million in candidate contributions should at least get us a vodka soda on the house. Maybe there wasn’t enough left over after all the attack ads. The good news is there are boxes of free pagliacci pizza and free soda. It’s like a Mormon wedding! Just kidding, just kidding. The soda would be a lot crazier. But we are curious about who is the Diet Coke lover in the Harrell camp. Is it you, Tim Burgess?

Kylie Minogue's "Padam Padam" is blasting.

7:15 p.m. POV, You Haven't Voted

YOU'RE FINALLY AWAKE

Sprint to your nearest ballot box. You have 45 MINUTES!!!!!

7:08 p.m. Black & Tan Hall

"THE QUINTESSENTIAL BULLY"

untz untz untz untz MICAH YIP

That's what they're saying about Mayor Bruce Harrell down at the Alexis Mercedes Rinck, Dionne Foster, and Erica Evans election night spectacular. At least ... that's what one blonde lady said to some guy. It was easy to hear her delightful phrase, as there was no music yet, nor many people. We were 30 minutes early. Too early. But by 6:57, there was a decent-sized crowd and music with an appropriate level of bass. Enough to drown her out. No more delightful phrases.

Chelsea Pimentel, an intern with Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal’s campaign, sang the three candidates’ praises. She voted for them, of course. She loved that they’re willing to fight for their community members. Same, Chelsea, same.

The DJ pumped Janelle Monáe’s "Make Me Feel" through the speakers. We felt.

6:51 p.m. Outside The Royal Esquire Club Hmm ... can't see any wage theft out here NATHALIE GRAHAM

Mayor Bruce Harrell is hosting his election night party at the Royal Esquire Club. You may know it from history. It’s a Black institution here in Columbia City. You may also know it from the KUOW article from six hours ago that reported how Harrell may have interfered with a wage theft investigation into the Esquire Club back when he was city council president and on the club’s board. He also allegedly made his council staff do secretarial work for the club. You can’t do that, Bruce! (A spokesperson said Harrell didn't do anything unethical.)

Hosting his party here is now very funny to us. What’s even funnier is once again he did not actually tell us where the party was let alone invite us. We had to find out by asking into the void. Will he let us in? Will we be able to sit in those garishly festooned chairs? Only time will tell.

Tanya Woo is here (it is said that her ghost appears on election night).

6:50 p.m. Learning on The World Wide Web

BLUE BLOODBATH

What is the lesson at this moment? Virginia is now resoundingly a Dem state. The New Jersey’s governor race is looking, at 64 percent of the votes, like it will become 20 point spread by tomorrow. It looks like ICE beating up city people is not a great thing when the cost of living is skyrocketing for wage earners.

6:45 p.m. King St. and 2nd Ave. in the CID

AND THEN THERE WAS LIGHT (ON THIS BALLOT BOX)

BILLIE WINTER

Election workers even added a magnetic flashlight pointing toward the slot. Brava. A slow, but steady stream of folks have passed through. A voter said she was voting tonight because, “Honestly?…I have bad time management and I thought so much about voting so it felt like I already did.” (They are not the same thing).

When asked who she picked for mayor, she said "Oh, Katie Wilson. I can’t wait to watch trump crash out.”

6:40 p.m. El Centro de la Raza

"I DON'T UNDERSTAND THE PHILOSOPHY OF STREAMERS."

Easy. Streamers are absurdists. HANNAH MURPHY WINTER

The Katie Wilson party hadn't started yet, but the doors were open and people were already trickling in. Someone brought a giant mylar balloon that looked like a slice of pizza. One volunteer was setting up a a table full of cards. "They're so people can write notes to Katie," she said. "It's like a wedding, not everyone is going to be able to talk to her." (She is getting married to us, maybe.)

Another volunteer teetered on a ladder, struggling with double-sided tape. "I don't understand the philosophy of streamers," he said to his spotter. I agreed with him. These streamers are a mess.

6:33 p.m. Rough and Tumble

HERE'S JOE (MIZRAHI)

Is that Sonic the Hedgehog, or is Joe just happy to see us COURTESY JOE MIZRAHI

We asked School Board Director Mizrahi for pics from his election night party with candidate Vivian Song and sitting school board director (and candidate) Sarah Clark. We asked how he was feeling.

"Good! I'm confident," he texted. "More nervous about Katie and Girmay."

6:30 p.m. Still In Beacon Hill

ACTION!

In this case, "we" is Charles Mudede CHARLES MUDEDE

We walked to Baja Bistro and it felt like the action was all there, in downtown Beacon Hill. We run into a friend running to the Plaza Roberto Maestas, where Katie Wilson is holding her election night event. Then we run into Eddie Lin, who is standing in front of Beacon Hill Station fishing for remaining votes in the dusk. We talk, we take a pic. We will meet later at Baja Bistro, where he is holding his event.

6:21 p.m. Beacon Hill

SMILING AT OUR PHONE

According to The Hill, "Mamdani wins NYC mayor’s race." This was declared on the first drop, which opened a 13% spread between Mamdani and Cuomo. As with Seattle, future drops are expected to maintain or expand this spread in a progressives favor. If we see those kind of numbers for Bruce Harrell, game is up. We will go to sleep like New York City: with a new mayor.

6:04 p.m. The City That Never Sleeps, The Big Apple

OOOOOOOOOO

Polls just closed in New York City. According to the New York Times, turnout surged to 2 million. Will Zohran Mamdani win? Will someone else even more terrible endorse Andrew Cuomo? Will Curtis Sliwa discover other hats, such as the baseball cap?

5:45 p.m. At Our House

CRYSTAL FINCHER DOESN'T REALLY MAKE PREDICTIONS BUT HERE ARE A FEW

Crystal Fincher, local political consultant and host of the Hacks & Wonks podcast, is “not a prediction person.” Just like all of us, she has no idea what’s going on in the King County Executive race. She’s “just looking to see what’s what.”

But she has a few thoughts on the city races: Dionne Foster is a shoo-in for City Council. Erika Evans has City Attorney in the bag. “Those primary results really did seem to be incompatible with a general election victory for those incumbents,” Fincher says. (In politico speak, that means they are screwed).

Fincher doesn’t think mayoral candidate Katie Wilson will win by the same margin she did on primary night, but she expects her to still have “the edge” on Mayor Bruce Harrell. The race will be competitive, though, thanks in large part to the buckets of money Harrell spent “attacking Katie.” Other races didn't get as nasty.

“Certainly, Sara Nelson had attack ads against Dionne Foster, but we didn't see those on during, like, the World Series, right?” Fincher says, referring to the ads Harrell ran during the American League Championship Series, which many will very sadly point out is quite different from the World Series. Still, big games!

Those ads got a lot of eyeballs, Fincher says, “especially from people who may not be primary voters, who may not vote as often or be as tuned in.” Will it make the difference?

That's a "tall order," she says.

5:30 p.m. The Beacon Hill Branch

THE DARKEST PLACE ON EARTH

BILLIE WINTER

Outside the Beacon Hill Light Rail station, we met a line of Girmay Zahilay volunteers, who asked: “Have you voted? Have you voted? HAVE YOU VOOOTTTEEDDD???”

At block away, a steady stream of voters dropped off their ballots at a box outside the library. It was pitch black. Can someone please bring some glow sticks? A camp light? Anything? A lovely “parent age” couple told us that they were A) Using the Stranger’s Voting Guide and B) dropping their ballots off tonight to capture some of the buzz they miss from voting in-person “from waaay before you were born.” Again, it was very dark.

5:03 p.m. Polar Bar at the Arctic Club Hotel

PROZAC LEVEL CALM BEFORE THE BALLOT DROP

Throwing W's instead of just throwing up MARCUS HARRISON GREEN

Zero anxiety at state representative Brianna Thomas's (34th District-West Seattle) early election night party. Turns out running unopposed is great for your cortisol levels. Appointed to fill Emily Alvarado's seat earlier this year, the third time has proven to be the charm for Thomas, who has struck out twice running for Seattle City Council.

"It's my third run for office, and being unopposed is certainly the best way to do it. Third time's the charm, that's what they say," she says.

Despite low voter turnout leading up to today, she says the folks who are showing up actually give a damn: "The people who are showing up actually care about our futures, and they're happy to hold us accountable." She also made light of her electoral hat trick:

Gotta say, with former Vice President Kamala Harris a couple miles away giving a book talk at Benaroya Hall, it's a fitting reversal to start the night off with a victorious Black woman.

She reminded procrastinators there was still time to vote. "Please go directly to the ballot box."

Spotted at the party: King County Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda, Sound Transit CEO Dow Constantine, former Seattle City Councilmember Lisa Herbold, and OneAmerica Executive Director Roxana Norouzi.

5:00 p.m. What We’re Watching for Tonight

A MAYORAL NAILBITER

This mayoral race? It’s going to be tight. That’s what the watchers on the wall, aka political consultants, say. However tonight goes, they do not think this will be an August Primary 2.0.

“The mayor's race is going to be a nail biter,” says local political consultant Stephen Paolini, who is involved with Katie Wilson’s PAC.

The warchest of millions of dollars Harrell’s funneled into negative messaging against Wilson have been working, Paolini fears. He’s heard people parrot the line about Wilson’s lack of experience. That’ll narrow the gap, but may not overcome it, Paolini says.

“It seems difficult from a math standpoint for Bruce Harrell to overcome a nine point gap in the primary with only 5 percent more people voting in a general election compared to the primary,” Paolini says.

Turnout is the difference-maker here, for both Wilson and Harrell. And it remains low. Harrell will need to make up a ground that he can’t cover with his regular voter base.

Paolini still thinks Wilson “pulls it out.” So do the political consultants the Seattle Times spoke to over the weekend. On Election Night, he’ll feel good if Wilson has 45 percent of the vote. Procrastinating progressives tend to vote later. Wilson will gain more votes in ballot drops throughout the week. “It would not be unusual for a progressive swing to account for five or six percentage points.”

Regardless, “this race is going to be really close.”

AN EXECUTIVE NAILBITER

The King County Executive race is gonna be tight. It’s progressive candidate (Grimay Zahilay) v. progressive-ish candidate (Claudia Balducci, who went moderate during the campaign) and according to recent polling, it’s a coin toss. Thirty-seven percent of voters said they’d vote for King County Councilmember Claudia Balducci, while 35 percent said Councilmember Girmay Zahilay was their guy (he was our guy from the start). The rest couldn’t make up their mind. The survey’s margin of error was +/- 4 percent, meaning the race was at a statistical tie.

OUR NAILS ARE LONG

The races for Seattle City Council and Seattle City Attorney seem buttoned up for progressives. Incumbents Sara Nelson and Ann Davison appear cooked. Boiled. Roasted. Flambéd. They’re probably done. Out of here. Out of sight, out of mind. Maybe.

“I would be, at this point, really shocked if any of those other races were as close [as the mayor’s race],” local political consultant Stephen Paolini says.

It’s definitely difficult from a math standpoint. He’s anticipating the District 9 race between Dionne Foster and Nelson to end with a decisive Foster win. “I think she'll be over 50 in the first drop, and it will just get worse for Sarah over time,” he says.

He expects the same thing for Erika Evans in her race against City Attorney Davison.

As for Eddie Lin’s race against skateboarder and DJ (and also candidate) Adonis Ducksworth, Paolini expects Lin to be in a comfortable position after tonight. But he’s not counting any skateboards before they ollie. “If I’m in Eddie Lin's shoes, I'm happy, I’m popping champagne if we're at like 48 percent,” he says.

The Stranger Election Control Board's General Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 15:34:00 -0700

Election Day on November 4. Vote.

by Stranger Election Control Board

The Stranger's General Election 2025 Voting Guide

Stranger Election Control Board — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 15:18:00 -0700

Election Day Is November 4. We're Taking Back the City. Choose Your Fighter.

by Stranger Election Control Board

The primary was an acid trip for the history books. We gotta make it real. Vote, vote, vote, vote, vote.

Just because progressives did well in the primary, doesn’t mean this is a shoe-in. Money has been pouring in for Harrell since his pitiful primary performance. He’s accumulated over $1.5 million from business CEOs and real-estate developers. And that’s just counting his PAC’s money. He’s rocking another million in campaign contributions. They believe this election can be bought. If you don’t show up, it will be. A lot of your neighbors don’t know what the hell is going on.

We have the chance for once in our city’s recent history to have a progressive mayor and not-totally conservative city council simultaneously. We can stop the rubber stamping of absolute bullshit and introduce adults to the halls of power. There’s a chance you can forget Sara Nelson’s name. Maybe you can even crack open a soapy can of Fremont Lush IPA and not have to tell your priest about it. Bruce Harrell can actually become the outsider he’s so sure that he is after 20 years in Seattle politics. We are so weary of this man and his sworn oath to destroy everything that doesn’t make his eyes light up with dollar signs.

Harrell and the council have already done a number on the Seattle of the future by pulling a gun on the Comprehensive Plan because it was in their parking spot. But all hope is not lost. There’s still time to make a Seattle that is walkable and affordable, with a public transit system that functions. If we keep the people in power who only drive cars and live in suburban castles, then we will not have this future. You didn’t listen to us last time when it was also true in 2021. And in 2023. You better listen to us this time.

And you did in the primary! The progressive slate of candidates jiu jitsu'd the more conservative weirdos into submission. Dionne Foster left Nelson in the dust. Katie Wilson embarrassed Harrell so badly we almost hope he has a humiliation kink in addition to his boot fetish. In District 2, Eddie Lin outskated Adonis Ducksworth by a mile. City Attorney and Republican Ann Davison better pack her bags for Palouse come November if the returns for challenger Erika Evans hold. Of course, Alexis Mercedes Rinck outshone Rachael Savage—we’re surprised she didn’t read that in her tarot cards.

We’re also picking a County Executive, school board members, State Representatives, and a bunch of super important ballot measures to fund things like early-learning and paramedics. We’re living in hell. Life is expensive, the history book horrors are at our doorstep, the kids have rotted brains, but Seattle can still be a haven. Sometimes bubbles are good. Vote for this city. Vote for your future. Vote for the kids. Vote against your uncle’s next heart attack. Vote like you’ll need to join a naked bike ride for freedom. Vote.

City of Seattle

Mayor
Katie Wilson

In this mayor’s race, we are relitigating the same conversation we’re always relitigating in Seattle: Do we want a mayor like Katie Wilson, who is interested in making our city better for people, or one like Bruce Harrell, who is interested in making it better for businesses? There’s another question, too. Do you want your mayor to be a dick? That would be Harrell.

Wilson built her career working with and for people. She left the world of prestige that comes with an Oxford degree to do the thankless, penniless work of organizing, literally building Seattle at her construction gigs, yacht cleaning, and busking at Pike Place Market. Those lived experiences shape a campaign centered around the affordability of housing, childcare, and transit.

Bruce Harrell was arrested for pulling a gun on a pregnant woman and her family. He has used the victims of gun violence as political props while ignoring their mothers’ pleas for help. As PubliCola reported, when mothers asked him to show up for their community, he picked a fight with one of them, slammed his hand on the table, and told her, “I didn’t even want to come here,” before trying to storm out of the room. From our endorsement meeting, we can tell you that spending 59 floor-stomping minutes in a room with him could be sold as a great escape room. We wanted to jump out of the window.

Misogyny is pervasive throughout the Harrell administration and the Harell campaign. Half a dozen women who worked in his office have called it a “boys club” where women were condescended to. His main criticism of Wilson, a woman who’s been in the grassroots Seattle political sphere for decades, is inexperience. Harrell cannot bring himself to say “his opponent’s” name, let alone acknowledge that she can and will do a much better job than him.

When we endorsed Wilson in July, she was the long-shot candidate without a name. Harrell had been on city council for 16 years, and had been mayor for almost a full term. She still kicked his ass. People are over his bullshit and they like the pretty, pragmatic, and human-centric picture of Seattle Wilson has been politely, and sometimes awkwardly, painting for them.

Her vision of Seattle has free childcare in the summer. It has 4,000 units of emergency housing for unsheltered homeless people. It has more civilianized first responders so armed police officers aren’t responding to people in crisis when they don’t need to.

Wilson’s not just pissing good intentions into the wind. She backs her ideas up with funding models that don’t throw the weight of the city’s budget on the backs of average, working Seattleites. She says she’ll champion a capital gains tax. She’ll convert empty workforce housing into emergency shelter and redirect the 2023 housing levy to address the cost of operating them. And, on the subject of piss, she wants to actually fund public bathrooms.

Harrell and brainless, business-casual editorial boards in this city claim Wilson hasn’t done anything substantial before. If you are part of the ORCA Low Income Fare program and pay a dollar per ride on public transit, thank Wilson. She helped pass higher minimum wage laws in Tukwila and Burien. She helped design and pass Seattle’s JumpStart tax. She was part of the group that first proposed the change to the B&O tax that became the Shield Tax. You can find Wilson’s fingerprints on most of the things that have made Seattle more affordable in the last decade. And that was all from the outside—building coalitions and herding volunteers who only have so much time to spare.

Harrell’s track record is grandstanding and failure. He says he stands by his record of building 3,000 units of housing in his term, but in reality, we have only 13 more units than when he started. He spent millions on hotel rooms to shelter homeless people, and then just… stopped using them. When anyone calls him out for how little he’s actually done, he blames the other cities in King County for our lack of progress. He won’t acknowledge his record-breaking history of sweeping homeless people around the city. And his idea of revitalizing downtown is to build a 10-foot AI-powered wall that lets you ask MLK Jr. what he had for breakfast (this is a real proposition that came out of his mouth).

Harrell is not a good, or even capable mayor. In debates he’s touted the fact that he’s a former linebacker—that with him in the way, the Trump administration couldn’t bully Seattle if they tried. But that doesn’t matter if Harrell’s bullying Seattle himself.

Bruce Harrell is desperately clinging to the power he has. He’s scared and should be. So are the businesses who benefit from his mayorship. They’ve spent piles of cash trying to keep him afloat. Harrell had his four years, and he has so little to show for it. Katie Wilson has a real chance to turn him into a one-term mayor.

We deserve a quarterback, or a coach, or whatever. Vote Wilson.

City Attorney
Erika Evans

We need Erika Evans to be our new City Attorney. We’re not just saying that because incumbent City Attorney Ann Davison is a Republican freak with bad ideas. Well, that does play into it for us, but we genuinely think Evans will be good for this city.

The city thinks so, too. Evans crushed Davison in the primary with over 58 percent of the vote in a crowded race of candidates who, like everyone else, hated the incumbent. Clearly, Seattle doesn’t want a Republican (who joined the party in 2020) at bat when the National Guard makes like the Seattle Police Department and starts flinging tear gas s(t)inkers at us.

The City Attorney has two jobs. The first is to prosecute all of the city’s misdemeanor cases—mostly low-level things like shoplifting, but also impactful things like domestic violence and DUIs. The second is to represent the city in civil cases like when one of Seattle’s finest runs over a student, the Chamber of Commerce wets itself over a new payroll tax, or rich lakesiders decide they’ve had enough of the buff at Denny Blaine for a lifetime.

It’s a big job. Davison is bad at it. Her regressive stances on crime have led to useless (at best) and genuinely harmful (at worst) results. In brief, her decision to dismantle community court was devastating. Her Close-in-Time filing policy to get rid of case backlogs didn’t work. Her “High Utilizer Initiative” targeting frequent offenders exacerbated recidivism. Criminalizing minor drug possession was overly punitive. Meanwhile, DUI cases are piling up, and domestic violence charges are lagging behind. People could be killed. And we haven’t seen hide nor hair of Davison on the campaign trail. But we haven’t checked the pockets of conservatives. They’re very deep.

Erika Evans, a former Assistant US Attorney, has prosecuted hate crimes, drug traffickers, wage-thieving business owners, and a few January 6 insurrectionists from Puyallup. Not wanting to wage lawfare on democracy, Evans quit her job a few weeks after Trump’s inauguration. Hell hath no fury like a district attorney scorned by a fascist ex-boss.

Evans says she’ll stand for this city when the federal government descends like a wannabe Wehrmacht and take care of shit on the homefront: speeding up those DUI and DV cases, bringing back community court, prosecuting wage theft, and pushing electeds to improve the police union contract to allow for more policing alternatives. Judging from the intensity and thoroughness she’s treated every aspect of this campaign with (she brought exhibits to our endorsement meeting), we trust Evans is capable.

Vote Evans.

City Council District No. 2
Eddie Lin

The city’s most diverse district deserves a driven, empathetic leader who’s focused on tackling the plagues of unaffordable and nonexistent housing, gentrification, pedestrian safety, and gun violence. That’s Eddie Lin. He may not be able to ollie or grind like his skater competitor Adonis Ducksworth, and we’re okay with that.

Skateboarding and antiquated names are cool. But you know what’s cooler? A résumé. At the City Attorney’s Office, Lin worked with the Seattle Office of Housing. He’ll steer affordable housing projects toward a path where they’ll actually exist. He’s also in support of pursuing multiple forms of progressive taxation. He recently proposed replacing a regressive sales tax with a capital gains tax to fund public safety. That’s initiative!

Lin and the SECB had a slight dustup. In our primary endorsement meeting, he said he voted for social housing, but did not clarify he voted for the shittier of two options, Prop 1B, which plundered the Jumpstart fund rather than establishing a real funding mechanism for the project. Lin worried that option 1A would barely pass, leaving it vulnerable to an old-fashioned dismemberment at City Hall. The voters proved Lin wrong, and he says he’s on board with them now. Before would’ve been better, man, but we believe your earnest Instagram reels. And we will make you look like a fool if you change your mind again.

Lin is on the path to win. His primary victory was a Ducks hunt Worth remembering. And what of Adonis Ducksworth? He says he’s the transportation guy because he coordinated a few big projects at the Seattle Department of Transportation and is Mayor Bruce Harrell’s senior transportation manager. Either Harrell isn’t listening, or they both have bad ideas.

Adonis also touts his work on the 23rd Avenue East redesign. We wouldn’t. That street still fucking sucks. We don’t want him in office, and judging from his unenthusiastic post-primary campaigning, he agrees. We do hope someone builds that skate park he wants in Rainier Beach, though. Lin will make sure no one runs over the kids.

Vote Eddie Lin.

City Council Position No. 8
Alexis Mercedes Rinck

Look, this race is a no-brainer. It’s between a strong progressive sitting city council member and a weird MAGA Republican who believes we should ship people with mental illness and drug dependency out of Seattle and bring in the National Guard. If that’s all you need, move on.

But Rachael Savage is just so … fascinating. She’s one of Seattle’s mythical “small business owners” who has a new-age shop on Capitol Hill, runs a meditation program that makes promises it surely can’t keep, and believes that her experience getting sober from a meth addiction makes her an expert. Sounds like identity politics to us! In our primary endorsement meeting, she told us words are never violent and hate speech doesn’t exist. She was the only candidate who spoke at the Charlie Kirk rally at Westlake Center.

Right now, Alexis Mercedes Rinck is the one staunchly progressive member on city council, and it could have made her an island. She’s often the lone “no” vote on bad policy. She speaks her mind, loudly, when the council harnesses their power to do baseless, harmful things like expand police surveillance when ICE is here and the National Guard could join them and try to roll back the council’s ethics code right before voting on renter protections.

But in the last year, she’s also proven that she’s not just a cardboard cutout of progressive values. She’s good at this job. She shows up where her constituents are. At the Mayday USA rally, she was instrumental in getting the city to shut down the event before police escalated even further. She finds common goals with her conservative colleagues and actually gets progressive shit done, like working with Harrell to help small businesses and fund essential programs with the Shield Tax. She’s been doing all of this as a progressive caucus of one, and we’re excited to see what she can do in January if (when) she’s not fighting against the monolith of this conservative body.

She already got more than 70 percent of the vote in the primary. Let’s make it 80 this time. Vote Rinck.

City Council Position No. 9
Dionne Foster

Dionne Foster rules. Sara Nelson drools. We hate to sound like schoolchildren, but it’s that simple. Our democracy, sense of decency, and collective sanity all depend on us wrestling power over city council out of Nelson’s perfectly tailored grasp.

Dionne Foster has been portrayed as the new kid on the block. She’s been on the block. Foster worked as a policy advisor at Seattle Public Utilities. Managed grants at the Seattle Foundation. While leading the Progress Alliance of Washington, she fought for a state capital gains tax—and won. She wants to pass another capital gains tax at the local level, something that a Nelson-controlled council would never, ever do. Comrade Cathy Moore tried in November 2024. It failed.

We could sing it from the rooftops: Sara Nelson is going to lose this election. This war is over. The general is negotiating the terms of surrender. No one mourns the wicked, and you know what, we’re going to take her ruby slippers and waltz down the open streets where there’s not a fucking eco block in sight. But, knock on wood. Or, whatever.

Not to count our chickens before they hatch and eat the political establishment alive, but Nelson suffered an embarrassing primary loss at what was supposed to be the height of her power in city council. Given that Nelson earned 35 percent of the vote to Foster’s 58.4 percent, the August primary was a referendum on how awful Nelson is and was. As the stars circled her head, she delivered an inspiring rallying call to her donors via Zoom: “I’ve been told I need to bump up my sort of anti-Trump rhetoric, or acknowledge that we’re under attack, or whatever.” In this real authoritarian political climate, she voted to expand a real-time police surveillance program ignoring serious, reasonable concerns that the council was handing the federal government a powerful tool for whenever the flaming Eye of Trump inevitably focuses on this provincial hamlet. In debates, Nelson has blamed the uselessness of her “stay out” zones on the mayor. She loves to blame shit on the mayor. But she’s City Council President. She’s responsible, too.

When criticized, Nelson has a go-to line: Who do you want representing you? A person with experience who knows how to fight and win tough battles, or some upstart? We’ll take the “upstart,” who has far more political experience than Nelson did when she failed forward into this position and took advantage of public opinion turning against the progressive city council of yore.

Prior to her victory in 2019, she was a city council aide and a serial IPA peddler, an actual crime in the opinion of at least half of the SECB. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a genius to run a successful business.

We need someone who understands the machinations of local government, but isn’t a machine herself. Foster is smart, is empathetic, loves bad JLo movies, and can actually listen to the electorate. Based on those primary returns, the electorate agrees.

Vote Foster.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 2
Kathleen Smith

Microsoft data scientist Kathleen Smith will do a fine job on the school board. She is skeptical of school closures and putting cops in schools. She has promised to advocate for more school funding in Olympia and is against the flawed Student Outcomes Focused Governance model that reduces the board to an unresponsive, disorganized mess, even if the right people are sitting on it. Smith’s platform centers on what she knows: gathering data and progressive politics. She’s light on specifics compared to her opponent, but she does not have her opponent’s flaws.

Sarah Clark should by all means be the frontrunner in this race. She is the incumbent, and in the 18 months she’s been on the board, she stood strong against school closures and organized against cops in schools. But, even after a followup endorsement interview, we cannot forget our lackluster impression of Clark in our first meeting. In that room, Clark was entirely unaware of the state-level anti-LGBTQ Parents Bill of Rights. At the time, she blamed her lack of knowledge on a recent knee surgery. In our more recent meeting, she blamed the gaffe on having “trouble articulating myself due to trauma.” It is even more disappointing because Clark does support trans kids.

More alarmingly, Clark failed to respond to the Washington Education Association’s—the teacher’s union—endorsement questionnaire. Before the primary, she blamed it on campaign staffing. But according to the teachers union, Clark never followed up with them about that missed endorsement. This lack of political will to work with the union is in and of itself a red flag for us. Even more, Clark earns a living as the policy director for the Seattle Chamber of Commerce. She insists there’s a firewall between her day job and her work on the school board. However, we cannot get over our distrust for someone who chooses to work with the most deeply regressive political body in our region. Vote Smith.

Editor's note: This endorsement has been updated since publication. Clark blamed the missed questionnaire on campaign staffing, rather than staff.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 4
Joe Mizrahi

The schools are in a bad way. We need someone to fix them as external forces whittle away at the existence of public education.

There’s only one option for Seattle School Board Director Position 4. Yes, it’s Joe Mizrahi. No, it’s not because of all that glorious hair. NO, it’s not just because he brought us cake costumed as apples—quit saying that. It’s because Mizrahi has a handle on this whole thing. As the secretary-treasurer and co-executive director of UFCW 3000, Mizrahi knows his way around a big, beefy budget. He’s an experienced organizer, regularly lobbying the legislature to stop fucking over workers and to support issues that make all of our lives better like the $15 minimum wage and paid family medical leave. We trust him to grovel in Olympia if he needs, or, even better, yell at those pencil pushers to quit sitting on their asses and fund education. Thanks in advance, Joe.

On the district level, Mizrahi is on the right side of the school closure debate—as in, we shouldn’t close the schools. He’s against cutting budgets and school programs to pinch pennies. Mizrahi is dedicated to boosting SPS enrollment, retaining those students, and keeping cops out. He hasn’t had a lot of time to accomplish these goals since filling a vacated seat last spring, so let’s give him the chance to. Then we can all say, “We did it, Joe.” Vote Mizrahi.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 5
Vivian Song

Vivian Song is an obvious choice to sit on the Seattle School Board, especially as it deals with a deficit from the darkest corner of an accountant’s unimaginative mind. Song has financial analyst chops and experience on the board. She’s done the job before and only resigned after some drama we’re tired of rehashing. We’ll do it one last time, though. While going through a separation, Song lived elsewhere and ran for the board in that district. She patched things up with her husband and moved back into a different district. She resigned over that mistake. But she never stopped working to better the schools.

In her absence from the board, the school closure clusterfuck took center stage. Instead of avoiding that heap of shit, Song, who is hearing impaired and has a hearing impaired child, fought to keep an alternative school with deaf and hard of hearing programs alive. Behind the scenes, she fought against the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association’s trans girls sports ban. Song’s not afraid to elbow her way into the room even when political rumors are swirling.

The word austerity makes her want to punch a wall. She’s well connected with other progressive leaders in the area and promises to work with them to help fund the schools. She’s a former ESL student and has plans for protecting immigrant families against the Trump administration.

We like Song’s opponent, Janis White, who is dedicated to improving special education district-wide. But we prefer Song’s track record. Vote Song.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 7
Jen LaVallee

This is an election between a senior UX designer at Amazon and a Gates Foundation alum. We don’t love either candidate, but we’ve got a binary choice here, and we’ve chosen Jen LaVallee.

LaVallee is an organizer who pushed back against the woebegone school closure plan. She helped orchestrate the “Billion Dollar Bake Sale” protest in Olympia to put the legislature on blast for their consistent failure to live up to their constitutional obligation to fully fund public education. The organizers wanted an additional $4 billion a year for education. Their point was this couldn’t be baked into existence, and districts couldn’t stuff this gaping budget wound with tax levies, or suture it with cut programs, forever. Real legislative solutions are needed.

In these financial conditions, a school district needs to be held accountable for managing its resources and connected to what the community actually wants. LaVallee is a conduit for parents, she cares about equity, and, like her opponent Carol Rava, is for stricter budget auditing.

Rava beats LaVallee on experience. She’s been in the education policy game for 25 years. She’s not a zealot for the Gates Foundation. When we asked for the foundation’s single worst education policy, she gave us an honest bushel. There’s an argument her arcane knowledge could set this district straight.

Experience is one thing, outlook is another. Rava was too soft on School Resource Officers (SRO) and dodged our question about whether the teachers’ union was a “reliable partner” or “encumbrance to education.” Meanwhile, when we asked LaVallee if she would choose enrollment or serving the students in the district, she recognized that the district doesn’t have to choose. We trust LaVallee to think through these questions without limiting the district’s options for sheer lack of imagination. Vote LaVallee.

Seattle Proposition No. 1: Families, Education, Preschool, and Promise Levy
Vote Yes

Make like a village and support Seattle Prop 1, or the Family, Education, Preschool, and Promise Levy (FEPP), a modest education tax levy to fund daycare, preschool and student health, and academic and safety support from kindergarten through senior year. Without proper care and feeding, some kids will rip through the social safety net and tumble into the abyss. Most of the SECB is childfree, but we prefer your kids cared for. Unless Paul Allen buried treasure before he died—and you have the Ouija board to find it—the billionaires are not going to rescue us.

Voters approved the same six-year levy in 2018. It’s as much a no-brainer now as it was then, but bigger this time. The median Seattleite has paid about $250 in property taxes a year for this levy. If we approve this one, they’ll pay around $650 a year, a significant increase to fill a more than $1.2 billion pot of money over the next six years.

Seattle would more than double the number of slots for subsidized childcare. It’d add 600 daycare slots. Seattle would put $275 million toward programs in school, after school, and over the summer. Another $66 million would fund Seattle Promise, a program that allows SPS graduates to attend city colleges tuition-free. The good stuff.

The program is imperfect. Success has been uneven: while the gap in kindergarten preparedness shrank, some specific demographic groups are less prepared now than they were in 2019. But there’s a little thing that happened in 2020. It’s impossible to disentangle the levy’s potential shortcomings from the insane disruption of a global pandemic, which upended daily life for children, their families, their teachers, and their voter-approved education levies.

The alternative is not funding the good stuff. That’s unacceptable. The school board won’t find the cash to make up for it under the couch cushions in the teachers lounge. The teachers have scoured them already.

Critics of the FEPP levy worry about the proposed measure’s increased funds for safety. Those well-intentioned worriers fret that the levy will use $46 million allocated for prevention and safety supports—about 3.5 percent of the total budget—to fund cops in schools. School Board Director Joe Mizrahi says this isn’t the case. The current FEPP levy already spends about $30 million on safety, but that doesn’t go toward police. Instead, it funds policing alternatives. The district already voted against putting a School Resource Officer (or, a cop) at Garfield High School. Without a board vote, cops can’t be in the schools. Mizrahi remains confident the next FEPP levy will not pad SPD wallets and instead will continue to support policing alternatives.

Help the kids swim, don’t make them sink. Vote yes.

Seattle Proposition No. 2: Changes to the Business and Occupation Tax
Vote Yes

If you know anything about us at the SECB, you know we are always banging the regressive tax system drum. We are always yanking the “Pull in Case of Funding Emergency” lever to no avail. But now, in a turn of events not even our most astrologically-plugged-in member saw coming, Mayor Bruce Harrell and City Council Member Alexis Mercedes Rinck teamed up to propose the Seattle Shield Tax. This proposition would change the B&O tax rules so small businesses pay less, big businesses pay more, and the Seattle general fund earns an extra $80 to $90 million to put toward necessary programs and fill gaps in our budget as the federal government unceremoniously rips grant after grant out from under us. In an even bigger plot twist, our council of progress haters approved the tax to allow the voters to decide.

The Seattle Shield Tax raises the filing threshold from $100,000 to $2 million in gross receipts and adds a $2 million standard deduction, effectively erasing the tax for about three-quarters of small businesses and lowering it for roughly 90 percent overall. That higher threshold is intended to protect small margin businesses like restaurants. Critics, of course, still fret about the tax burden. They worry about recessions and about businesses packing up and leaving. But those critics couldn’t rustle up any fervent opponents to speak against the tax. Instead, a tired, grumpy man named Eugene Wasserman is going to war. He is not a compelling debater, but is very good at crossing his arms and looking displeased.

One valid concern is the grocery stores, which have high gross sales but tight margins. We’ve seen that Kroger will shut down a store whenever it becomes inconvenient to operate. But the benefits outweigh the risk.

Raising the exemption threshold to $2 million and introducing a universal deduction means that the small businesses that actually texture the city—the cafés, bookstores, mechanics, and daycare centers—can finally breathe. If done right, the tax could create permanent relief for the people keeping neighborhood economies afloat, financed by a temporary surcharge on the corporations most able to withstand it. It’s hard to pay your fair share, isn’t it? Vote yes on Prop 2.

King County

King County Executive
Girmay Zahilay

The King County executive race has a beautiful problem. Two good politicians are running for the seat. Sadly, there can only be one mayor of the county. And darn it, it should be Girmay Zahilay.

For a decade and a half, King County elected and elected and elected Dow Constantine. What was it? His glorious silver locks? That no one knew what the King County executive was? Dow Constantine is not on the ballot. He’s dead. And by dead, we mean Sound Transit CEO, a role we think should be Claudia Balducci’s job, but unfortunately she wants Dow’s old job.

Zahilay and Balducci are both on the county council, Balducci since 2016 and Zahilay since 2020. They’ve aligned on almost every fucking thing. Their voting histories are so, so similar.

If they weren’t both running, we’d be game to endorse either one of them. But Zahilay, council chair and head of the budget and finance committee, is a hair better, though he has none. In his short political career, he’s been a leader and an advocate for targets of the Trump administration: Black and brown people, poor people, immigrants, transgender people, the list goes on. The county hasn’t been rounding them up like the Feds have, but it has systematically oppressed them and ignored the South King County communities where they’ve lived for generations.

It’s not like we’d expect Balducci to abandon those people, but there’s no way Girmay will. He came to this country—specifically, South King County—as a child refugee and has done good work as their representative.

He sponsored a $2 million community-based gun violence program and a $1.2 billion property tax levy to fund mental health treatment centers. And while a recent financial report on the $1 billion Regional Workforce Housing Initiative bill he sponsored was not so good, Zahilay is still optimistic he’ll find a funding source for his county-level mirror of Seattle’s social housing developer. And we need someone who’s hungry for housing to solve the region’s crisis.

Do we like his Jail4Kids? No, not very much at all. But Balducci directed King County’s Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention.

Balducci is and has been a maestro of behind-the-scenes politics, especially on transit. She deserves flowers for pushing Sound Transit to open the East Link despite delays and lobbying to open the Federal Way stations ahead of 2026. However, since falling behind Zahilay in the primary, Balducci’s more moderate vein has been popping. The suburbs are calling and she’s picking up the phone. In response to Kroger grocery stores closing due to “shoplifting” across the region, Balducci proposed using new sales tax funds to start a regional task force on retail theft. C’mon, that isn’t why those stores are closing. She knows this. We know she knows this. But it appeals to the moderates and she wants to win.

That sensible, pragmatic strategy also rears its head in her new Sound Transit platform, where she has proposed eliminating a second downtown tunnel to save mounting costs. The transit nerds are not happy about this. We aren’t thrilled either. Balducci has been taking the safe route after the primary, and it’s only affirmed our decision to go with Girmay. Vote Zahilay.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 3
Sarah Perry

Incumbent King County Council member Sarah Perry is running for reelection. Her district, which spans from Bothell to Duvall, Carnation to Snoqualmie, and everything in between, is historically red. But it’s been turning bluer. So blue that she flipped the district three years ago when she took the seat from Republican incumbent Kathy Lambert. The seat is technically nonpartisan, but nothing really is.

Still, Perry is a Democrat in a moderate district. Her top priorities include maintaining roads and bridges, creating more housing, keeping water clean, adding more transportation, and beefing up public safety. She’s hesitant to say whether she supports more taxes to fund these things, but she won’t say she’s against them either—like we said, she’s a Democrat. In her time on council, Perry added funding to the sheriff’s office to increase staffing, she supported funding for more criminal justice efforts, and she’s critical of the recent audit of the Department of Community and Human Services. It’s all very status quo, normie stuff. But Perry says she won’t bend to federal overreach on immigration and will do everything in her power to protect the immigrants in her district.

Her only challenger is Snoqualmie City Council member Rob Wotton, who is a Republican. He’s anti-tax and pro-business. He also strongly disagrees with Perry’s voting history where she sides with the majority “99% of the time,” he claims. Most of the King County Council members are on the left side of the political spectrum. We get it, you’re a dick. Vote Perry.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 5
Steffanie Fain

You dumbasses. You had one—one—legitimately good candidate running in this race to fill Dave Upthegrove’s vacant King County Council seat and you blew it. She came in third, and got left behind in the primary. Now, we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. A fake Democrat and a fake Democrat. To put how bad our choices are into perspective, evil mayor of Burien Kevin Schilling has endorsed both of these yahoos. It’s lose-lose here and we are furious that we have to make a pick instead of throwing our hands up in the air and saying, “I dunno! Not my problem! Staying out of it!” We miss you, Kim-Khánh Văn.

Sigh. In one uninspiring corner, we have Steffanie Fain, an attorney, a member of the Harborview Board of Trustees, and wife of alleged rapist and confirmed Republican Joe Fain, who left office after those sexual assault allegations. Steffanie Fain is an uninspiring moderate at best.

The conservative-backed Jobs PAC is throwing money behind her through an IE called Coalition for Pragmatic Leadership because what else would it be called? They’ve spent $15,000 so far to get her elected. Why would they want a Democrat elected? Unless, of course, they know something about Fain we don’t. It raises alarm bells for us. And so does her terrible husband. Look, we’re not saying that he’s going to assert his own political will if his wife is elected, but we do have those concerns. Then again, she didn’t do those terrible (alleged) things. Her husband did. It’s just that we don’t want him anywhere near a position of influence, not even on the board of KUOW, the station that reported the allegations about him.

So, it seems like we’d be absolutely fucked in the head to choose Fain. Except you haven’t heard about who’s lurking in the other corner. ENTER: SeaTac City Council member Peter “Definitely a Republican” Kwon (not his legal name).

He received the Slade Gorton Rising Star award in 2020, a commendation from the Republican Party for a commitment to furthering conservative principles and contributing to the party. The 47th Legislative District Republicans actively recruited people to support him at a forum. Despite this, Kwon has consistently described himself as “a true nonpartisan” and “truly nonpartisan” in his voters’ guide statements in 2019 and 2023, respectively.

This cycle, he sought out the King County GOP’s support by submitting the 2025 Primary questionnaire and was labeled “Best Choice” by the King County Republicans. Since the primary, they have taken his responses and his recommendation down, after he started rightfully getting called out. In the survey he said, if given the opportunity, he would actively prohibit trans kids from playing sports with kids of the same gender. Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates un-endorsed him for this.

He’s been on SeaTac City Council since 2016, but his fellow council members have never elected him to serve as mayor. The current mayor endorsed Fain. Like us, he wanted Van. To beleaguer the point about how bad Kwon is as a council member, during the pandemic, when we really needed some leadership, Kwon voted against things like: the eviction moratorium, funding more homeless shelters, using federal COVID-relief dollars to give kids internet access while they toiled away in virtual school. He has consistently voted against taxes and against humanity, propping up camping bans and homelessness sweeps.

We don’t think Fain will legislate well. We know Kwon won’t. His ass is all the way out. Hold your nose. Vote Fain.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 7
Maya Vengadasalam

Look, we’d eat our hats if Maya Vengadasalam actually won her King County Council race. She’s challenging the rarely challenged elder statesman Pete von Reichbauer, whose grasp on this district has lasted for more than 30 years. He has a road named after him. To challenge this man is to march on Moscow. That’s why Democrats have basically ceded this territory until he retires. So we admire the courage of a fool free-thinker willing to fling $25,000 in campaign funds at a giant in a $250,000 plated cuirass. As David found out, and Goliath found out more, anything can happen if your aim is true. Though Vengadasalam wouldn’t win even if she scooped up every single primary vote from the third-place candidate.

Vengadasalam is not exactly our ideal pick to replace von Reichbauer. Ready your groaning throats (groats?), she’s an “Independent Democrat” with a hard-on for fiscal responsibility. She served as a school board director in Kent and currently works as a leadership development consultant for the Washington State School Directors’ Association. Her five-prong four-prong platform of government transparency, economic growth, expanding affordable housing, and advancing education and safety (that’s two, Maya), is fine. Her austerity-driven solutions are misguided, but she’s honest about them. There’s no pretense with Vengadasalam. What you see is what you get. What you get is someone who sees going paperless as her chief accomplishment working on the finance side of the Tacoma Housing Authority before COVID. It came in clutch, tbh. Vengadasalam wouldn’t even say a bad word about Reichbauer, because she didn’t know the guy. We don’t have the same hangup. Where Vengadasalam thinks “camping” is a ridiculous term for people forced to sleep outside, von Reichbauer once called the homeless people sleeping outside the King County courthouse “animals.” She may think we can educate our way out of a housing-driven homelessness crisis, but we’re on the same page about humanity.

Vengadasalam probably won’t work out, so here’s a free idea for an enterprising candidate in 2029: Pull a von Reichbauer. In 1973, Reichbauer landed in the Washington State Senate as a Democrat, switched parties years later, in the middle of a legislative session, and handed the majority to the Republicans. What a bastard! This “new Valentine’s Day Massacre” led to a recall that von Reichbauer survived and lived happily ever after. So beat him at his own duplicitous game. He couldn't even be mad. The voters … they’d be … pretty mad. In the meantime, we encourage your protest vote. Vote Vengadasalam.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 9
Jude Anthony

Reagan Blackburn Dunn is one of the very few Republicans on the King County Council. He will not let go of his seat unless he achieves higher office—and that didn’t work out for him very well last time he tried, when he conceded to Dr. Kim Schrier in the Congressional District 8 primary. Much like Pete von Reichbauer, five-term Dunn is glued to his seat. His district must like how he votes no on sales taxes, traps safe consumption sites in limbo, scrutinizes mental health centers, spends $100,000 of county money putting homeless people on buses and sending them somewhere else, and his general ~cOmMoN sEnSe~. Please, please won’t someone run against him and put us out of our misery? Ideally, a sharp dresser.

Jude Anthony, a fedora-rocking software engineer, answered the call. Except, before Anthony filed, he didn’t even know who Dunn was. He just knew there was an upcoming race with room to challenge a Republican incumbent. We trust Anthony’s commitment. He’s worn a fedora since high school, style trends and assumptions be damned. “People are going to think I’m an incel,” he told us. “I have a wife.” (And multiple kids who are all “members of the Alphabet Mafia.”) “No, no,” we said, placating. “We love Indiana Jones’s fedora.” Is that a fedora? Anthony says that the fedora is back in fashion now thanks to the recently revived 2007 show Phineas and Ferb’s fedora-wearing platypus secret agent character. If he had his druthers, Anthony says he’d commission a Phineas and Ferb campaign ad. He sang us a snippet, doing an impression of one of the characters, the bad-at-being-evil Dr. Doofenshmirtz.

Anthony and his fedora (tan with a pink cloth attached to it because men “shouldn’t be afraid to wear pink,” as Anthony says) have solid platform positions: He wants food access for all, universal health care, and to create more affordable housing. He doesn’t have political experience, but he is done with Dunn—now that he knows who Dunn is. He wears many of his priorities on his sleeve—wait, no, his fedora. He has many buttons on there. Vote Anthony.

King County Proposition No. 1: Medic One – Emergency Medical Services Replacement of Existing Levy
Vote Yes

We here at The Stranger are pro-life. Wait, not like that. We love to be alive. To continue to be alive anywhere in King County, we’re voting to reapprove a six-year property tax levy to fund Medic One, the county-wide emergency medical service. Next time you call 911, remember to thank taxpaying landowners before blacking out in a pool of your own blood. They’ve funded this service for around 50 years. Call us crazy, but we think they ought to keep doing that.

Life is on the table, or the kitchen floor, or the toilet, or wherever the paramedics find you flopped over and in need of assistance. Plus, there’s no other realistic funding option.

We’re going to assume you understand why 911 is vital to the 2.3 million people who live in our county’s 2,130 square miles. But Medic One isn’t just necessary. We’d go as far to say that King County is a primo location for your next heart attack. You’re two to three times more likely to survive here than other areas of the country. There are a number of reasons why. We’ve got speedy response times (5.2 minutes on average). Dispatchers are trained to send the appropriate aid for the situation at hand. One of the leading reasons for the high survival rate is because 70 percent of cardiac arrests in the region receive bystander CPR before EMTs arrive. The Medic One levy helps fund CPR education programs. It’s why we know what the fuck we’re doing—not just because we watched a lot of Grey’s Anatomy, or ER, or The Pitt, or Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace.

They’re also not afraid to try new shit—like equity. Response times are consistent across the county, and race is not a prognostic indicator of surviving a cardiac arrest. The program gives out naloxone and buprenorphine to the community. It started a taxi voucher program because some people wouldn’t go to the hospital if they had to pay for the ambulance. Five years ago, they started bringing blood to hemorrhaging patients—instead of rushing them to the blood—improving survival rates.

Obviously, paramedics respond to more than heart attacks and bleeding-outs; 911 is a catchall for almost every need across social, behavioral, and medical lines.

This levy is like a painless shot. Homeowners are already paying it, and if we approve the levy, they’ll actually pay a little less than they pay today. If the levy doesn’t pass, the county would be left to scramble for an alternative funding source. We know funding everything through property taxes is sucky and regressive as hell, but that’s for the legislature to take up with our broken-ass Washington State Constitution.

With no other choices, we think it’s good and should continue existing because we want to live. And, heck, we even want you to live. Vote yes.

State of Washington

Legislative District No. 5, State Senator
Victoria Hunt

Victoria Hunt is an urban planner with a PhD in computational ecology. She is a scientist. She served on the Issaquah City Council before being elected as a representative in 2024. She was appointed to the Senate in 2025 to fill the late Sen. Bill Ramos's seat after he died of a heart attack on a trail run. He was 69. RIP, Bill.

In her short time in the House, Hunt passed a bill modernizing Washington’s Clean Energy Transformation Act. She sponsored a bill to ensure baby changing stations are in public buildings, successfully securing the coveted baby vote. She also fought for a public notification system for sewage spills—and won! Poopy water, you’re on notice. There’s more to it than poop, though. Hunt’s other priorities include affordable housing, gun safety, and even more stuff about the environment. Sounds like a scientist to us.

One of Hunt’s crowning achievements while in the Washington State Senate was when 2024’s bomb cyclone played Cat’s Cradle with powerlines. FEMA said, “Sowwy, no emergency money for Washington.” Hunt stepped up and won state disaster recovery money for cleanup, repairs, and financial aid.

Chad Magendanz (pronounced like Häagen-Dazs) is not what you’d call “a Chad.” You would call him a Republican. He was a state representative in the same district between 2013 and 2017. He even became the ranking Republican on the House Education Committee. He dreams of charters. His Icarus moment came in 2016, when he ran for this senate seat and lost to Sen. Mark Mullet. Magendanz is also a bit like Sisyphus, because he cannot fucking stop running for office and losing and running again. This man is honestly deranged. He paid his own company to generate biased polling data about his own races multiple times. To make matters worse, the company is called Voter Science, a concept he seems to hate.

The race does not appear to be going well for him, despite his own projections. “Frankly, I’m already taking a lot of flak from the conservative base for earning my 8th endorsement from the Seattle Times,” He told us in an email. “I won’t be pursuing an endorsement from The Stranger.”

We could endorse him to hurt his chances, but we know too many of you just read the cheat sheet. We have the analytics. That’s science. Vote Hunt.

Editor's note: In a previous version of this endorsement, we said that Hunt was appointed to the Senate in 2024. She was appointed in 2025.

Legislative District No. 33, State Representative Position No. 1
Edwin Obras

Edwin Obras might be new to politics, but in just a year, he’s already established himself as a labor champion. He sponsored (and passed) a bill that establishes protections for isolated workers like housekeepers and janitors from sexual harassment and assault. He slapped some much-needed worker protections on Uber and Lyft. He proposed a bill that would keep companies from passing the cost of credit card processing fees to their tipped workers. He has a knack for spotting vulnerabilities in our most invisible workers and doing something about them.

We love to see it, and we’d love to see it no matter who he was running against. But in this case, he’s running against Burien Mayor Kevin Schilling. Who sucks.

Schilling calls himself a Democrat, which was a dubious claim even before his biggest funder became the Cascade Party of Washington—the centrist party founded by Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic. For progressives, Schilling is the Grinch. No good policy for Burien this Christmas! This year, Schilling’s administration sued to try to overturn Burien’s raised minimum wage. As deputy mayor, he turned down $1 million in King County funds for a tiny home village when it conflicted with the interests of one of his major donors. He had a public fight with the King County Sheriff’s Office after he tried to force them to impose a camping ban in the city. It should come as no surprise that conservative commentator and Trump darling Brandi Kruse considers him one of her favorite Democratic mayors. She only loves people with hearts two sizes too small.

Obras won the primary with 47 percent of the vote, with Schilling limping behind with a measly 31 percent. But a Republican who didn’t make it to the primary hoarded another 20 percent of those primary votes. Schilling could scoop those up. Based on Schilling’s record, we suspect the little bubble beside his name will be screaming “DINO” to those voters. We need a labor champ like Obras in Olympia. We don’t need the Grinch. Vote Obras.

Legislative District No. 41, State Representative Position No. 1
Janice Zahn

Janice Zahn, a Democrat, the assistant majority whip in the House of Representatives, and a member of committees on housing, energy, budget, and local government, is up against John Whitney, a Republican with a real estate background running on the motto “Common-Sense Leadership Rooted in Faith, Family, and Service.”

Zahn was raised by a single mother. Her family immigrated to the US from Hong Kong when she was 10 years old. Her uncle, a podiatrist, sponsored their green card. She and her husband moved to Bellevue 30 years ago, where they raised two adult daughters.

A few of our favorite facts: She was a certified aerobics instructor with the American Council on Exercise for six years, and she spent over seven years on the Bellevue City Council and four years on the City of Bellevue Transportation Commission—the last as chair. For 11 years, she was a Girl Scouts troop leader, so she knows a thing or two about honor. And cookies. She also collects rocks. This made us smile.

Zahn seems like she had a busy first year in the House. She passed a slew of bills like one helping improve data collection to understand homelessness and one strengthening accountability for out-of-state health care providers. Other accomplishments Zahn boasts: supporting universal health care legislation, investing in public education, and reforming recycling. Above all, Zahn is proudest, perplexingly, of her work improving our cultural ties with Canada.

Whitney is all about Christ, lower taxes, “community safety,” supporting law enforcement, “parental rights,” restoring “efficiency to government,” and Christ. His campaign is mostly self-funded, with a little help from money lender Intrust Funding and the Washington GOP that supports the National Guard rolling into Seattle. Christ did not donate. Vote Zahn. She… rocks.

Legislative District No. 48, State Representative Position No. 1
Osman Salahuddin

Osman Salahuddin is the wunderkind of the state legislature. When the King County Council unanimously appointed him in January, he became the youngest member of the legislative body (he’s 29). And in his short year in office, he advocated for public transit, fought for public investment in the housing and homelessness crisis, and introduced a state bill to integrate behavioral health professionals with cops and other first responders.

Before the primary, we asked Salahuddin what he was most proud of in his first year in the legislature, and he listed two bills: the first recognizes Eid as a state holiday (“It showed my community that the government exists to serve all residents,” he told us), and the second allows workers to use paid sick leave to attend their own or a family member’s immigration proceedings. This is the heart we need in the legislature.

His opponent, Dennis Ellis, is a Republican with a cartoon-character name and the politics to match. Ellis says that three books represent his political world view: The Revolution by Ron Paul, Red Handed by Peter Schweizer, and RFK’s favorite anti-vax manifesto, Lies My Government Told Me by Dr. Robert Malone. We will not be following him on Goodreads.

He’s a “fiscal responsibility” conservative who believes that spending money to address homelessness is one big get-rich scheme for… someone, so he wants to take all that funding away.

Ellis flailed in the primary with only 29 percent of the vote. Let’s keep it that way. Vote Salahuddin.

Legislative District No. 48, State Senator
Vandana Slatter

The sheer drama of this race. In the fair Eastside where we lay our scene, two representatives in the same district find themselves pitted head to head. Sen. Vandana Slatter and Rep. Amy Walen previously legislated side-by-side in the 48th district as house representatives. Then, earlier this year, Sen. Patty Kuderer ascended to the throne of Washington State Insurance Commissioner. The King County Council appointed Slatter to Kuderer’s empty seat, triggering this special election. Who challenged Slatter? Not only a fellow Democrat, but Walen. If Slatter loses, she’s out of the legislature. If Walen loses, she keeps her old job. During our endorsement meeting, Slatter brought this tension to the fore. It was uncomfortable, it was glorious, and it was about 8:45 a.m. We lost count of how many things Walen said “everyone” knew about Slatter, and how many times Slatter said, “Who is everyone?”

“Thanks for the free counseling session lesson, ladies,” Rep. Walen said when it was over. No, Rep. Walen. Thank you.

Walen was certain she wouldn’t get our endorsement. She was right. Slatter is the better choice. She works as a clinical pharmacist and is concerned with healthcare. One of her crowning achievements was passing the My Health My Data bill, which restricts which companies have access to health data. She is a champion of the environment, she’s a proponent of progressive taxes, and she has the support of the broader Democrat coalition in Olympia. Walen, on the other hand, doesn’t play nice with other Democrats.

The proud car dealership owner, Walen brings a very business-first attitude to the legislature. She called her general approach “balls to the wall.” She’s not all bad. Even though she’s more moderate than her opponent, Walen went for an income tax as fast as Slatter did in our meeting, and she brought some wacky ideas to the table like seizing unoccupied buildings via eminent domain (especially those empty churches because Washington doesn’t go to church) and converting them into housing. But turning retail space (or worship space) to housing is not so simple. It’s prohibitively expensive a lot of the time.

The conservative-funded Jobs PAC has spent almost $200,000 in support of Walen. Walen has no bones about considering herself the more conservative candidate in the race, but didn’t have any explanation for the PAC spending so much to get her elected. She also didn’t seem to care. Against our better judgment we liked Walen and her mostly no-bullshit candor. She passes the beer test, but not the bar. Vote Slatter.

Senate Joint Resolution No. 8201
Vote Yes

You’re in your late 30s to early 40s. Your back pain is manageable, but worsening daily. You think good music ended in 1997. The Reaper is coming for you. It won’t be long before Crocodile shows and craft cocktails are but a twilit memory, and your life revolves around the coming void. This slow decline will be expensive for you, or the cost will rest on the shoulders of your incorrigible, brainrotted children and their AI polycule. You should know. Your parents are dying right now and you’re dealing with it. (Your human polycule has been no help. We could’ve told you that.)

Lucky for us, the state is squirrelling away our money via the Long-Term Services and Supports Trust Fund (known as WA Cares), the public long-term care insurance program that survived Brian Heywood and his taxphobic gooners last year.

That hedge-fund managing asswipe doesn’t need the money for tapioca pudding and Depends. You do, and for the sake of your non-dog progeny, we have to keep this fund going for generations. On this ballot, we have an opportunity to let those bean-counting poindexters at the State Investment Board manage our money smarter than they’re currently allowed to.

A “yes” vote for this constitutional amendment would knock down a century-old firewall and allow WA Cares to invest in the stock market. This allows us to get more bang for our buck without having to implement another regressive tax or take more money from your paycheck that you’ll complain about on r/SeattleWA.

They’re not going to play fast and loose with our money or anything. To put it in pleb terms, it’s kind of like a 401(k). You’d be a fool to chase hot stocks with your retirement nest egg. But it’s normal to put your life savings in a diversified fund that isn’t tied to any single company’s stock, but the market as a whole (otherwise known as an index fund). There are dips, crashes, and God forbid the Greatest Depression, but generally the market trends upward. Right now, we’re stuck with returns from stable but slower-growing government bonds that ultimately won’t be able to fund the elder care we need.

Those return less than 5 percent per year. If we turn those diamond-handed nerds loose, we could see returns up to 8.5 percent per year. With that money, we could draft a bionic seniors professional pickleball league to dominate courts at Green Lake. Compound that interest and you’re looking at a fuckton of cane money. Even Republicans like it. If nothing else, you can trust that those cheapskates love money.

The State Investment Board already successfully handles our pension fund this way. It’s one of the strongest in the country.

Ageist humor aside, this makes sound financial sense. You wouldn’t leave money on the table for your retirement, so why should the state do that with our collective future? Our population is getting older, we neglect our elderly as if they aren’t human and make tasteless jokes about them almost constantly, and with the cuts to Medicaid at the national level, the already-abysmal state of elder care is going to collapse. The medical system is already struggling under the burden.

It’s unfathomably expensive to age. The average cost of assisted living in Washington State is over $6,000 per month, a number higher than the national average. The average cost of a semi-private room at Washington nursing home is over $12,100 a month. A private room runs $13,000 a month. It’s a lot of money for the most bummer digs of your life.

Washington State must be a caretaker. If this resolution passes, it actually can. Vote yes.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Julianne Bell, Nathalie Graham, Marcus Harrison Green, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Emily Nokes, Antifa’s girlfriend, Megan Seling, Audrey Vann, Hannah Murphy Winter, and Micah Yip. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races or in races we forgot.

Katie Wilson Cracks 50 Percent of the Vote

Stranger Election Control Board — Fri, 08 Aug 2025 16:25:00 -0700

With only 96,000 votes left to count in King County, Seattle mayoral candidate Katie Wilson has hit 50.15 percent of the vote. Mayor Bruce Harrell is now at 41.70 percent, or about 8.5 points behind. As his last campaign email subject line read: “We are down.” Boy, are they. by Stranger Election Control Board

With only 96,000 votes left to count in King County, Seattle mayoral candidate Katie Wilson has hit 50.15 percent of the vote. Mayor Bruce Harrell is now at 41.70 percent. About 8.5 points behind. As his last campaign email subject line read: “We are down.” Boy, are they.

These numbers would be difficult to pull for an incumbent, and even more so for an upstart who didn’t get the support of MLK Labor, the county’s union of unions, or establishment democrats like Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, Governor Bob Ferguson and Attorney General Nick Brown.

In polling just before the election, it was clear that voters were still getting to know Wilson. Only 27 percent of likely voters polled by the Northwest Progressive Institute chose Wilson on name recognition alone. But they also showed that voters were responding to her campaign’s message: simply giving likely voters access to her candidate statement in the voter pamphlet gave her a symbolic lead on Harrell.

Progressives improved their leads all around in Friday’s ballot drop. Dionne Foster now has 57.89 percent of the vote to City Council President Sara Nelson’s 35.77 percent of the vote, increasing her lead from 17 points to 22 points.

City Attorney candidate Erika Evans is now 21.5 points ahead of republican incumbent Ann Davison. Eddie Lin has an almost 18 point lead on Adonis Ducksworth in the race for District 2.

See you all at the next ballot drop on Monday.

Editors note: This article has been updated since its publication. We stated incorrectly that Katie Wilson had an almost 10 point lead on Mayor Bruce Harrell. Wilson is 8.45 points (or about 8.5 points) ahead of Harrell. We regret the error.

UPDATED: Primary Election Takeaways

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 12:04:00 -0700

In Seattle's primary election, progressives are up, conservatives are out, and we're on our way to having a new city. Early leads for Katie Wilson, Erika Evans, Alexis Mercedes Rinck, and Dionne Foster are good tidings. But what does that mean for Mayor Bruce Harrell, City Attorney Ann Davison, City Council President Sara Nelson, the rest of Seattle's conservative establishment, and all those poor souls endorsed by The Seattle Times Editorial Board? by Stranger Election Control Board Updated on August 7, 5:36 p.m.: The Tiniest Conservative Bump, Progressives Still Dominate

Katie Wilson loses barely any ground in Thursday’s drop: With 30% of the ballots counted in the Seattle Mayor’s race, Katie Wilson holds an almost 4 point lead (3.95 point). Yesterday, she had a 4.48 point lead. The slight droop barely matters, and is still higher than her 2 point lead on election night.

City Attorney Ann Davison fucked as she ever was: Erika Evans held a steady 17 point lead over incumbent Davison.

Finish Her! D9 candidate Dionne Foster lost a half point to City Council President Sara Nelson. She’s still got a 17.42 point lead.

Skateboarding still not cool: Eddie Lin holds on to the same 16 point lead over Adonis Duckworth. Wipeout, dude.

Oh, what a night. Will you remember where you were when you learned Bruce Harrell was behind on primary night of his re-election campaign? We will never forget it.

We were at Katie Wilson’s party, where she whispered into the mic: “Are we really at 46 percent?” We were at Harrell’s lakeside shindig eyeing the botched sheet cake and waiting for somebody, anybody, to mention that he was behind. We were at Stoup Brewing, watching an audience mob Alexis Mercedes Rinck, Dionne Foster, and Erika Evans with hugs. We were kicking it with our guy Girmay Zahilay in front of a sneaker wall at Darkalino's.

We learned a lot from the first ballots in Seattle city races. And, reader, it’s good. Now that we’re done binging free candidate booze and cramming crab legs in our uncensored cakeholes, we’re ready to get into what the hell this means for the state of the city and the upcoming general election. Let’s dig in.

Progressives did amazingly well on the first ballot drop. We don’t even feel the need to knock on wood or sacrifice any more babies for the cause. The left swept last night. Katie Wilson didn’t even believe the numbers when she saw them. Wilson is more than a full point ahead of Bruce Harrell. Erika Evans and Dionne Foster both cracked 50 percent of the vote. Alexis Mercedes Rinck didn’t have a real challenger, and she has 75 percent. Traditionally, in our mail-in voting system, older conservatives vote earlier and younger progressives vote later, so we should expect to see the numbers go up for the left in the next few days.

For some context, let’s look at the District 2 Tammy Morales/Tanya Woo showdown in the 2023 primary. Election nerds might remember that Morales absolutely trounced Woo in the primary. But night of, they were only three points apart. Morales grabbed seven more points by the time the election was called, securing a full 10-point lead.

Similarly, in the 2021 mayoral primary, Harrell had a nine-point lead on Lorena González in the first ballot drop, and she clawed back seven points.

The backlash to the post-2020 conservative backlash has begun. These results are a referendum on Seattle’s existing political establishment. Voters didn’t buy Harrell and Nelson’s campaign messaging. People obviously want something different. Harrell’s in trouble. The one-term mayoral curse is already working its magic (not to discredit his history of being a bad mayor). Nelson is done. Dionne Foster, until recently a political unknown, knocked her lights out. “Nelson and Bruce are fucking cooked,” Stephen Paolini, progressive political consultant, said in a text.

And while they cook, egg is dripping from the faces of all the people who endorsed Harrell: MLK Labor, Governor Bob Ferguson, Attorney General Nick Brown, Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, King County Council Member Teresa Mosqueda, and many, many others. Were they scared that upsetting the establishment candidate (and, for a time, expected shoo-in) would complicate their political lives?

Wilson has extended a hand. “Earlier this year, many powerful people and powerful groups made the decision to line up behind the mayor, because they didn’t think that anyone would dare to challenge him,” Wilson said in her election night speech. “They didn’t think that anyone would try to hold him accountable. But they didn’t know about you. They didn’t know that the voters of Seattle would demand better. So I say to those who are still backing Harrell, even though they might actually want us to win, you know who you are: It’s time to join our campaign.”

Red rover, red rover, come on over.

King County Executive candidate Girmay Zahilay’s 10 percent lead over Claudia Balducci, his opponent and colleague on the King County Council, is striking, but it does not guarantee him a win in the general election. The 10 percent that went for County Assessor John Arthur Wilson, who eventually suspended his campaign after accusations that he was allegedly stalking his ex, will go somewhere. It’s not clear where yet.

“She has a really strong chance in a two-way race,” Lexi Koren, consultant for Claudia Balducci, said in a text. “The next two candidates, Derek Chartrand and John Wilson, got a combined 22% [of the vote], and she’s got a better shot with those voters given the Seattle Times endorsement. And two of the other candidates that got a lesser vote share (about 3.5 percent combined)—Amiya Ingram and Bill Hirt—are also from Bellevue.”

So long, Ann. Seattle clearly does not want a Republican in charge of anything in our town, especially not the Seattle City Attorney’s Office. This is not the time to be soft on Trump, to revive regressive anti-drug and prostitution laws, and to completely dismantle community court, the one part of the justice system trying to steer people out of jail. Erika Evans ended the night with 51 percent of the vote, a cushy 14-point lead over incumbent Ann Davison. Her fellow progressive Davison challengers, Nathan Rouse and Rory O’Sullivan, scooped up 4.9 percent and 6.3 percent, respectively. Don’t let the revolving door hit you on the way out, Ann. Or do.

Speaking of Republicans, there are 13,500 people (and counting) living among you who willingly voted Rachel Savage for District 8, who wants to ban homeless people from sleeping outside, ban public drug use, throw offenders in jail or treatment for a year, and “return to a system of compassionate law enforcement” that has never existed.

The ’90s are finally over, and skateboarding is no longer cool. All Adonis Ducksworth has is 30 percent of the vote and a sore arm from the tattoo he got on primary night.

Eddie Lin, on the other hand, got the lion’s share of the progressive vote. He pulled in 45 percent of the vote while sharing the progressive spotlight with challengers Jamie Fackler and Jeanie Chunn earning 10 percent and 12.5 percent, respectively. Will all of those voters go toward Lin in the general? It’s hard to say. What remains clear is that Ducksworth will be skating uphill on the road to November 4.

“In a word, we’re feeling ecstatic,” Lin wrote in a text last night. “D2 residents are feeling squeezed by skyrocketing rent and higher costs. Our campaign focused on concrete steps to address the affordability crisis, and tonight’s results show voters resonated with that message. I’m so thankful to the numerous volunteers and over 2,300 [donors] that made this possible. We’re going to keep fighting for a Seattle that works for everyone!”

Seattle Times-endorsed candidates performed poorly: The paper typically endorses everyone we don’t, but we do rarely overlap because sometimes logic actually prevails in that room. This year, the only candidates both papers endorsed were Joe Mizrahi, Janice Zahn, and Osman Salahuddin, and, because the Seattle Times Editorial Board is not completely stupid, it endorsed the King County Parks Levy that makes sure we can have public parks in this county. After this first ballot drop, only their Bellevue City Council candidates (not our circus, nor our monkeys) and King County Council candidates Steffanie Fain and Pete von Reichbauer were leading their races, and von Reichbauer barely counts. The man has been in his seat for three decades. He will die there.

Is that the sound of purses unzipping? All right, now that the more conservative, more big-business-friendly candidates are well behind in the polls, where will all of that outside money, like Nelson’s friends at the National Association of Realtors, start flowing? It’s hard to say. In 2019, when progressives last had a very good year in this city, businesses like Amazon spent $2.5 million fighting against those results with the Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy PAC. Progressives ultimately won, but those races were razor-thin, and voters may have been motivated to swing left due to all of the outside money. The way 2025’s primary shook out—with progressives in sexy, bodacious leads—is unprecedented.

Paolini, the consultant, isn’t sure what will happen with independent expenditures in Nelson’s race. “They may still feel they need to help her or delude themselves into thinking she has a chance,” he said. As for Harrell, that’s a different story. “I’d expect a big influx there,” Paolini said. “They’re in too deep.”

Regardless of what happens, this primary is the beginning, not the end. “We’re going to need to keep rallying to raise money to talk to voters in the general and not take anything for granted,” Paolini said. “Crazier shit has happened. We have an advantage: it's time to step on it, not let up.”

If progressives don’t take their feet off the gas, if an influx of big business money doesn’t win over our hearts and minds, and if the world doesn’t end before November 4, then we might have a progressive mayor and a city council no longer paralyzed by Sara Nelson.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Nathalie Graham, Marcus Harrison Green, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Emily Nokes, Megan Seling, a sad slice of cake, and Hannah Murphy Winter.

Primary Election Night 2025 Live

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 18:05:00 -0700

See you later tonight for fun, mischief, and maybe some crying. by Stranger Election Control Board

📌

Let's get ready to crumble!!!! ...under the crushing weight of democracy's corpse. JK, JK. It's not all bad. It's Primary Election Night, babies, and the future actually looks bright-ish! Mayoral candidate Katie Wilson is giving Mayor Bruce Harrell a run for his money (literally), and Dionne Foster is neck-and-neck with conservative City Council President Sara Nelson. There is hope!

While it's impossible to know what will shake out once all the ballots are counted, we're going to do our best—tonight, members of the Stranger Election Control Board are charging into the city to pop into election parties all over town. We're going to sneak snacks, eavesdrop, and see how candidates react to the first wave of tonight’s results, so stay tuned to this liveblog to follow along!

Speaking of results, the first batch should drop tonight shortly after 8 p.m. Which means... you still have time to vote!

Is your ballot still sitting in the pile of old mail, unopened and ignored? Just fill it out (here’s our cheat sheet), and drop it in a ballot box by 8 p.m.!

If you never received a ballot, lost your ballot, or forgot to register before the ballots were mailed, you can vote in person at one of King County's election sites, which, in Seattle, is at the Lumen Field Events Center. Also open until 8 p.m.

As of 4 p.m., 22 percent of registered voters in King County have returned their ballots. Don’t be another statistic. VOTE! See you later tonight for fun, mischief, and maybe some crying.

All photos by the Stranger Election Control Board unless otherwise noted.

"Are We Really at 46 Percent?"
8:30 p.m.

When Wilson got onstage, she admitted that she'd written her speech assuming that Harrell would be ahead—she planned on reminding voters that progressive voters always cast their ballots last, and the numbers will go up from here. Instead, it just rubbed a little salt in the wound we assume Harrell is nursing. She promised the best ground game the city's ever seen in the next 13 weeks. We can't wait.

Zahilay Says He's Ready to Take on Trump
8:28 p.m. Smiling because he's winning.

Claiming victory in the King County Executive race, Girmay Zahilay didn’t take long to address the threat posed by the Trump regime: "At a time when the Trump agenda threatens our values, we need a County Executive who won’t just draft plans but will fight like hell to make them happen," Zahilay told his nearly 300 supporters.

In pole position to become King County’s first immigrant elected as County Executive, and leading Claudia Balducci by 10 points in the initial returns, Zahilay highlighted the broad coalition his campaign built during the election: "Tonight we celebrate a historic victory. Voters from every corner of King County have come together to back the broadest coalition our county has ever seen."

Victory Vibes
8:27 p.m. Believe it or not, Dionne Foster is speaking in this photo.

Leading each of their races, Alexis Mercedes Rinck, Dionne Foster, and Erika Evans each took a turn at the mic.

"Talk about a vote of confidence," says Rinck, who has been in office eight months. She delivered her speech like a WWE announcer. It worked for her.

"This is an affirmation that the work we're doing is what the people want."

Foster told the crowd the results were clear. Seattle is ready for new leadership. We can only wonder what City Council President Sara Nelson is saying right now. She only got 39 percent of the vote tonight. We'd ask, but her campaign did not get back to us about her plans tonight (moping?).

Evans says come November, she would take back the City Attorney's office for "workers, renters, our values, our people," all the reasons she says she became a lawyer.

Katie's Number One
8:17 p.m. Nose-picking daughter not pictured.

Someone screamed, "Katie's number one!" and the party exploded. Wilson brought in 46.2 percent of the first ballot drop, beating Harrell by almost two percentage points. This whole party knew that the divide between them is only going to get better from here. Young and progressive voters tend to vote late, which will be in her favor. Katie got onstage to make a speech, but first she asked everyone for a little patience. It was her 2-year-old daughter's second birthday, and she asked the crowd to sing for her first. Josie picked her nose the whole time.

Harrell, Down by Two Points, Says He's Ready for the Fight to Come
8:16 p.m. On to the Primary.

“We knew this was going to be a tough race, but we know we will win because the data is on our side for what we’re trying to do,” Bruce Harrell said to the crowd. “The results are people really, really want to see change because there’s a lot of fear in our lives right now.”

He went on to say that now he needs to spend the next couple of months telling “our story.” But we, the crowd, know him, he said, and we know he welcomes a fight.

“These are tough, tough races,” Harrell said. “What we’ve gotta do is listen to what people want.”

Some optimists in the crowd kept saying, “Four more years.” I guess we shall see!

Progressive Women Whooping Ass at First Ballot Drop
8:15 p.m. But your wifi still sucks, Stoup!

People jumped up and down as the emcee announced the ballot drop: Erika Evans at 51 percent, Alexis Mercedes Rinck at 75 percent, Dionne Foster at 53 percent. The three women walked down the stairs, hugging campaign workers, friends, and family.

"You can print it—I remember as an incumbent when it sucked to be at 44 percent on election night," said former city council member Andrew Lewis, who was standing behind us.

"We're back," he yelled. "Progressives are back."

The Results Are In 8:07 p.m.

The first batch of results just dropped, and Katie Wilson has 46.21 percent of the vote, with Harrell right behind her at 44.86.

Someone screamed, "Katie's number one!" at her party, and the room exploded with cheers.

More soon!

Stoup Brewing, Fix Your Wi-Fi
8:00 p.m. We weren't supposed to be here.

With the ballot drop fast approaching, the party is hopping at the joint Alexis Mercedes Rinck/Erika Evans/Dionne Foster party at Stoup Brewing (the carcass of Optimism Brewing, RIP) in Capitol Hill. We're not sure what song is playing, but the bass reverberates. The heat is unbearable. The wi-fi barely works. On an upstairs balcony, Evans scribbles on a sheet of paper. Rinck peers over the balcony between heavy curtains. Oops. This is a candidate-only area. Time to leave.

Belvedere-Fueled Solidarity and Club Vibes at Zahilay Primary Party
7:53 p.m Zahilay thought bubble: “Yeah, I know I’m cruising into the top two. But I still gotta go through the motions (shake hands, nod at babies, pretend I’m nervous…)”

Even before King County Assessor John Arthur Wilson peaced out of the race over a tiny hiccup known as alleged serial stalking, the contest for the first newly elected King County Executive since the Obama administration had already effectively narrowed to two: Claudia Balducci and Girmay Zahilay. Both are current King County Council members. Both have raised more cash than anyone else in what’s shaping up to be this year’s priciest local election.

Both are poised to make history: Balducci as the first woman elected to the post (Shannon Braddock was appointed in April), Zahilay as the first immigrant to ever hold it. And both have the distinction of belonging to demographics our current orange overlord would happily deport, gag, or strip of basic bodily autonomy before breakfast.

True to her Bellevue bona fides (she once served as mayor of the land of high-end strip malls and cul-de-sac HOA drama), Balducci posted up at Lincoln’s Lookout for her primary night party. There was no way in hell we were about to throw ourselves into the meat grinder that is 520 rush hour traffic just to bask in the glow of “the city in a park” (a branding line that needs to suffer the same abrupt death as critical thinking skills in this country). So we headed to Zahilay’s shindig at Darkalino’s in Pioneer Square instead.

Early vibe? Early aughts club vibes, Belvedere-fueled solidarity (as one attendee already said), focaccia to spare, and enough progressive rhetoric flying around to spark a thirst trap for brunchtime liberals to fantasize about a third Obama presidency. About a third of the 300 RSVPs have already arrived, including Zahilay and his wife, Joyce, and 1-year-old child. Oh, and Attorney General Nick Brown just made a cameo.

“I’m out here tonight to see who wins and how people react—but if I had to bet, the vibe is Girmay, Bruce Harrell, Dionne Foster, and Erika Evans,” says Nicole Grant, of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 46.

Zahilay, meanwhile, has the vibe of a guy who definitely knows he’s moving on but is trying to play it cool, like he’s at a poker table with the worst poker face in the county.

“For me, it’s not just about the numbers. It’s about the people who showed up, who knocked on doors, who believed in the work. I keep telling my team: We just want to make it to the general. We can’t control the outcome, only the effort we put in. And I’m proud of that. I was raised in King County, and now I’m raising my family here. That’s what drives me—I’m deeply rooted in this place and want to keep giving back to it.”

The party is packed. Thank You for the Crab Legs, Millionaires 7:50 p.m. More food should be served in buckets.

Jane Drago is at Bruce Harrell's party. Her husband gave us her resume. She is a former city council person and also Häagen-Dazs mogul? We’re not sure. The two have been married 66 years, and that tugs on our heartstrings. Tanya Woo is here. This does not tug on any heartstrings. We talked to an intern with the WA Alliance for Gun Responsibility. We don’t think she liked us. We especially don’t think she liked us after we asked if she was in high school. She had just graduated from college. Sorry!

The spread is decadent. There is a vat of crab. We are eating good tonight. Thank you to the donors!

An Empty Rooftop in Capitol Hill
7:30 p.m. A lone disco ball.

After asking a nice man with a French bulldog how to access the rooftop at this Capitol Hill apartment building that will remain secret, we find... absolutely no one on the rooftop.

White plastic tablecloths blow in the wind. Small disco balls sway on their perches. There's boxes of beer, bottles of whiskey, and a cherry liqueur. But no Ry Armstrong, an underdog's underdog candidate in the mayoral race.

Suddenly, Armstrong's campaign manager Sunny Owens arrives with another underdog mayoral candidate: Joe Molloy, who has a bag of ice tucked under his arm.

Molloy, who is homeless, says he'd learned a lot through this process. Mostly, how many people in this city want to be part of real solutions, but are struggling to keep their heads above water. "That's been very apparent to me," he says.

Armstrong has eight pizzas and pride in what they've accomplished: the 127 hours of calls, the 4,000 doors knocked, engaging disengaged people. That said, they're jaded. While touring the tiny home Hope Factory in SoDo, Armstrong says a man told them they agreed with 99 percent of their policies, but couldn't vote for them because he didn't think Armstrong could win in a dress. Armstrong says they're probably "too young" and "too trans" to win in Seattle in 2025. "But who knows? There's always a path."

Katie Wilson Says She's Nervous, but She Also Can't Stop Smiling
7:40 p.m. Evidence of non-stop smiling.

We just watched a grown man tape his shoe back together.

In other news, when we asked Katie Wilson what a "good night" looked like for her, she made it clear she's shooting for the moon. When the ballots drop tonight, she's hoping to be within a few points of beating Harrell—so when the more progressive later ballots roll in, she can trounce him. Everyone's worried about low turnout today, but even Wilson and her husband dropped off their ballots this afternoon.

Bruce's Big Cake Mistake
7:25 p.m. Why leave the "On To The" there? Why not smooth out that whole third line? We're just asking questions!

We got into Mayor Harrell's party just as they were bringing out the cake. But whoops! Turns out someone miscommunicated the message, and a big chunk of the icing was wiped away.

After another reporter asked what the cake originally said, a campaign staffer said, “We gotta figure this out,” and a volunteer replied, “I don’t think she wants to say.” Luckily, we grabbed a shot of the cake before it was defaced. It read "Congratulations, Mayor Harrell! On To The Primary."

They offered us a slice.

The mistake cake. Jamie Fackler Sticks to the Bit
7:05 p.m. What an ass! (Haha just kidding, that's Fackler's kid in that donkey costume, we'll be nice.)

We're at the joint election night party for Jamie Fackler, Rory O'Sullivan, and Katie Wilson at Centilia Cultural Center in Beacon Hill. There's a pizza truck for Katie "$8 slice of pizza" Wilson, and Fackler suckered his kid into wearing a donkey costume, because he's nothing if not dedicated to the bit. The whole party has a community center potluck vibe. There's kids everywhere, balloons at every table, and so many bags of tortilla chips. We're relieved that the food truck is here. That guac and hummus are already looking sweaty.

The balloon budget must've been spent on the donkey costume. There Is Not Very Much Parking in Leschi, and Harrell's Base Is Going to Hate That
6:45 p.m. So far it's all boats and BMWs.

We did not get invited to Bruce Harrell’s election night party in Leschi. His campaign never even responded to our inquiries! Fear not. Little birdies told us where it is. This is why we are 30 minutes early. Upon arriving, we had to parallel park into one of the only available spots. It took us three tries. We already hate this, and unless there is a secret special parking lot for Bruce’s guests who *definitely* all drove to this, then they are going to hate it, too. Anyway, we are now sitting on a Leschi dock, preparing for the inevitability that Harrell tells us to high-tail it out of here without even a single crab cake (based on the venue, we assume there will be crab cakes).

A pontoon boat full of tan blond people is singing happy birthday to one of their ilk. We are watching the staff at Harrell’s party place cups on tables.

Now we have moved to Lakeside Ave to scope the front entrance. We just saw three BMWs drive by in a row. Are these donors? We will wait a little longer.

Hope we at least get a crab cake. You're Voting, You're Really Voting!
6:25 p.m. Cute nail polish makes voting more fun.

A couple of hours ago, 22 percent of registered voters in King County had returned their ballots. Now, as of 6 p.m., the King County Elections office is reporting that 24 percent of y'all have done your civic duty. Will we beat last year's sad 41 percent? We believe in you, Seattle! Go! Vote! Ballot boxes and in-person voting centers are open until 8 p.m.!

What We’re Watching in City Council Position 9
6:15 p.m.

This race is keeping us on our toes. Recent polling put City Council President Sara Nelson and policy wonk Dionne Foster in another statistical tie, but the vast majority of voters were undecided. “It could break pretty aggressively in one way or the other,” said political consultant Stephen Paolini. “I don't think anyone has a good pulse on how that's going to break.”

What We’re Watching in the Mayor’s Race
6:10 p.m.

Katie Wilson’s campaign has been picking up speed, especially in the last month. New polling showed her statistically tied with Mayor Bruce Harrell at the end of last month, and fundraising-wise, they’re neck and neck (about half a million each). The big difference between the two right now is PAC money. Bruce Harrell for Seattle’s Future has already spent more than $180,000 on his behalf.

So what does a good night for Wilson look like tonight? According to Stephen Paolini, a local political consultant, it’d look like Harrell getting less than 45 percent of the vote, with her in second place. “I’m expecting her to actually have a really good night,” he says.

No One Is Dancing at Jeanie Chunn's Othello Park Primary Dance Party
5:56 p.m. Dancers TK.

It’s still early, and maybe everyone is busy eating the fare from Soul Fusion, but the DJ in the park is bumping sick beats (remixes of "Jessie’s Girl" by Rick Springfield, "Hot N Cold" by Katy Perry, "September" by Earth, Wind & Fire, "Danza Kuduro" by Don Omar, "Can't Hold Us" by Macklemore, "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-a-Lot) to an audience of no groovers. But people are chowing down and playing corn hole. Maybe things will heat up as we get closer to ballot drop. We have yet to see Jeanie, but that’s because we are hungry and want Soul Fusion just like everyone else.

The best election party food so far.

The Stranger's Primary Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 12:11:00 -0700

The Stranger's Primary Election Cheat Sheet by Stranger Election Control Board

Vote Yes on the King County Parks Levy

Stranger Election Control Board — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 11:17:00 -0700

The Future of Our Parks Hangs in the Balance

by Stranger Election Control Board

Should we or should we not have a county parks system? The question before voters is that simple. Because if voters do not approve this property tax levy, we functionally won’t have one.

The 6-year levy, last approved by voters in 2019, will support 250 parks in King County 185 miles of regional trails, 215 miles of backcountry trails and 50 square miles of open space for we, the people, to frolic, picnic, bike, and aimlessly wander. There’s splash parks, pools, ballfields, and play courts of various kinds for racket-oriented aristocrats. If we renew this levy, we maintain that system and homeowners pay 24 cents per thousand dollars of their home value each month. For the median homeowner, that comes out to $16.38 a month. It would generate $1.45 billion over the next six years.

If we don’t renew this levy, say goodbye to new infrastructure improvements. Advocates say the county would close parks, or put up signs telling people to recreate at their own risk. Lawns will grow long, hedges wild. After-school programs that depend on county parks funding will suffer. We hope you and your kids like pissing yourselves, because we won’t have anybody to open the restrooms. It’s not a world we want to live in.

When the SECB suggested we hold our endorsement meeting in a park, it could not have known we’d meet with this levy’s well-prepared stakeholders on the hottest day of the year so far, a 90+ degree scorcher, with glaring, headache-inducing sunlight bouncing from the concrete like a mirror. We could go on complaining about this thing that was our fault, but it wouldn’t be fair to the people who sat on the porch outside the community center at the genuinely lovely Steve Cox Memorial Park in White Center with us, or the “Log Cabin,” as it is affectionately known. It’d be especially unfair to Fin Crispy Jr., the mascot of the park’s resident summer collegiate baseball team, The DubSea Fish Sticks. They were getting deep fried in there. We didn’t see you leave Fin Crispy Jr., but hope you survived, even if childhood experiences have made some of our stomachs twist into knots whenever mascots are near (it’s a combination of your large size, wide-open, smiling mouths, and mime-like silence. It’s very disconcerting).

Like we said, this levy is a no-brainer. It is also uncontested. The advocates, including County Council Member Teresa Mosqueda and Christie True, the county’s former head of natural resources and parks, could have easily shown up, sat down, told us to “vote for this or the parks are screwed,” and called it a day. But they came with data. With a deep love of the parks. Even answers for why the wealthy, who don’t think the county parks are worth a few quarters a day when their backyard, waterfront tennis courts are right there, should vote for this.

No matter how rich they are, they don’t own Tiger Mountain, where they race wildly-expensive mountain bikes (yet), or the county-owned pool where little Richie Rich III has his swim meets. If this is you, and “eyesores” are one of your top concerns, consider the weeds. Are you going to schlep a bag and a weeder to your local park, or are you willing to cough up less than a dollar a day so someone else will? We’re willing to bet that’s less than the going rate for a gardener. But those homeowners would probably know better than us.

When we pool our money together, we can all have nice things. Even those with little to spare. In Seattle, we’re lousy with parks. But many of the diverse, immigrant populated areas of unincorporated King County aren’t. They depend on this money. Everyone deserves a place to play, to enjoy themselves, to throw a party, to organize a cultural event, and not have to pay for it. Bummed about another property tax? Take it up with the Washington Legislature, which needed to figure out progressive revenue solutions, like, yesterday.

Keeping these parks open and thriving at a time when we’re still trying to recover from the isolation and depression of the pandemic and so much public money is under federal threat is literally our civic duty.

Vote YES, or don’t let us catch you frolicking in a public green space ever again.

The Stranger's Primary Election Voting Guide

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 09 Jul 2025 15:17:00 -0700

The Stranger's 2025 Primary Election Voters Guide by Stranger Election Control Board

It’s the Primary Election 2025. We’re taking over the city. Choose your fighter.

We know it’s easy to miss these odd year elections. They’re local! They’re wonky! There’s not a President in sight. Maybe you’ve used up all your fucks and your will to live watching the world sputter and burn. Or maybe you spent them watching our city government waste everyone’s time building digital advertising kiosks, painting over graffiti, trying to weaken our ethics code, and allowing cops the ability to lob blastballs into protests once again instead of finding ways to protect us from a robber baron and literal fascists.

But please vote. Please please please. This year, we have the chance to swap big business politicians for scrappy progressives across the ballot. (Sara Nelson is up for reelection. Need we say more?) And if we seize the opportunity, we can also maintain the proud Seattle tradition of one-term mayors. In just a few months, we could say goodbye to the mayor who couldn’t even keep the one promise he cared about (bringing back the Seattle SuperSonics). The mayor who never managed to find a vision for Seattle’s future, because he was busy sweeping the homeless people out of downtown and into Little Saigon. But you’ll never see him holding the broom—because he’s unable to lift a finger, let alone take responsibility for this city.

Seattle has rarely—if ever—allowed itself the luxury of having a progressive mayor and a progressive city council at the same time, because we’re masochists who get our rocks off at complaining about the Seattle Process. Right now, this city is currently run by vampires. Let’s take a bath in free-range fair-trade certified organic holy water and fashion a stake from lab-grown (or ethically sourced) balsa wood and get out there.

This year, dare we say it, there’s a roster of honest-to-goodness actual progressives that are looking for a chance to totally transform Seattle. And they couldn’t have come at a better time. We’re staring down the pike of a Seattle comprehensive plan that will steer the next two decades of growth and infrastructure on these near-suburban streets. We’ve got a lot of work to do if we don’t want the Seattle of the future to be a charming little hamlet with $4,000-per-square-foot rents, nary a corner store in sight, and unionized robocops arresting “the nipple” at the behest of an anti-socialist neural network that’s named itself Jeff Bezos 2. So listen up, we’re choosing our mayor, our city attorney, our county executive, and three city council seats—and that’s not even the whole ballot.

In the last month, we sat down with (almost) all of the candidates. They made their case. They brought us snacks that sometimes we were allergic to. Nobody even cried this year, but they screamed a lot. Idiot aside, we heard a lot of exciting ideas from inspiring people politicians.

Uh oh, is our optimism showing? We hate when that happens. But if the best of the best get elected, we’ll go full frontal. Because right now we simply cannot resist the potential dripping from these ballots. Let’s fantasize for a sec: City Council District 2 is going to have a new champion. Pro-business, anti-protester (evil) Council President Sara Nelson has a real challenger in Dionne Foster. And we’re pouring our hope into Katie Wilson to once and for all send Bruce Harrell packing.

You should get your ballot around July 18. If you don’t know what to do with it, we have a guide on page 20. Let’s go. We’ve got a city to fix.

City of Seattle

Mayor
Katie Wilson

Bruce Harrell had his chance.

A lifetime ago (in 2021), when Harrell first ran for mayor, he made a lot of big, substantive promises that voters seemed to believe: He pledged to build 1,000 new housing units in his first six months in office; he committed to changing the biased policing culture in SPD after the George Floyd protests; he said he didn’t believe “dispersal,” or sweeps, worked, and promised to take a “Housing First” approach to encampments around the city. Are we living in a utopia yet?

In our endorsement meeting, we asked about his broken promises. We pointed out that he conducted more sweeps than his five predecessors combined. That he sunk years of municipal effort and energy into a Comprehensive Plan that won’t meet our housing needs. That he pandered to police with bruised egos, letting them become the militant thugs that we saw in Cal Anderson on Memorial Day weekend, but with higher salaries. And in an hour-long endorsement meeting, he didn’t answer for a single thing. In every case, the conditions in his city were someone else’s fault. Homelessness? The other cities in King County aren’t doing their part. The police that he says can take a hike if they don’t agree with his idea of good policing? Well, he told us, he doesn’t actually know what good policing is. They’re the experts, not him. Nothing was his responsibility.

We understand why he would feel that way. Because the greatest sin of the Harrell Administration is what it hasn’t done. He’s a mayor without imagination, and with him at the helm, Seattle is a rudderless ship on a windless ocean. While tens of thousands of Seattleites are struggling to keep their head above water, he’s obsessing over penises spray painted on the overpasses, AI incubators, and digital advertising kiosks that profit private companies.

There’s a perception that this race was Harrell’s from the start, so there was no use doing anything to stop him. But that’s not the case. In polling this spring, only 37 percent of Seattleites were happy with Harrell’s work in City Hall. Enough of Seattle is sick of the Harrell Show.

Katie Wilson is Harrell’s opposite. If Harrell is all politics and no substance, Wilson is substance embodied. She’s been an organizer in Seattle for 15 years, and she’s built a career fighting for—and winning—campaigns like raising the minimum wage, protecting affordable transit, and building progressive revenue.

Wilson’s campaign platform is clearly made by someone who’s used to making change in a system that’s built to fight against it. She has clear, step-by-step plans to build 4,000 units of shelter in four years, to streamline access to addiction and mental health treatment, and to build $1 billion worth of union-built affordable housing. Harrell made promises. Wilson actually intends to keep hers. And she knows how to do it.

In our meeting, one question best captured the difference between Wilson and Harrell. We asked about the FIFA World Cup coming to Seattle in 2026. When Seattle hosted the MLB All-Star game in 2023, the city swept any encampments in the area out of sight. Surely, next year, Seattle’s mayor would have to field a fair amount of outside pressure to make visible homelessness invisible while the world’s eyes are on us. How would they respond?

We gave Harrell two chances to answer the question, and he never did. Instead, he ranted about how our surrounding cities aren’t building as much shelter as we are, how he has to prioritize small businesses, said it was his responsibility to revitalize downtown, and reminded us that he signed an ordinance to make Seattle a Human Rights City. Then he turned to the other candidates, and said: “How dare you talk about the values I’ve been a part of for the last 16 years.”

Wilson, meanwhile, rejected the premise of the question entirely. Not because she didn’t want to answer it, but because she had a plan to stand up enough shelter in the first six months of her term—between tiny home villages, faith communities, and vacancies throughout the city—to make the question irrelevant. “Let’s get people inside in time for the World Cup,” she said.

See that, Harrell? No excuses, just a goal, a plan, and a timeline. This is why Wilson has our vote. She sees people that are struggling and thinks about solutions, not optics. She obviously, palpably gives a damn about people, and that drives her to act, not just talk.

While we were writing this endorsement, Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist with a people-first platform, wiped the floor with an establishment Democrat in New York City’s primary. Mamdani’s win is proof that people can show up in droves and throw decades of political tradition in the trash and choose something better. And that to accomplish such a feat, being a hell of a politician with a great personality helps a fuckton.

Wilson has the platform. What she doesn’t have is the energy. She’s quiet. She’s policy minded. She makes deeply awkward TikToks. But she knows her shit and she cares. Wilson doesn’t pull out the tear-jerking stump speech or throw down with her opposition. And while we trust that your vote will get her through the primary, we need her to throw down. Show everyone that Harrell’s empty, that he’s unelectable this time. This city wants to see that. And it wants change. Do what you need to do to give the people what they want. Show us your spine is as sturdy as that platform. We know it’s in you.

Now reader, we know that Wilson isn’t the only one making a run for Harrell’s graffiti-less office (and Joe Molloy, we hope to see you run for City Council, where your good heart, and brains, would be appreciated), but she’s the only one who has the secret sauce we need to see: one-part great ideas, one-part the knowledge and experience to pull them off, two-parts the willingness to leave an easier life as an organizer to serve the city when she thinks she’s needed. We just need her to add a little heat to that sauce.

If you’re still wondering if dethroning Harrell is the right decision, we’ll leave you with one more detail. For the last year, members of his administration have talked about the misogyny, bullying, and literal chest beating in City Hall since he’s been in office. We had Mayor Harrell in our conference room for just under an hour, and in that time, he did nothing to convince us that his reputation was not a completely accurate characterization. We lost count of how many times he pounded his fist onto the table and stomped his feet, and we had to shout over him more than once to stop him from yelling at other candidates. Harrell somehow made Joe Mallahan look good (well, not that good). He took control of the room—not the way a charismatic speaker captures an audience, but the way your angry uncle sucks the air out of the room on Thanksgiving. Our civic self-esteem cannot be so low.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that we need a strong, bullish personality at the helm of our city to combat everything that Trump promises to rain on us in the next three and a half years. Mayor Harrell has shown us, time and time again, that all he’s going to do is bully Seattle, not Trump. And we can’t afford that. Wilson may be quiet. But she has values.

Seattle has a time-honored tradition of producing one-term mayors. Let’s make Harrell one of them. Vote Wilson.

City Attorney
Erika Evans

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last three-and-a-half years, let us brief you on our current City Attorney: the regrettable Republican Ann Davison.

The City Attorney has two jobs: one criminal (prosecuting all of the city’s misdemeanor cases, like DUIs and domestic violence charges) and one civil (acting as the city’s attorney, either suing people or other governments and also defending Seattle in court when, for instance, the Seattle Chamber of Commerce sues the city to kill the JumpStart tax).

From a criminal perspective, Davison’s whole thing is being “tough on crime,” which famously does nothing to make our city safer or to get people on the streets the help they need. She instituted policies like Close-in-Time filing. Implemented in 2022, it’s meant to reduce the criminal case backlog, but really just places the backlog in a different pile. It hasn’t worked. Her “High Utilizer Initiative” to target frequent offenders, surprise, also doesn’t solve any problems and worsens recidivism. Plus, Davison killed “community court,” an alternative system that offers people charged with misdemeanors non-punitive options to resolve their cases.

Meanwhile, Davison is unforgivably behind on filing DUI cases—one of the two serious misdemeanors the office can prosecute. Domestic violence cases are lagging. Back in 2021, before Davison, it took 26 days to file a DV case. Last year, on average, it took twice as long.

Davison is a tumor on the city and we don’t expect her to be willing to stand up to Trump. She converted to the Republican party during DJT’s first term, when anyone with an ounce of sense jumped ship. When King County, San Francisco, Santa Clara County, Portland, and New Haven signed onto a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security for their attacks on “sanctuary jurisdictions,” Davison dragged her feet, only joining the lawsuit months later. Meanwhile, while Boston and 43 other cities (including our less progressive neighbors, Spokane and Olympia) fought cuts to federal research funding, Davison stayed out of it. This person cannot protect us from the next three-and-a-half years (or more) of authoritarian encroachment.

So, she sucks. We can’t let her win again. And she could. With three progressive challengers splitting the left vote, Davison will almost certainly skate through the primary, liberal Seattle bubble be damned. The people who didn’t march in the No Kings rally get ballots, too!

Of this bunch, we believe Erika Evans, a former assistant US Attorney, is our choice to best Ann, make the City Attorney’s office effective and fair, and protect Seattle from the Trump administration.

Evans has prosecuted hate crimes, she’s gone after drug traffickers, she’s slapped the wrists of business owners dipping into their employees’ wages, and she was involved in a case prosecuting January 6ers from Puyallup. Her résumé is impressive. Her platform (speed up DUI and DV case filings, bring back community court, prosecute wage theft, improve the police union contract to allow for more policing alternatives) mirrors the platforms of her opponents. But they don’t have her grit.

In our meeting, Evans leapt for her opponents’ throats. She presented exhibits for every argument, and demonstrated a deep understanding of the power, and limitations, of the City Attorney’s Office. She spoke thoughtfully about the importance of working closely with Washington Attorney General Nick Brown against the constitutionally intolerant Trump administration, and made a commitment to not prosecute “peaceful” protesters (though she wouldn’t define a “peaceful protester” for us, which is peak prosecutor brain).

We also love a prop comedian: she brought Jarritos and African Black soap to symbolize SOAP/SODA laws, a Raggedy Ann doll to represent Davison, a printout of photos of the white men who have held this office for the 150 years before Ann got the job, a binder of her and her opponents case files. Sure, she gave Model-UN vibes, and if being corny were illegal this woman would be in jail. But it isn’t. And what we care about is Evans’s ability and will to protect us when Trump goes after this city.

We know, we know. A history as a prosecutor brings with it a track record of upholding a system built for oppression. But our federal government is actively antagonistic to cities like ours, and a prosecutor knows how the federal government works. Evans knows what levers to pull. And local progressives such as City Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck and State Rep. Shaun Scott believe she’s the right choice despite all the prosecutorial baggage.

But we don’t discount her mistakes and our misgivings. Evans voted for Bruce Harrell last election (“But I voted for Nikkita Oliver twice when they ran,” Evans said). She donated $100 to Harrell’s campaign before Katie Wilson got into the race, but wouldn’t say whom she was voting for in this election, and hedged by saying she couldn’t talk shit when the winner could be her client. Public defenders are worried about what her real intentions are and how she’ll act when she’s in the seat of power. We understand where they’re coming from. But we’re inviting her to prove them wrong.

This wasn’t an easy decision. Any of Davison’s challengers would be wildly better for Seattle. We wish we could have endorsed Nathan Rouse, the public defender running for the seat, because he knows the system doesn’t work for everyday people and wants to change it. He’s tougher on the Seattle Police Officers Guild than any other candidates. But he didn’t convince us he could put his ideas into action or win. Please run again next time, Nathan. We want to see you in our swivel chairs again, with more experience under your belt. Thanks for the Pop-Tarts.

And Rory O’Sullivan could do a perfectly fine job in the role. But he lacks trial experience. And most importantly, we aren’t confident he could beat Davison.

Evans will hit the ground running in a way we need. Here’s to knocking Davison into the stratosphere. Vote Evans.

City Council, District No. 2
Eddie Lin

We didn’t know what kind of fresh hell we were in for when District 2 City Councilmember Tammy Morales bowed out of office one year into her second term. The appointment process sucked; the unimaginative snoozers on the city council selected multiple-SECB-endorsement-loser Mark Solomon to take the seat. Luckily, Solomon isn’t running to keep the seat, so we have an open race on our hands!

Which brings us to the pool of four viable D2 hopefuls: Union guy and SDCI inspector Jamie Fackler; restaurant organizer and activist Jeanie Chunn; assistant city attorney Eddie Lin; and mayoral transportation engagement manager Adonis Ducksworth.

After a lively (read: tense, yell-y) discussion, the clear choice for D2 is Eddie Lin. As an assistant city attorney, Lin’s focus for the last several years has been working with the Office of Housing. When it comes to housing, and building more of it, Lin knows his stuff. In the midst of a never-ending housing crisis and a new Social Housing Developer on its way through the Seattle Process’s long birth canal, we need someone who can get shit done. Lin knows we need subsidized affordable units, social housing, limited equity co-ops, and everything else under the sun to get people four walls and a roof. Plus, whoever sits on council will implement Mayor Bruce Harrell’s Comprehensive Plan. Lin, a fiend for density and walkable neighborhoods, is a smart choice to kickstart the next 20 years of Seattle’s growth.

One of the main hits against Lin, as Fackler repeatedly brought up, was that he didn’t go all out championing Proposition 1A, the voter measure that set up a funding mechanism for the Social Housing Developer. Lin didn't vote for it because, as a housing wonk, he was concerned that it was vulnerable to being undermined by a more conservative, Chamber-backed City Council. However, he says he’s come around and is ready to champion it.

He’s also a total slut (sorry, Eddie) for progressive revenue. He’s DFAIT (Down For An Income Tax), a vacancy tax, and a city-level capital gains tax. We liked Chunn’s idea for a commercial vacancy tax, but felt she was still a little too green to hack it in City Hall. We hope to see her again.

The other knock against Lin is, like all other candidates except Chunn, he wants more cops. Lin’s desire for increased police presence does go hand-in-hand with hiring a more diverse police force and expanding police alternatives. Plus, Lin’s experience with police brutality made him wary of cops. In his 20s, a Minneapolis police officer cuffed him, put his hands on his throat, and made racist comments—confusing Lin, who is Asian, for a Native American. The rattling experience forever changed Lin’s view of policing. We felt Fackler, while progressive and knowledgeable about the same issues, was too soft on the cops, especially their union.

We’re certain Ducksworth will win the Seattle Times endorsement. He’s suave, charming, and doesn’t answer a single question. He’s also fucking cool. Sadly, underneath his skater chic, Ducksworth is nothing but a visionless moderate (read: Bruce Harrell). We already doubted he’d be our guy from the start, and he did us a solid by confirming that with a shitty, uninformed comment blaming drug users for their own predicament.

“I did the ride along last week, and these guys asked at least 50 people, are they ready to go to treatment? We got one. We got one. So this comes down to the person on the street, too. Who wants to get off the street,” Ducksworth said.

“That’s because some of the treatment options are not—,” Lin said.

“They’re not asking about the treatment options,” Ducksworth interrupted. “They’re getting high.”

Ducksworth’s mask came off. We did not like it under there.

So, Lin is our guy. He’s the whole package. He’s a cat guy and a dog guy. He’s a public schools champion. This is why we willfully turned a blind eye to the fact that he could only name two examples when asked what his four favorite films were and one of them was White Lotus Season 1, famously not a movie. If he’s even seen a movie, he wasn’t paying attention. There weren’t enough housing solutions for his taste. Vote Lin.

City Council, Position No. 8
Alexis Mercedes Rinck

When we endorsed Alexis Mercedes Rinck in 2024, we had a lot to say about what she wouldn’t do: She wouldn’t stoop to a lower minimum wage, she wouldn’t make it easier for landlords to evict you, she wouldn’t reduce oversight on cops, she wouldn’t help corporations hoard more wealth.

That was because we knew that if she was elected, she (and at the time, Tammy Morales before she was bullied out of City Hall) would be a progressive in a sea of conservatism. As we hoped, she pushed back: She voted against giving SPD more access to “less lethal” weapons, and when her colleagues approved additional surveillance from law enforcement, she opposed it.

But more important than what she didn’t do is what she did. Despite being on council with people allergic to helping the city, Rinck found other ways to show up. She supported counterprotesters at a Christian Supremacist group in Cal Anderson, and was instrumental in convincing the city to deescalate the situation. She spoke out at the committee hearing when Council Member Cathy Moore tried to defang our city’s ethics code, even though she wasn’t on that committee (and even though Council President Sara Nelson tried desperately to shut her up). Rinck knows that being on city council gives her a voice, and she’s shown us over and over again that she’s willing to use it for ordinary people.

She’s also clearly the voice we need to start fixing our ass-backward revenue streams in Seattle. Just weeks after our endorsement interview, she presented a collaborative effort with the mayor to reform our tax code to reduce the taxes that small businesses are paying, shift the burden to big business, and raise an extra $90 million in the process. Now that’s what we call progressive revenue!

Rinck doesn’t have much competition in this race. Her standout opponent is Rachael Savage, who quite frankly fascinates us, even if we had to sage the office after she left. A Republican with chunky jewelry and overlined lipstick who started the election season running for mayor, Savage switched to a City Council race just before the filing deadline. She owns a new-age shop on Capitol Hill, runs a meditation program, and believes that her experience getting sober justifies her argument that people who are mentally ill or dealing with “late-stage” addiction should be shipped to facilities for Shiny Happy People outside of the city. Oh, and she told us words are never violent and hate speech doesn’t exist.

This election has the chance to reshape our city council into a functioning governing body (would we even recognize it?) and we want to see what Rinck can do when she’s not swimming upstream. Vote Rinck.

City Council, Position No. 9
Dionne Foster

Seattle will not have a functional city government until Sara Nelson is KO’d so far out of our political orbit that she’ll be nothing more than a footnote: a forgettable, one-time City Council President who reigned over this legislative body during a remarkably chaotic and useless time in its history.

At this point, progressives would endorse a cinder block over Nelson if it had a pulse and a fixed Seattle address. Fortunately, we don’t have to. Because we have Dionne Foster, an excellent candidate for this office. Rejoice!

Foster, a former policy advisor for the city and the former executive director of the nonprofit Washington Progress Alliance, is a knowledgeable, likable, competent wonk. She wants to lead the way on economic justice. Stop this city’s affordability crisis and addiction to sweeps from displacing people. She’ll fight conservatives on this council willing to divert JumpStart funds from affordable housing. Unlike Nelson, Foster knows Seattle must go harder for housing density than the legal minimum set by the state and that it’s unrealistic for a real city expecting major growth in the next two decades to click its ruby red heels, ignore its housing needs, and remain an overgrown, dysfunctional suburb forever.

Foster also wants to embrace affordability and outrun Washington’s regressive tax code with progressive revenue. She wants a municipal capital gains tax, a vacancy tax, and working with the state on a mansion tax. She has the right plans and can articulate exactly how she’d implement them, a rare quality on our curb-busting city council. She’s granular, but not myopic. And we believe her because she already did this work at the state level to pass the limited capital gains tax

Foster has earned a heap of endorsements from politicians like Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, State Rep. Shaun Scott (D-43), and Scott’s dearly departed predecessor, Frank Chopp, because she is the best, quickest-witted candidate to walk through our door this election cycle. With two other seats up for reelection, that’s a chance she won’t be a progressive island on council.

Nelson, on the other hand, is a fundamentally un-democratic chaos agent and a disastrous leader whose sole purpose has been to accumulate political power. Her Council’s “accomplishments” have been wildly unpopular: Approving a police contract with big raises and no accountability? Putting blast balls back in the hands of untrustworthy cops, and ensuring they can surveil us? Establishing “stay out” zones for drug users and sex workers that stigmatize people and don’t work? Attempting to weaken our ethics code and repeal protections for gig workers? We’re embarrassed.

Seattle is immobilized in Nelson’s… full Nelson, controlled by business interests who shelled out hundreds of thousands of dollars for her meandering status quo that squeezes the renters, the poor, the homeless, and the disadvantaged on the margins. A skilled politician at least pretends to listen. Nelson is either incapable or indifferent. She shuts down anyone who is too loud and cumbersome for her taste. Her hostility for representative government and working people is boundless. But in her hallowed chambers at least we’ll have decorum, won’t we?

Her contempt for the public seemed like the only reason competitor Connor Nash, a former state and federal employee, joined this race. Mia Jacobsen, on the other hand, is running a protest campaign to overhaul the system that puts people like Nelson in the driver’s seat. Nash was angry, shooed away too many times.

But Nelson isn’t just the rock and the hard place. She’s a liability. A threat to reforms from a more progressive council, a roadblock to desperately needed progress on housing and homelessness, and the last person we want in city government when President Donald Trump comes to play. We’re tired of incompetence. We want someone with ideas, who loves this city and its people. A vote for Nelson is a vote for nihilism. A vote for Foster is a vote for intelligence, compassion, solutions, and a chance for a future.

Vote Foster.

Proposition No. 1
Vote Yes

If you’re registered to vote in Seattle, you’ve probably had a chance to see the Democracy Voucher Program (DVP) in action: a blue and white envelope arrives in your mailbox with a small stack of $25 coupons; you, the voter, are invited to spend them on any candidate you like. It’s Seattle’s own, first-in-the-nation public campaign financing program. And Proposition 1 asks if we want to renew the levy that funds it for another decade.

The new levy would be funded through a property tax, and it’s expected to raise $45 million over 10 years, costing the average homeowner $12.20 a year.

By most metrics, the DVP has been a roaring success. It makes primaries more competitive and campaigning accessible to more diverse candidates, and the vast majority of people running for office in Seattle participate in the program. More than 106,000 Seattleites have slipped their vouchers to candidates, and according to the City, through 2024, we’ve distributed more than $10 million to local campaigns.

It’s difficult to find opponents to the DVP (the opposition statement is written by right-wing radio host Ari Hoffman). But supporters of the program still have complaints. The most common concern is that when we introduced the Democracy Voucher Program (which limits the amount of money a candidate can accept), spending from lobbyists skyrocketed (which remained unlimited). But lobbying spending has shot up across the region, not just here in Seattle. And even if it did push lobbyists to up their game, it's also one of the few tools we have to combat them.

There’s a reason that there isn’t any organized opposition to Proposition 1. It’s a new, promising program that deserves time to shake out its minimal kinks and prove to other cities that it’s worth it. Our democracy is already under attack. Now isn’t the time to defund one of the projects that makes democracy just a little bit more accessible. Vote yes on Proposition 1.

Schools

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 2
Kathleen Smith

We were so unimpressed with the Seattle School District position 2 incumbent, Sarah Clark, that we are endorsing the person who didn’t even have her website set up at the time of the endorsement meeting (it’s set up now!).

Kathleen Smith is a data scientist at Microsoft. She’s soft-spoken until a topic she’s passionate about like, say, gay kids or anything about data comes up. Then she’s all fire. We can see her doing this thing. And, we might have to see her do this thing because, whew. Our other options are Eric Feeny, a top performer at Optum (okay, brag much?) who acted like a mannequin came to life and read Sam Altman’s Wikipedia page. He likes AI a little too much. And incumbent Sarah Clark, whom we expected to like, gave us absolutely nothing.

Clark is director of policy at the Chamber of Commerce. This should already be a red flag according to the SECB handbook, but progressives say she separates her evil day job for the not-evil mostly-volunteer school board position.

Except for a policy director, Clark did not demonstrate much, if any, policy knowledge. In fact, she had no idea what the Parents Bill of Rights was, a homophobic, transphobic Trojan horse of a ballot measure that the state legislature passed in the 2024 session and put down like a rabid dog (amended) earlier this year. This behemoth has been a national issue in education for years, and in Washington for a year and a half. Literally every other candidate for school board (even the dolts) knew what it was and why it sucked. We don’t expect Clark to know the ins and outs, but jeez, a scrap of situational awareness would be nice.

You may be thinking, “Sure, but state policies shouldn’t matter too much to a local school board director.” And you’d be right. This isn’t a policymaking position—it’s a governance one. But Clark did not prove to us she had any of the passion or engagement to make the kinds of waves on the school board that she promised. And a birdie told us Clark didn’t even bother responding to the teachers’ union’s endorsement meeting invitation. You don’t have to play ball with them all the time, but show up to the game.

Still, we at the SECB are nothing if not reasonable. If Clark can prove she’s got what it takes, we’ll listen. Prove the Clark who walked in our door was not the real Clark we’ve heard so much about.

For now, though, we’re sticking with Smith and her spreadsheets. She has booksmarts and a lot of heart. She pushed back on the common narrative that “broken trust” was why 4,000 students have left Seattle Public Schools since 2019. She’s not discounting that, but she thinks a study is needed. And, she knows how to do data things. Have at it, Smith. A thoughtful data wonk who wants to burn down any institution that doesn’t protect its queer students is good enough for us. Especially when the alternatives are so limp. Vote Smith.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 4
Joe Mizrahi

Look… school’s bad. Parents mad. Kids sad. We fund our schools back-asswardly and we’re, unsurprisingly, looking toward a $94 million budget deficit in Seattle Public Schools next year. They’ve faced nearly $100 million deficits three years in a row. To combat that, the geniuses on the school board debated closing a cool 21 schools last year, spawning months of big, tearful, apoplectic (and justified), public outcry. The board then did not close the schools, but the threat still looms. Parents are still angry, and distrust the board. Enrollment in SPS is down. So, who the fuck is going to fix this?

In this race, the choice is clear as day. Joe Mizrahi, long-time secretary-treasurer and co-executive director of UFCW 3000, can do it. He is as qualified for it as his hair is tall. Mizrahi has experience working with complicated and deep budgets. He’s a labor guy fixated on what teachers need. He’s also an SPS parent and the incumbent.

Mizrahi stepped into the role last spring when two school board members resigned over residency issues, and he’d like a full term to really effect change.

Mizrahi is against closing the schools. He’s against austerity budgeting, and recognizes that the only way out of this Sisyphean ordeal of never-ending budget deficits is to lobby the legislature for progressive revenue. Mizrahi has a long résumé full of organizing for causes like the $15 minimum wage, paid sick leave and family leave. He’s wonky, passionate as hell, and will be a force fighting for better funding at the state level.

When it comes to more tangible schools stuff, we of the SECB trust Mizrahi’s takes. He wants open enrollment for option schools to attract and retain SPS students and clear waitlists. He’s already thinking about protecting undocumented students from ICE raids. He’s a champion of trans youth at a time when their right to exist and their right to privacy, are under attack.

And gosh, he is charming from the tip of his Jimmy Neutron hair to the fresh basket of apples he brought—SIKE. They weren’t apples. They were cake. That’s right, Mizrahi is probably the only guy who stuck to his COVID cake dupes hobby. That commitment to “Is it cake?” shows the dedication that runs through Mizrahi. Also, the cake was delicious. (He did place fourth at a cake convention once, but first place in our hearts.) Vote Mizrahi.

Seattle School District No. 1, Director District No. 5
Vivian Song

Vivian Song resigned from the Seattle School Board over a residency conflict. Since it’s our only substantial reservation about her candidacy, we’ll start there.

Shortly before declaring her candidacy in 2021, Song moved out of her family home in Capitol Hill to an apartment in Ballard so she could run in D4.

In early 2024, The Seattle Times revealed that Song no longer lived in the district she moved to, she was back in Capitol Hill again. This caused drama. Accusations of racism. By the end of the month, she’d resigned.

Political career over? Not so fast. Though “shy” about it at the time, Song says she moved to Ballard with the intention of divorcing her husband (we also would only move to Ballard under duress). But they worked it out and she moved back home.

And Song argued her move wasn’t secret: She said she followed the rules and never hid this from the school board. Some people disagree. But it’s not just shady, messy family stuff. According to School Board policy, her move should have opened her seat in the November 2023 general election.

That matters. This disclosure snafu undermined a democratic process. But the details point more to a mistake than a scandal. And we doubt she’s pulling a scheme. Again, it’s the school board. It isn’t a cash cow (pay is capped at $4,800 a year) or a golden escalator to grander political aspirations (though it’s clear Song has them, she applied for a vacant seat in City Hall. Some argue it remained vacant when Tanya Woo held it). Good news! Song is part of the wealthy, unemployed activist class and literally can’t find enough boards to serve on.

More importantly to us, she never tuned out of this board. She decided to run again during the school closure mess. Tops K-8, an alternative school with a deaf and hard of hearing program (Song is hard of hearing, so is her child), was slated for execution and she wouldn’t have that. When the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association tried to ban trans girls from school sports, Song worked behind the scenes to make sure this district’s WIAA rep, School Board Director Joe Mizrahi, would have the votes to fight it.

Song’s progressive credentials are legit, so her finance background isn’t a sign she’ll lean on austerity and replace all the lunch ladies with gruel boys. She’ll do things like partner with other elected leaders on progressive revenue, like Former City Council Member Teresa Mosqueda’s increase to JumpStart for student mental health support.

She knows that the district is going to have to body block the federal government if they come for undocumented students, and she has detailed ideas for the ways they can serve kids from immigrant families under Trump. She’s also against armed officers in schools.

This was the rare race where we liked almost everyone in the room, particularly Janis White, a special education advocate whip-smart on every school board issue. Good ideas abounded. But Song has already shown this city she can do this job well. She wanted to do it so badly that she applied for the job again after enduring her political “scandal.” That’s something, right? Vote Song!

King County

County Executive
Girmay Zahilay

For more than a decade and a half, if you asked people in King County what a “County Executive” was, they might’ve said “uh, some guy named Dow Constantine?” Dow’s dynasty (Dow-nasty?) is through and it’s time for Girmay Zahilay to take charge.

Zahilay, a charismatic County Council Member first elected in 2019, is already a political staple repping University District, Laurelhurst, Ravenna, Eastlake, Capitol Hill, the Central District, South Seattle, Allentown, and Skyway, but he’s never held such a powerful executive position. He can do it. And, damn it, we want him to. So do the “just fine” establishment dems like Governor Bob Ferguson, cool establishment dems like Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, and moronic warhawks like Congressman Adam Smith. Big tent!

He’s also led plenty. In the five-plus years he’s been on the dais, he’s risen to current council chair and prince of fiscal management (or, in boring council speak, chair of the county’s budget and fiscal management committee. Yawn). He introduced the $1 billion Regional Workforce Housing Initiative and led the effort for a $1.2 billion property tax levy to fund mental health treatment centers. He sponsored a $2 million community-based gun violence program. He passed a five-part gun violence prevention program and supports a year-round gun buyback program. He reached these heights by knocking the legendary (read: old, respectfully) civil rights legend Larry Gossett off his perch—a big upset for an unknown lawyer from the South End who ran a nonprofit mentoring middle schoolers and came to this country as a refugee when he was 3.

In our endorsement meeting, he even seemed genuinely nervous. He clearly expected our question about the child jail. In his first campaign, he made closing the detention center a huge part of his platform. But in a vote last year, he walked it back.

During our endorsement meeting, Zahilay didn’t give a satisfying explanation for why he changed his mind. He says he believed the jail could be transformed with activities and community-based services. When we asked for an example of similar successes, he pointed to close-to-home facilities and “bringing the home to them through the integration of community services.”

And it was a bullshit answer when there’s probably a more straightforward version: The county had nothing to replace kid jail, so the council didn’t close kid jail. This is the infrastructure we have, so Zahilay wanted to make it better. We’re not convinced that sour lemon will ever make lemonade, but Zahilay’s only real challenger in this race, County Council Member Claudia Balducci, didn’t vote any differently, and her background directing King County’s Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention is way, way more carceral.

That said, these two are pretty politically aligned and did a good job at least pretending they loved each other.

We like Balducci, just not as much as Zahilay. She’s a Transit Maven with political experience who is good at getting those Eastside misers to pay for things. And if we have any hope of addressing homelessness and building thousands of units of housing, someone is going to have to convince (or force) those misers to buy the biggest goose in the window (pay taxes) for Tiny Tim (us).

What appeals to us aside from Zahilay’s progressive zeal and résumé, is that instead of facing east toward the suburbs à la Balducci, Zahilay will continue to face South, the direction of his district, and toward the people and places this county has neglected. At a time the federal government is literally rounding up immigrants and refugees and saying they don’t belong, we think it’s only right to elect Zahilay, so all King County residents know they belong and they matter. And we trust he’ll do right by us all. Vote Zahilay.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 5
Kim-Khánh Văn

Last year, Dave Upthegrove left the King County Council to save the trees as the state Commissioner of Public Lands and, we guess, yell at tree sitters who also trying to save the trees. But that’s his problem. Ours is filling the seat he left behind (and that’s currently being warmed by long-time Tukwila City Councilmember De’Sean Quinn, who is not running).

Renton City Council Member Kim-Khánh Văn stood out in a crowd of good candidates. She’s electric and her vision for this diverse district prioritizes racial equity, democratic values, and local stability as a means to weather this federal storm.

When she was 6, Văn’s family fled Vietnam for a refugee camp in the Philippines and resettled in King County with the help of a nonprofit. After becoming the first in her family to graduate college, she went to law school and became an immigration attorney. She’s involved in rapid response efforts to ICE raids, and Văn is the only candidate who said “Abolish ICE.”

This is the place where King County made waves (both good and bad) by housing homeless people in a vacant motel. It is also a region awash with camping bans. Văn is against those bans and homeless sweeps. She’s—forgive us for using the line—solutions-oriented. And for all the homosexual treehuggers missing Upthegrove: Văn says water is life and she’s here to save rivers.

Văn’s big challenger is Steffanie Fain, whose moderate Republican husband Joe Fain was ousted from the State Senate after KUOW reported a rape allegation against him. When she filed for office, it would have been easy to assume that Fain, a lawyer and cancer survivor who has never held public office, was some kind of political puppet. Nope, she’s definitely her own woman. A very boring one who has raised a lot of money.

She wants to fix the floundering King County Regional Homelessness Authority (who doesn’t?) and didn’t have an idea of how (who does?). And that was a basic theme. Fain is fine. Not an existential threat, but the absolute wrong pick for the political moment. Or, really any political moment, for that matter.

Văn is the moment. We’d pick her even if Trump wasn’t dragging us all kicking and screaming into hell. South King County, perpetually overlooked and fucked over, and full of people vulnerable to federal lawlessness, deserves a fearless champion. We’re not even sure why Fain’s running. Vote Văn.

Metropolitan King County, Council District No. 7
Maya Vengadasalam

Maya Vengadasalam is the only “Independent Democrat” in this non-partisan race with any chance of beating former Republican State Senator Pete von Reichbauer, an elder statesman who has held down his seat since 1993. Why? The man has a road named after him and he isn’t even dead. His feet are dangling from the $211,000+ war chest he’s sitting on and he lords over part of the county Republicans haven’t totally lost. So ever since the hot new rock band Nirvana was on the radio, to try was to lose and to waste money while doing it.

Enter Vengadasalam. She’s a former school board director in Kent and a current leadership development consultant for the Washington State School Directors’ Association. And she’s only like $206,000 behind on fundraising! Since her whole deal is fiscal responsibility, maybe she can stretch it or blow the whole thing on a limited-run zine.

While Vengadasalam wasn’t “partaking in endorsements,” she willingly answered all of our questions as long as we told you she was running a non-partisan campaign for this non-partisan office. Vengadasalam’s platform is four-prong: champion government transparency, strengthen economic growth, expand affordable housing, and advance education and safety (a two-for-one deal).

Vengadasalam is no Republican, but she’s not the kind-of-handsome blue stranger that sweeps us off our feet. She’s a “where’s the money going” type who assumes the answer is waste and the solution is austerity. She’s not against progressive revenue, per se—but she wanted to be honest about the scissors in her hand. And honest she was. Vengadasalam spent six years on the finance and process management side of the Tacoma Housing Authority and didn’t even try to masquerade as a housing advocate. She bragged about her division going paperless before COVID hit. She’s got the right idea about some things, like the inhumanity of the term “camping” when applied to unsheltered homeless people, and that certainly gives her an edge over von Reichbauer, who once called homeless people outside the King County courthouse “animals” that had taken over the streets. Though we’re unconvinced she’ll solve the housing crisis with educational opportunities, unless all those graduates are comfortable with 20 or 30 roommates (we need affordable housing).

She didn’t tell lies (even for her own benefit) or talk shit. There was literally nothing we could do to drag Vengadasalam into the muck and insult von Reichbauer, because she didn’t know him personally (she is strict on a two-term limit, however). It’s no fun, but how endearing.

District 7 voters, we’re not thrilled about von Reichbauer’s de facto lifetime appointment. But while we still have representative democracy, why not have an election for old time’s sake? Let’s retire von Reichbauer to sunny Arizona. Vote Vengadasalam.

King County Proposition No. 1
Vote Yes

Should we or should we not have a county parks system? The question before voters is that simple. Because if voters do not approve this property tax levy, we functionally won’t have one.

Vote YES, or don’t let us catch you frolicking in a public green space ever again.

State

Legislative District No. 33, State Representative Position No. 1
Edwin Obras

The state legislature is just getting to know Edwin Obras, the 22-year SeaTac resident who was appointed to replace Tina Orwall when she moved over to the State Senate chamber earlier this year. He’s new to politics, but very familiar with government: Before this January, he’d worked for the City of Seattle’s Human Services Department for 16 years.

In the last six months, he’s managed to make an impression. He sponsored (and passed) a bill that establishes protections for isolated workers (like housekeepers, security guards, and janitors) from sexual harassment and assault. He slapped some worker protections on Uber and Lyft. And he proposed a bill that would keep companies from passing the cost of credit card processing fees to their tipped workers. Because somehow that’s still legal.

“What about the other Democrat in the race?” you ask? That’s Burien Mayor Kevin Schilling, and it’s a helluva stretch to call him a Democrat. Schilling’s administration is currently suing to overturn Burien’s historic minimum wage victory. As deputy Mayor, he turned down $1 million in King County funds for a tiny home village when it conflicted with the interests of one of his major donors. He had a public fight with the King County Sheriff’s office after he tried to force them to impose a camping ban in the city. And conservative commentator Brandi Kruse considers him one of her favorite Democratic mayors.

We don’t need that nonsense anywhere near the state house. And we sure as hell need someone who’s dedicated to workers’ rights. Vote Obras.

Legislative District No. 41, State Representative Position No. 1
Janice Zahn

Well, Janice Zahn ghosted us. After she rescheduled our planned endorsement call, we just… never heard from her again. Is that encouraging? Nope! But there’s not much happening in this race.

Zahn is the only Democrat running a serious campaign for this seat. She’s a former Bellevue City Councilmember, and she’s been an engineer with the Port of Seattle for more than 20 years. She was appointed to the office in January, and she’s done a few things we dig: She sharpened some definitions for autism care on the state level so people who need 24/7 care have access to it and she expanded the protections for discrimination in schools. Good stuff!

Plus, we love a weirdo. When addressing the County Council, she shared that since the COVID lockdowns, she’s been collecting rocks, polishing them, and then sharing them with community members. “I carry them around in my pocket and I start giving them away to my community as I’m out in community and I see people struggling, because what I believe is that leaders need to be the calm in our community when they’re in the storm while we’re trying to help them,” she said. She’s like the socially underdeveloped white lady in Shrinking and we’re obsessed.

Vote Zahn. (But Janice, get it together. We better hear from you in the general.)

Legislative District No. 48, State Representative Position No. 1
Osman Salahuddin

Yes, Salahuddin really is as young as he looks. Actually, he’s the youngest serving member of the state legislature.

So it shouldn’t surprise you that Salahuddin’s political experience is limited. Before he was unanimously appointed to this legislative seat by the King County Council earlier this year, he was two years into his term on Redmond City Council. Before that, his only political experience was as the student body president at the University of Washington.

But Salahuddin has picked up the work quickly. He’s an advocate for public transit (he rode the bus from Redmond to UW every day), he understands the importance of public investment in the housing and homelessness crisis, he introduced a state bill to integrate behavioral health professionals with cops and other first responders.

When we asked Salahuddin what he was most proud of since he was appointed to this legislative seat in January, he listed two pieces of legislation: the first recognized Eid as a state holiday (“It showed my community that the government exists to serve all residents,” he told us) and the second allows workers to use paid sick leave to attend their own or a family member’s immigration proceedings.

The 48th legislative district is largely made up of renters (more than half), immigrants (about 40 percent) and people of color (about half). The median age is barely more than 35. “My role is a bit unique in the district I represent,” the 29-year-old child of immigrants told us, because demographically, he’s a lot more like his constituents than many representatives.

If he’s elected, Salahuddin will get another year to show us what he can do. Vote Salahuddin.

Vote Yes on Seattle's Proposition No. 1

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 08 Jul 2025 15:16:00 -0700

We created a first-of-its-kind public funding model for city political campaigns. We need it now more than ever.

by Stranger Election Control Board

The new levy would be funded through a property tax, and it’s expected to raise $45 million over 10 years, costing the average homeowner $12.20 a year.

Vote for Girmay Zahilay for King County Executive

Stranger Election Control Board — Mon, 07 Jul 2025 08:00:00 -0700

He can do it. And, damn it, we want him to.

by Stranger Election Control Board

That said, these two are pretty politically aligned and did a good job at least pretending they loved each other.

Aside from Zahilay’s progressive zeal and résumé, we need someone in the executive's chair who, instead of facing east toward the suburbs à la Balducci, will continue to face South toward the people and places this county has long neglected. At a time the federal government is literally rounding up immigrants and refugees and saying they don’t belong, electing Zahilay is one way we can show all King County residents know they belong and they matter. And we trust he’ll do right by us all. Vote Zahilay.

Vote for Alexis Mercedes Rinck for City Council Position 8

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 16:07:00 -0700

This election has the chance to reshape our city council into a functioning governing body, and we want to see what Rinck can do when she’s not swimming upstream

by Stranger Election Control Board

Vote for Eddie Lin for City Council District 2

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 10:44:00 -0700

The Stranger's Primary 2025 Endorsement for City Council District 2 by Stranger Election Control Board

We’re certain Ducksworth will win the Seattle Times endorsement. He’s suave, charming, and doesn’t answer a single question. He’s also fucking cool. Sadly, underneath his skater chic, Ducksworth is nothing but a visionless moderate (read: Bruce Harrell). We already doubted he’d be our guy from the start, and he did us a solid by confirming that with a shitty, uninformed comment blaming drug users for their own predicament.

“That’s because some of the treatment options are not—,” Lin said.

“They’re not asking about the treatment options,” Ducksworth interrupted. “They’re getting high.”

Ducksworth’s mask came off. We did not like it under there.

So, Lin is our guy. He’s the whole package. He’s a cat guy and a dog guy. He’s a public schools champion. This is why we willfully turned a blind eye to the fact that he could only name two examples when asked what his four favorite films were and one of them was White Lotus Season 1, famously not a movie. If he’s even seen a movie, he wasn’t paying attention. There weren’t enough housing solutions for his taste. Vote Lin.

Editors Note: This endorsement originally appeared in The Stranger's July 2025 issue. In that version, we said Lin voted to support Prop 1A. After publication, his campaign clarified that he voted for 1B in February, but supports the social housing model now. We regret the error. Also, Jamie Fackler's last name is "Fackler" not "Frackler" (as it appeared in one instance in print). We regret the "r." Give a Frack doesn't hit like Give a Fack.

Welcome to The Stranger’s Primary Election Issue!

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 10:34:00 -0700

Don’t forget to VOTE. What if it matters again? by Stranger Election Control Board

Wait, where are you going? This is important! It’s true that local primary elections can be a little—yawn—but please believe us when we tell you that this year’s primaries may just be the most exciting we’ve had in years.

Case in point: New York City’s recent mayoral primary. Just a summertime primary, no biggie, right? But it was full of drama and suspense, and the results were downright inspiring. Seattle could use some new energy as well, and, come August 5, it will be our votes that could make that happen. Nine candidates are vying for their shot to be mayor of Antifaland, and already, the conversation has revolved around two Democrats, incumbent Bruce Harrell and challenger Katie Wilson.

After hours of candidate interviews, research, and investigation—and one hell of a shouting match—we here at The Stranger are endorsing Katie Wilson for mayor of Seattle. And while the choice doesn’t really get made until November’s general election, to cast a vote for Wilson in the primaries would send a hell of a message to City Hall: It’s time for a change. It’s time for a new mayor. It’s time for Katie Wilson.

Click here to read more about our reasoning, and over the next few days, we'll be rolling out the rest of the endorsements we painstakingly researched and debated for days on end. (Spoiler: We plan to see Sara Nelson lose her job, too.)

When you’re done doing your civic duty, why not treat yourself to some of the best pizza in town? Asian Verified columnist Michael Wong chats with one of Seattle’s most innovative chefs, Khampaeng Panyathong, the man behind Taurus Ox, Ox Burger, and Ananas Pizzeria. And Stranger staff writer Audrey Vann interviews pelagic dream rockers, Coral Grief, who celebrate the release of their debut album, Air Between Us, at the Tractor on July 26. Want more bang for your buck? Audrey also put together a flowchart to help you find your perfect music festival match this summer.

There’s also a profile on Y2K-loving local fashion designer Dan McLean, an interview with author and culture critic Lawrence Burney, and, as always, a big ol’ Things To Do calendar full of music, food, art, film, comedy, theater, and culture recommendations and listings. Dance to tenderpunk project Illuminati Hotties at Ballard SeafoodFest on July 12! See weird and avant-garde contemporary art from all over the world at Seattle Art Fair July 17–20! Catch a screening of the underrated ’80s teen sex dramedy Little Darlings on July 29! There is something amazing to do literally every single day in July—click here to see it all.

Whatever you decide to do, don’t forget to VOTE. What if it matters again?

Love,

The Stranger Election Control Board

Cover artwork by Victor Castillo, www.victor-castillo.com. This Issue Brought to You By….

A List of Good Things That Got Us Through Hours of Candidate Interviews

Incredible patience; yelling

A 45-second timer

The little gay people in our phones

Cole Escola’s beautiful doe eyes

The Safelite guy who fixed a car window and only left a little glass on the seat

Petting photos of dogs with my cursor (could a depressed person do this?)

Last-minute campaign dirt

Claudia Balducci assuming we like natural wine because we’re gay (and being right)

My new PMA tattoo

Deming D’Ette

Sara Nelson’s vibrant green pants (no shade, they’re great)

Rachael Savage’s lipstick

Candidates who arrive 30 minutes early

Bars that open at 4 p.m.

Smoking a cigarette outside a hospital

Season two of Pokerface

Open Book by Jessica Simpson

Fruit Riot frozen sour candy-coated grapes

The rainbow seltzer tower in the QFC on Pike and Broadway

Raven Grass’s CBD/THC blend pre-rolls

Getting a cunty little charm for my vape pen

Scrunchies

Rainier cherries

MJ Lenderman’s wristwatch that tells him we’re all alone

George Dickel

“Hammer” by Lorde

Being funny 80 percent of the time

Midol

Caitlin Mary Cunningham serving harlequin goth on the basketball court

Friends’ boners

Vote for Erika Evans for City Attorney

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 09:30:00 -0700

The Stranger's endorsement for City Attorney in the 2025 primary. by Stranger Election Control Board

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last three-and-a-half years, let us brief you on our current City Attorney: the regrettable Republican Ann Davison.

And Rory O’Sullivan could do a perfectly fine job in the role. But he lacks trial experience. And most importantly, we aren’t confident he could beat Davison.

Evans will hit the ground running in a way we need. Here’s to knocking Davison into the stratosphere. Vote Evans.

Vote for Dionne Foster for City Council Position 9

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 08:00:00 -0700

The Stranger's endorsement for City Council Position 9, in the 2025 primary election. by Stranger Election Control Board

Vote Foster.

The Stranger Endorses Katie Wilson for Mayor

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 12:20:00 -0700

Bruce Harrell had his chance. by Stranger Election Control Board

Bruce Harrell had his chance.

We understand why he would feel that way. Because the greatest sin of the Harrell Administration is what it hasn’t done. He’s a mayor without imagination, and with him at the helm, Seattle is a rudderless ship on a windless ocean. While tens of thousands of Seattleites are struggling to keep their head above water, he’s obsessing over penises spray painted on the overpasses, AI incubators, and digital advertising kiosks that profit private companies.

Seattle has a time-honored tradition of producing one-term mayors. Let’s make Harrell one of them. Vote Wilson.

Vote "No" on King County Proposition 1

Stranger Election Control Board — Fri, 18 Apr 2025 18:03:00 -0700

It’s time to dig your ballot out of your pile of unpaid bills and Safeway coupons. We’ve got a special election coming, and your ballot’s due on Tuesday. Let's get into it. by Stranger Election Control Board

It’s time to dig through your pile of unpaid bills and Safeway coupons. We’ve got a special election coming, and your ballot’s due on Tuesday. Let's get into it.

At its simplest, King County Proposition 1 is a levy renewal. It would continue funding the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS), a massive biometric database that stores over 3 million fingerprint and palm print records and helps police connect prints left at crime scenes to people. It also confirms the identities of arrestees, preventing people from being wrongfully detained or released under false names.

On its face, Prop 1 may seem tempting enough. This is, after all, a levy with no organized opposition (as you’ll see on your ballot), endorsed by nearly all King County Councilmembers (yep, even the ones you like), and designed to renew a decades-old program that helps solve crimes and identify the dead, sometimes those beyond recognition. It’s relatively inexpensive—about $24 a year for the average homeowner—and funds forensic infrastructure across 39 cities and unincorporated King County.

There’s no question that it’s better for local police departments to share a centralized, taxpayer-funded forensic system than to duplicate these services piecemeal at additional public cost. The people who currently run AFIS do seem to take privacy concerns seriously. Additionally, the system doesn’t store citizenship data, and it complies with King County’s ban on facial recognition. As of now, AFIS doesn’t collaborate with ICE (because of the Keep Washington Working Act), doesn’t scoop up facial scans, and doesn’t seem particularly interested in expanding beyond its current scope.

But what if that changes? But even reasonable-sounding systems can be dangerous when left unscrutinized. Surveillance overreach isn’t tinfoil hat anymore. It’s a Tuesday. And surveillance tools rarely stay in their lane for long. We can't afford to blindly renew government tracking tools—no matter how routine—without first demanding detailed accountability, privacy protections, and public oversight.

We asked Tee Sannon, the Technology Policy Program Director at the ACLU of Washington, and she flagged serious concerns about AFIS—from its potential for abuse to the lack of public transparency around how the system actually works. While the ACLU hasn’t taken an official stance on Prop 1 (they didn’t last time either), Sannon made it clear that questions about how this biometric data is managed, and what might happen to it down the line—are more urgent than ever in today’s political climate. Could this data be repurposed later? Used in ways the public never agreed to? That uncertainty alone should give us pause.

AFIS is a surveillance system, and like all surveillance systems, it lives inside a criminal legal infrastructure with a long and ongoing track record of racism, data misuse, and mission creep. And right now, this system operates with little meaningful public oversight, and just as little transparency about how it impacts the communities most likely to be swept up in it.

Back in 2018, we told voters to reject the AFIS levy because it came bundled with facial recognition software, tech we didn’t want then and still don’t trust now. To their credit, the county banned facial recognition in 2021, and AFIS officials say the software has been disabled. But pay special attention to that word: disabled, not deleted. Not dismantled.

We shouldn’t expect the erosion of civil liberties to creep at a snail's place. Change is coming at the speed and volume of an avalanche. The federal government is hoarding surveillance powers and conducting warrantless data grabs. It’s proudly throwing immigrants like Kilmar Ábrego García in foreign prisons they may never escape. And the ICE snatch job on Rumeysa Ozturk, taken into an unmarked van by plainclothes federal agents, looked awfully like a secret police operation. Our civil liberties aren’t being chipped away at, they’re being jackhammered. So forgive us if we’re slightly suspicious of any system that collects biometric data on hundreds of thousands of people, promises it’s “just for fingerprints,” and asks us to trust that it will never, ever be used for anything nefarious.

This time around, Prop 1 supporters say there’s nothing to worry about. No facial recognition. No new biometrics. No big expansion. Just a routine renewal. Just trust us.

We’d be skeptical of that any day, but today? Today the federal government is pulling every lever it can find to surveil the population and amass information that can support its agenda of mass deportations—and that’s just what’s happening three months into the administration.

Prop 1 allows data collected by AFIS to be shared with state and federal agencies—including the FBI—without any clear, enforceable restrictions. Once that data leaves King County’s hands, the Keep Washington Working Act (which keeps Washington law enforcement from participating in immigration enforcement) doesn’t protect our state’s immigrants. The data AFIS collects can be repurposed for uses that are opaque to the public and often hostile to civil liberties.

Worse, the public has no real way to see how the system is being used. AFIS doesn’t publish regular audits or racial breakdowns of whose prints are in the system. There are no citizen oversight bodies empowered to review its operations. There are no requirements for public disclosure when policies change or technologies expand.

AFIS is a biometric dragnet in an era when rights are increasingly fragile, and when the difference between “not used for this” and “can’t legally be used for this” matters more than ever.

Supporters of Prop 1 argue that rejecting this levy will delay investigations, hurt cold case resolution, and force local departments to pay more for worse systems. That might be true. But that’s an indictment of how little effort has been made to rebuild AFIS into something accountable and transparent, not a reason to keep funding it without conditions.

Voting no on Prop 1 is a vote demanding more from a system that has quietly amassed the biometric data of millions of people and is asking for our continued trust with almost no strings attached.

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Surveillance systems don’t get safer when we stop paying attention. They expand when we’re distracted. They deepen when we stop asking questions. And eventually, predictably, they turn toward us.

We’re in a crisis of government, morality, and sanity right now. Anything that helps authoritarianism is worth saying no to, and finding new ways to make it work.

We urge you to vote “No” on King County Proposition No 1.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Nathalie Graham, Marcus Harrison Green, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Emily Nokes, Megan Seling, a very stale Peep from Easter 2020, and Hannah Murphy Winter.

The 2025 Campaign Season Has Begun

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 01 Apr 2025 11:20:00 -0700

The filing deadlines are in early May, so there’s still time for some surprises, but even now, the election is shaping up to be an interesting one. by Stranger Election Control Board

We blinked, and suddenly, we’re on the cusp of another local election season.

In case you haven’t been following the election so far (and with totalitarian takeover on our heels, we’d understand), here’s your chance to catch up. The filing deadlines are in early May, so there’s still time for some surprises, but even now, the election is shaping up to be an interesting one.

This year, we have a mayor’s race featuring an embattled moderate incumbent who speaks the language of progressivism, but governs like a conservative. We’ve got a challenger for the District 9 City Council seat and a wide-open race in District 2. And finally, a City Attorney race, where anyone with an ounce of progressivism (or human decency) has been eager to unseat the incumbent from the moment she took office.

We’ve got months before endorsement time, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t meet the candidates who have thrown their hats in the ring. Without further ado, here’s our quick breakdown of the local elections so far.

Mayor

Bruce Harrell, Seattle’s very own Chamber of Commerce sock puppet, finally has some challengers.

The biggest name in the game so far is Katie Wilson: a street-fighting policy wonk who’s built a strong, progressive reputation actually winning battles for working people (raising the minimum wage, keeping transit affordable). When she launched her campaign, she told The Stranger about the kind of mayor she hopes to be: a coalition builder who’s able to reach across the aisle to find common goals, without diluting progressive, research-backed policies. She described herself as someone who’s willing to test new ideas and push forward on issues that have stagnated in this city for a decade.

She’s untested in elected office—or even running in an election—but she urged voters to look at her record as a policy advocate. “I’ve spent the last 14 years of my career organizing, building powerful coalitions that win major victories for working people,” she told The Stranger. “And I’ve done all that from the outside. I would be happy to put my legislative record up against Bruce Harrell’s any day of the week.”

Then there’s Ry Armstrong, an MLK Labor Delegate for SAG-AFTRA and an elected member of the Actor’s Equity Association, repping 50,000 actors from Texas to Hawaii. This is Armstrong’s second go at elected office. In 2023, they ran for Kshama Sawant’s City Council seat in District 3, and while progressives generally got wildly outspent by big business (and therefore creamed) in that election, Armstrong’s showing was particularly rough. Only 1.86 percent of the electorate (a total of 488 people) voted for Armstrong in that race. They’re proud of their big ideas, and a suite of progressive taxes to pay for them.

Ry and Katie are joined in the race by a handful of other candidates, including: MAGA-y Rachael Savage, the Republican who is campaigning to block permanent supportive housing and arrest homeless addicts as means of recovery; and Joe Molloy, a homeless man who says he lost his housing last year due to an unsupported disability, and is running his grassroots campaign from Tent City 3.

City Council District 9

Seattle’s City Council President Sara Nelson has been on the council since 2022 and has been president since 2024. Her leadership has represented the Chamber of Commerce (and Amazon’s) bid to claim control of city government, so we’re very pleased to announce that she has a challenger. Her name is Dionne Foster, progressive policy wonk, and capital gains tax champion. Nelson, known for her right-leaning, business-first politics, might be in trouble, given the city’s enthusiastic support for progressive Alexis Mercedes Rinck in November, and the runaway success of February’s social housing initiative. Foster’s got the right ideas on housing and homelessness, but let’s be real, to quote a Reddit-er, if a rock ran against Nelson, some Seattleites would probably throw a vote its way just to avoid the “right-wing, inept millionaire” vibe.

City Council District 2

At the end of last year, Tammy Morales stepped down from her seat representing D2 on City Council, saying that the conservative, business-oriented City Council was a toxic, undemocratic environment. The council appointed Seattle Police Department crime prevention coordinator and long-time City Council hopeful Mark Solomon to hold down the seat until this year’s election, when it goes back to the people.

So who’s gonna replace the progressive Morales? In the battle for D2’s vote, we start with Assistant City Attorney Eddie Lin, who primarily works with the Office of Housing. He describes himself as a champion of affordable housing, progressive revenue, and creating a city where “artists and bike messengers and baristas and educators can all afford to live here.” So far, he’s light on details for how he plans to do that, so we’ll be watching him closely.

Then there’s Adonis Ducksworth, the Mayor’s senior transportation policy official and one of the architects of the 2024 transportation levy. He’s pushing a platform that combines safety, affordability, and... skate parks? The lifelong skateboarder knows how important public space is for kids (yay) but he also believes safety in D2 comes with more cops (boo). Like Lin, though, he hasn’t offered many other details yet.

Eclipsing both of their fundraising, though, is a newer entrant: Takayo Minakami Ederer, a Columbia City-born real estate investor and karate instructor (and one of the first members of the women’s national karate team). Based on her early interviews, she’s largely running on a “public safety” platform—which, you guessed it, to her means more cops. She also acknowledges that we need more shelter beds, and advocates for a public-private partnership to make that happen.

City Attorney

In our friendly neighborhood City Attorney showdown, Nathan Rouse, Rory O’Sullivan, and Erika Evans all have big ideas on how to fix Seattle’s broken justice system in contrast to incumbent Ann Davison—spoiler alert: most of them don’t involve locking up more people. Rouse, a public defender who’s done with Davison’s “tough-on-crime” charade, wants to bring back community court and stop prosecuting minor offenses like SODA and SOAP violations (which, fun fact, aren’t even being enforced right now). Meanwhile, Evans is focusing on serving up anti-Trump tea and advocating for harm reduction programs that actually help people instead of shoving them into jail. And then there’s O’Sullivan, who thinks the City Attorney’s office could use a little more compassion and a little less spectacle. So, get ready for a race that could decide whether Seattle stays stuck in the criminal justice quicksand or finally tries to pull itself out with actual solutions.

Stranger Election Control Board is Marcus Harrison Green, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Emily Nokes, Megan Seling, and Hannah Murphy Winter.

Margaret Flatley

February 2025 Special Election Voting Guide

Stranger Election Control Board — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 18:34:00 -0800

It’s Special Election Time! Where the turnout is low and the measures are extra confusing. By now, you should already have your ballot in hand—or in that pile of mail you swear you’ll get around to. This time, we’re voting on if/how to fund a social housing developer, and continuing to close the state’s funding gap for Seattle schools. Let’s dive in. by Stranger Election Control Board

It’s Special Election Time! Where the turnout is low and the measures are extra confusing.

By now, you should already have your ballot in hand—or in that pile of mail you swear you’ll get around to. This time, we’re voting on if/how to fund a social housing developer, and continuing to close the state’s funding gap for Seattle schools. Let’s dive in.

City of Seattle, Proposition Nos 1A and 1B:

Vote for 1A to fund our social housing developer in a sustainable, actionable way.

This one has a lot of moving parts, so it’s helpful to have some backstory. It starts with I-135, a ballot measure in 2023 (that we also endorsed). Two years ago, House Our Neighbors, the policy arm of Real Change newspapers, brought Seattle a new idea: a law to create a social housing developer. And 57 percent of you voted to make it happen.

The Seattle Social Housing Developer gives the city a chance at long-term affordable housing. They will be equipped with the tools to “build, acquire, own, and manage” housing that, if done correctly, will permanently stay affordable. Instead of market-rate housing, which has become chronically inaccessible for low- and middle-income earners, or government-subsidized housing, which can be put back on the unaffordable market in 20 or 30 years, social housing is publicly owned and operated, out of the hands of private, money-grubbing middlemen, and rents are forever capped at 30 percent of a tenant’s income.

We said it then, and we’ll say it again: Our public housing developer will not solve the immediate housing crisis. But with enough time and political will, this solution could end Seattle’s affordability crisis.

Okay, so what does this have to do with Prop 1 in 2025? This initiative actually funds our social housing developer.

The Yes/No vote reaffirms what we’ve already voted on: Yes, we want a social housing developer. Prop 1A and 1B are the two possible ways that it could be funded.

1A represents the funding model proposed by House Our Neighbors (HON), who envisioned this social housing endeavor. Under this model, the buildings’ costs are recouped by the tenants’ rent, functioning almost as a sliding scale: Residents can make anywhere from 0 to 120 percent of the area’s median income (AMI); because every tenant pays 30 percent of their income, the wealthier tenants effectively subsidize the lower income residents. Equity!

To fund the rest of the project, 1A creates a new payroll tax on employers—5 percent on annual compensation above $1 million paid to any employee in the city. This ongoing tax could generate as much as $50 million in its first year and become a long-term funding source for social housing.

Now, Prop 1B is the alternative funding source proposed by the Chamber of Commerce and city council, who don’t want a new tax on the city’s businesses. Rather than funding a new idea with a new tax, 1B would pull $10 million a year from the Jumpstart payroll tax (sound familiar?) for just five years. When it comes to real estate, $10 million doesn’t get you very far in Seattle. (And if we keep trying to use Jumpstart for everything, it won’t be good for anything.)

It also undermines the “sliding scale” model because Jumpstart funds can only be used for units that serve people who earn 80 percent AMI or below, rather than 1A’s 120 percent. This only works if richer people can subsidize housing for their poorer neighbors. That’s the “social” part.

Keep in mind that social housing is new to Seattle, but it’s not a new idea. Vienna, Finland, and Singapore have all used it successfully to address housing shortages; And here in the U.S., Montgomery County, Maryland, has established its own public developer.

The chamber wants to spook us with the fact that the developer isn’t staffed (right now they only have a CEO), and said repeatedly during our endorsement meeting that they “had no plan.” But we don’t find that concern reasonable. In our endorsement meeting, HON acknowledged that the developer isn’t established yet; They do plan to staff up—which can’t happen without $$$—and once they have that staff, they’ll be equipped to turn these admittedly lofty goals into an actionable plan.

Would we prefer to see a more established developer at this point? Yes! Have they been given the resources to do so? No! Does that mean we shouldn’t give them the resources to do just that? No! In the meantime, the Low Income Housing Institute (which, most notably, has managed many of the city’s tiny home villages, and larger developments around the state) has offered to provide practical support (including compliance, design, and technical expertise) while the developer builds its staffing infrastructure—which, we should mention, did not assuage the Chamber’s concerns, but we agree it would undeniably help the developer get their feet under them.

We’d be remiss if we didn’t acknowledge that there is a small Vote No contingency. They argue that we shouldn’t spend money on social housing when we have the immediate need for shelter beds today. We agree that we have an urgent need for shelter. But we don’t believe this is a zero-sum game. If we don’t invest in long-term solutions, too, we’ll keep finding ourselves right back where we are now.

This is a brand new proposition in this city, and we’re not arguing that it’s perfect, but it's more than good enough that our city should let the public developer find whatever kinks there may be and work them out. We’re in a housing crisis. We can’t afford to sit on our hands. The possibility of problems, which are inevitable with any new solution, should not be enough to dissuade us from bold action. We need to give social housing a real chance in Seattle, and the only way to do that is to fund it.

So vote Yes on Proposition 1, and vote for 1A.

Schools, Proposition 1:

We’re a levy town. We love to pass ‘em. And we think that’s great. They fund transit! They fund schools! We love these things!

This time, we’re funding schools, and the district is proposing two levies that, combined, come out to about $2.5 billion. Before we dive in, though, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. After the district threatened to close as many as 21 schools last year, these levies are under more scrutiny than usual. The chaotic back-and-forth didn’t inspire public confidence in the district’s finances, or how they were being managed. We agree that the district’s actions warrant scrutiny. But whether or not we feel confident in how they’re spending this money, kids still have to show up to school every day, by law. And if we require them to be in these buildings day in, day out, they deserve a safe, clean, supportive environment.

Now for the next question: “Aren’t our schools funded by the state?” you ask? Yes! They should be. And for the most part, they are. But the funding falls short of our districts’ needs, so statewide, districts have been forced to supplement what we get from the state with levies like these.

Prop 1 uses a property tax that covers about 16 percent of our operating costs. (The Feds cover less than 10 percent, and the rest is covered by the state.) This year, Prop 1 would cover a third of the districts’ special education costs, and provide funding for arts, athletics, security specialists, and multilingual staffers.

If last year’s school closure panic taught us anything, it’s that our district’s funding is on a razor’s edge. We can’t afford to lose this funding.

Vote Yes on Proposition 1.

Schools, Proposition 2

Now for the big one. Prop 2 proposes $1.8 billion for a “capital levy.”

What’s the difference? This one doesn’t just buoy the district financially—it allows for investment in buildings, security measures (in particular, an inter-building intercom system, cameras, and key cards), technology, etc. Seattle moderates have some mild reservations about this one: After last year’s drama with a messy closure plan foisted on families and then abandoned, can we trust how the district would spend this money? (They dare to propose $150 million to replace an aging elementary school, for example. The gall.) We agree that last year’s showdown invites some scrutiny about how the district makes its decisions, but we absolutely disagree that withholding funding from a struggling school system is the way to do that.

Vote Yes on Proposition 2.

General Election Night 2024: Grab Your Anxiety Meds and the Vice of Your Choice, LFG!!!

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 05 Nov 2024 16:44:00 -0800

Follow along for continuous Election Night 2024 coverage! by Stranger Election Control Board 📌

Welcome to the General Election 2024 Live Blog. Election Day is here, and it’s time to grab your anxiety meds and vice of choice and tuck in for a wild ride.

Chances are, we won’t know the results of the presidential election tonight (though we’ll likely know who won Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan by the end of the night—we’ll keep you posted.)

But in the meantime, we should have results for some of our most important local elections before we all go to bed tonight. As always, we’ll be lurking at their parties, judging their snacks, and capturing the election night magic/anxiety/crushing defeat.

If you haven’t voted yet, there’s still time! But run, don’t walk.

Check your voter registration here. If you’re not, you can still register and vote at one of seven voting centers in the county, which are open until 8 pm today. Remember to bring your Washington State driver's license, and a state ID, or memorize the last four digits of your social security number when you go. If you’re already registered to vote, awesome. The ballot should be in your mailbox unless you took it out and put it somewhere weird, but if it’s not, you can print out a new one or go vote in person at a King County voting center. Once you’ve filled out your ballot, find your nearest drop box here.

Once you’ve voted, if you need to be with people who are just as stressed as you, come on by The Stranger and KEXP’s election party at the Crocodile. The party started at 4 pm but we'll be there until midnight—join us!

Now back to business. Want a refresher on the races as we count them down? Check out our endorsements here.

Here’s a very non-exhaustive list of the things to know going in:

We’re going to elect a new governor! (Bob, you better have food at your party this time.) Both The Stranger and the Seattle Times endorsed Bob Ferguson, and he was squarely in the lead in recent polls, so we’re not too worried about MAGA-dude Dave Reichert running the state.
Alexis Mercedes Rinck! The most recent polling puts the progressive newcomer a whole 24 points ahead of Council appointee Tanya Woo. Woo came in second in the August primary, but Woo’s campaign manager called the gap between the two candidates (Rinck’s 50.2% to Woo’s 38.4%) “brutal.” It looks like Woo’s big business supporters abandoned her in the general, so we’re hoping to send a proper progressive to City Hall tonight.
Now here’s one for the books, folks—a real blue-on-blue showdown in the 9th Congressional District. We’ve got 14-term Congressman Adam Smith, who is also a House Armed Services Committee bigwig, going head-to-head with civil rights firebrand Melissa Chaudhry. What’s the primary dividing line? What else: Gaza and the ongoing horror show that Smith pretends to wring his hands over while quietly writing blank checks for the next round of airstrikes. He's made empty calls for a ceasefire, while Chaudhry has called for an arms embargo. With no fears of a Republican winning in the state's only majority POC- district, it'll be interesting to see if the race serves as a referendum on Smith's support of the Israeli genocide.
Have you read about Superintendent Chris Reykdal’s opponent in this election? Local families say David Olson is cozy with Moms for Liberty, a far-right parents group that opposes inclusive policies and lessons on race, gender, and sexuality in school; and he helped the Peninsula School District push away critical race theory and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) training while parents and students raised concerns about racism and discrimination in his district. The race for Superintendent of Public Instruction is a nonpartisan race, which is likely why the most recent polls show that 21% of voters plan to vote for Reykdal, 18% for Olson, and a whopping 61% had no idea who they’re voting for. We hate this, and we’ll be watching it closely.
All eyes are on Clallam County. This little bellwether county at the top of the Olympic Peninsula has backed every presidential winner since 1980. Will they keep their streak?

Check back regularly—we’ll keep you updated through the night!

Outgoing Governor Jay Inslee Takes the Stage 9:26 pm Jay Inslee speaking at the convention center. SECB

Inslee was the last to speak at the WA Dem election party, opening his speech by saying, “I’ve been waiting for Bob Ferguson to take over my job for years…”

People Are Doing Therapy Crafts at the Crocodile 9:11 pm Color the pain away. BILLIE WINTER

Sure, we got a lot of good news locally, but holy shit things are still VERY TENSE. So folks are crafting, donating to Shout Your Abortion, and, of course, drinking at the Crocodile to soothe the stress.

Shout Your Abortion's free swag at the party. BILLIE WINTER Cheers or something! BILLIE WINTER Attorney General Bob Ferguson Declares Victory 9:02 pm Bob Ferguson made it clear he's not gonna take Trump's bullshit (if it comes to that, please god don't let it come to that). SECB

Ferguson declared victory in the Washington State Governor’s race from the stage at the WA Dem election party, as he leads his opponent, former US Representative Dave Reichert, by about 13 points. Ferguson declared that if the presidential election results in another four years of Donald Trump, there is no other statewide candidate in the nation more “prepared to defend your freedoms against that administration than I am.”

Everything We Know So Far About Local Results 9 pm

Alright folks, do yourselves a favor and turn a blind eye to that "other race" going on (unless you’re a glutton for punishment and want to dive headfirst into an instant doom spiral). But hey, there’s actually some decent news in the local returns. Here’s your super-quick breakdown that won’t exactly soothe your soul but might take the edge off:

Nick Brown is mollywhooping Republican Pete Serrano in the Attorney General race. Brown, who has that “Obama” appeal we’re told, is ahead 56.85% to 43.06%.
Chris Reykdal, who’s held down the Superintendent of Public Instruction role since 2017, might not be packing up anytime soon; he’s beating David Olsen 53.1% to 45.84%.
Over in the Commissioner of Public Lands showdown, Dave Upthegrove is trouncing Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler 54.6% to 44.87%.
Sal Mungia’s narrowly ahead of Dave Larson, with 50.6% of the vote to Larson’s 49.91% in the race for State Supreme Court Position #2.
Seattle is maybe, possibly, finally, saying goodbye to Tanya Woo. The never-elected city council member currently trails Alexis Mercedes Rinck 42% to 57%.
In Congressional District 9, genocide enabling Adam Smith will most likely defeat Melissa Chaudhry. The race currently sits at 70% to 30%, respectively.
In what we believe experts refer to as a one-sided ass-kicking, Democratic Socialist Shaun Scott has a gargantuan lead of 68% to 31% over Andrea Surez in the race to replace Frank Chopp in the 43rd district.
And in what should be a surprise to no one Bob Ferguson is likely our next governor. He currently leads Dave Reichart 56.47% to 43.34%

Turning to the initiatives…

The good: Initiatives 2066, 2109, and 2124 are sinking fast, with nearly 60%, 70%, and 54% of counted ballots giving them the thumbs-down. There’s a little light at the end of the tunnel!

The not-so-great: Initiative 2117 is pulling 53% in favor.

Still, three out of four ain’t bad!

And finally, in the race everyone was teetering on the edge of sanity about for the last five months. In the state auditor’s race, Pat McCarthy leads Matt Hawkins 59.21% to 40.66%. If you’ve been losing sleep over this one, maybe you’ll get a nap tonight.

Nick Brown Feels Good After Initial Results (But Won't Wear Sparkly Cowboy Hat) 8:56 pm Nick, why won't you wear the cowboy hat too? SECB

Nick Brown thanked his team and his supporters and told us he didn’t see a world where he wouldn’t win at this point. As of 8:39 pm, Brown had 56% and his opponent, Pete Serrano, had 43%. As Brown thanked everyone and headed to main ballroom to give a speech, he pointed out his kids, who were sporting those blue cowboy hats.

All But One Initiative Rejected 8:45 pm State Representative Nicole Macri reacting to tonight's local results. SECB

Spirits were high in the Defend WA room at the WA Dems Election Party. Defend WA organized the campaign to reject the four initiatives that sought to repeal the Capitol Gains Tax, the Climate Commitment Act, Washington’s public Long Term Care program WA Cares, and a law intended to reduce Washington’s greenhouse gas emissions. Voters roundly reject the first three of those initiatives, I-2109, I-2117, and I-2124. Unfortunately for Washington’s hopes to decrease our reliance on natural gas in favor of electric power, voters appear to have voted yes on I-2066, which would effectively prevent the state from trying to electrify anything in any building. Insane. State Representative Nicole Macri said Defend WA knew that would be a hard fight because of a lot of early misinformation about the law I-2066 sought to repeal. She says Washington tried to get ahead of the nation, but the change confused voters, and they seem to want the state to go a little slower. But the results aren’t finalized. At last check, numbers showed 51.1% voting “Yes” and 48.84% voting “No.” Also, Macri said the fact that the capitol gains tax remained in place was great. “We need this,” Macri said.

Holy Fucking Shit, Shaun Scott 8:37 pm Shaun "Holy Fucking Shit" Scott speaks. SECB

“Holy fucking shit!” screamed the man next to us, reading the election results from his laptop. “Shaun Scott–67 percent.” That’s as far as he got before the emcee took over to lead a call and response shout of “I believe that we can win.” Rep. Darya Farivar got 87.52%, while Alexis Mercedes Rinck got 57.32%. She acknowledged the anxiety people may be feeling about the presidential race, but she and the crowd kept up the energy.

Election officials have not counted all the voters, but all three candidates are looking like winners, which would be a serious victory for local progressive politics and a rebuke of reactionary conservatism.

Rep. Farivar told the room that they all had work to do.

“I’m so grateful that locally we have Alexis to defend things at the City level,” she says. “I am absolutely thrilled I’m going to have a partner in these shenanigans.”

Scott began his speech by saying his victory came five years ago to the hour of his 2019 defeat running for City Council—and that tonight he finally got it done for the essential workers, the students, the parents, the teachers, and everybody who would benefit from the economic justice he campaigned on.

Alexis took the mic last. The crowd cheered when she said a queer Latina would represent them on Seattle City Council.“But I know I stand on the shoulders of many who pave the way and I promise I won’t be the last.”

The TV is back on, but people are too busy hugging and shaking hands to pay much attention.

Suarez Is Cheery, Losing 8:34 pm Suarez promises to run again. SECB

Suarez kept a cheery attitude despite dismal results—31.4% to Shaun Scott's 67.7%. She says she can't swing back from her poor showing at the first drop. But even though she lost, Suarez maintains that she won.

"When you run, you win just by getting your message out there," says Suarez. "Winners never quit, and quitters never win."

Saurez hugged her small group of supporters after her results dropped. She comforts them by promising to run again. She's not sure for what, but she's always had one eye on the citywide council seats in 2025.

No One Seems to Notice the Local Election Wins at the Dem Party 8:17 pm Look, y'all! Local results are in! SECB

At the large WA Dem party at the convention center, all eyes remained fixed on the national races as Dems swept local results. Speeches will come later, but initial results show the Governor, Attorney General, and Lands Commissioner races all went to the Dems.

The First Batch of State and King County Results Are In! 8:06 pm

See statewide results here!

See King County results here!

We're reading and thinking and typing as quickly as we can to bring you some analysis very soon...

For now, a cat in a stroller:

A cat in a backpack at the Sea-Meow convention at the Seattle Center last weekend. MADISON KIRKMAN Hey! We Were Watching That! 7:59 pm Turn it back on! SECB

Somebody shut off the TV at Saint John's. The presidential race is looking a little scary, isn’t it?

Nick Brown Jumped in the Ocean This Morning 7:55 pm Yes, that *IS* Nick Brown. SECB

Attorney General candidate Nick Brown woke up at 5:15 this morning and jumped into the ocean to start his day. Then he did some other campaign stuff, and right before heading to the Dem watch party, he had dinner with his campaign team and Governor Jay Inslee. Brown said he’s excited for his chances tonight and he had a better ground game than his opponent. As we chatted, someone walked past and said, “That’s Nick Brown.” He looked up, confused for a moment, and then said, “I gotta get used to that.” The charm is charming.

Upthegrove's Mooching off Brown’s Campaign 7:49 pm Dave Upthegrove and his husband Chad. SECB

Candidate for Lands Commissioner Dave Upthegrove just arrived with his husband Chad. Upthegrove doesn’t have his own suite at this thing, it would have cost him $2,000, which made us gag. We appreciate thrifty Upthegrove stashing his stuff in Attorney General Candidate Nick Brown’s room. Upthegrove says he feels good about his chances to win his race, and he hopes to be toasting with a glass of champagne at his parent's house later tonight.

Meanwhile, at Our Election Party at the Crocodile... 7:46 pm Billie Winter

Thank god for Miss Texas 1988.

You Have 15 Minutes to Drop Off Your Ballot 7:45 pm

This ballot box on Capitol Hill even comes with live music!

Polls close in 15 minutes! But the party is just getting started at this dropbox on Capitol Hill... pic.twitter.com/ddNfGYQw63
— The Stranger 🗞 (@TheStranger) November 6, 2024

Capitol Hill Protest Update 7:30 pm

A total of five people have been arrested for property damage, according to SPD. The property damage was, apparently, spray paint. They used the helicopter for some spray paint.

There are now five total arrests. The group has broken up. We will update here with additional information if anything changes. pic.twitter.com/YcmKUium3V
— Seattle Police Department (@SeattlePD) November 6, 2024

Loose Protest Leads to Arrests on Capitol Hill 7:10 pm

The Seattle Police Department made at least four arrests for property destruction at a protest on Capitol Hill tonight. Some flyers posted earlier in the week called for people to show up at Cal Anderson Park at 6 pm on Election Day to protest the “genocide abroad and a militarized police state at home.” Apparently, a lot of cops are out on the hill tonight on their bikes according to one of the photographers we have assisting us with election coverage. SPD said the King County Sheriff’s Office has their helicopter out to assist them with the situation.

The Social Justice League Will Save Seattle 7:08 pm People are too nervous to party at Saint John's. SECB

We’ve arrived at Saint John’s in Capitol Hill for the combined election night party for progressives Shaun Scott, a candidate for the 43rd District, District 46 Rep. Darya Farivar, and Alexis Mercedes Rinck, the Seattle City Council candidate challenging appointee Tanya Woo for Position 8. The Stranger endorsed all three of these progressive candidates this year, and if the results tonight are anything like the midterms, all three are likely to win.

It’d be a jolly vibe if everyone wasn’t so goddamn nervous about the presidential election. The people wearing Harris/Walz shirts are looking from their phones to the big screen TV showing minute-by-minute updates from NBC. The room was filling up and a group of guys asked to sit at our table, including Harrison Jerome, a volunteer with the Rinck campaign from the start because he thinks she’s good on housing affordability. “I’m a renter and I want to live in Seattle and by my parents,” he said. “But it gets harder and harder every year. Feels like if you didn’t move here in the ’90s you pretty much have no hope of owning a home.” As we talked, his eyes barely left the screen.

A minute later, Rinck walked in the door, trailed by a cameraman from Fox 13 with a blindingly bright light. On the back porch, she tells me she tried to take it slow today. She made some calls, did some sign waving, and ran off the pre-election jitters. She says that over the past few weeks, voters have been eager to share their personal experiences with affordability, safety, and their loved ones struggling with substance use disorder.

“They just want to be heard,” she says. “...They want to know how the City can play a role in addressing those things.”

Boooo, Bob Ferguson! 6:56 pm Ferguson's folks are turning people away at the door. SECB

Ferguson won’t let anyone in his party. So excited for this man to represent the Democratic Party. Big tent with no room for the people. ☹️

He won't let us in and we're jealous because we want to make friends with this girl. SECB Good Gossip (but No Free Booze) at Andrea Suarez's Party 6:49 pm TELL US WHERE WOO'S PARTY IS, ANDREA. SECB

State House candidate Andrea Suarez of We Heart Seattle fame hosted a small gathering at Cotto (no free booze, remind us to Venmo request Brady). In a small crowd of less than a dozen, Suarez gave us lots of attention. She said she had never seen us in so much clothing! We called her rude in the moment, but we forgive her. She also loudly prompted We Heart Seattle's Tim Emerson to tell us how many people the organization has housed this year. He said eight. Suarez said there's a lot of good We Heart Seattle does, but people get fixated on the times she's moved tents and stuff. She said more coverage should come about the positives of her controversial organization after the election.

But after an Aperol spritz, we really gossiped like girls. We learned that Suarez recently officiated a wedding for two of her "original litter pickers," relitigated her talent show-related trauma, and shit-talked consultants.

Suarez also tattled on Council Member Tanya Woo, who told us she wasn't having a public party. Turns out she's hosting a gathering on the waterfront. Suarez grumbled about Woo not agreeing to a combined party. She said she feels a little insecure about the fact that people came to her party early so they could get to Woo's event in time for the results.

Speaking of, Council President Sara Nelson popped in briefly. She left around 6:15 pm, probably to get to Woo's event, according to Suarez. Feeling snubbed, we plotted briefly to crash Woo's party. We offered to pick up litter for 3 hours in exchange for the address for Woo's secret party, but she didn't rat her all the way out.

Unfortunately, we just missed Council President Sara Nelson. She kept plenty of space between us before she rushed out the door.

Oh Hey, Kay!
6:39 pm And another one. SECB

Democratic convention delegate Kay Acholonu doubled up on the cowboy hats, sporting the one from tonight and the one from the Democratic Convention.

Immaculate Vibes at Representative Pramila Jayapal’s Party 6:33 pm DO THE HATS LIGHT UP????? SECB

In a swath of empty, lonely, cold rooms, Jayapal’s party set itself apart as the place to be in this convention center tonight. She lucked out that the air conditioning in her room crapped out, we walked in and immediately felt like we were actually at a party, not a failing mega church’s Sunday service (seriously convention center lighting is terrible for the vibes). Jayapal says she expects Democrats to win the presidency tonight, as well as the House. We noted that one of her former campaign staffers, Shaun Scott, is on the ballot tonight, and she says a whole host of great new and old local candidates are on the ballot this year, name-checking Bob Ferguson among them. We left Jayapal with a drink in her hand and in conversation with Leesa Manion, who seemed relieved to no longer be standing in a mostly empty room.

Do You Need to See a Picture of a Cat Wearing a Cheeseburger Hat? 6:29 pm

That fucking New York Times needle is back, goddammit.

A cat in a cheeseburger at the Sea-Meow convention at the Seattle Center last weekend. MADISON KIRKMAN You Have Two Hours Left to Vote, Seattle! 6 pm

Washington polls close at 8 pm! Not even registered? There’s still time! Haven’t dropped off your ballot yet? Find the nearest drop box and get to it!

As Hannah Krieg wrote on Monday:

As of 9 am Monday, 50% of King County’s 1.4 million registered voters cast a ballot. That’s a much higher engagement rate than in typical odd-year elections, where less than half of registered voters usually participate. However, turnout still falls short of the nearly 86% we saw in 2020.

Young people need to pick up the slack. About 21% of registered voters are 65 or older, but with a whopping 71% of those voters turning in a ballot, they make up 30% of the returned ballots. As for voters under 35, they account for 28% of all registered voters, but make up only about 19% of the returned ballots. Young people: You tend to vote better than old people. Sorry, not sorry. Please get to the ballot box!

Early Birds Arrive at the Big Dem Party 5:53 pm King County Prosecuting Attorney Leesa Manion (center) starting the party at the Convention Center. SECB

King County Prosecuting Attorney Leesa Manion arrived at the Dem party at the Convention Center. She looked around for a second and commented how quiet everything was. They’d only just opened the doors, but we agree with her. Manion said she feels like the election will be solid on the local level, and she’s “going to live in the land of hope” about the presidential race.

And Now for a Message from the Great Riz Rollins 5:33 pm

Riz Rollins has entered the chat with some thoughtful words for the night, from our election party at the Crocodile:

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by The Stranger 🗞 (@thestrangerseattle)

Alllllll the Democrats Are Gathering at the Convention Center, Where They're Passing Out Sparkly Cowboy Hats 5:20 pm It's giving Cowboy Carter. SECB

We arrived at the Seattle Convention Center to the smell of popcorn and the vibes of one of those conferences where you learn to sell real estate. Candidates expected here tonight include US Senator Maria Cantwell, Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Bob Ferguson, Governor Jay Inslee, US Representative Pramila Jayapal, Candidate for Attorney General Nick Brown, King County Councilmember and Public Lands Commissioner candidate Dave Upthegrove, and the Defend WA Coalition who mounted the opposition to the statewide initiatives. Excited to see Ferguson spend the whole night avoiding someone placing one of these sparkly hats on his head.

Chris Reykdal Is More Nervous About Presidential Race Results Than His Own 5:14 pm Brandy the dog (left) and Chris watching early national results before Washington's numbers come in. COURTESY OF CHRIS REYKDAL

“It’s been a long 18 months, but I’m glad it’s over,” says Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal. Just home from work, he plans to swing by a function with the Thurston County Democrats tonight. He'll be back by 8 pm to lock in and watch the numbers.

Reykdal got screens. His campaign manager’s got screens. They’ll be watching the county-by-county numbers in his race, as well as races in the Legislature, the open State Supreme Court race, the Commissioner of Public Lands Race, and the I-2109 ballot measure to repeal the state’s gains tax, a big deal for education. They’ll throw MSNBC on the TV for the presidential. The clear favorite, Reykdal is more nervous about Trump and Harris than his own race.

The Superintendent race is technically a non-partisan, but the only non-partisan part about it is that voters won’t see either candidate’s political preference on the ballot. Practically speaking, the Democrat-endorsed Reykdal and his Republican-endorsed challenger David Olson have vastly different visions for our schools.

Reykdal is a progressive former teacher, former state legislator and the two-time OSPI incumbent. He cares about feeding poor kids, diversifying the workforce, paying teachers what they deserve, and protecting queer and trans kids from the onslaught of “anti-woke” attacks from right-wingers.

Republican-endorsed David Olson is one of those right-wingers. As a member of the Peninsula School District school board, he made friends with his local chapter of Moms for Liberty. He said in his nearly 11 years on that board fighting DEI and “critical race theory” was one of his proudest moments.

Despite this clear contrast, a Northwest Progressive Institute survey of 571 likely voters found that despite the stark ideological divide, 61% did not know who they were voting for. Of those who did know who they supported, Reykdal held a narrow three-point lead (21%) over Olson (18%).

Andrew Villeneuve, founder and executive director of the NWPI, said in an email that the lack of party affiliation explains the large group of undecided voters in this race, even though previous polling shows Washingtonians are enthusiastic about Reykdal’s policy positions. “For those voters taking the time to study the candidates, it should become apparent pretty quickly that Chris is fired up to tackle the tough issues head-on.” (The NWPI has worked with Reykdal for years on issues like no-cost meals and school seismic safety, he says.)

Rekydal says that’s just a reality of his race. “I do think it’ll be closer than it was four years ago, but I also think it’s just the fact that there isn’t an obvious D or an R by a name,” he says. “They just don’t have the traditional political cues.”

The Big East Coast Dump Results... 5:04 pm

Several polls on the East Coast just closed, and the New York Times is projecting:

Trump wins Florida, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, and Tennessee.

Harris wins Maryland, Massachusetts, and Delaware.

Polls are still open here in Washington for another almost 3 hours! Get your ballots in! There are tons of local elections worth voting on!

Here's another cat in a backpack.

A cat in a backpack at the Sea-Meow convention at the Seattle Center last weekend. MADISON KIRKMAN Vermont Goes to Sanders and Harris 4:30 pm

But you already knew that wouldn't happen, didn't you?

Related: New York Times called Kentucky and West Virginia for Trump.

Don't worry, we have more cat pictures for later.

MSNBC Calls Indiana for Trump 4:06 pm

Don’t panic. It’s early.

Here's a picture of a cat preparing for space travel.

A cat in a backpack at the Sea-Meow convention at the Seattle Center last weekend. MADISON KIRKMAN Melissa Demyan's Brain Feels Like Goo 3:55 pm Demyan with her partner in their special occasion tracksuits. COURTESY OF MELISSA DEMYAN

Melissa Demyan, the brave labor organizer taking on Rep. Larry Springer, the Stranger Election Control Board’s least favorite so-called Democrat in the State House, says her brain feels like goo right now. Her campaign’s reached more than 63,000 voters, knocked on 10,000 doors, made 1,300 phone calls, and pitched 500 signs in lawns. And this morning, she and her partner put on their matching Adidas tracksuits—saved for special occasions—to do some last-minute get-out-the-vote effort. When The Stranger called her (we only took 5 minutes of her precious time, we are very considerate!), she said she still had one more “lit drop” before she could head to her party at Ixtapa in Redmond Ridge. She plans to treat herself to a sipping shot of the nicest tequila in the house while she watches the results roll in for her race and across the country. Jane Fonda will not be in attendance.

Iconic actress Jane Fonda endorses labor organizer Melissa Demyan to unseat 20-year incumbent Rep. Larry Springer in the 45th LD, who she said we should really call a Republican. Fonda also asks voters to vote NO on the Let's Go Washington initiatives. pic.twitter.com/0jaW7IYQmc
— Hannah Krieg (@hannahkrieg) October 11, 2024

Every action counts for Demyan. She came within striking distance of Springer in the primary, but he outspent her about five to one. Still, given the outpouring of community support and her team's tireless ground game, she anticipates a close match. Either way, Demyan’s proud of the race she and her supporters ran. Demyan felt especially hartened when a supporter responded to a campaign text to tell her that her 8-year-old is telling everyone they encounter that she’s her favorite candidate besides Kamala Harris.

Melissa Chaudhry: Not Stressing, Eating Cake 2:45 pm Why didn't you send a picture of the cake, Melissa? COURTESY OF MELISSA CHAUDHRY

After a long weekend of door knocking, flyering, and general get-out-the-voting, U.S. House of Reps candidate Melissa Chaudhry is ready to celebrate with her supporters and the broader movement against Israel’s genocide in Gaza. “I’m doing party prep and not stressing. I repeat—not stressing,” Chaudhry told the Stranger Election Control Board in a phone call this afternoon.

She’s throwing a party at the Mall of Africa Restaurant in SeaTac where her supporters will enjoy food, non-alcoholic drinks (coconut water appears to be the crowd favorite, she says), and a cake frosted to resemble her campaign yard signs.

Until then, Chaudhry says she’ll be keeping up with prayer, but she won’t be praying for a victory. Her competition, Warhawk Rep. Adam Smith, secured more than 50% of the vote in the primary. Flushed with cash from the defense industry and pro-Israel PACs, Smith has a pretty good chance at winning the general too.

If she loses, Chaudhry says she will continue to do “much of the same work” she’s done on the campaign.

“Dozens and dozens and dozens of people have told us that they're registering to vote or their whole families are registering to vote for the first time because of my campaign,” says Chaudhry. “And that's the kind of grassroots engagement and political empowerment that we need to make democracy real.”

She also hopes her campaign sends a clear message to Smith that his constituents want investment at home, not in genocides across the globe.

A Rainbow Appears
1:44 pm Don't forget to breathe. SECB

As we were preparing all our election night coverage, this rainbow appeared over the city. Good omen?

Vote No on Initiative Measure No. 2124

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 05 Nov 2024 11:30:00 -0800

Destroying the Nation's First Long-Term Health Care Benefit Would Suck by Stranger Election Control Board

Though our present gerontocracy suggests otherwise, we’re currently wading through the largest wave of people hitting the retirement age in American history. This “silver tsunami” wildly increases the demand for long-term health care, which is a nice way of describing the kind of care that involves paying someone to come wipe asses, pull up pants, and generally help our sick and dying family members age with dignity while the rest of us toil away at our jobs.

Seventy percent of us will need this care after age 65, but less than 5 percent of us buy it on the private market because the premiums are sky-high and growing higher, the coverage is skimpy and getting skimpier, and people with serious pre-existing conditions are, for the most part, ineligible. People assume Medicare will cover this kind of care, but it doesn’t really. Medicaid kinda does, but to access that care you need to spend down your life savings and literally impoverish yourself, which isn’t exactly ideal. Moreover, if a bunch of our elders impoverished themselves just to qualify for Medicaid, they’d basically bankrupt the state.

Stranger Suggests: White Center Halloweentown Block Party, Seattle Catrinas Festival, Gouge Away, the Art of Studio Ghibli, and VOTE! VOTE! VOTE!

Lindsay Costello — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 13:55:00 -0700

One really great thing to do every day of the week. by Lindsay Costello WEDNESDAY 10/30

Seattle 48 Hour Horror Film Project

(FILM) You might already be familiar with the Seattle 48 Hour Horror Film Project, a fast-paced, pressure-cooker film series featuring dozens of short films created by Seattle talent over 48 short hours. (Filmmakers must "draw a genre from a hat and incorporate specific elements such as a character, prop, and line of dialogue into their films," so the results feel improvisational and invigorated.) This spine-tingling spin on the project invites participants to create horror flicks in two short days. I'm anticipating the results to be a little more funny than terrifying, but who knows? There might be some truly twisted greatness in the mix. (SIFF Cinema Uptown, 511 Queen Anne Ave N, through Oct 31, $13.50–$17.50) LINDSAY COSTELLO

THURSDAY 10/31

White Center Halloweentown Block Party

(HALLOWEEN) White Center gets serious about Halloween with a 10-hour-long celebration where kids can "trunk-or-treat" from decked-out lowriders along 16th Avenue SW (4–8 pm) and enjoy carnival games, crafts, and themed food and drink. As the sun goes down, the live entertainment starts up with wrestling matches, drag performances, and tunes from local bands and DJs. Plus, this is the time to pull out all the stops with your costume—the winner of the neighborhood-wide costume contest will be crowned at midnight at Southgate Roller Rink and gifted two box suite tickets to a Kraken game. (White Center's Business Core, 16th Ave SW between SW Roxbury St and SW 100th St, 4 pm–2 am, free, all ages) SHANNON LUBETICH

Find more Halloween recommendations in EverOut's Halloween Guide!

FRIDAY 11/1

Seattle Catrinas Festival 2024

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(COMMUNITY) This four-day community Día de los Muertos celebration is centered around catrinas, elegant skeletal characters associated with the Day of the Dead. The festival honors the memory of departed loved ones with a giant altar, photo and graphic art exhibitions, face painting, and a street market full of traditional food. You can interact with live catrinas, play a game of Lotería, and get your photo taken with professionally decorated giant skulls and mojigangas, or giant puppets. In the evenings, grab a seat for entertainment, such as folk dance performances, a live catrinas procession, and a mariachi concert. (Town Hall Seattle, 1119 Eighth Ave, Oct 31–Nov 3, $45, all ages) SHANNON LUBETICH

SATURDAY 11/2

Gouge Away

(MUSIC) With the election just days away, you're likely feeling the urge to scream, to shout, to thrash your body around in an effort to release some of the unrelenting tension that's crushing your brain, your heart, your soul. Get thee to the Vera Project Saturday night for Gouge Away, a band that captures the musical catharsis of Perfect Pussy and the political unrest of anyone who’s paying attention and not an asshole. “No Release,” from their new album Deep Sage, will feel especially potent leading up to the election. Vocalist Christina Michelle cries out, “Feeling nauseous, no release / Getting breathless, it's hard to think / Can't control it, it's in the blood” over pummeling drumming and guitar riffs that are faster than your racing pulse. The anxiety is a little sneaker in “Idealized.” Wirey guitars wrap themselves around driving percussion like a snake coiling around its prey’s chest as it tries to squeeze out the last heartbeat while Michelle chants “No apology means no apology!” over and over again. Phew, that’s dramatic. I might need a nap. After I release my demons at Vera, of course. (Vera Project, 305 Harrison St, 7 pm, $21.33, all ages) MEGAN SELING

SUNDAY 11/3

Brandon Vosika: Vases to Hold My Tears

See Brandon Vosika's exhibit Vases to Hold My Tears through November 4. COURTESY OF GALLERY ERGO

(VISUAL ART) Brandon Vosika, whose piece "Painting for the Artists and the Lovers" recently graced the cover of The Stranger's Fall Arts + Performance guide, is one of our favorite local artists. His new exhibition, Vases to Hold My Tears, reflects on the preciousness and cruelty of life. "There are so many tragedies right now, I can hardly contain them," he explained in an artist statement. The selection of new paintings and sculptures includes the layered, mysterious "Death" in acrylic and pastel. (Gallery ERGO, 1501 Pike Pl Ste 314, through Nov 4, 5–8 pm, free) LINDSAY COSTELLO

MONDAY 11/4

The Art of Studio Ghibli

(FILM) Over the last 40 years, Studio Ghibli has become legendary for its lush visuals, emotional and affecting storytelling, and poetic, intelligent approach to nature and the more-than-human world. One of its central figures is (duh) cofounder Hayao Miyazaki, who has made some of the studio's most revered flicks (Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Kiki's Delivery Service among them). He's also the most endearingly idiosyncratic director, like, maybe ever, and has announced, then broken, his retirement a total of four times. Never change, Miyazaki!! Anyway, if you're a Ghibli fan, you probably know all of this and are already jazzed for this film series, which celebrates all things Studio Ghibli with screenings of Ponyo, Castle in the Sky, Princess Mononoke, The Secret World of Arrietty, and many other crowd faves. (SIFF Cinema Downtown, 2100 Fourth Ave, Nov 1–14, $14.50–$19.50) LINDSAY COSTELLO

TUESDAY 11/5

VOTE! Then Come Party with The Stranger!

Feeling nervous? Feeling weird? Feeling a little tense? Vote! Brian Scagnelli

(CIVIC DUTY) The most important election since the last one is upon us, and the choice between voting for Vice President Kamala Harris and the worst American in recent memory is only one of the extremely consequential decisions you will have to make on this hell ballot. As ever, you’ll find all the arguments we marshaled in support of our endorsements here. If you don’t have time to read all of our bratty hectoring, then just jump straight to the Cheat Sheet. Rip open that ballot and select your favorite pen—any color will do!—and fill in the bubbles we tell you to fill in. Then slide the ballot into its funny little Hot Pocket sleeve, stuff the whole thing into the envelope, and then drop it in the mail by November 1—no need for a stamp. You can also slide your ballot into a nearby drop box no later than Tuesday, November 5 at 8 pm. Afterward, come to our FREE election party at the Crocodile to watch the national and local returns with hosts Miss Texas 1988 and Stranger editor Hannah Murphy Winter and music by DJ Larry Mizell, Jr. and DJ Riz Rollins! There will be games, prizes, dancing, and maybe some screaming and crying. (The Crocodile, 2505 First Ave, 4 pm–midnight, free, 21+) STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

The Stranger's November 5, 2024 General Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0700

The Stranger's Cheat Sheet. by Stranger Election Control Board

Behold, the Stranger's November 5, 2024 General Election Cheat Sheet:

Want more information about these candidates and issues? Read our full endorsements here. And if you appreciate the work, please contribute to our efforts here! All contributor funds support our journalism.

The Stranger’s Endorsements for the November 5, 2024 General Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0700

Vote Now. It Might Be Your Last Chance. by Stranger Election Control Board

Alright, alright, stop panicking over the swing state polling for one second and listen up. The most important election since the last one is upon us, and the choice between voting for Vice President Kamala Harris and the worst American in recent memory is only one of the extremely consequential decisions you will have to make on this hell ballot.

Right off the bat, you’ll have to face the Four Initiatives of the Apocalypse. They’ll cut billions in education funding, billions in funding for transit and clean energy programs, completely destroy a long-term health care benefit that we’ll all rely on sooner than we think, and ensure that Washington remains forever dependent on fossil fuels. Not good! Not good at all!

After we reject all that bullshit, we need to pick members of Congress who will either help Harris deliver for the people or else serve as a bulwark against the last President of the United States.

At the state level, we need to build a blue wall of executives to shield against attacks from a possible Trump administration and a Republican-controlled Congress, or, if our better angels prevail, to effectively implement the laws our lawmakers pass.

Speaking of those lawmakers, we have the chance to give Democrats supermajorities in the State Legislature, which they could use to fix some major problems for once in their lives! That’s fun! As is the prospect of voting for a State Supreme Court Justice who isn’t a barely closeted Republican!!

And down at the municipal level, we have the opportunity to do the funniest thing ever. We can replace an ineffective conservative city council member with an effective progressive city council member and show the current council that they only achieved their conservative majority thanks to big checks from corporations and the voter suppression inherent in holding city elections on odd-numbered years. Oh, and there’s a hugely important transportation levy we need to pass so that we can have sidewalks to walk on, to roll on, and to chalk up with abolitionist slogans.

That’s a lot to consider! But that’s why the Stranger Election Control Board is here. We spent the last few months grilling candidates, analyzing platforms, digging up dirt, reading with great interest about the particulars of forest management and utility planning practices, and writing strongly worded emails, all to help you fill out your ballot swiftly and correctly.

As ever, below you’ll find all the arguments we marshaled in support of our endorsements. If you don’t have time to read all of our bratty hectoring, then just jump straight to the Cheat Sheet.

Your ballot should land in your mailbox soon. If you do not see it by October 21, then contact King County Elections as soon as possible to find out what the hell is going on. (You can reach them by phone at 206-296-VOTE [8683] or by email at elections@kingcounty.gov.)

If you’re not registered to vote, then register online or by mail any time through October 28. If you’re unsure about your registration status, then check VoteWA.

Once that big, thick ballot arrives, rip it open, select your favorite pen–any color will do!—and fill in the bubbles we tell you to fill in. Then slide the ballot into its funny little Hot Pocket sleeve, stuff the whole thing into the envelope, and then drop it in the mail by November 1st—no need for a stamp. If you’ve always wanted to be a mail carrier, or if you just like a little walk through the neighborhood, then skip the snail mail and slide your ballot into a nearby drop box no later than Tuesday, November 5 at 8 pm.

And if all of this love and support and information makes you feel good on the inside, then please consider sending us a nice little tip! We know we just got bought by a rich guy, but he’s kind of banking on continued financial support for our readers.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Hannah Krieg, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Ashley Nerbovig, Megan Seling, Rich Smith, a working family, and Hannah Murphy Winter. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races or in races we forgot.

Initiative Measure No. 2066
No

Before we dig into the particulars of each of these initiatives, you need to know a couple things up front. First, all of these measures more or less repeal laws that your duly elected officials passed in the last few years. Second, none of the laws are as cool as "Let’s Go Washington" makes them out to be.

What is Let's Go Washington? Let us briefly explain.

After the Republicans sold their brains to Donald Trump, they discovered that they could not win majorities in Washington State government. In an attempt to assert minority rule here, a wealthy hedge fund manager named Brian Heywood grabbed the torch from convicted campaign finance violator Tim Eyman and decided to try burning the government to the ground via the state’s easily gameable initiative process.

So Heywood founded a PAC called "Let's Go Washington" and dropped a few million dollars to fund signature-gathering campaigns to kill several laws that he and his rich friends didn't like, mostly because they cut into the profits that he and his rich friends do like. Four of those initiatives ultimately made it to the ballot.

Now, Heywood and his industry backers probably know they can’t win their arguments on the merits, but they might be able to use their considerable wealth to trick 50.01 percent of the state’s voters into believing a whole lot of bullshit, and so here we are voting on I-2066, an electrification ban that they’re framing as the repeal of a gas ban. And if these absolute virgins win ANY of these initiatives, then they will keep spending their pocket change to gum up the political process in this state until the end of our days.

For that reason alone, you should vote NO on I-2066 and the rest of these initiatives on this ballot, but if you need other reasons, then let’s get into it.

As we mentioned earlier, conservatives spin I-2066 as a repeal of a “natural gas ban” that state lawmakers passed earlier this year. We fucking wish state lawmakers banned “natural” methane gas this year, but they did not.

Here’s what happened. Back in 2008, legislators passed a law to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by certain amounts over the course of a number of years. In 2020, they updated that law. All told, the law says we need to reduce emissions by 95 percent in about 25 years.

If Heywood and his buds really wanted to repeal a “gas ban,” then they would try to repeal that old/updated law. But even they know they’ll lose if they try to tilt their lances at our pollution reduction goals, so instead they’re trying to stop the state from actually doing anything to achieve that goal.

One of the many things the state actually did to help achieve that goal was pass a bill to require Puget Sound Energy (PSE), “one of the largest producers of greenhouse gas pollution in the state,” to “plan for a plan” to do its part to reduce emissions in a way that doesn’t screw over poor people, to quote the bill’s sponsor, Democratic state Senator Joe Nguyen.

The nerdier summary of the legislation will mean even less to you, unless you work in middle management at a utility company: Instead of forcing PSE to continue sending regulators separate plans to manage its electric and gas lines, this bill streamlines that process by allowing the company to send along a joint gas and electric plan. It’s classic, incremental, business-friendly climate policy.

The bill came about because, though the initiative-backers don’t want to admit it, decarbonization is already happening. According to PSE, natural gas use is already “down 7% for residential and 3% for commercial customers in 2023 and forecasted to continue to decline over the next five years.” Accordingly, "Electricity use is increasing and forecasted to continue to rise."

The utility needs to plan for this decline in a way that doesn’t leave people with low incomes in the lurch. If they don’t make those plans, then prices for some people hooked on natural gas could shoot up as much as 900 percent, according to one former California utility commissioner, as everyone else switches to more energy-efficient appliances.

I-2066 would repeal key parts of the law that give PSE some tools to prevent those kinds of crazy price spikes, better serve customers, and protect the environment all at the same time. For instance, the initiative kills a provision that allows the PSE to ask regulators if it could pretty please offer incentives to customers in certain areas to switch to electric appliances rather than, say, having to replace a bunch of costly, aging gas infrastructure just to serve a few people.

Because the bill gives PSE tools like that to decarbonize, initiative-backers are calling it “a gas ban,” but it’s just not. Unfortunately, state law requires PSE to provide natural gas to any customer with gas hookups who wants it. The law that I-2066 partly repeals does not change the utility’s “obligation to serve” those customers, so it’s not a fucking gas ban, and every time they say it’s a fucking gas ban, they’re betting you’re a fucking idiot who doesn’t know how to read.

Anyway, the initiative does something worse than making PSE more climate friendly: It actually adds language that forbids the state from doing anything to “in any way prohibit, penalize, or discourage the use of gas for any form of heating, or for uses related to any appliance or equipment, in any building.” In other words, this initiative would prevent the state from trying to electrify anything in any building, despite the fact that emissions from buildings represent a quarter of our greenhouse gas pollution. It’s pure climate arson.

But this initiative’s supporters don’t want you to focus on that reality. They want to keep you hooked on fossil fuels. To scare you into thinking that’s a good idea, they fearmonger about the upfront cost of electric appliance conversions. However, as we’ve mentioned, the state isn’t forcing anyone to electrify their homes or businesses. It does offer lots of generous subsidies for those interested in doing so, but if this initiative passes, then those subsidies will be just one lawsuit away from evaporating–along with our dreams of a cleaner, greener Washington. Vote no.

Initiative Measure No. 2109
No

This crackpot initiative would repeal the state’s new capital gains tax and cut $2.2 billion for education, early learning services, and child care at a time when schools across the state face huge deficits.

Aside from dramatically reducing funding for schools, passing this initiative would help restore Washington’s status as the state with the most unfair tax code for poor people, all in the service of helping our wealthiest residents dodge a tax that their accountants might mistake as a rounding error.

The capital gains tax skims 7 percent in profits from stocks and bonds and other assets over $262,000. Unfortunately, the tax doesn’t apply to the sales of homes, small businesses, farm land, farm equipment, livestock, timberland, commercial fishing, and auto dealership sales, so it hits fewer than 4,000 people in a state of 8 million, a little less than half of whom file taxes. If you’re reading this, then there’s a 99.9% chance that you do not pay this tax.

The arguments that right-wingers use to support this initiative match the ones they used against the tax as it ping-ponged around the Legislature for ten years, but let’s rehearse them again for old times’ sake. They argue wealthy people “may relocate” due to the tax, but studies have shown that people don’t often move as a result of state taxes. That makes a lot of sense for this tax in particular, given that 41 other states also impose a capital gains tax.

The right also says the tax “makes our state less competitive.” That doesn’t seem to be the case. In 2024, Oxford Economics ranked Seattle the 4th best city in the world based on our “economics.” The top three cities were located in California and New York, both of which levy capital gains taxes.

Finally, Republicans also argue that the capital gains tax is a slippery slope to an income tax. Again, WE WISH. Last session, the Democrats, who control all branches of government, adopted a Brian Heywood-funded initiative that banned the passage of an income tax in Washington state. So state lawmakers can’t even do the cool thing and pass an income tax to put the question to the State Supreme Court anyway. Fuck that. Vote no.

Initiative Measure No. 2117
No

This initiative would repeal the Climate Commitment Act (CCA) and prohibit the state from ever implementing a similar law, cutting billions of dollars in funding for transit programs, ferries, clean energy projects, air quality improvement, and a bunch of other stuff that’s good for the environment and for the organisms who live in it, including the filthy rich psychopaths who got this initiative on the ballot.

The CCA established a cap-and-trade system similar to the ones run by a collection of northeastern states, the European Union, and California-Quebec. Our version aims to lower Washington’s carbon emissions by 95 come 2050 in accordance with state law. To help hit that target, the state sets an emissions cap and then regularly holds auctions where polluters can buy and sell permits that allow them to comply with the cap while continuing to pollute. As the cap lowers, the price of these allowances rises, which incentivizes polluters to find ways to lower their emissions. Voila, a market-based way to curb carbon emissions.

Since this system launched in 2023, it’s generated more than $2 billion, which the state plowed into a bunch of accounts and subaccounts that are too boring to describe. Importantly, 35 percent of the money must “provide a direct benefit to vulnerable populations within overburdened communities” and “10 percent of auction funds must be used for projects with Tribal support.”

So far, proceeds from this bill have funded free transit for all Washingtonians under the age of 19, electric school buses, electric vehicle chargers, air quality monitoring, and a $200 electricity bill rebate for thousands of Washington families. The rest of the spending plan, which is quite long, includes grants to fund public transit, bike lanes, sidewalks, solar projects, and green infrastructure jobs. There’s also millions to help people weatherize their homes and switch to energy-efficient heat pumps; millions for fish passage projects, habitat restoration, and Native land-back initiatives; millions for shore power electrification and electric ferries; and half a billion for clean buildings.

The right’s entire argument in support of setting a match to all that goes like this: 1) We think the CCA raised gas prices by 40 cents, and we cannot abide such a horror. 2) We shouldn’t fight climate change in Washington because our carbon emissions amount to a drop in the bucket compared to China and India and blah blah blah.

To support their first point, they cite a Seattle Times analysis of numbers from the Oil Price Information Service showing gas prices steadily climbing from Jan 2023 and spiking in June of 2023 at 50 cents more per gallon. Washington’s prices ran higher than Oregon’s during that time period, and so the Oil Price Information Service blamed the CCA for the rise.

It may be true that fossil fuel companies passed along some, all, or much more than all of the compliance costs to consumers while raking in huge profits in 2023, but we can’t know for sure because the Legislature failed to pass a bill that would have given us insight into those numbers. However, the Clean and Prosperous Institute looked at WA’s gas prices for all of 2023–not just the first six months like the Oil Price Information Service did–and found that the 50-cent spike was an outlier, and that “the full-year average (including July) was just 13.4 cents per gallon.” And, according to AAA, Washington tallied its highest-ever recorded gas price in 2022–a year before the state implemented the CCA.

But let’s accept for the moment that oil companies saddled consumers with higher gas prices because they’ll take any and every excuse to do that. Repealing this law will blow a massive hole in the state’s 16-year transportation budget, and state lawmakers will absolutely raise the gas tax to help fill that gap because they sure as hell aren’t going to refrain from buying the ferries they need to buy or from fixing the bridges they need to fix just because some rich people didn’t want fossil fuel companies to pay to pollute. With the CCA intact, at least we get investments in transit options that will help us stop using our cars so much, plus more energy-efficient appliances that will save us money, oh, and CLEANER FUCKING AIR TO BREATHE.

As far as the right’s baby-brained comparison between emissions in Washington and China goes: Sure, yeah, it’s true, Washington’s current emissions amount to a drop in the bucket compared to China’s. But obviously, greenhouse gasses are cumulative–it actually does help not to put more of that shit in the air. Moreover, we set the pace for other states and smaller countries around the world. If we prove that this model can work to curb emissions, then others will catch on, and we’ll have a cleaner, greener world for all. Vote no.

Initiative Measure No. 2124
No

That’s where WA Cares comes in. At this very moment, around 3.9 million working Washingtonians are paying 58 cents on every 100 dollars we make for a first-in-the-nation long-term health care benefit. Come 2026, the state will grant anyone who pays into it $36,500, which will increase with inflation, to deal with stuff that medical insurance doesn’t normally pay for.

If an auntie comes over ten hours a week to help dad get around, then he can use this money to pay her for that. If mom’s getting too old to cook for herself, then she can use this money to have meals delivered. And if your bright and youthful self needs money to pay for a temporary caregiver and an ADA-compliant home after getting hit by a car while crossing E. Olive Street and Harvard Avenue because the Seattle Department of Transportation took its SWEET ASS TIME painting a crosswalk there, then you can tap this benefit to pay for all that, too.

But not if this initiative passes. Rather than automatically paying into the benefit, just like Social Security or anything else, I-2124 would force all workers to voluntarily opt into it. Imposing this new rule would likely lead to lots of people dropping from the benefit or never signing up to begin with, which will kill the whole thing. An analysis from the Office of State Actuary ran five different scenarios if this initiative passes, and every one of them led to the insolvency and elimination of the benefit by 2027.

But we wouldn’t just lose the benefit that so many of us are paying into. The state would have to hire people to slowly tear down the system, which would cost between $12.6 and $31 million per year over the course of three years, according to an analysis from the Office of Financial Management. In essence, this initiative would make us pay to fuck ourselves, which we only like doing for free, thank you very much.

The destruction of this benefit would come down hardest on women in general and on women of color in particular, a disproportionately high number of whom work as unpaid caregivers. It’d also fuck over the LGBTQ community, which faces high rates of financial insecurity and is less likely to have family around to help out as they age.

The right-wingers who back this initiative have never seen a safety net they didn’t want to shred to pieces, so they dance around the catastrophic fallout that would result from WA Cares’ failure and argue that this initiative simply aims to offer workers a choice. But the choice is a false one–as we mentioned, the miniscule private long-term health care insurance market is totally broken, and, oh yeah, it charges women up to 70 percent more than men.

Others rightfully groan about the relatively low amount of the benefit–$36,000 tied to inflation. We hear ya. We, too, would like a universal health care system that takes care of everything. But until then, we’ll have to deal with Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all these other earned benefits that don’t quite cover the full cost of everything we need to simply live. Vote no.

US President
Kamala Harris and Tim Walz

We here on the Stranger Election Control Board assume that every voter who picks up our (legally binding) voter’s guide wants to vote. In that spirit, you should vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz over Donald Trump.

As president, Harris promises to do whatever polls well at the moment with certain key demographics in certain key states that she needs to win because this country still uses an antiquated and racist election system to pick its top executive. But it’s not like that means she’s offering nothing that will directly improve our lives.

In general, she wants to make permanent a lot of stuff that worked during the first few years of the COVID crisis. She aims to restore the $3,600-per-kid tax credit and raise it to $6,000 per kid for the first year of their lives, which will take a big chunk out of child poverty.

For the childless cat ladies among us, she wants to expand the $1,500 Earned Income Tax Credit to a larger swath of working people. She also plans to keep the Obamacare tax credits and cap insulin prices at $35 for everyone, not just the elderly. Vowing to “build on” all the good work the Biden administration did for the climate, she’ll keep juicing the green energy economy and giving us money for switching to more energy-efficient appliances.

To prove she’s heard our cries about the housing crisis, she will attempt to increase a tax credit that makes affordable housing easier to build, give a tax cut to developers who build homes that “working families” can afford, crack down on price-fixing landlords, offer $25,000 to help cover the downpayment on a first home, and give tax breaks to startups and to manufacturing companies who keep jobs in the country, all while “cutting red tape” to boost housing production and new business applications.

Of course, every one of those insufficient but noble policy goals requires Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, which she is very unlikely to get. As president, she has much more control over agency rulemaking, immigration, and national security. On those issues, she has much less to say about what she’ll do with her power. Higher-education advocates question her support for canceling more student debt than Biden. She and every other Democrat made a hard-right turn on immigration. Her foreign policy strategy does not appear to depart with Biden’s in any meaningful way.

But no other candidate on the ballot has a snowball’s chance in hell of beating former President Donald Trump, who holds the most insane stance you could possibly hold on every single one of those issues, whose stated policy proposals will dramatically increase inflation, end American democracy as we know it, and endanger the lives of every marginalized group in the country, including the deluded bumpkins who hold him up as their savior. So you should also vote for Harris and Walz in the spirit of stopping a fucking wannabe fascist dictator from taking over the fucking country again, only this time for good.

Many of you may have understandably blacked out the Trump years, or maybe some of you weren’t that tapped into politics back then. You didn’t wake in a cold panic to the push-alert about the Muslim ban and then rush to rally at the airport, didn’t fill with rage as you listened to audio of a border patrol officer belittling babies as they cried out for the mothers they’d been torn away from, didn’t spend evenings at town halls trying to convince Republicans to stop trying to kick millions of people off of their health insurance, didn’t watch your rent rise as Trump signed massive tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, didn’t go bankrupt as his education secretary fucked over student loan borrowers, didn’t go hungry when he made food stamps harder to get, didn’t have to tighten your belt as he undermined worker protection after worker protection, didn’t light a candle for Mother Earth as he gutted nearly every environmental protection he could find, didn’t protest as he set the stage for the genocide in Gaza, didn’t start forking over hundreds of dollars you couldn’t afford to abortion funds and the like as he filled the Supreme Court with Heritage Foundation goons, didn’t talk to literally any woman during the Brett Kavanaugh hearings, didn’t wake up more or less on edge every day for four years, thinking it plausible that at any given moment that fucking moron in the White House could start World War III on a whim. Well, it fucking sucked. And with Project 2025 giving him a blueprint for putting more power in his hands, it’s going to fucking suck more.

And make no mistake: Trump is still no friend to anyone but himself, and he’s definitely no friend to the left. In his 4th of July address, he compared “the radical left” to Nazis and vowed to target “the Marxists, the anarchists, the agitators, the looters.” He also “promised to crush pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses” and to deport any protesters from foreign countries. Remember the “snatch vans” during the 2020 protests? Those rolled out under Trump’s administration. In October of this year, he doubled down on all of that, flagging for “removal” anyone who he deems antisemitic, including pro-Palestine protesters, journalists, and members of the Democratic Party.

The left’s first order of business is to stop the rise of fascism. Voting for the person who is most likely to bury a fascist’s political career will help do that.

Yes, Harris’s decision to continue enabling Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza presents voters of conscience with an urgent moral question. But we live in a fallen world. Voting in the general election is a zero sum game, it’s realistically a binary choice, and picking the lesser of two evils is actually a worthwhile thing to do, especially when, in this case, the more evil one will make sure you never get the chance to make that choice again. He already tried to stop the peaceful transition of power last time. If we hand him the presidency after inspiring an insurrection and trying to work the refs to overthrow the results, then there won’t be another transition until he dies.

Sure, Washington reliably votes for the Democratic presidential candidate, so your decision to skip that race won't directly lead to the election of a madman who wants you dead. But by that same logic, not voting for Harris really doesn’t make much of a statement, either. Some local consultant might remark that Harris lost a few thousand votes relative to Biden in Washington, maybe, and that will be the end of that. So, in that context, how big of a moral stand is a protest vote for Jill Stein? How little of a “reward” are you denying the establishment?

Conversely, a vote for Harris will make your voice stronger when you do–as we all should do–continue to push her administration to stop sending arms to Israel until they agree to a ceasefire. A vote for Harris could lend you credibility when you try to convince your family members and friends in swing states to vote for her. And, perhaps most importantly, electing Harris will prevent the likes of Mayor Bruce Harrell and Council President Sara Nelson from becoming the faces of the #Resistance like Jenny Durkan, Ed Murray, and the rest of those losers were during those dark and cringy pussy hat days.

It’s not much, but in the general election under the electoral college in Washington State, that’s about as much as a presidential vote counts. Vote Harris and Walz.

United States Senator
Maria Cantwell

Returning US Senator Maria Cantwell to Congress will contribute to a Democratic majority that we need to obstruct a Trump administration or else help a Harris administration move policy forward, which is good. But we’ll be honest: Cantwell’s not our favorite Democrat. We can’t help but fantasize about her retiring and then watching Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal take her place. That said, Cantwell has made some moves we gotta respect.

She was the brains behind the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022, which may create 4,000 new semiconductor manufacturing jobs right here in the U.S. of A. Thanks to her, the University of Washington snagged a cool $10 million to train the future semiconductor whizzes.

She hasn’t shied away from calling out Boeing for their lackadaisical oversight and their airplane doors popping off mid-flight, which we appreciate.

She also collabed with Republican US House Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers this year on the American Privacy Rights Act, which would set national data privacy rights and hold violators accountable. We would like the strongest possible privacy rights to protect data in our period-trackers, our step-counter apps, and our OnlyFans watch history. That shit’s between us and God, not advertisers, cops, or any other third party. If we give her another term, Cantwell will keep fighting to get that bill across the finish line

Let’s get one thing straight, though: Neither one of Washington’s senators has done enough to stop the genocide in Gaza. A senator with a conscience would make quicker, clearer, and more frequent calls for a ceasefire, and they would block weapons to Israel at every turn. Cantwell has utterly failed on that front.

But we don’t think her competition, Republican Raul Garcia, will serve as a more passionate advocate for Palestinian liberation. For example, in a July Q & A, he said he would not set stricter conditions for sending bombs to Israel.

Besides, he’s shady as fuck. He’s vowed to stay neutral in the upcoming presidential race, which means he wants Trump to win. If elected, Garcia said he would support the agenda of whichever presidential candidate wins, which he thinks is the role of Congress, which is funny because the role of Congress is to serve as a check on the Executive branch, but whatever.

The point is: If Trump wins, then we want senators who push back on his bullshit, not senators who bend over and take it. Heck, if Harris wins, then we want senators who push back on her bullshit, too! We don’t have that option in these two candidates, but, still, Cantwell’s the best choice. Vote Cantwell.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 1
Suzan DelBene

Well well well, what can we say about Congresswoman Suzan DelBene that anyone will remember five minutes from now?

The earmarks she secured this year include enough money to finally complete the big Food and Farming Center up in Snohomish County, which will serve as a big ag hub and farmer’s market to help local growers distribute food from northwest Washington to the rest of the region. That sounds nice–as does the money to preserve some marshlands, upgrade some water infrastructure in Bothell, and design the Ash Way light rail station up in Everett.

If we send her back to Congress for a seventh term, she vows to continue trying to pass legislation that polls well, such as bills to give people tax breaks for having children and developers tax breaks for building affordable housing.

She heads up the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) because she’s apparently good at raising a lot of money and she enjoys the security of a safe blue seat. That’s kinda fun.

For all her incrementalism and moderation, she’s a hell of a lot better than Republican Jeb Brewer, whose name and politics appear to derive from some generic GOP candidate generator. He’s mad about inflation, he’s mad about electric vehicles, and he thinks homelessness is a mental health/drug problem first and not a housing problem first. He’s also apparently a little bit of a moron. On his website, he argues that “Washington and our country are worse off today than two year [sic] ago,” which is why he’s running. Well, Jeb, we’re just humble cosmopolitans living in cities you call “decaying,” but we do know that a bunch of obstructionist Republicans took over the House two years ago, which partly explains why we’re worse off now. Do us all a favor and stop contributing to that problem. Vote DelBene.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 7
Pramila Jayapal

One of the reasons why we get so pissed about local conservatives identifying as “practical progressives” is because “practical progressives” actually do exist, and four-term Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal is one of them.

As chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, she led the bloc of nearly 100 members as they rolled out the Progressive Proposition Agenda, which tried to push Biden to the left on climate, the economy, and everything else.

When the Republicans are in charge, as they have been for the last couple of years, Jayapal tries to get things done by introducing bipartisan legislation. Recent efforts include bills to tamp down on anticompetitive hospital mergers, reduce wasteful war spending, and restore at least a little trust in Congress by preventing its members from owning and trading stocks.

In lean times, she’s also not afraid to use the bully pulpit. She recently joined the Boeing machinists on the picket line to stand up for workers’ rights, and she regularly appears on TV to defend and advance progressive positions on immigration, Gaza, and data privacy. And after the Israeli Defense Forces killed Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, a University of Washington graduate who protested illegal settlement expansion in the West Bank, Jayapal joined forces with US Senator Patty Murray to write a letter demanding an investigation, signed onto another letter with 102 members of Congress demanding the same, and followed up with a fiery press release in early October when she didn’t see any movement from the State Department on that front.

Give her a blue president and senate, and she’ll keep pushing to cancel more student debt, secure a lasting ceasefire in Gaza, reform the Supreme Court, increase protections for LGBTQ communities, and win higher pay for workers.

Meanwhile, her Republican opponent, Dan Alexander, is basically nutso. Over the phone, he tells us he’s probably voting for Donald Trump this year because RFK Jr. supports Trump, and since he supports RFK Jr., then he’ll probably support Trump, too. He also peddled anti-vaxxer bullshit, saying that he couldn’t tell us if the COVID-19 vaccines were safe (they are!) and that his “understanding” was that the vaccines killed thousands of people (they haven’t). Not exactly the kind of views we like hearing from a longtime Boeing engineer who works on military versions of the 737, but there you have it! Vote Jayapal.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 8
Kim Schrier

As a pro-abortion pediatrician, three-term Congresswoman Kim Schrier will really shine when she inevitably has to play defense against Republicans as they attempt to gut earned benefits and impose national abortion bans. In that way, she’ll be an asset to a likely Democratic minority and to the country as a whole.

Even when she served during the Trump administration, she chalked up a few wins. Her not-so-small list of bills signed by the bad man suggests she can find common ground with MAGA freaks, largely in the worlds of agriculture and conservation. Of course, her embrace of hard-right immigration policy, cops, and her support for Israel overlap with their interests as well, which does not bode well.

Though Schrier now leans way more to the right than she has to, we’ll take her over Republican bank executive Carmen Goers any day. Goers refuses to entertain the notion of raising taxes despite the need to increase special education funding, speed along a just transition from fossil fuels, build around seven million affordable homes that the private sector simply will not build, and pay for about a thousand other things. She also holds anti-trans positions on kids sports and thinks schools have dropped standards “in order to prevent anyone from feeling bad,” which makes her, if nothing else, an absolutely tedious Thanksgiving dinner guest. Vote Schrier.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 9
Melissa Chaudhry

Oh, look! A Congressional race where we had to make an interesting decision! Kind of!

In terms of issue knowledge and policy imagination, grant writer and civil rights advocate Melissa Chaudhry represents the strongest challenge that 14-term Congressman Adam Smith has faced in recent memory. She presents detailed prescriptions for fixing our dismal and dehumanizing immigration system, increasing worker power, building more housing that people can afford, making our political processes more democratic, and supporting every other item we care about on the progressive agenda.

Most importantly for this race, she also stands well to Smith’s left on foreign policy issues, particularly when it comes to Pentagon spending and Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza. Smith calls for a ceasefire, and yet he votes to send billions in weapons to Israel while blaming Hamas for being “the biggest obstacle to a ceasefire,” when reporting strongly points to the political ambition of Benjamin Netanyahu as the biggest obstacle to a ceasefire and the cause of war escalation in the region. Unlike Smith, Chaudhry doesn’t talk out of both sides of her mouth on this issue. She wouldn’t have voted to send Israel more bombs to drop on babies, wouldn’t have blocked funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees for a year, and would remain an outspoken critic of the US’s stance on this war until the killing stops.

Unfortunately, though she makes a more persuasive case on many of these issues than Smith does, she has yet to raise the kind of money needed to make sure voters hear that case. Plus, Rep. Smith isn’t all bad. He helped lead the House Democrats’ call for Biden to step off the presidential ticket, nixed a few of the more heinous Republican amendments to the bill that authorizes Pentagon spending, and has tried this year to secure a bunch of funding for affordable housing units and community centers that serve marginalized communities. All of that is good, but it’s all stuff Chaudhry would do as a matter of course. Vote Chaudhry.

Governor
Bob Ferguson

Attorney General Bob Ferguson is the only candidate for governor prepared to lead Washington through its most pressing, ongoing issues: The housing crisis and the crisis in education funding.

On housing, he’ll focus on increasing market-rate and affordable units in his first term, promising a cabinet-level agency to implement his top priority of building 200,000 new homes “using public-private partnerships” in four years. As for education, he plans to increase the percentage of the state budget devoted to funding the public education system. We believe he’ll follow through on his promises. When he first ran for Attorney General in 2012, he promised to be a consumer protection crusader, and more than a decade later he’s clawed back a couple billion dollars for the people of Washington, state and local government coffers, and nonprofits through his civil law enforcement division, including $1.1 billion to address the fentanyl epidemic. Promises made, promises kept, and then some.

All of that is very nice. Unfortunately, like his GOP opponent, former US Representative Dave Reichert, Ferguson refuses to advocate for new taxes on the rich. Now, Reichert promises to veto any new taxes, which would be disastrous. And while Ferguson has supported the capital gains tax and taxes on big banks in the past, in interviews he routinely asserts the need for the state to cut waste, not to increase its coffers. And yet, he refuses to explain how cutting waste can generate enough dollars to fund all the stuff he says he wants. (Newsflash: It can’t.)

Still, Ferguson’s tendency to pivot away from questions like a man with an avoidant attachment style raises far fewer concerns than the answers Reichert gives. Reichert supports school voucher programs, which would divert public dollars to private schools, exacerbating our education funding problems. He believes marriage is “between a man and a woman,” and while he promises not to foist his beliefs on the state, the friends he keeps raise eyebrows. He chose to hold his first town hall for his gubernatorial bid at Firmly Planted Action, anti-LGBTQ+ group that wants to end abortion rights. Plus, Larry Sandquist, board chairman of the Family Policy Institute of Washington, which actively advocates for anti-abortion policies, donated $5,000 to the pro-Reichert independent expenditure committee, Washington 24. Beyond that, his religious beliefs clearly do affect his policy choices, like in the area of climate change, which he doubts can be reversed because “the guy upstairs” controls the weather.

Ferguson is not the lesser of two evils. He actively supports codifying a person’s right to abortion in the state constitution, and he’s fought vehemently in the past against LGBTQ+ discrimination. Under a Trump administration, Ferguson will fight to uphold those hard-won rights; under Harris, he’d move us forward, albeit *shudders* incrementally. Reichert would take us backward. Vote Ferguson.

Lieutenant Governor
Denny Heck

So you’ve gotten to the point in the ballot where you have to Google what the fuck the Lieutenant Governor even does. Don’t worry about it, baby girl. Bubble in the circle for Denny Heck and allow us to explain.

The Lieutenant Governor serves as the president of the state Senate. While the position cannot cast a vote, the person who holds it gets to break ties and root for their policy goals.

In his first term, Heck showed he knows how to use his clout to corral the cats in the Senate. For instance, he took major credit for the “Year of Housing” in 2023. He rallied a broad coalition of pro-housing advocacy groups to pressure legislators to pass a bunch of bills to promote density, including the crown jewel of the session, the so-called “missing middle housing” bill, which dramatically reformed zoning around the state. In 2025, he will advocate for lot-splitting measures, transit-oriented development, and other permitting reforms to build, build, build.

If you noticed that Heck’s pushing a lot of supply-side strategies, you would be right (and maybe you should monitor your Urbanist Twitter screen time). He’s sort of lukewarm when it comes to helping renters keep their heads above water as he tries to build his way out of the crisis; the Senate killed the rent stabilization bill last session under his watch, and in his meeting with the SECB he offered no assurances that he would prevent that from happening again.

In an ideal world, Heck would use his position of authority to send every rent stabilization holdout in the Senate to timeout until they’re ready to vote right, but we don’t live in an ideal world. We live in a world where we have Heck, who takes the housing crisis seriously, and Republican Dan Matthews, who is too busy obsessing over the genitals of athletes to cheerlead for market urbanism. Vote Heck.

Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs

Incumbent Steve Hobbs did a pretty good job in his first term as Secretary of State, and we want to see what he can do with another one.

Let’s start with the good stuff. Hobbs takes voter outreach very seriously. In fact, he hired a whole team to help disenfranchised voters cast their ballots. After a 2021 law reinstated voting rights for incarcerated people upon release, he established a new civics course to encourage them to vote. Incidentally, he also got Dungeons & Dragons unbanned from prisons, which counts as lawful good behavior if we’ve ever seen it. If we give him another term, he’ll scale up those efforts.

But Hobbs has some work to do. His office rejected more ballots from people of color and young people than from white people and older people. To combat that disparity, he wants to start a program to allow voters to “cure” their ballots via text message. His office also rejected almost 70,000 ballots in the presidential primary because voters failed to check a box to denote party affiliation, which they don’t have to do in other elections. Advocates would have Hobbs get rid of that box altogether, but such a change would require action from the Legislature, and he thinks the political parties would probably fight that effort so they could keep collecting data. Nevertheless, he’s establishing a work group to find solutions.

And, fuck it, we’ll say it. Hobbs is a Democrat and his opponent, Dale Whitaker, is a Republican. Call us a bunch of soy libs, but after former President Donald Trump tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election, we don’t really trust Republicans to head our Secretary of State’s office. Whitaker did not agree to an interview with us, but we wanted to grill him on why he opposes Hobbs’s efforts to combat online disinformation following the insurrection, on what basis he spreads the myth that undocumented people stuff our ballot boxes, and, to be frank, we wanted to ask him who he thinks won the 2020 election. Sorry, but a Republican with no experience running on “election integrity” in the year 2024 rings alarm bells that Whitaker failed to silence. Vote Hobbs.

State Treasurer
Mike Pellicciotti

Incumbent Democratic Treasurer Ben Gibbard Mike Pellicciotti has managed our state finances so well that even his Republican opponent openly admits that we're in a “good position.” Stone-cold reality forces her to concede that point. Under Pellicciotti’s leadership, in June Moody’s gave Washington a triple-A rating due to our “strong governance practices and sound reserve and liquidity positions,” which means we govern well, save enough for rainy days, and still have money to get shit done. Meanwhile, this year Standard & Poor’s maintained Washington’s AA+ rating, and they even moved our economic outlook from “stable” to “positive," which means our credit fucking rules. In fact, in terms of our credit rating and our pension fund liability, US News and World Report ranked Washington #1 in the country this year.

Aside from serving as a faithful steward of public funds, we like Pellicciotti for his obsession with long-term thinking, a quality so many public officials sorely lack. In his first term, he goaded the Legislature into passing Washington Saves, a state-run, automatic retirement savings account that will serve the 1.2 million Washingtonians who do not have access to such a benefit through their employers.

If we return him to office, he vows to continue pushing for his baby bonds proposal, which would give every child born on Medicaid tens of thousands of dollars they could tap into at 18 to help launch a new business, or to pay for college or vocational school. Pellicciotti argues that this kind of policy will give us all “the hope and promise of a future where everyone can reach their full potential,” so that the 14-year-old going into high school will have some real financial help to look forward to after graduation.

And right now, he’s drawing up plans to Trump-proof Washington state. Few may remember in the chaos of, well, everything, but in 2020 then-President Donald Trump threatened to withhold federal funding from Seattle. You better believe that Project 2025 Trump will withhold federal funding from Washington State if he doesn’t like the way we, say, support trans kids in school or try to reduce carbon emissions. So Pellicciotti’s in the lab looking at budgets, trying to figure out what he can backfill with state funds in the advent of the worst thing that could happen to America.

We can’t say the same for his Republican opponent, Sharon Hanek, who co-founded Let’s Go Washington with Brian Heywood, the multimillionaire hedge fund manager responsible for all the apocalyptic initiatives on the ballot this year. According to a questionnaire for a religious voter guide, she not only opposes taking into consideration environmental, social, and governance ratings when deciding where to invest public funds, as Pellicciotti does, she also opposes abortion, medical abortion, marriage equality (which she brags about trying to overturn), trans rights, and every other thing we care about. You will not be surprised to learn that she believes “laws to control gun ownership have gone too far.” Well, we don't! Vote Pellicciotti.

State Auditor
Pat McCarthy

Everyone’s worried about government fraud, waste, and abuse, but we’d bet our second-best bong that 9 out of 10 people at the bar couldn’t tell you the name of Washington’s two-term incumbent state auditor, Pat McCarthy. And probably 10 out of 10 people at the bar couldn’t tell you that she’s done such a good job overseeing the place–with one somewhat major exception–that it’s won THREE national awards for excellence since 2020.

In 2020, the National State Auditors Association (NSAA) gave the agency an award for its mildly thrilling investigation that turned up a former Pierce County Housing Authority finance director who stole $7 million in a fraud scheme.

In 2022, the department picked up another award for performing a “culture audit” of the Department of Fish and Wildlife—“the only one in the country ever conducted that we’re aware of,” McCarthy says. The audit uncovered a widespread culture of bullying.

And this year, the NSAA bestowed an award upon the agency for its Cyber Checkups program. The “popularity” of the Auditor’s cyber security programs, which help local governments learn where they’re most vulnerable to attack, led to a three-year backup for services. In response to the growing queue, the agency developed the “checkup” program to give governments a few more tools in their toolbox that they could use to avoid cyber attacks while they wait for a proper audit–and everybody loves it.

The cyber security award seems a little funny after a vendor the auditor’s office used experienced a major data breach in 2020 that exposed the sensitive data of more than one million people. McCarthy’s office didn’t reveal the breach for three weeks. She argues the department acted quickly and needed that time to “verify the scope of the vendor’s breach.” Since then, McCarthy says, she’s created a Data Risk Committee to identify and clean up the agency’s data request process, “worked with the state’s IT agency and Microsoft to create a customized data sharing platform called SAOShare, and supported and implemented legislation requiring annual data sharing agreements with the 2,300 governments and state agencies we audit.”

So she took the breach seriously and then took steps to make sure it wouldn’t happen again. Plus, that little hiccup isn’t the total expression of McCarthy’s being. We’re impressed, for instance, with the way she embraced the task of auditing investigations of incidents when police use deadly force, a new duty the Legislature gave her early in her second term. In the face of some grumbling from law enforcement, she says she set up the system quickly and welcomed it as a way of “holding everyone accountable.”

If we give her another shot, she plans to continue to strengthen the department’s inclusivity practices and to look into ways to offer performance audits to tribes who’ve expressed interest in finding efficiencies.

Speaking of finding efficiencies, she’s also put together “a small task force” to look into ways to use artificial intelligence. “On the one hand, I know AI is going to destroy civilization as we know it. On the other hand, it could provide efficiencies,” she says. That’s the kind of level-headed approach to certain doom that we like to see in an auditor.

And she’s a hell of a lot better than her Republican opponent, Matt Hawkins, an “election integrity” guy who helped produce an alarming number of children (10), uses Qanon-y phrases like “We the People” in his campaign copy, and clearly does not understand the basic functions of the office he seeks. He thinks, for example, that the auditor oversees elections—it doesn’t. Vote McCarthy.

Attorney General
Nick Brown

Nick Brown’s years of experience working with the Washington State Attorney General’s Office (AGO) as general counsel for Governor Jay Inslee and his values on topics such as gun safety and abortion make him the best choice to serve as our next Attorney General (AG). Brown can show up on day one ready to defend our laws, provide state agencies with the legal advice they need, and fight for consumers against big business.

As gun violence continues to rip through communities, Brown argues for reducing the number of guns on the street as a key way to lower the number of homicides and suicides. Meanwhile, his GOP opponent, Pasco Mayor Pete Serrano, spends his off-time fighting for the rights of Washington gun dealers to sell assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, as well as seeking to overturn the state’s ban on “ghost guns.”

Serrano’s choice to attack these laws shows a disregard for public safety, as studies show again and again that stricter gun laws can result in less gun violence, and laws such as the ones we have on the books may have prevented mass shootings. His stance on the issue also displays how out-of-step he is with Washington voters, who in 2018 passed a suite of gun safety laws through Initiative 1639.

Brown would also better represent the interests of Washingtonians on abortion. Seventy-three percent of the state believes abortion should be legal in most or all cases, and while both Brown and Serrano promised to protect access to the pills and procedures, Serrano refused to guarantee he’d enforce the state’s “shield law,” which makes us a safe haven for those fleeing prohibition states just to get health care. Brown vows to fight to keep those laws on the books.

While Serrano argues that “excessive” consumer protection litigation amounts to an abuse of the AGO’s power, Brown promises to put consumers first. He’ll fight companies that plot to increase rent prices, do a better job of overseeing compliance with the Landlord-Tenant Act, and establish a new unit to actively investigate and punish wage theft.

Finally, Brown just has the most relevant experience for the job. As former US District Attorney for Western Washington, he already knows how to run a large public firm. In our interview, he ticked off several ways to make law departments at the state and county levels run more smoothly, most of which dealt with more frequent and more thorough communication practices. Not as flashy of a topic as abortion or gun control, but we do love a bureaucrat who gets fired up about making small but meaningful changes to operations.

A vote for Brown means Washington can continue to progress on all the issues we care about, whereas a vote for Serrano installs someone who plans to pick and choose which laws he’ll fight for based on his political preferences, not the will of elected legislators. Vote Brown.

Commissioner of Public Lands
Dave Upthegrove

The next leader of the Department of Natural Resources (DNR), a large agency that oversees Washington’s 5.6 million acres of public lands, will either be a Republican who takes money from lumber companies or a Democrat who takes money from environmentalists. For the sake of all that is green and blue and clear and good, we strongly encourage you to vote for the latter and more aptly named option, Dave Upthegrove.

If the Lorax wasn’t already incredibly gay, we’d call Upthegrove the gay Lorax. As the head of the DNR, he plans to beef up community wildfire resilience efforts, meaningfully increase the frequency of tribal consultation when citing green energy projects, and continue the agency’s new program to set aside 10,000 acres of forest for carbon sequestration, all while trying to preserve structurally complex forests—colloquially known as “mature legacy forests”—from the buzzsaw.

Though we know lumber groups and conservative counties will fight the agency on all of that, we’re confident that Upthegrove’s experience will allow him to win the day. His years as a State House Representative means he knows which arms to twist and which mouths to feed to get stuff done, and his years representing south King County on the King County Council give us faith in his ability to oversee policy implementation.

Our lands would fare much better in Upthegrove’s hands than they would in the hands of Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler, who boasts a 14 percent lifetime score from the League of Conservation Voters because of all the anti-environment votes she took during her time in Congress. Recently, she voted against the Inflation Reduction Act, against cracking down on oil industry price gouging, against protecting public lands and waters across the west (seriously), and the list goes on because she’s a fucking Republican.

Of course, we know she doesn’t care what environmentalists think of her record, as she referred to those who oppose her as “extremist groups particularly in one part of the state” who “want to see things preserved” but "oftentimes they apply very old science.” The “old science” she’s talking about refers to efforts to preserve the state’s mature legacy forests, most of which were logged before the 1940s and haven’t been touched since. The science she’s leaving out isn’t old but actually new science that says biodiversity is good, and that we shouldn’t cut down a bunch of old trees that do a really good job of storing carbon, maintaining healthy watersheds, and serving as places to walk around and stand in awe of nature. She should read it sometime!

Also, we made the following argument in our primary endorsement, but it bears repeating. We expect not a little discrimination against Upthegrove for being a member of the King County liberal elite telling a bunch of country folk how best to tend their lands. We reject this line of thinking because it fails to acknowledge the “elites” in the timber industry keeping small towns dependent on one crop—trees—and then holding a knife to their throats whenever a conservationist suggests that we might, perhaps, in the midst of a mass extinction, try to increase biodiversity while simultaneously diversifying local economies. As we said in July, the choice between saving the trees and saving rural economies is a false one—we can and should do both.

And there’s real urgency here, too. Thanks to some court cases going the right way, the DNR has more latitude to find creative ways to manage and monetize lands that don’t involve destroying them. We need to seize those opportunities now. Vote Upthegrove.

Superintendent of Public Instruction
Chris Reykdal

Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal’s experience as a teacher, his three terms as a state lawmaker, and his two terms leading this office through the pandemic and the fog of America’s (latest) stupid culture wars make him the only real choice in this race.

Under Reykdal, who grew up poor and who credits his ascendence to public education, more children are receiving free meals. More schools are offering dual-language programs. He’s got a plan to continue diversifying the workforce and to retain more teachers of color, and he’s made a commitment to protecting marginalized students and teachers from an onslaught of conservative attacks on our education system.

After some mixture of cowardice and cunning convinced the Legislature to pass the so-called “Parents Bill of Rights,” a right-wing initiative from our old pal, hedge fund manager Brian Heywood, this summer Reykdal rightly directed the agency to ignore it until the courts and other institutions provided clarity on a number of issues. That’s the kind of direction we can get behind. (We also like him because we saw him at Pride and he seemed happy to see all the gay people.)

Now, a lot of people are pissed at our education system right now, but laying the blame squarely at his feet makes no sense. Our schools are starved for funds, and Reykdal can only ask legislators for more money–he does not control how much he gets. His latest budget request–$2.9 billion–will get us way closer to the bare minimum he says we need to run our classrooms, fund special education, pay teachers a fair wage, and put kids on the bus.

The GOP’s pick for superintendent, David Olson, throws up about a thousand red flags. The former Navy welder and diver has been on Peninsula School District’s board for nearly 11 years, and he’s a friend to fringey right-wingers. His district boasts higher-than-average academic achievement numbers, but for some reason he told the GOP convention in Spokane that we’d save America if every student went into the trades and every four-year university went bankrupt. We love the trades, but that kinda anti-school talk seems pretty radical coming from a guy who wants to run the schools.

The proudly anti-DEI Olson claims to stop short of wanting to ban books. Instead, he tells parents who are upset about trans children playing sports to join their local chapter of the book-banning political extremists, Mom’s for Liberty. And–wouldn’t you know it–the PSD school board meetings have been full of parents and students who say racist and anti-queer bullying is a problem in the district! Huh! Wonder what’s up there? Wonder if anyone could use some training in diversity, equity, and inclusion? Hm!

Putting Olson in charge would be a disaster. Remember, the superintendent isn’t just the bag man. The position comes with the statutory power to choose when and what kids learn. Vote Reykdal.

Insurance Commissioner
Patty Kuderer

Democratic state Senator Patty Kuderer’s experience in employment law, her legislative track record on insurance policy, and the fact that she doesn’t spend her time on the Senate floor saying some of the craziest shit imaginable makes her far and away a better candidate than Republican state Senator Phil Fortunato, an absolute dodo bird who, nevertheless, earns some respect from the SECB for picking up the phone when we call.

Anyway, the Office of the Insurance Commissioner recently experienced a lot of upheaval and turnover following a slew of complaints against outgoing incumbent Commissioner Mike Kreidler. Kuderer’s background as an attorney who has represented victims of workplace discrimination will help the agency heal, regrow, and hopefully safeguard against any future bullshit.

In terms of policy, Kuderer earned the SECB’s respect not only for picking up the phone when we call but for beating the extremely powerful and extremely annoying landlord lobby to pass a number of moderate renter protections. As she has with tenants as a senator, she plans to focus on advocating for consumers rather than a bunch of vampiric insurance companies. She also aims to continue to “pursue” the establishment of a regional, single-payer health care system, require gun-owners to buy insurance to cover negligence and accidents, and expand the Insurance Fair Conduct Act to make the claims process fairer.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t want to regulate the industry to the point where she’s “strangling businesses,” but we’ll take her approach over Fortunato’s, a man who, to cite one recent facepalm moment, defended the rights of Catholic priests not to tell law enforcement if someone confesses to raping a kid.

As for his views regarding the work of the Insurance Commissioner, his public-facing materials offer only some typical Republican pablum about wanting to deregulate the industry to increase competition. For some reason, his website doesn’t really mention his strident opposition to abortion, the “Don’t Say Gay” in schools bill he introduced this session, his opposition to common sense gun laws, or anything else that would reveal him as widely out of touch with most Washingtonians. Vote Kuderer.

Legislative District No. 5
State Senator
Bill Ramos

State House Representative Bill Ramos threw his hat in the ring to replace state Senator Mark Mullet after Mullet skipped off to run an inarguably silly campaign for governor. In almost every conceivable way, Ramos represents a major upgrade. For one, Ramos voted yes on the House’s version of an anti-rent gouging bill that Mullet helped to kill. If the same bill came before Ramos again, he said he’d vote for it. Hoorah.

But he’s not just better on tenant issues. During his five years in the House, he picked some worthy issues to champion. He helped craft Washington’s $17 billion transportation funding package back in 2022, which included about a billion to fund pedestrian walkways and bike paths, with some dollars set aside to build these paths in historically underserved communities. He generally stressed the importance of paying attention to equity issues when designing transportation, which we love to hear.

In-between his transportation work, he took on the project of combating violent domestic extremism. The bill he sponsored would establish a commission to study the issue and recommend some concrete proposals to address it, including looking at a public health approach. He says protesters chanted outside his office “for weeks” before the bill ultimately died in the House. Despite the backlash he received, including at times from his own neighbors, he plans to try again next year.

He has reliably supported policies to increase funding for education, transit, and environmental protections, which is more than we can say for his Republican opponent, Chad Magendanz, who loves charter schools so much that he sponsored the bill that kept them open back when the State Supreme Court struck down the law that made them legal. Vote Ramos.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 1
Victoria Hunt

During the primary, we swooned over Issaquah City Council Member Victoria Hunt for her enthusiastic support for rent stabilization and her urbanist know-how–she’s an experienced urban planner with a PhD in computational ecology. Now we swoon over her again, especially when we see that her Republican opponent is Mark Hargrove, who we once named the “dumbest legislator in Washington” for using a Jack in the Box commercial to buoy his argument against same-sex marriage.

When it comes to housing, Hunt knows that changing zoning alone will not magically create the very large number of apartments that we need to build, which is why she supports funneling more money into the Housing Trust Fund, one of the funds the state uses to help subsidize affordable units.

Unlike her opponent, she believes that we need to increase funding for education, especially for students in the special education system. And she wants to protect that funding by making sure that no dollars go toward charter school voucher programs.

On climate, she strongly supports the state’s cap-and-trade system and wants to pass a bill to force fossil fuel companies to open their books so we can see just how much of a burden they’re passing down to consumers while raking in huge profits.

But what we love the most about Hunt is her support for all kinds of progressive revenue ideas– everything from adjustments to the capital gains tax, an excess compensation tax, and even a tweak to make the estate tax more progressive. She’s in her Robin Hood era. Vote Hunt.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 2
Lisa Callan

Lawmakers work on a number of issues, but three-term State Representative Lisa Callan seems especially dedicated to helping Washington’s children, which is great–our understanding is that children are our future, and if we want to have a good future then we have to treat them well and not just throw them in the lake when they fuck up like our uncles did.

Anyhow, Callan successfully carried the bill to increase the 2024 special education funding cap from 15 to 16 percent, which was a good start but probably isn’t enough. The bill included funding for a report that will tell us whether we should remove the cap altogether or whether, miraculously, every school’s needs somehow conform to this arbitrary cap, so we’re happy for that.

Last year, Callan also permanently enshrined a program that keeps kids in foster care connected to their original homes. The Family Connections Program provides resources to parents and foster parents to allow them to work together on reunification, seeking to minimize the trauma of the child welfare system by helping to maintain some communication between all parties when possible.

If reelected, Callan will keep pushing her colleagues to back her bill limiting isolation and restraint of children in schools, a disciplinary strategy that really isn’t that productive for a lot of seven-year-olds! In the meantime, she’s scraped together some dollars for some pilot programs encouraging districts to avoid the practice, and she’s running an inside strategy to get more lawmakers onboard with the movement to stop traumatizing kids.

She beat her opponent, Patrick Peacock, by about 15 points in the primary, and it’s no wonder why. Like the rest of these cookie-cutter Republicans, he supports all the shitty initiatives, wants to lower taxes, and yet also wants more police. Classic. We’d do the state’s children a real disservice in swapping out Callan for a generic Republican. Vote Callan.

Legislative District No. 11
Representative Position No. 2
Steve Bergquist

When he’s not working on education policy, State Representative Steve Bergquist acts out his own version of Undercover Boss as a paraeducator and substitute teacher in Renton. The time in the classroom informs his work as a legislator, which has led to the introduction and passage of some pretty decent policies.

Last session, he successfully secured money to standardize programming that helps kids transition to Kindergarten. He also voted to eliminate the special education enrollment cap that many legislators (at least 94 of them in the House) believe interferes with the State’s duty to provide a free, appropriate education to all students. Though his bill to fund one year of trade school for free didn’t make it out of committee last session, he'll try again next year if he wins back his seat–which he should.

Bergquist’s Libertarian opponent, Justin Greywolf, is mostly running on a platform of cutting taxes. He also told the Family Policy Institute of Washington–a conservative, religious lobbying organization that defends “Biblical values”—that he agreed with a lot of their positions, though he said he disagreed with their opposition to marriage equality. That’s not quite enough to swing us to his side. Vote Bergquist.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 1
Jamila E. Taylor

Last year, State House Representative Jamila Taylor got ahold of $1.25 million to stop Pattison’s West Skating Center (now known as El Centro Skate Rink) in Federal Way from turning into a gas station, an accomplishment that immediately elevated her in our eyes to the status of a 1980s movie hero. We love a legislator who cares that deeply about a culturally significant gathering place in her community.

We also appreciate the economic development work she’s done for her district and across Washington, including her Covenant Homeownership Program, which provides interest-free loans to first-time homebuyers who can prove they or their family felt the effect of Washington’s racial housing discrimination prior to 1968. The program also includes a provision to investigate past housing discrimination to see if lawmakers can expand eligibility criteria, and it will hopefully go a little way toward repairing discrimination that led to wealth gaps.

If we return her to office for a third term, as chair of the House Civil Rights & Judiciary Committee she promises to continue making progress on creating a unified court system. The Legislature needs to modernize and standardize our court system, partly so we can collect better information on its effects. We’re glad Taylor’s on the case because she really lights up when she talks about this very serious but utterly dull work.

Her Republican opponent, Republican Melissa Hamilton, has worked for both the Lacey and Federal Way police departments in support roles. She supports all of the initiatives, which would set Washington back on climate change, long-term care, and progressive revenue. While Taylor’s down in Olympia digging into court structures and trying to reverse years of discrimination, Hamilton would be making it harder for the state to fund services and fighting any bills to limit police power or reduce mass incarceration. Boriiinnnggg. Vote Taylor.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 2
Kristine M. Reeves

State House Representative Kristine Reeves is fine. If elected for a second full term, her one big priority will be to ban flavored tobacco products in Washington State. Whoopee. In the 2023 Healthy Youth Survey, about 7.7 percent of 10th graders reported using an electronic cigarette in the past 30 days. Vaping companies seem to target the youth with their bright colors and candy flavors, and Reeves doesn’t want her kids or anyone else’s to grow up in the shadow of addiction. Fair enough.

Even if we’re a little sad that Reeves plans to confiscate our cinnamon-flavored vape fluid, it was nice that she sponsored the House version of the bill to establish a state-run, automatic Individual Retirement Account (IRA) program for workers whose employers don’t offer them. Though the senate version ultimately passed, the new law could result in Washingtonians saving an additional $3.9 billion for retirement over the next 20 years. That could be big. According to Legislative staff, about two-thirds of all millennials have no retirement savings.

She also voted for rent stabilization, and she promises to keep voting for it, she says. She stressed that Washington can’t build its way out of the problem of housing instability tomorrow, and the bill addresses the immediate harm people face from rising rent prices pushing them out onto the street.

Reeves did do a couple weird things surrounding that bill, though. First, she secured an amendment to monitor the effects of rent stabilization, with a particular focus on whether the program inadvertently dissuades people from pursuing home ownership, especially Black and Brown people, Reeves says. This argument made our heads explode. Washington has the sixth highest average rent in the country, nearly half of our renters currently spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing, and the median home price in King County topped $1 million this year. That’s what makes it difficult to buy a house–not protections to prevent gouging. But, whatever. The study is mostly harmless. Reeves argued she just wants to ensure the state funds rental protection programs alongside home ownership assistance options, which is fine.

We do like her more than her opponent, Republican Federal Way School Board Director Quentin Morris. In an interview with the Federal Way Mirror, he argued that homelessness is “rarely a housing scarcity” issue and is simply based on “behavioral issues.” Reeves responded to that assertion by first exclaiming, “Jesus Christ,” and then she said she’s just tired of hearing Morris’s bullshit. Reeves herself experienced homelessness for a couple years as a teenager, and it had nothing to do with her having a substance use disorder or a mental health diagnosis. Vote Reeves.

Legislative District No. 32
Representative Position No. 1
Cindy Ryu

Look, we’re not saying that eight-term State House Representative Cindy Ryu won’t try to defend a landlord. She’s a commercial landlord herself, after all. But she voted for a rent stabilization bill that would help prevent landlords from gouging tenants, and that’s better than we would have predicted in 2022. She’s just okay on tenant issues, but we can work with just okay.

We also didn’t love Ryu for sponsoring a bill to make trafficking in catalytic converters a Class C Felony, but we also don’t love waking up to a damaged car that’s going to release more gross emissions, so we’ll call that a wash.

Plus, Ryu is occasionally a friend to some recently incarcerated people. She said she’s working with Edmonds Community College (ECC) on a bill to help fund support and courses for veterans who did time. ECC started a similar program using federal COVID-19 dollars a few years ago, and Ryu hopes to find state money to make the program permanent and maybe expand it to other community colleges. Though that bill failed to exit a key committee last session, she plans to bring it forward again next session.

We’d happily take Ryu’s lukewarm support for rent stabilization (she said she'd be more comfortable with a 10 percent cap than the 7 percent cap she ultimately voted for) and her heavy regulation of the scrap metal industry over her opponent, Republican Lisa Rezac, an auctioneer, fundraising consultant, and former Republican Party Chair for the 32nd Legislative District. Rezac supports the Let’s Go Washington initiatives, which would reduce funding for public education and set the state back in its climate goals. AND YET, she claims she wants to prioritize education and to stop the government and corporations from putting anything into our air and water that might hurt us. We really don’t think she’s thought through her platform, though we did love that she dedicated one entire page of her website to promoting some random wellness book. But that's not enough to convince us. Vote Ryu.

Legislative District No. 32
Representative Position No. 2
Lauren Davis

State House Representative Lauren Davis deserves a fourth term in the Legislature for her dedication to improving Washington’s underperforming behavioral health and criminal legal systems. Few lawmakers display her breadth of knowledge and commitment to making progress on any issue, let alone a couple of the toughest and most politically dicey ones we face.

But she’s not one to let the cowardice of her colleagues prevent her from funding the issues she supports. Every session that leadership decides to skip an opportunity to pass a new progressive tax, she spends hours digging for ways to close loopholes to find the millions of dollars that the State could be collecting and redirecting toward treatment facilities, recovery housing, and jail reentry programs.

Admittedly her hours of study haven't always paid off. In 2022, she tried to close a tax break for companies that warehouse opioids and other drugs in Washington. The bill would have raised an estimated $53 million to go to far better purposes, but it died at its first public hearing. She promises to bring it back again this session.

The death of that bill does not speak to the level of success that Davis has achieved during her time in the House, though. Thanks to her, Washington hospitals send every overdose patient home with a naloxone kit, not just a prescription for one. (Under the previous system, few people actually filled those naloxone prescriptions.) She’s also had her hand in some criminal justice reform, eliminating a law that revoked a person’s license after any felony conviction involving the use of a car, unless the crime threatened the safety of people or property. The law scooped up a lot of people and made complying with sentencing conditions, such as making behavioral health appointments or retaining employment, much harder.

On the other side, Davis’s Republican opponent, Lori Theis, plans to vote for Trump. Though she says she wants to “fix” homelessness, crime, and every other issue conservatives like to exploit for votes, she offers no real viable or evidence-backed alternatives. Vote Davis.

Legislative District No. 33
Representative Position No. 1
Tina L. Orwall

Back in 2015, longtime State Representative Tina Orwall made it her mission to get the Washington State Crime Lab to finish testing all the backlogged sexual assault kits. Thanks partly to her consistent pressure, last year she saw the successful conclusion of that work, allowing us all to close that “dark chapter” in our state’s history, she says. Now, the lab tests kits within 45 days, and sometimes closer to a month, which provides people with more paths for legal action.

While Orwall sometimes leans a little heavily into carceral feminism for some of our tastes, at other times she seriously pursues avenues other than policing to solve societal ills. For example, she led the House’s work on 988, a suicide and crisis hotline that allows people to call something other than 911 when they need help with a behavioral health crisis. She also sponsored a successful bill to fund more mobile crisis teams in conjunction with the launch of 988. At a time when people seem reluctant to take up police work and communities struggle to help people cycling through behavioral systems, investing in these alternatives seems wise.

For her next project, she’s started coordinating with colleges to find better ways to help students access services after they’ve dealt with gender-based violence. Right now, victim complaints often only lead to a scheduled appointment with a counselor. She’s not yet sure what “better” looks like, but we’re excited to see what she comes up with.

We don’t have very many mean things to say about her opponent, George Richter, mainly because he’s not giving us much to work with. He has no money, and we weren’t even really sure if he existed. But Orwall says she met him the other day, and they’re actually going to talk about some stuff they can work on together. We’d prefer she shun Republicans, especially in the age of Trump, but good for her for neutralizing her opponents. Vote Orwall.

Legislative District No. 33
Representative Position No. 2
Mia Su-Ling Gregerson

Generally, we have good things to say about State House Representative Mia Su-Ling Gregerson. For the past 10 years, she has consistently supported legislation to keep people in housing, to tax the rich, and to increase participation in the political process.

Last session, she fought hard for a bill to allow cities to hold local elections on even years, when average voter turnout runs much higher. That simple change would make municipal elections much more democratic and representative, which we love–and not just because it scares politicians such as conservative Seattle City Council President Sara Nelson, who was elected in a low-turnout, odd-year election. Unfortunately, Gregerson failed to find the votes for the bill, but she promises to keep fighting if we give her a sixth term.

While she’s good on tenant stuff and democracy stuff, her increased support for charter schools, which she recently confessed to the Seattle Times, deeply disappoints us. As if the education system didn’t have enough issues, now we have to deal with progressives peeling off to funnel dollars away from actual public schools.

Gregerson told the Seattle Times she thought charter schools could offer benefits, such as smaller class sizes, and that it may be time for a conversation about increasing the number of schools. When we asked her what the fuck she was talking about, she said she wanted to remain open to the conversation because people continue to ask her about increasing funding for charter schools.

She says she’s sat through presentations where BIPOC parents with kids attending South King County charter schools share how their students really thrive in those environments. She pushes back on the idea that charters improve outcomes for kids of color, arguing that many of those kids often live in Kirkland and Bellevue, and they benefit from a high economic status. She could also point to all the evidence showing that charter schools lack funding accountability and lead to underfunding of public schools. And while we readily admit that public schools are failing children of color, we disagree that she needs to leave the door open for a discussion about ways to starve public schools of the funding we need to better serve them.

Nevertheless, Gregerson is a much better candidate than her opponent, Casey Esmond, who appears not to be running much of a campaign. His candidate website is no longer up, and he ignored our call, as well as calls from other, lesser, endorsement boards. From what we can tell, he espouses a Libertarian ideology. Very old school, very ‘90s. Still, we hope Gregerson will stand firm against charter schools. Vote Gregerson.

Legislative District No. 34
Representative Position No. 1
Emily Alvarado

When the SECB endorsed House Representative Emily Alvarado for her first term in 2022, we vowed to print out our endorsement and eat it if she ended up morphing into her old boss, Jenny Durkan. Good news: We don't have to do that! Double good news: We don't have to learn how to connect to the printer in the office!

Alvarado exceeded our expectations during her first term in the House. She marketed herself as a strong housing advocate, and advocate she did, supporting, if we are not mistaken, every single bill to encourage housing density. She also championed the perennial rent stabilization bill, an issue so tough we thought she took it on as part of some kind of humiliation ritual to haze the frosh. But she passed it out of her chamber, moving the humiliation on to the moderates in the Senate who killed the bill.

In addition to standing up to the landlord lobby, she stood up for the working class by making it easier to access food assistance programs, accelerating stability for those with work-limiting disabilities, and attempting to beef up consumer protections around gift cards.

Alvarado said she wants another term to attend to some unfinished business. She'll pass rent stabilization through the House again, only this time with a more progressive Senate to get it to the Governor's desk. She'll also remove barriers to workers’ benefits that some see after a workplace injury, fight to keep kids who are in the foster care system out of the criminal legal system, and pass legislation to make it easier to get a year's supply of birth control all at once.

Though she anticipates a tough budget year in 2025, she said Washington needs a strong advocate for progressive revenue like her. We agree! And we'll take nine of her for the Seattle City Council, please! Real Slog readers get it *wink*.

With all Alvarado has going for her, it's almost not worth mentioning her Republican opponent, Kimberly Cloud. In fact, it would be almost kinder for us to pretend she does not exist. We like that Cloud frequently used “lol” in the answers to her Ballotpedia questionnaire, but we didn’t like that she said her biggest role model is Donald Trump, and that she recommended voters watch the 1994 buddy comedy Dumb and Dumber to understand her political philosophy. We’ll pass! Vote Alvarado.

Legislative District No. 34
Representative Position No. 2
Joe Fitzgibbon

State House Majority Leader Joe Fitzgibbon may not be the 23-year-old lefty the SECB of yesteryear fell for (and heavily sexualized! Sorry about that, Joe. It won’t happen again—at least not until you go gray). But with landmark climate policy on the ballot, we need an environmental advocate like Fitzgibbon wrangling Democrats in the House to do the right thing.

As we’ve mentioned, this year mega-rich farmer-cosplayer Brian Heywood bought a slew of “Let’s Go Washington”-branded initiatives, including I-2066 to ban electrification and I-2117 to repeal the Climate Commitment Act. Fitzgibbon said the passage of either initiative would represent a huge step backward, but if that happens, then he would use his leverage in leadership to strengthen the environmental policies the state will still have. For example, he suggested accelerating timelines for the Clean Fuel Standard law, which requires fuel suppliers to reduce carbon intensity of transportation fuels to 20 percent below 2017 levels by 2034. He also said he could expand the Clean Buildings Performance Standards to include more types of buildings, or ramp up requirements on car dealers in the Zero-Emission Vehicles law.

But right now, Fitzgibbon is putting all his energy into stopping the repeal altogether. We think it's pretty cool that he fights the good fight off the clock, too!

On the other hand, his opponent, Jolie Ann Lansdowne, shouts out her support for the “Let’s Go Washington” initiatives on the homepage of her website. In addition to the attacks on environmental policy, she seems particularly excited to repeal the capital gains tax, a modest 7 percent tax on the sale of stocks, bonds, and other long-term capital assets.

In contrast, Fitzgibbon said he will be an advocate for progressive revenue. Instead of repealing the capital gains tax, he’s interested in filling some of its “loopholes,” particularly the exclusion of residential real estate. Based. Vote Fitzgibbon.

Legislative District No. 36
Representative Position No. 2
Liz Berry

State House Rep. Liz Berry won 89 percent of the vote in the primary, and we totally get it. She advocates for popular, Democratic priorities, and she does so very successfully.

Hate gun violence? Berry’s right there with ya. She introduced and passed a ban on ghost guns, a mandatory 10-day waiting period on the purchase of firearms, and a bill to require gun owners to report their missing or stolen guns within 24 hours. She also co-sponsored a ban on the sale of assault rifles and a ban on high-capacity magazines. Now, if only she’d sponsor a bill to melt all the guns…

Anyway, love workers’ rights? So does Berry. She shepherded bills to help workers recover wages they’re owed, to extend death benefits to the families of gig drivers who die on the job, and to invalidate non-disclosure agreements for workers who experience harassment, discrimination, assault, retaliation, and wage theft in the workplace. As chair of the House Labor Committee, she also worked on and supported the Strippers Bill of Rights and a bill protecting workers who refuse to attend captive audience meetings

We’re not sure when Berry sleeps, but we’re glad she’s not tired of her job just yet. In her next term, she will continue her gun safety crusade by reintroducing a bill to establish a permit-to-purchase system. She believes such a system will help prevent guns from getting into “the wrong hands.” She also wants to push legislation to require companies to label their recyclable materials in a way that makes sorting waste easier on the consumer.

We would advise you not to vote for her opponent, Victoria Palmer, a Republican who advocates for “vaccine choice,” but, again, almost 90% of voters in Berry’s district already voted for her, so we’re preaching to the choir. Vote Berry.

Legislative District No. 37
Representative Position No. 2
Chipalo Street

BREAKING: The Stranger Election Control Board endorses a tech bro landlord–AGAIN. But we’re not endorsing just any tech bro landlord, we’re endorsing State House Rep. Chipalo Street.

Hear us out. Despite what his background might suggest, Street is without question one of the most progressive lawmakers in the whole State Legislature. He spent his first term securing incentives for the development of affordable housing and supporting vital health care infrastructure.

Street argues that his experiences in some of the more bloodless corners of the private market contribute to his good work in the public sector. His Big Tech job gave him a unique and important perspective on the My Health My Data Act, a first-of-its-kind bill he co-sponsored that requires companies to take meaningful steps to protect consumer health data. He could sniff out when lawmakers should hear the tech sector as whiny babies and when they actually had a good point, particularly when it came to implementation timelines.

Similarly, Street used his experience as a landlord to act as an authoritative counter to the landlord lobby’s advocacy against rent stabilization. When landlords gasped at a 7 percent cap on rent increases, Street pointed out that a landlord’s mortgage is fixed. That 7 percent cap is plenty to cover the increased cost of utilities and maintenance expenses.

Finally, if we give Street another two years, he swears to be another dedicated foot soldier in the quest for more progressive revenue. The state will likely face a deficit next year, and the candidates we elect will decide between slashing social programs and taxing the rich. Street would choose to tax the rich. Right answer! Vote Street.

Legislative District No. 41
State Senator
Lisa Wellman

When not caping for corporate interests, state Senator Lisa Wellman, who represents Mercer Island, tends to vote the right way, and she seems broadly supportive of things we like, such as progressive taxation, opposition to charter schools, and, somewhat excitingly, rent stabilization–though she has some caveats there about wanting cities to set the caps themselves, to which we say booooooo, and booo again.

Given that she chairs the Early Learning & K-12 Education Committee and sits on the Senate’s powerful Ways & Means Committee at a moment when schools across the state face big deficits, education will top her list of priorities this session. In our interview, she swore that in her fifth term she’d push for a fully funded public education system. In fact, she says she’s already starting to “oil the skids” on that topic with her fellow legislators and has put together presentations on why administration and operation costs continue to climb for school districts.

If she can explain where every district spends its dollars to the satisfaction of her fellow lawmakers, she hopes they’ll be more inclined to increase funding. She also wants to push Congressman Adam Smith to make the federal government kick in more for special education funding. Finally, she’s hoping to work with her Olympia “bestie,” potential future Insurance Commissioner Patty Kuderer, to figure out how to lower insurance costs for schools.

Our major gripe with Wellman is her consistent opposition to removing the cap on the percentage of students enrolled in special education. In 2023, Wellman agreed to lift the cap from 13.5 to 15 percent, but she opposed full elimination of the cap, a decision that frustrated some lawmakers, including State House Representative Gerry Pollet, who wanted to see the cap gone altogether. (That cap increased to 16 percent in 2024.)

Pollet has consistently framed the "arbitrary cap” as a civil rights issue that disproportionately hurts low-income and students of color. We’re with him on this one and think the state can’t just set a random number for what they think a school’s disability percentage should be. Luckily, the State Auditor plans to study this very issue and give the Legislature a recommendation by the end of 2025. Hopefully Pollet can shake some dollars loose from Wellman in the meantime.

Still, Wellman’s clearly working to convince the Legislature that school districts aren’t fretting away their funding on unnecessary expenses, as some would believe. And she’s a hell of a lot better than Republican Jaskaran Singh Sarao, the Bellevue landlord who jumped on the right’s weird “squatter” panic and harassed his tenant for months. Vote Wellman.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 1
Tana Senn

Yet again, State House Representative Tana Senn managed to exceed our expectations for someone from Mercer Island. With her bill to allow the Washington State Patrol to melt down the guns they confiscate, she ended the state’s role as a gun dealer, which was kinda fun. She also sided with tenants on the issue of rent stabilization, supporting a 7 percent cap on rent increases. And her bill to fund electric school buses shows us she cares about clean air around bus stops and the planet that our kids will inherit.

She’s also advocated for some necessary but arguably controversial bills, as well. Last session, she sponsored a bill to help children convicted of a sex offense to seek removal from the sex offender registry based on completion of certain court conditions. We appreciate someone who stands up for the future of all children, not just the ones choking on smog at bus stops. That kind of courage deserves a seventh term.

And she certainly outshines her Republican challenger, Emily Tadlock, who spent part of 2022 prowling through neighborhoods trying to unearth illegal voters. We imagine Tadlock may end up having some controversial takes about this presidential election. How enthralling. Vote Senn.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 2
My-Linh Thai

We thought about making this endorsement a TikTok montage of us and State House Representative My-Linh Thai set to Billie Eilish’s “Birds of a Feather,” but our Human Resources department advised us against that. Buzzkills!

Anyway, Rep. Thai is an exceptional advocate for working-class people in a Legislature that’s way too cozy with the landlord lobby. In her last term, she fought for renters by scoring more money in the state budget to pay for legal aid for tenants facing eviction and by passing a new law to protect tenants from unreasonable damage claims.

While she’ll always support renters’ rights, she’s got a different priority for her next term: The wealth tax. In 2023, Thai and another SECB fav, state Sen. Noel Frame, proposed the Washington State Wealth Tax, a super-narrow tax on extreme wealth over a quarter million dollars of assessed value derived from the ownership of stocks, bonds, and other financial assets. The revenue would pay for education, housing, disability services, and tax credits for working families.

The proposal didn’t make it very far in either chamber, but Thai thinks she and Frame can build a pressure campaign to move stragglers within her party—after all, Democrats have a majority, which should grow after this election.

If Thai doesn’t win, we’d lose one of our strongest advocates for progressive revenue to Republican Al Rosenthal, who advocates against the sales tax, car tab fees, and other regressive revenue streams without plans to backfill them with a tax on the rich. But taxation is far from the centerpiece of his campaign. Rosenthal joins a distressing trend of candidates who seemed to plug the sparknotes of that San Fransicko book into ChatGPT to write their ill-conceived “Treatment First” homelessness platforms. We’ve debunked this model a few times in response to We Heart Seattle’s Andrea Suarez and new internet villain Rachael Savage. And no amount of cosplaying as war reporters on 3rd and Pine will change the fact that it is more effective to house people than to stick them into mandatory treatment, where they may fail out and return to the streets. This ideology of shame, punishment, and paternalism must be rejected. In the meantime, vote Thai.

Legislative District No. 43
Representative Position No. 2
Shaun Scott

We could all go on and on and on about how Statewide Poverty Action Network Lobbyist Shaun Scott and We Heart Seattle Executive Director Andrea Suarez represent starkly different ideologies and visions for Washington, but voters in one of the state’s most renter-heavy districts are too busy working too hard for too little to put up with that crap. The choice here is between a candidate who knows what they’re talking about and one who does not.

Even if he talks as if he expected us to carve his words into stone atop Mount Sinai, Scott isn’t your typical sanctimonious Democratic Socialist. (Sorry, love you all.) He’s a serious guy with serious policy experience who wants to get stuff done in Olympia–like yesterday.

He’s all-in on closing corporate tax loopholes, implementing progressive taxes like a statewide wealth tax, and taxing real estate transactions to pay for social housing. To help out all those tenants in the district, he wants rent control, and he wants rent payments to help build credit scores. As a representative of a neighborhood the cops gassed for a week, he also wants to protect protestors from state prosecution, establish a state police accountability board, and pass a law to stop police unions from bargaining away accountability measures. And as many Democrats ignore COVID entirely, Scott wants to fund research for Long COVID and to support those suffering from the post-viral illness. Sprinkle a state task force to look into white supremacist activity and resettlement centers for asylum-seekers, and, people, you have like a third of his detailed platform.

Suarez lacks this sort of vision and eye for policy. Though her campaign materials tout her as a “progressive,” it’s all drag. Zero Democratic groups back her, let alone the progressive ones–and for good reason. Based on the way she’s been running her campaign, she’s got more in common with a compulsive conservative Facebook commenter than she does with even the most moderate of Democrats. When not calling Scott a “communist,” she spends her time proselytizing on behalf of a homelessness policy that spawned from a toxic MAGA pit and tagging news organizations on social media when she finds stuff in the woods. That’s about it.

Though the big brains on the Seattle Times Editorial Board dismiss Scott as an extremist, they don’t have much company. Scott has been endorsed by more than a dozen labor unions, the biggest conservation group in the state, environmental justice orgs, urbanist orgs, and gobs of establishment Democrats, including his potential future seatmate, State House Rep. Nicole Macri, and Washington State House Speaker Emeritus Rep. Frank Chopp. If you want someone who will actually provoke debate in Olympia and not waste any more of your precious time, then vote Scott.

Legislative District No. 45
Representative Position No. 2
Melissa Demyan

The Stranger Election Control Board probably would have bought a billboard to attract new talent to the 45th Legislative District, which covers Kirkland, if 20-year incumbent State House Rep. Larry Springer faced another election without a progressive challenger. That’s why it is with such great pleasure that we endorse labor organizer Melissa Demyan to knock down this switch-hitter Democrat.

Things we like about Demyan: She’s a renter, she’s got a union background, she wore a cool tie to our endorsement meeting, and she’s not fucking Springer. He’s a landlord (to his adult son, if that matters), he’s the self-described liaison between his caucus and the business community (there’s plenty others, believe us), and he wore no such cool tie to our meeting. (Though we did like his glasses, and he kinda had great taste in general.)

Instead, Springer droned on and on, excusing his piss-poor voting record on technicalities or utter bullshit. Why didn’t he support a bill to protect abortion care from hospital mergers? He wanted to consider how the bill would affect chiropractors. Why did he want to give more public funding to charter schools? He said he liked the educational “vibe” in charter school classrooms. Why does he support I-2066, the Republican-backed initiative to ban electrification? Based on the convoluted answer he gave and then somewhat walked back in a follow-up email, we have to assume he just did not read the initiative.

Still, Springer thinks his experience as one of the few lawmakers who served during the 2008 financial crisis would be valuable next year as the State faces budget turmoil. We say institutional knowledge, shminstitutional shknowledge. If Springer’s still convinced we should use public funds on charter schools after two decades in the State Legislature, we actually don’t think he’s better-suited to manage tax dollars than any rando in Kirkland.

And Demyan’s not a rando. Sure, she may be a little green, but she’s got all the organizing experience a lawmaker needs to build coalitions to pass bills that will help people. Give her even half a term in Olympia, and she’ll find all the levers she needs to pull. Springer had his chance. It’s time to pass the torch. Vote Demyan.

Legislative District No. 46
Representative Position No. 1
Gerry Pollet

As Seattle’s school district threatens to shutter elementary schools, voters in the 46th Legislative District, which covers the city’s northeastern reaches, should count themselves lucky to have a public education champion like State House Rep. Gerry Pollet on the ballot this year.

In his last term, he raised the “unconscionable and unconstitutional” cap on education services funding for children with disabilities. He promises to eliminate the cap for good in his next term.

To stave off school closures, he will propose a $1.1 billion increase to school budgets. He acknowledges that the sum won’t solve the problem entirely, as school funding relies heavily on local levy revenue. To help juice enrollment to keep those state dollars flowing, he said Seattle must increase affordable, family-sized housing density around public schools. And he’s not just saying that to the Stranger Election Control Board. In a six-page letter, he told Mayor Bruce Harrell that his comprehensive plan did not go far enough to promote affordable density.

That brings us to the elephant in the room—Pollet’s NIMBY streak. He watered down the so-called “missing middle” housing bill, catching a lot of flack from urbanist types. He stands by it, saying he wanted to keep marginalized communities in their neighborhoods. To be clear, we think he should still advocate against displacement, but we hope he finds ways to do that without perpetuating the housing shortage that also prices people out of their neighborhoods. But we probably won’t have to worry about a repeat of the “missing middle” episode because Democrats booted him from the local government committee.

And it's not like his opponent brings a platform of militant urbanism to the ballot. Republican Beth Daranciang’s “platform” matches the policy prescriptions offered by every other low-rent GOP loser on this ballot: She supports all four batshit initiatives, wants to cut taxes, fearmongers about crime, and then caps it all off with a little transphobic nonsense about “women’s and girls’ sex-based rights.” Vote Pollet.

Legislative District No. 46
Representative Position No. 2
Darya Farivar

In 2022, Washington voters sent Rep. Darya Farivar–the State House’s youngest member, its first Middle Eastern woman, and its first Iranian American–off to Olympia. And they were so right to do so.

Whether she’s crafting or voting on legislation, she approaches questions of policy with an exacting mind and human heart. A wonk who previously directed public policy for Disability Rights Washington, she recognizes how small tweaks and vague legal language can make an enormous difference in our lives. Farivar successfully carried bills last session that eliminated the cost of extended family visits to their incarcerated loved ones, made sure people leaving state custody had an ID in their hands when they headed home (you can’t really get a job or apartment without one), raised caps on penalties for antitrust violations to hold big companies to account for things like price-fixing and collusion. She also sponsored the Nothing About Us Without Us Act, which requires the state to include people with lived experience of issues in government work groups, task forces, and advisory committees. In Farivar’s experience, that kind of requirement leads to better policy.

All-in-all, that’s four bills she prime-sponsored and got passed, as well as another she co-sponsored–quite good for a junior lawmaker. And if we send her back, which we should, then she’ll keep doing more good work. Next session, for instance, she plans to reintroduce a bill that would give courts the option to divert low-level offenders with mental health and substance use disorders to treatment alternatives, skipping jail that can disrupt housing and job prospects and even lead to overdoses.

We’ll happily take a compassionate policy nerd like Farivar over a vibes candidate like her Republican challenger, Simone Barron. At first blush, you’d think a service industry pro with 35 years experience who co-founded the Full Service Workers Alliance and sat on the board of Restaurant Workers of America would be into worker’s rights, but names can deceive. In 2021, she did a video for the conservative media nonprofit PragerU, which tries to brainwash America’s children (and adults) with their trash content, to explain how minimum wage increases are an attack on tipped workers. We don’t think they are, and we’re not alone. Barron has attracted only tens of financial backers, and nearly a quarter of her whopping $4,100 war chest comes straight from the King County Republican Party. Lol. Vote Farivar.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 1
Debra Jean Entenman

Debra Jean Entenman is the friend we generally get along with, occasionally really vibe with, and have that one awkward topic we don’t want to bring up, but we respect her sense of conviction overall.

A 30-year resident of Kent who first ran to represent a changing South King County, Entenman has represented the 47th Legislative District since kicking Republican dunce cap Mark Hargrove to the curb in 2018. We want her to stay.

On the transportation committee, she says she’s worked to improve the safety between SR 18 and I-90. Covington locals benefit from her commitment to creating more parks and improving the pool, so more kids of color can learn to swim, hopefully preventing drownings in our watery region.

We all benefit from her uncompromising attitude on police accountability. In 2021, she sponsored a bill to create Washington’s Office of Independent Investigations, which will start investigating incidents of deadly police force this December.

She wants to go even farther by eliminating police immunity and creating a statewide prosecutor independent of the State Attorney General. That latter goal gets tricky because it would take a state constitutional amendment, so Entenman supported State House Rep. Monica Stonier’s Russia- doll workaround to create an independent office within the AG’s office. That bill failed, and she says the community did not think the office would be separated enough anyway because prosecutors still had first dibs on cases. But she remains open to other ideas, and we appreciate the effort.

Our beef with Entemann was and will continue to be the charter schools she’s insistent on funding. When we asked about charters siphoning off funds from kids in neighborhood schools across the country, she said without charters there is still inequality from rich fundraising PTA parents at well-to-do public schools. Yeah okay fine, but two wrongs don’t make a right.

But since her now-perennial Republican challenger, Kyle Lyebyedyev, is not so much a real candidate as much as he is a scramble of promises to fix everything without raising taxes, we’ll just have to agree to disagree with her.

This is sort of beside the point, but Lyebyebyev looks like Zach Braff and Dax Shepard morphed into one guy. Coincidentally, he’s also really annoying. For some reason, he calls his public Facebook page “Kyle Lyebyedyev’s Corner: Where Family, Politics and Fun Collide,” our “gateway to connection, insight and a sprinkle of laughter.” The page features smiley family pics and a photo of him and his wife standing by an American flag with swimmer-turned-anti-trans activist Riley Gaines. At least Entenman’s not for charter school vouchers? Vote Entenman.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 2
Chris Stearns

State House Rep. Chris Stearns made history when his constituents voted him the first Native American on the Auburn City Council, and then again in 2022 when he became one of only three Indigenous lawmakers in the Legislature. And it’s not empty representation—he is using his seat to fight for Indigenous people.

To name one example, he sponsored the Native American apprenticeship bill, which will help pay for tuition, supplies, and the cost of living for tribal members in apprenticeship programs when it goes into effect in 2026. He also doubled state funding to treat people living with a gambling disorder. Studies show Indigenous people deal with gambling addiction at about twice the rate of the general public.

If we give him another term, Stearns says he will continue working to address problem gambling. Last year, he introduced a bill to create a pilot program for gambling treatment diversion court, which would help people who commit financial crimes as a result of their gambling addiction get into treatment instead of jail.

Speaking of jail, the Legislature recently passed a bill to end the automatic use of juvenile points in sentencing that can add years to jail time. If we re-elect Stearns, he will push the issue even further and strike the juvenile points retroactively, removing years off of sentences that already accounted for juvenile points.

It is clear to the SECB that Stearns brings a unique and thoughtful perspective to his role, which is more than we can say of his opponent, Ted Cooke. Cooke is a Republican–and an uncreative one at that. He’s running on a copy-paste platform of election denialism, bootlicking, and anti-trans panic, according to his website. Yawn! Vote Stearns.

Legislative District No. 48
Representative Position No. 1
Vandana Slatter

Vandana Slatter, chair of the Post-Secondary Education & Workforce Committee and co-chair of the Science, Technology and Innovation Caucus, is a clinical pharmacist running for her fourth full term in the State Legislature. We should send her back to continue fighting for the environment, affordable housing, access to a college education, and our all-important health care.

Last year, Rep. Slatter worked with Gov. Jay Inslee’s office to create the Washington Climate Corps Network. Managed and administered by Serve Washigton, the program buoys AmeriCorps funds with Climate Commitment Act money to funnel 17 to 31-year-olds and military veterans toward green energy jobs statewide. Neat!

She also co-sponsored a bill that streamlines the financial aid process for high school students on food stamps. Starting next year, they’ll automatically qualify for the Washington College Grant without having to submit paperwork to prove their income.

To ease the crushing burden of student debt on the state’s public servants and to align with changes to the federal Public Loan Service Program, she also introduced a bill to better notify teachers, firefighters, and nurses of relief opportunities.

And last year, Inslee also Slatter’s My Health My Data Act, which protects our health information, as well as people visiting on their abortion care and gender-affirming medicine journeys from Republican hell states. All very good things!

We can’t really drum up the same level of enthusiasm for her opponent, Lynn Trinh. Trinh’s short but sweet video-forward platform could be summed up with five hearty puffs on a bright-red dog whistle. Republicans, get your slop: “Reclaim Parental Rights, Restore Quality Education, Redeem Public Safety, Reduce Regulations and Taxes, and Return to Civil Liberties.” Love the alliteration, but hate the ideas.

Trinh, whose family moved to the US following China’s Cultural Revolution, said she “understood the danger of losing freedoms” but has suggested that “Tibet’s today” could be America’s tomorrow, and this “misinformation” talk is silencing “genuine criticism.” Counterpoint: No, and if you’re worried about draconian overreach, then maybe the call is coming from inside the house?

Anyway, she didn’t respond to our meeting invitation, and it’s not entirely clear how Trinh hopes to protect your constitutional rights, but it will involve school choice and “giving power to the people” by giving cops more power, and also solving homelessness with “community-driven” responses. Bleh. Vote Slatter.

Justice Position No. 2
Sal Mungia

We remain big fans of Sal Mungia, who plans to ensure greater access to the legal system and to guarantee that people face a fair and impartial court no matter their race. His passion for his work as well as for civil rights gives us confidence that, if elected, he’ll likely succeed at improving the court system for all.

Mungia consistently landed on the right side of history as an attorney. He’s spent most of his career as a personal injury lawyer for Gordon Thomas Honeywell in Tacoma, and while he focused on medical malpractice lawsuits, he’s fought for all kinds of causes. Back in 2005, he was filing amicus briefs in support of same-sex marriage in Washington. Before that, he fought and won better conditions for people held at Pierce County Jail.

Mungia passionately voices his support for the legal reasoning behind “the bright-line Rhone rule,” a Washington Courts policy that allows judges to take direct action against attorneys who try to eliminate jurors based on their race. He can rattle off statistics about the many ways the courts show bias against Black plaintiffs in the civil legal system. His close attention to these issues suggests that he’ll closely examine cases before him involving bias while also looking to make the court more equitable.

Speaking of equity, we squeezed Mungia as hard as we could on the topic of whether he’d do the fair thing and overturn the dumb 1933 court decision that outlaws a progressive income tax in Washington. He knew better than to answer that question, as court cases must be decided based on the facts before the judges and all that jazz.

Weirdly, his opponent, Federal Way Municipal Court Judge Dave Larson, shared his thoughts without much prodding, and he acknowledged if he’d had the capital gains tax in front of him as a Supreme Court Justice, he’d have ruled it a property tax lickity split. Despite finding Larson generally good company, his easy declaration that he’d opposed a progressive tax made it very simple to choose Mungia over him.

Also, Larson’s choice to campaign alongside GOP gubernatorial candidate Dave Reichert certainly didn’t earn him any points in the room. When Larson attended an event with Reichert back in June, he told the crowd, “‘It’s time that we take back the judiciary in Washington state,’” according to the Chronicle. He argued that he only meant that people needed to have more control over the court so that it better served them, but, with all due respect, we think he’s full of shit. And anyway, we’re definitely gonna go ahead and back the candidate who defended gay marriage before it was cool over the candidate who speaks alongside a man who believes marriage should be “between a man and a woman.” Vote Mungia.

Judge Position No. 41
Paul M. Crisalli

King County Superior Court Judge Paul Crisalli says he works to pay attention to what happens to Black people and people of color who police sweep into the criminal system, he understands the importance of the Rhone Rule (or GR 37), which allows judges to take a more active role in preventing racist jury selection, and he believes in the importance of a public defender system. All told, he seems like a judge who has his heart in the right place.

He’s big on jury selection. He’s embraced doing voir dire virtually, which we think is pretty cool since it allows more people to show up for the selection process, hopefully resulting in more diverse juries. He also advocates for increasing jury pay from the measly $10 a day that King County Superior Court currently funds. (That’s honestly crazy, juries should unionize.)

Crisalli deeply understands the critical role that money plays in both the criminal and civil legal systems. He says he wished he could spell away the costs of the court system, but the best he can do for now is try to allow for more virtual hearings when possible, avoid holding superfluous hearings, and keep things moving in his courtroom by reading all the material that he needs to beforehand and coming prepared to court.

Speaking of reading everything, if you’re an attorney reading this right now and you think you can just ChatGPT up your next brief for Crisalli, think again. He caught an attorney doing that the other day when he read a brief they submitted and realized none of the citations matched actual case law. Crisalli wouldn’t give us any of the other details (we thought the courts were open and public, apparently not.) Still, he says he’s interested in how AI may end up creeping into the court system, and we like a judge who is aware that people can start faking photos and videos to try to pin crimes on them.

At the end of the day, Crisalli’s role is to referee a rigged system. We think he’ll do that as fairly as he can, and for that we say vote for him, especially over Andrew Schach, who works for the Washington State Office of Administrative Hearings. Schach acted like he couldn’t meet us for an endorsement interview or even speak with us during business hours. Literally, we’ve interviewed dozens and dozens of judges as part of SECB and never had this issue. He was also kind of rude. Much ruder for sure than Crisalli, who showed up bearing chocolate chip cookies he’d baked himself. What a sweetie. Vote Crisalli.

Council Position No. 8
Alexis Mercedes Rinck

It's like the old meme goes: If Alexis Mercedes Rinck has a million endorsements, the SECB is one of them. If Rinck has one endorsement, it’s the SECB. If Rinck has no endorsements, the SECB is dead.

Aside from your NOs on those four ballot initiatives, the race for this citywide city council seat may be the most consequential bubble on your ballot. In 2023, in a low-turnout election, big business spent more than $1 million to flip the council from tepidly progressive to brazenly conservative. Since then, the new council has levied attacks on workers rights in the very region that put the Fight for $15 on the map. They’ve killed measures to incentivize affordable density amid a housing crisis. They’ve reinstated racist, transphobic, and classist anti-loitering laws that the City already repealed in 2020. They’ve so far refused to tax big business, putting affordable housing, renters’ services, and labor law enforcement on the chopping block in the 2025 budget. And they won’t stop there.

All that bad shit we rattled off just now? Rinck’s against it. Rinck won’t fight for your bosses to pay you less, or for your landlords to evict you more easily, or for cops to arrest you more, or for corporations to hoard more wealth.

We speak in negatives for a reason. Rinck won’t have many faithful friends on the council to help her advance policy. That’s not to say we doubt her political savvy—if anyone could reason with the current council to move forward on decent legislation, particularly in the realms of homelessness policy and public safety, it would be Rinck, who convinced a bunch of suburbs to buy into the regional response to homelessness during her time at the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. Still, the numbers are not in her favor, so we expect her to play defense for the oppressed in a legislative body that mostly seeks to comfort the oppressor.

Speaking of comforting the oppressor, Rinck faces off against the council’s nepo baby, Tanya Woo, who lost her election in 2023 but got handed an appointment to the citywide seat at the request of the council’s corporate donors. And we’re not exaggerating here. In a letter to all those donors, PAC wrangler and consultant Tim Ceis said big business had “earned the right” to tell the council who to pick because they paid for their seats, and their puppet council did as instructed.

And who is Woo, the person they picked? She’s the scion of landlords in the Chinatown International District whose political profile rose after she worked with Republicans to block a shelter expansion in SODO. One of the dimmer bulbs in the council’s already flickering chandelier, she evinces zero capacity for discussing complex legislation, no will to put forth any major legislation of her own, and otherwise displays total fealty to the corporate class. None of which should surprise anyone, given the fact that she’s only voted in local elections a handful of times in her life.

Making sure you vote for Rinck is so important because her election represents something bigger than one seat; it represents a referendum on the entire conservative bloc. If Rinck blows Woo out of the water, this conservative council’s legitimacy may as well be toast. Any time they try to mess with working people or make the city more hostile to the unhoused, Rinck can vote against it with the backing of more voters than anyone else on the body. The bigger the win, the more momentum progressives can ride into the 2025 election, when the conservative ringleader, Council President Sara Nelson, will have to defend her seat. Let’s make her scared. Vote Rinck.

Proposition No. 1: Property Tax Levy Renewal for Transportation
Yes

If you ever leave your place of residence, you should absolutely vote “yes” on Prop 1 to pass our desperately needed transportation levy. The new levy will generate a historic $1.55 billion in its eight-year lifetime. The City will spend that money on 350 blocks of new sidewalks, 160 projects to improve bus-rider experience, safety projects at 70 high-collision locations, a full revamp of Aurora Avenue N, plus much, much, more.

A little history: Mayor Bruce Harrell proposed a puny, baby little levy that favored car-centric infrastructure. Thanks to the tireless work of transportation, environmental, disability, labor, and other advocates, the mayor and then the transportation chair cranked that number up by $250 million and earmarked 45 percent of the total investment for multimodal transportation via buses, bikes, foot, and any other way you may get around without a car.

The levy’s been called a “consensus” levy, as it pleases the progressive transit heads and the conservative business community. Even the Stranger Election Control Board struggled to play devil’s advocate against it. Every argument against Prop 1 falls apart like much of Seattle’s poorly maintained infrastructure would if this levy were to fail.

Some may argue that the levy costs homeowners too much. For the owner of the median-valued home, the new levy will cost them $41 per month, a 70 percent increase from the $24 cost of the 2015 Levy To Move Seattle. Washington State relies heavily on property taxes to pay for social goods because our state constitution outlaws an income tax. The SECB would sacrifice a lifetime of drunk cigarettes if it meant flipping our upside-down taxation scheme right-side up, but, in the meantime, this is how we pay for shit.

Besides, that framing's whack. Sure, $41 a month may sound like a lot, but relying on a car costs homeowners about $1,000 a month based on estimates from Experian, AAA, GasBuddy, and the National Conference of State Legislatures. The better our public transit, the less Seattleites have to rely on cars, the more money voters actually stand to save. Besides, the City and County run levy relief programs for seniors and disabled people who cannot shoulder the cost, so no one should be splitting pills for better bus service.

On the flip side, there’s some militant urbanists who would rather tank this levy and force the City to produce a bigger, bolder one in 2025. If the levy legit sucked, then we’d be on board. But it doesn’t suck. And without a strong, concerted movement to reject it in protest, there’s no reason to believe the mayor and the city council would interpret a failed levy as anything but a sign to slash the price on a future proposal.

Don’t overthink it. Vote yes on Prop 1.

Primary Election Night 2024: The Great Statewide Shakeup

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 06 Aug 2024 18:40:00 -0700

The Great Statewide Shakeup by Stranger Election Control Board

Good evening and happy Election Day, you surly, beautiful voters!!!

Before we begin: If you're reading this message before 8 pm and have NOT yet voted in the primary elections, then stop what you're doing, read this, vote accordingly, and then get back here.

As for the rest of you, the time has come to stop watching clips of Tim Walz doing incredible handyman shit on social media and start watching The Stranger's biannual election night party coverage!!! (Okay fine, we'll probably drop in some good Walz clips throughout the night, too—we can't help ourselves, either.)

In any event, as always, we've deployed the members of the Stranger Election Control Board to election parties all over town AND ALSO to the Olivia Rodrigo concert at Climate Pledge Arena. Look forward to live updates on party snacks, party drinks, party gossip, and outfit swaps—plus election results and snap analysis.

Once the first round of results drop at around 8:15 pm, we'll all be a little closer to answer the following questions:

Who's in line to replace 30-year incumbent and House Speaker Emeritus Frank Chop in the state's most progressive district? Is this the end of Andrea Suarez's political career, or only the beginning???
Which progressive will emerge to challenge Tanya Woo for the citywide city council seat?
Will Bob Ferguson crack 50% in the gubernatorial race?
Did Republicans ice out Dems in the Public Lands Commissioner Race?
Will the progressives challenging US House Reps. Kim Schrier and Adam Smith on Gaza make it through?
Who the fuck is taking Olivia Rodrigo for granted? Who the fuck would do that?

Stay tuned!

OLIVIA RODRIGO SUMS UP TONIGHT'S RESULTS
10:15 PM Be the change you want to see in the world. SECB

Olivia Rodrigo didn't explicitly say her customized Seattle-inspired shirt is a nod to the power of voting in local elections, but it is. It totally is.

DOUGHNUTS ARE FOR WINNERS
10:10 PM

Chaudhry’s team was still out canvassing voters at 7:45 tonight, so when the first ballot drop showed them in third place, but barely more than one percentage point behind republican Paul Martin, she was STOKED. Her campaign feels confident that in the next few days, they’ll be able to close that gap. (As we expected, Adam Smith is still miles ahead with almost 56% of the vote.) In the meantime, she’s celebrating with a glazed cruller from Top Pot (which we approve of). When we asked how she was feeling, we heard the same idealism that inspired our endorsement in the first place: “This is about claiming power,” she said. “Power is amoral—it’s all about how you use it.”

OLIVIA RODRIGO IS FLYING AROUND CLIMATE PLEDGE ARENA ON A GIANT MOON
9:45 PM 🌙 SECB "We're lookin' at the stars, the moon's lit." SECB SIDDIQI IS NOT IN THE MOOD TO TALK ABOUT PIZZA
9:43 PM

As the first ballots dropped, Imraan Siddiqi came in at just under 3% of the vote. “Obviously it’s disappointing,” he told us. “But I can sleep with a clear conscience knowing that we put together a clear campaign. It just didn’t break in our direction.”

He mentioned Cori Bush’s brutal loss tonight as a sign that the genocide in Gaza “isn’t registering with people as a primary issue.” He said he hopes they “move the needle a little bit,” and knows that their campaign empowered people to vote with their morals. We asked him how the Domino's pizza went over with the fam, but he didn’t want to talk about it.

SLAMMING A SOUR WITH POTENTIAL SEAT-MATES
9:40 PM State House Rep. Lisa Callan, State House hopeful Victoria Hunt, and State House Rep. Bill Ramos will very likely go to Olympia next session. COURTESY OF VICTORIA HUNT

With 35% of the vote share in the 5th Legislative District, which covers a big swath of east King County, former Issaquah City Council Member (and Stranger-endorsed candidate) Victoria Hunt cleared the Democratic field and established a seven-point lead over Republican Mark Hargrove. Later returns will likely trend in her direction, albeit less so than in races closer to Seattle.

“I’m feeling very good, very happy with the results,” she said at Formula Brewing, where, true to her word, she downed a sour and noshed on pizza, wings, and artichoke dip as the results came in.

She said canvassing and sourcing volunteers from all parts of the district contributed to her lead, and she just plans to maintain that strategy going into the general.

“NOT UNEXPECTED”
9:37 PM He said he wasn’t going to drink due to his upper respiratory infection, but as the results came in, he caved to a Heineken. Who among us. COURTESY OF DAVE UPTHEGROVE

As the polling from Northwest Progressive Institute forewarned, King County Council Member Dave Upthegrove is running in third place, 4,000 votes behind Washington GOP-backed Sue Kuehl Pederson and 27,000 votes behind former Republican Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler.

“Not unexpected. It’s too close to call. I’m excited to be the top Democrat in the race,” he said.

Though generally statewide votes tend to shade red, Upthegrove remains optimistic that the later votes will trend in his direction given his strength in King County, and given that he thinks King County votes will make up a larger-than-normal share of the statewide votes this cycle.

When the SECB asked if he had any choice words for the four other Democrats in the race who may have drawn votes from him, he said, “Oh, look at you!” and then called them all exceptional candidates.

If he does end up squeaking by Pederson in the coming days, then he says the results don’t indicate any need to make policy adjustments in the race. “Given the field, this is a predictable outcome. I am fired up and ready to face a Republican instead of a Democrat, and I think Dem voters are energized with the top of the ticket.”

WE ARE GOING TO INVOICE YOU FOR THIS BOB
9:20 PM You owe us $5.30. SECB BRANDY REYKDAL AND PETER FERGUSON SHOULD HANG
8:46 PM Brandy Reykdal, unstoked. COURTESY OF CHRIS REYKDAL

We called Chris Reykdal in his fortress of solitude at 8:38 pm, before the Stevens County results were in. He judged us a little for jumping the gun, but in our defense, with almost 40% of the vote, he was clearly in the lead for tonight’s count. He’s feeling “pretty darn good,” he told us.

We followed up when the results came in—still at nearly 40%!—he was stoked that they’d taken the lead in the majority of Washington’s rural counties. His dog, Brandy, did not share his stoke.

IT WOULDN'T BE AN ARENA CONCERT WITHOUT INTERPRETIVE DANCING
8:45 PM Not a dry eye in the house. SECB

Over at Climate Pledge Arena, we could feel the teenage teardrops raining on our shoulders while Olivia Rodrigo performed "Drivers License." Also in the setlist so far? "Vampire," complete with a full moon, and some wild interpretive dancing.

Rodrigo has not yet commented on tonight's election results.

"Bloodsucker, famefucker." SECB We don't really know what's going on, but we love it. SECB NICK BROWN REMAINS OPTIMISTIC
8:40 PM Hugs! SECB

With more votes to count, Nick Brown has come down from his hotel room to claim second in the Attorney General primary. Brown hugged and kissed his kids, thanked the crowd, and confidently promised he’d be Washington’s next Attorney General. Early vote counts show Brown’s Republican opponent Pete Serrano with 41% of the vote, Brown with 36%, and Democratic State Senator Manka Dhingra trailing with 22%. We overheard Brown say nice things about Dhingra. A Brown spokesperson for the night, Sandeep Kaushik, said the campaign expected Brown to come in second, given that Serrano ran as an uncontested Republican, but the fact that the numbers are close for the two of them is really good for Brown. Andrew Lewis also showed up for a moment, but everyone started leaving to go celebrate with Alexis Mercedes Rinck.

THEY'RE SINGING THE DOORS AT ELYSIAN BREWING
8:35 PM A very happy Alexis Mercedes Rinck and Shaun Scott. SECB

Our ears hurt from the sheer volume of people cheering “I believe that we can win” at Elysian Brewing, where gathered progressives just witnessed two big wins in the primary elections. Both Shaun Scott and Alexis Mercedes Rinck were winning on the first ballot drop.

Shaun Scott is performing like an incumbent in the race for the 43rd Legislative District, where he has 54% of the vote. We Heart Seattle’s Andrea Suarez tails far behind at 23% while Seattle Times-endorsed Daniel Carusello holds 17%.

In a crowded field of three progressives and a conservative incumbent, Rinck took 46% of the vote. Council Member Tanya Woo trailed her with 41%. In general, the first ballot drop is most conservative, so the outcome is only likely to be even better for the two candidates.

At 8 pm, as Scott spoke just before the ballot drop, hollers came from the back of the room. “I thought my speech was killing it,” he said as he realized results must be coming in. With each number announced by a campaign staffer over the PA, the people cheered and cheered some more. The crowd gathered in a circle around Rinck and Scott.

Over the stereo, Robby Krieger and Ray Manzarek traded solos in the Doors’ “Light My Fire.” People hugged one another. They shook hands and raised glasses. They shook hands and hugged others at the same time, all smiling. A server set down a celebratory chicken sandwich on the table and we are so jealous.

OLIVIA RODRIGO OPENED TONIGHT'S SHOW WITH "BAD IDEA RIGHT"
8:31 PM Just a girl. SECB

And she is delivering some major '90s-era Gwen Stefani vibes.

BOB IS AHEAD WITH 45.8% OF THE VOTE AND HALF THE PARTY DOESN'T KNOW YET BECAUSE “SEPTEMBER” BY EARTH, WIND & FIRE IS TOO LOUD
8:30 PM "Do you remember? The 21st night of September?" SECB

A smattering of whoops and applause heralded the arrival of Bobby Ferg’s election result. It’s looking like he has at least en passanted his way FAR into the lead. (That’s a chess term, and we DO NOT care if it makes sense here; we’re using it anyway!!!!) In front of a crowd of Bob supporters—including a very tall twink with a ten-gallon hat—King County Council Member Teresa Mosqueda yelled, “ARE YOU READY TO STAND WITH THE MAN WHO HAS NO FEAR???” She then listed his resume of court victories. The room loved it!!!

What does Bob think? We are on our toes waiting for him to say something. Someone trying to get us to write about a 9/11 event commented, “Looks like it’s a done deal.” Is that enough? No, no.

WA Democratic Party Chair Shasta Conrad said it looks “pretty decisive for Bob.” She also said she would “love to see him try” regarding Dave Reichert.

Fresh off an inspiring introduction from Council Member Girmay Zahilay, who is fucking everywhere this evening, Ferguson said, “ARE YOU FIRED UP? I’M THE *REAL* BOB FERGUSON.” And then he said he won the primary or something but he’s speaking too fast for our hungry little fingers.

“We did it by being the only people-powered campaign,” he said. “Why are we fighting so hard? Because we represent the campaign that will move Washington forward and not backward—am I right?”

He loved the rhetorical questions tonight, and so did the crowd!!! And so did the twink in the 10-gallon hat!!!!

That's CM Teresa Mosqueda in the blue. SECB "BRUTAL"
8:20 PM Tanya Woo (left) and Sara Nelson looking at tonight's election results moments after they dropped. SECB

Council President Sara Nelson rushed over to her appointee, Tanya Woo, when she saw the results drop. They scrolled "all the way to the bottom" to find her results. They mumbled to each other with blank expressions across their faces. She was in second and behind her progressive challenger Alexis Mercedes Rinck by five percentage points. She didn't say much to her supporters, just that it's only the initial drop, and she will keep them updated if her standing changes. Traditionally, the more progressive candidate gains ground with the votes that trickle in the days following the election. "Brutal," her campaign manager said.

STATE RESULTS TAKING THEIR SWEET-ASS TIME FOR SOME REASON
8:15 PM

Though the first batch of King County numbers are in, the state’s numbers are still being weird. Please hold. We will be taking this up with Steve Hobbs.

KING COUNTY RESULTS
8:07 PM

They’re up. We’re processing.

CARMEN BEST IS HERE AND HAS A MASSIVE LOUIS VUITTON BAG
8:06 PM Carmen Best and her big bag. SECB

Bob’s biggest (and only??? someone fact check this) endorser from the pro-cop camp is here and she’s looking ELEGANT. Ditching the top job at the SPD really clears up the skin. It is unclear whether she took a road trip a la Thelma & Louise, but looks like her new consultant gig or whatever she’s doing is paying well!!!

CUSTOM DENIM IS A HIT AT THE OLIVIA RODRIGO SHOW
8:05 PM Cute denim! SECB

Not all of us are out at election parties. Some of us get to be at the Olivia Rodrigo show! Fans (and their parents) are lining up outside Climate Pledge Area covered in purple sequins.

A sea of purple. SECB THE BIG PROGRESSIVE PARTY AT ELYSIAN BREWING
7:58 PM A packed house at the Elysian. SECB

Shaun Scott, candidate for Washington’s 43rd Legislative District, and Seattle City Council candidate Alexis Mercedes Rinck decided on a joint election night party, kind of like kids do when they’re born in the same month. The doors opened at 7 pm, and partygoers flooded the room within minutes. Say what you want about progressives voting late, tonight they were on time to mingle.

Rinck agreed her party had “kid’s birthday party energy.” For her, the day has been a whirlwind of sign-waving with interns and phone calls with supporters. She still had time to take notice of Council, including her opponent Tanya Woo, limiting public comment and punting the vote on I-137, an initiative to fund social housing.

“I’m brought to this feeling of who gets to be heard in this moment,” she said. “I think we just saw a really startling example of what happens when we shut down community voice.”

We’re sure Scott is here, but the room is so crowded we didn’t see him. He’s the likely frontrunner in his state-level race to replace Rep. Frank Chopp, but the question on everyone’s mind is who his challenger will be.

The Stranger endorsed Scott. Seattle Times editorial board endorsed Daniel Carusello, a relative unknown. Challenger Andrea Suarez may not have a newspaper endorsement, but she’s popular for her work with We Heart Seattle, the controversial homelessness nonprofit she founded.

Kaiden Cook sat down at the booth across from us. He’s heard plenty from the Suarez campaign, which packed his mailbox with three mailers. He only got one each from Scott and Carusello.

“The Times endorsement really puts things in the air,” said Cook, who managed Nilu Jenks's campaign for City Council last year. “In Nilu’s race, we had money, we had endorsements, but we didn’t have the Times or The Stranger, so that was the end of that. My conventional wisdom is it will be Scott against that guy, I forget his name.”

MANGO LASSIS FOREVER
7:54 PM

While everyone else is partying, running analytics, or drinking protein shakes (looking at you, Reykdal), Melissa Chaudhry is at home “catching up on emails.” (Relatable.)

The candidate for congressional District 9 isn’t totally leaving her volunteers hanging: she plans to throw a thank you party for them next week. But today, she’s ordering shawarma, and her big treat for the night is a mango lassi, “if I can get it,” she says.

We love a mango lassi, and we love her gentle optimism for the night. “Of course I want to be top two,” she told us. “But I’ll be happy with anything that validates the support we’ve gotten.”

NICK BROWN'S SWANKY PARTY HAS WEIRD VIBES AND POWERFUL PEOPLE
7:49 PM We took this photo of Nick Brown after spending $14 on a glass of champagne. SECB

For the non-millionaire candidate in the Attorney General’s race, Nick Brown’s party had some swanky vibes. Who knew we’d be dropping $14 on a six-ounce glass of bubbly tonight? But that’s the 1900 Fifth Bar + Lounge for you. Brown arrived basically on time, with his kids in tow. His son posted up outside the bar on Brown’s cell phone, not allowed inside the 21-and-over section. The whole event had bigwig vibes, with people such as King County Council Member Girmay Zahilay and his wife Joyce Bruce hanging out at the bar. Zahilay smoothly passed us off to the nearest possible people to talk to. Other notables we spotted included State Senator Joe Nguyen, former City Council candidate Ron Davis, a bunch of consultants, and, oh my god, the Secretary of Department of Children, Youth, and Families Ross Hunter just caught us searching him online. How embarrassing. He showed us his website, and the photos he’s taken. Apparently, we endorsed him in the past and called him a bad word. He told us he spent $1,500 to buy all the website domains for his name. What a character. Also, people keep telling us their friend owns us? Weird vibes at this one.

IT'S ALL ABOUT FAMILY AT TANYA WOO'S PICNIC IN THE PARK
7:30 PM Tanya Woo's friends and family grilling out at Donnie Chin International Children's Park. SECB

Conservative City Council appointee Tanya Woo invited her supporters to a BBQ at Donnie Chin International Children's Park. Woo has held her last three election parties at the park because community elders can easily walk to it, according to her mom, who encouraged the Stranger Election Control Board to stop standing off shy on the outside of the party. We looked sorta like the three cops who stood watch on the sidewalk!

We chatted with a few distance relatives of Woo's. One distance uncle said he "pounded the table" when he saw how narrowly she lost her last election. He feels like she has a better shot this time around because now she has experience on the council. We bit our tongue instead of arguing about her record—or lack thereof. We may be a bunch of argumentive d-bags, but we have enough courtesy not to pick fights with Woo’s elderly family members!

Not pictured: Shy sidewalk cops. SECB WE WANT TO PULL OUR FERGUSON ENDORSEMENT OVER THE NO FOOD THING BUT PETER THE FIRST CAT MAY MAKE US RECONSIDER
7:29 PM Meow. SECB

Okay, there seriously is no food and we are not being super chill about that. But, Bob has a cat named Peter who will become the first cat if he wins and that’s enough to change our hungry heart. What is exacerbating our hanger, though, is that the campaign staff WILL NOT let us talk to Bob even though all we want is to ask him about Peter the Cat. Unfortunately, Peter is not in attendance. SAD.

We did stoop to just asking campaign staff about election stuff. When asked how they were feeling about the chances tonight a staffer said, “Can’t you tell from our upbeat playlist?” Okayyyyy... all we can glean from that is you have the music taste of a 2014 wedding. As we type this “Mr. Brightside” by the Killers is playing and a table of white women next to us is dissecting the meaning of it. “It’s about cheating,” one says. “You know there’s another man. That’s why it’s *Mr. Brightside.* There’s a better option.” We stan a close reader!

NERD ALERT (WE LOVE NERDS)
7:17 PM A protein shake hardly counts as dinner, but okay?? COURTESY OF REYKDAL

As a rule, Chris Reykdal doesn’t throw watch parties during the primaries. So when we caught up with him tonight, he had just finished a five-hour drive from Spokane to his home in Tumwater, and he’s already hitting the books. “I’ll spend tonight looking at the models from 2020, reviewing data as it comes in,” he told us. “Lots of screens.”

When we asked the candidate for Superintendent what his results-night meal would be, it seemed like he might have forgotten that food is typically a human necessity. And since he’s given up booze and coffee, he’s oscillating between two beverage options: a protein shake, or iced tea (“because it’s more celebratory” than herbal tea).

But he knows what he’s looking for in the numbers tonight. His models show that winning incumbents with three or more challengers average 42% in the primary, so tonight, he’s looking for 38% to 43%.

Does he think he’s going to win? “We think so,” he told us, “but we won’t jinx anything.” Either way, he says he’ll be back at work at 6:30 tomorrow morning. We can guarantee we won’t be.

YOU HAVE LESS THAN ONE HOUR TO VOTE
7:09 PM Look at the cuuuuute barn! SECB

If you don’t vote in the primary, you won’t get to complain as convincingly in the general, and, more importantly, you won’t get one of these new, extremely tasteful stickers from King County Elections!!! Don’t you just love the nonpartisan color scheme, the diversity of transit and housing options, and that adorable little barn? 🥹 According to a KCE spokesperson, Victoria C. designed the sticker. Though our mail-in voting system rules, it does kinda cut down on the number of opportunities to promote voting in this fun little way, so we’re glad they figured it out. NOW OPEN UP YOUR BALLOT, VOTE, AND SLAP ON THAT STICKER.

BOB FERGUSON’S PARTY IS BUMPIN’ WITH BEE GEES, BEER, BUT NO FOOD
7:03 PM Where is the food???? SECB

We've put on our dressy pants and made the trek to Ballard where we promptly found a parking spot in between one of Council President Sara Nelson's beloved eco blocks. Then, after we lint rolled the hair off of our child-free and cat-having self, we stumbled across an outdoor soiree at Reuben's Brews' Barrel House. Here is where the Bob Ferguson diehards, the Democratic who's who of Seattle, are mingling and sipping. And yet, we fear there is no food. Only beer and La Croix. Why didn't we eat dinner? Couldn't Bob spare a slice of pizza or something? We used to get all hot under the collar for you, Bob. Is this—like your newfound love for strengthening the police—some sort of long-game tactic of wooing? We obviously like you, but you're going to have to pull out the red carpet a bit more to really get our fanny fluttering like the old days.

Upbeat jams like the Bee Gees' "More Than a Woman" and Hall & Oates' "You Make My Dreams Come True" are playing. We are going to try to find someone to teach us the Queen's Gambit and maybe a Reuben's Brews' worker will toss us the crust of their Serious Pie pizza to nibble on like the rat we are.

In the meantime, we chatted up Bill Ferguson, one of Bob's SIX brothers (he also has one sister). Bill is proud of Bob, but he is NOT happy with the only non-alcoholic beer at the function, some kind of berry atrocity. Right after we chatted with Bill, a woman named Kathleen in a piratey-striped shirt and thick liberal arts glasses told us she was surprised by how much of her voting choices aligned with ours. "I didn't know I was so liberal," Kathleen said. We could've told you how liberal you were just by that getup, Kathleen!

Seriously, did someone spend all the food budget on balloons? SECB IMRAAN SIDDIQI IS EATING AIRHEADS XTREMES
6:17 PM A totally candid photo of the fam watching results that will drop in 1.5 hours. Saddiqi

Imraan Saddiqi’s watch party is in Sammamish, and election nights are for drinking, not driving, so the SECB gave him a call this afternoon.

The congressional candidate for the 8th District told us he’s having a “lowkey” watch party with family and friends at his campaign headquarters. They’re eating pizza (Dominos), candy (Airheads Xtremes), and protein bars (“to keep ourselves energized,”) which all sounds very wholesome to us.

Saddiqi ran an insurgent campaign that only launched in May, so when we asked if he was going to win tonight, he wouldn’t give us a confident “yes.”

Airheads give us optimism, too. Saddiqi

“But I’m optimistic,” he told us. “I feel good about the energy. We left everything out there.”

Saddiqi is hoping for a win, but if all his campaign does is force Congresswoman Kim Schrier to budge her position on Gaza, he’ll be pretty stoked. If he makes it to the general, though, he looks forward to being “a gut check for the Dems,” forcing them to “make a moral decision” about Gaza.

DAVE UPTHEGROVE EMBRACES GAY TREES
2:50 PM King County Council Member Dave Upthegrove said La Costa Mexican Restaurant in Burien is a place of comfort for him. Selfie

After polishing off a cheese enchilada and a spinach enchilada at La Costa Mexican Restaurant in Burien, King County Council Member and Public Lands Commissioner candidate Dave Upthegrove said our endorsement inadvertently delivered him a new campaign slogan.

The other day his husband, who works as a librarian, overheard a group of people reading The Stranger’s endorsement package and discussing our picks. When they finished reading the Commissioner of Public Lands endorsement, they said, “Well I don’t know what gay trees are, but I’m all in for Upthegrove.” That level of enthusiasm inspired him to create a line of “GAY TREES” t-shirts for the campaign. After all, gay trees are happy trees.

But he’ll only make the shirts if he makes it through the primary, a decidedly uncertain prospect in a field of five Democrats and two Republicans. Recent polling shows a plausible future where the two GOP candidates in this race could waltz through the primary with low double-digit vote shares, blocking out the Dems. Upthegrove hopes the Republicans—former Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler and Sue Kuehl Pederson—do not put up similarly close numbers, but otherwise he doesn’t know what to look for tonight. “It’s a complicated field with a lot of independent money, and I don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said.

And he ain’t lying about the money. He raised $590,000—the most in his field—and an independent expenditure from the Washington Conservation Voters Action Fund dumped another $350,000 on top of that. Conservative Democratic state Senator Kevin Van De Wege brought in nearly $341,000, but then an IE called “Firefighters for Protecting Public Lands,” which is actually funded primarily by big timber companies, spent a jaw-dropping $736,000 on his behalf. With $430,000 raised, Herrera Beutler hauled in the second-largest pile of cash, with no IE spending on her behalf yet. Of the other viable candidates, Department of Natural Resources Tribal Liaison Patrick DePoe pulls up the rear with $221,000, plus close to $90,000 in independent expenditure funding largely from tribes and the teachers’ union PAC.

Upthegrove said he felt “good about the things I can control,” such as raising all that money, deploying volunteers all over the state, and wrangling every local Democratic club in support of his campaign.

This evening he plans to fight off the remainder of an upper respiratory infection among friends and family at his parents’ house. He'll dine on a vegetarian Subway sandwich and watch the returns roll in as the others enjoy “beer, wine, and soda pop.”

“I’m feeling zen about it,” he said. “I’m braced for any outcome. And if doesn’t work out, I’m okay.”

VICTORIA HUNT IS HUNGRY
1:45 pm The dog’s name is Sadie. Sarah Perry

In the hours before the primary results dropped, former Issaquah City Council Member and Democratic State House candidate Victoria Hunt was working the phones with a stable of volunteers and fighting back hunger pangs. “Someone just finished up making lunch, though, so that’s good,” she said. God bless. If we go without lunch for more than an hour after lunchtime, then we … get sluggish and irritable like everyone else.

Growling stomachs aside, Hunt said she felt as if her team “left everything on the field” in their race for the open 5th Legislative District seat. As far as fundraising goes, the Stranger-endorsed candidate pulled in north of $76,000, mostly from individual contributors. Her stiffest competition, former Sammamish City Council Member Jason Ritchie, who is running to her right, pulled in about the same amount of money, but $46,000 of it came from his own pockets. That gives us some indication of the level of grassroots support each candidate garnered.

Hunt said she’ll watch the results at Formula Brewing in Issaquah, along with her potential seat-mates in Olympia: State House Rep. Bill Ramos, who is running for the state Senate seat that Mark Mullet abandoned for his quixotic gubernatorial bid, and State House Rep. Lisa Callan, who’s running for reelection to her own damn seat.

At the party, Hunt plans to house a slice of pizza and order a sour beer, her favorite, but she hopes to toast to sweet, sweet victory.

This story has been updated since its original publication. We intitially reported that Bob Ferguson was leading by 45.8% of the vote. He was, in fact, leading with 45.8% of the vote. We regret the error.

The Stranger’s Endorsements for the August, 6, 2024 Primary Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 16 Jul 2024 08:00:00 -0700

The Stranger’s Endorsements for the August, 6, 2024 Primary Election by Stranger Election Control Board

A tyrant currently leads a corpse in the presidential polls, the Supreme Court turned our democracy into a monarchy, Congress keeps sending Israel bombs to rain down on babies, Washington is staring down the same fifteen crises it’s been staring down for the last decade, and the only thing stopping the Seattle City Council from rolling back the rights of workers and renters is its own ineptitude. At this point, the arc of the moral universe has bent so far back toward injustice that it’s pretty damn close to snapping off and floating through outer space for the rest of eternity.

All of that is pretty scary, but we’re not helpless. We’re rugged individuals with great hair, great taste in art, and communicative sexual partners—and we can do a lot to bend that arc back toward justice.

We can march in the streets, we can shore up our community supports, we can smoke weed in the tub and cry a little, and, most importantly, we can vote to send the most progressive politicians possible to defend our rights and advance our agenda at every level of government.

And that’s why we’re here. Over the last couple months, we increasingly rage-filled, pot-dependent reporters on the Stranger Election Control Board have called a bunch of power-hungry politicians into our conference room, grilled them over their votes, probed their public and private statements, and critiqued their taste in music, all so we can help you fill out your ballot in a way that will hopefully lead to a less-fucked world. And this year, we realllllllllllyyyyy need you to vote exactly the way we tell you to.

Starting at the national level, polls give Republicans a decent shot at controlling every branch of government. If you’ve woken up in a cold sweat about a particular policy, then it’s on the table: Federal abortion bans, gender-affirming care bans, rollbacks to marriage equality–the works. We need to send Democrats to Congress who will block all that and advocate for a ceasefire in Gaza while they’re at it.

At the state level, we need to find all the billionaires, grab hold of their ankles, turn them upside down, and shake the money out of their pockets so that we can fund our education system, housing for poor people, transit, and treatment and recovery facilities.

We also need to pick a governor who can defeat anti-gay, anti-trans Republican Dave Reichert, a public lands commissioner who vows to save the trees, a superintendent with a solid plan to improve the schools, an attorney general who stands ready on day one to sue the fuck out of big corporations on behalf of consumers and to protect us in the advent of Trump Part II: The Retribution, an insurance commissioner who will fight to lower costs, a slate of progressive state lawmakers who will fund all of the above, and a Washington State Supreme Court justice who is going to be cool with all of that.

Here in Seattle, we have the opportunity to change out one of the dimmest light bulbs on the council for a brighter one—and we should absolutely take that chance.

At this point, you know the drill. In the following pages, you’ll find all the arguments we used to support our endorsements. If you’re too busy to read, then just find the Cheat Sheet and fill out your ballot accordingly.

Speaking of ballots, yours should arrive in your mailbox by July 22. If it does not, then ask King County Elections what’s up. (By phone at 206-296-VOTE (8683) or by email at elections@kingcounty.gov.) If you’re not registered to vote, then register online or by mail up to eight days before the election. If you’re unsure either way, then check VoteWA.

Once you have your ballot, rip it open, use a pen of any color to carefully fill in the bubbles we tell you to fill in, slide it into its cute little sleeve, stuff the whole package in the envelope, and then mail it in ASAP—no need for a stamp! If you don’t trust the mail, then just drop it into a nearby dropbox no later than Tuesday, August 6, at 8 pm.

Oh, and, please consider tipping us for the work. The Seattle Times says you’re all suffering from “tip rage,” but surely that doesn’t apply to your willingness to support local journalism in the face of democratic decline. Right? Let’s prove ’em wrong.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Hannah Krieg, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Ashley Nerbovig, Megan Seling, the Hawk Tuah girl, and Rich Smith. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races, races with only two candidates (those go straight to the general), or races we forgot.

United States Senator
Maria Cantwell

Washington desperately needs to replace our US Senators, who have been in office for a combined 54 years, but, alas, no viable progressive challengers have stepped up to the plate. So, just as we were stuck with Senator Patty Murray in 2022, we’re stuck with Senator Maria Cantwell in 2024.

But that’s not all bad. If you give her another term, Cantwell said she will work to “grow the middle class.” She already got that work started by authoring the CHIPS and Sciences Act, which aims to create 44,000 semiconductor manufacturing jobs here in the US that companies may have otherwise offshored. She said she would also continue to “lead” the fight to increase affordable housing production in Washington, citing her attempt to score changes to the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program in a tax package that would add 1,700 affordable housing units to Washington’s housing stock in 2024. Of course, every year for the next 20 years Washington needs to build north of 20,000 units of affordable housing for people who make less than 50% of the area median income, and we’d hope that a US senator with 24 years in the tank could try to bring home a little bit more than a fraction of the need, so we’ll have to keep pressing her.

Her biggest electoral threat comes in the form of Republican Dr. Raul Garcia, who recently dropped out of the gubernatorial race and endorsed nutjob Dave Reichert. Garcia won’t say how he will vote in the upcoming presidential election, and he hesitantly supports abortion protections. We don’t have time for any bullshit on either of those scores, so we don’t have time for Garcia.

We’ll be watching Cantwell, and if she comes asking for votes again, she better have something to show for it. If not, one of you lefties with elected experience, serious fundraising skills, and statewide appeal better be running a solid campaign against her. Capisce? Vote Cantwell.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 1
Suzan DelBene

If voters give Suzan DelBene a seventh term and a Democratic trifecta in the federal government, she pledges to lead the charge to expand and make permanent the Child Tax Credit, increase the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, and create a more “fair” tax code that doesn’t “favor the wealthy.” Doing so would mean significantly cutting child poverty, significantly increasing the number of affordable housing units throughout the country, and, well, we don’t know what she really means by creating a more “fair” tax code because she wouldn’t get specific about which sorts of progressive taxes she’d support or which Trump tax cuts she’d let die their extremely timely deaths in 2025. Given her past life as chair of the New Democrat Coalition, a centrist caucus within the party dedicated to preventing transformational change, and given her current life as chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, we’ll assume she’ll take the middle-of-the-road path she’s taken during her last 12 years in office.

But that’s a better path than the one that any of her weird opponents would take. Republican candidate Mary Silva writes like a conspiracy theorist, though she does rightly blame shadowy corporate figures with bad taste for many of the problems the country faces. That said, she makes a better case for not voting for her than we could ever make when she says, “I hold no special official qualification” for the position. Meanwhile, Republican Derek Chartrand dresses like a long-lost Trump failson, and he even randomly capitalizes nouns like one, but he mostly just champions civility and center-right positions on education and the environment. We’ve got plenty of that coming from DelBene already, so you may as well just vote DelBene.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 7
Pramila Jayapal

Those who stand firmly against genocide, forever wars, corporate greed, and cruel immigration policies will find themselves well-represented by four-term congresswoman Pramila Jayapal.

Jayapal is an effective progressive—even with Republicans in control of the House this term, she still chalked up some accomplishments. As head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), she led the push for Biden to cancel student debt, and she vows to continue pushing him to cancel more. She and US Senator Elizabeth Warren also led a successful effort to reduce the prices for some inhalers and EpiPens. Last November, she and 24 Democrats signed a letter demanding a ceasefire in an attempt to at least moderate Biden’s position. And when she does talk to the President and to the Vice President, she tells them that supporting Netanyahu’s slaughter only makes Israel less safe. Whether they listen is up to them.

If Dems take back the House, Jayapal would chair the House Judiciary Committee’s immigration subcommittee, wherein she promises to fight for immigrant protections in the face of the hard-right turn that so many of her Democratic colleagues are taking. She’ll also work to pass the CPC’s proposition agenda, which would break the gridlock in DC, rein in the clerics on the Supreme Court, and advance policies to reduce the cost of health care, ameliorate the housing and child care crises, invest in education, increase worker power and pay, expand protections for LGBTQIA communities, and, perhaps most importantly, legalize weed nationwide (woo!).

Even those who don’t stand for any of that stuff may take some comfort in the fact that she runs a pretty robust constituent services operation, which has helped more than 10,000 people navigate labyrinthine federal agencies, according to her office.

Of course, given the current political climate, Jayapal won’t get us everything we want. But we won’t get any of it if we vote for Republican Cliff Moon, who doesn’t appear to have updated his website since the last time he ran as a “normal American” pissed off about the PC police, the horrors of the defund movement, et cetera. Boring. Vote Jayapal.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 8
Imraan Siddiqi

Imraan Siddiqi, a longtime civil rights leader who currently directs Washington’s chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, wants to divest from wars abroad so we can invest those US tax dollars right here at home. Instead of building bombs to drop on starving babies, he wants to create a better and cheaper health care system, construct more affordable housing, properly fund education, and shrink the carceral state while he’s at it.

He also speaks with passion and precision on the need for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, a position driven in part by the pain and terror his wife’s family feels every day as they manage to dodge US-made bombs. Adding his voice to the growing anti-genocide minority in Congress would be the least the people of the 8th Congressional District could do for the world.

Despite his good politics and his persuasive anti-war rhetoric, however, he speaks in vague terms about progressive domestic policy, and his relatively low campaign funds all but foreclose a real path to victory.

For those reasons, we seriously considered endorsing three-term incumbent Kim Schrier, a pro-abortion pediatrician whose centrist politics position her to “get stuff done” in a Congress paralyzed by stubborn Republicans. We welcome, for instance, her recent passage of bills to continue funding landslide research and child emergency care research, as well as her bill to help lower some hospital visit costs. That’s exactly the kind of middling shit we expect out of someone who represents Sammamish.

But Schrier has moved way farther right on immigration and criminal justice than we think she needs to, and now she’s added warmonger to the mix. To list a few particularly heinous votes: In this last term, Schrier voted for the Laken Riley Act, which would allow ICE to indefinitely detain undocumented immigrants accused of theft, including Dreamers. So a cop could accuse a teenager of stealing some earrings from the mall, and that teenager could wind up in a federal immigration prison. When asked why she’d support a bill that will undoubtedly lead to this scenario, Schrier said, “Um, everybody needs to follow the law, and there is due process.” Now there’s someone who will always stand up for what’s right, even with a racist, xenophobic tyrant waiting in the wings!

She went on to vote for the so-called Middle Class Borrower Protection Act, which will ultimately make it harder for first-time home buyers to get a home loan, according to the Center for Responsible Lending. She also voted to expand the US’s sterling warrantless surveillance program, to meddle in local DC criminal justice politics, to censure Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib for criticizing Israel’s slaughter of Palestinians, and to send billions of dollars in weapons to Israel while ALSO hobbling the only organization who could realistically distribute aid in the country. Given that voting record, you won’t be surprised to learn that Schrier has not called for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

We know she cannot always do the right thing and vote the right way because she represents a “purple” district, but a lot of these votes are inexcusable and/or shit that even independents don’t like. True, we’d much rather have a Democrat in this seat than Republican Carmen Goers, a commercial banker whose policies would increase economic inequality and melt the planet, but we don’t see any danger of that outcome this year. Given Schrier’s absurd fundraising advantage, we think she’ll make it through the primary easily, and we’d rather see Siddiqi hold her feet to the fire en route to the general election than watch Schrier move even further to the right to stave off a Goers victory. Vote Siddiqi.

United States Representative
Congressional District No. 9
Melissa Chaudhry

Over the last several years, we’ve seen a bunch of candidates come for 14-term Congressman and House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Adam Smith, but, in terms of policy knowledge, rhetorical prowess, and sheer drive, none hold a candle to Melissa Chaudhry, a grant writer and civil rights advocate.

On every domestic issue, she lays out clear, practical solutions. To help build more housing, she wants to streamline permitting processes to let the private market do its thing, but she also wants to dump more money into public housing to build the units that the market simply will not build, introduce code variation pathways to allow developers to build regenerative and restorative communities that still meet safety standards, and direct more Congressional funds to community land trusts and co-ops to keep prices lower for longer.

To help deal with the state’s mental health crisis, she wants to reduce barriers to work for immigrants, invest in recruitment and on-the-job training for entry-level employees, and encourage cooperative management and team-based care to push out bad managers. She wants to expand the Supreme Court, hold them to binding ethics rules, nuke the filibuster in the Senate, legalize and protect abortion nationwide, codify Chevron deference, and more or less push every item on the Congressional Progressive Caucus’s proposition agenda.

She spoke with authority on Israel/Palestine, Russia/Ukraine, China/US, and she, unlike Smith, embraces the reality of an increasingly multipolar world instead of stubbornly clinging to a unipolar, hegemonic one that has only led to more problems around the globe. To that end, she would not have, as Smith did, voted to send $26 billion in aid—the lion’s share of it military—to help Israel prosecute its genocide. She would not have, as Smith did, expanded the US’s warrantless surveillance program as intelligence agencies continue to abuse the program.

Now, we recognize and admit no small amount of idealism behind this endorsement. Chaudhry seems smart, capable, and empathetic, but she’s never held elected office before, we have little faith she can raise the kind of money she needs to raise to really be competitive, and she has written some woo-woo self-help blogs we didn’t really love—but then again, who hasn’t?

If we weren’t absolutely certain that Congressman Smith will prevail in this contest, as he always does, then we might have more strongly considered begrudgingly going his way. After all, as we’ve argued in the past, cutting off Smith’s head means a worse one will grow in its place on the House Armed Services Committee. Like it or not, the world can get worse, and Smith is nowhere near the worst of the Dems on that committee, let alone in Congress.

Moreover, in the realm of military funding, his experience gives him the skills needed to stop Republicans from doing the most horrendous shit imaginable. Just this year, for example, he helped block an amendment that would have prevented us from using military aircraft to bring Palestinian refugees to the US. He also did a bit of productive virtue signaling when he voted against the National Defense Authorization Act—aka the Pentagon’s budget, which he leads negotiations on every year for the House—after Republicans added a bunch of racist, transphobic, and anti-choice shit into the bill. And by all accounts, he runs a responsive district shop, he brings home some good bacon in the form of money for affordable housing projects and community centers, and he respects his enemies by giving them the time of day to argue their points.

But he also does some horrendous shit himself, such as taking the votes we mentioned above, and also comparing pro-Palestine protesters to January 6 insurrectionists, as if protesting at a politician’s home comes anywhere close to the same level of extremity displayed by a fascist mob attempting to stop the peaceful transfer of power. Smith deserves a worthy challenger. Vote Chaudhry.

Governor
Bob Ferguson

Attorney General and internationally ranked chess master Bob Ferguson is by far the best option to be Washington’s next governor. In the past, he has supported more mental health resources in schools, LGBTQIA+ rights, the codifying of abortion rights in the state constitution, and data privacy rights, and we have little doubt he’ll continue to support those basic liberal policies.

If elected, he wisely plans to make housing a top priority of his administration. He envisions a cabinet-level position to oversee the issue, and he promises to encourage private developers to build 200,000 new homes in four years.

That’s all well and good and long overdue, but our enthusiasm for Ferguson drops off pretty hard on some fundamental issues. Though he’s supported the capital gains tax as well as taxes on big banks in the past, he wouldn’t commit to pushing the Legislature for new progressive revenue sources that we all know we desperately need to fund housing the market won’t build, education, transit, et cetera.

When we pressed him for clear plans on issues such as mental health or for plans to increase school funding, he told us he’d “cross that bridge when we get to it.” When we pointed out that it might be a little hard for voters to know what they’re voting for when they hear Ferguson say he’ll decide what to do once he’s in office, he disagreed with us. After spending 20 years in politics, Ferguson said, people know what to expect from him. He’s running a real “trust me, bro” campaign, and it fucking sucks.

Based on his interview with us, we bet Ferguson thought that we’d write a pissy endorsement about how he dodged answers so that he could tout our mean endorsement as evidence that he’s not beholden to the left. But really, we’re just disappointed that the effective straight-talker we knew as Attorney General Bob Ferguson didn’t show up when he was running to be Governor Bob Ferguson.

Nevertheless, he’s better than (arguably) Democratic State Senator Mark Mullet, or anti-gay, anti-trans, pro-Trump Republican Dave Reichert, or, lol, Republican Semi Bird—none of whom even showed up for our interview. Cowards. Vote Ferguson.

Lieutenant Governor
Denny Heck

In the face of a housing crisis, we need an urbanist like Lieutenant Governor Denny Heck to use his bully pulpit to bully the NIMBY pols.

The lieutenant governor serves as the president of the state Senate. In that position, Heck cannot vote and cannot introduce legislation, but he can break ties and use his figurehead role to advocate for policy priorities. Because he can only move the needle so far, Heck said he’s been laser-focused on housing and will keep it up if reelected.

Heck flexed his advocacy muscles in 2023, dubbed the “Year of Housing,” to rally a diverse coalition of pro-housing organizations to pressure lawmakers to pass the so-called “missing middle housing” bill, among other measures to promote density that year.

In his interview with the SECB, he didn’t sound thrilled about his ability to keep up that pro-housing momentum in 2024, but it was a short session, so hopefully in 2025, he can get his mojo back. He plans to advocate for lot-splitting measures, transit-oriented development, and more permitting reform. The problem is so big, he said, it requires many bills!

But don’t get too excited. Heck’s not one to stick it to the landlord lobby. Under his watch, the Senate squashed a renter stabilization bill last session. When we talked to him, he wouldn’t dare say the word “control” or even “stability,” though he said he anticipates the Senate will deliberate some form of “increased rent security” next year. He made it clear that “elements” of the anti-rent gouging bill that the Senate killed may help some renters, but he wants to focus his advocacy next year on making sure the Senate understands that the housing crisis is “fundamentally an issue of supply and demand.”

That sucks, mostly because it’s just not true. The private market will not build half of the housing we need to build over the next 20 years, and in the meantime, we need to give renters more than a modicum of the stability that the government provides for homeowners.

But we could do a lot worse in this position. We could have Heck’s competition, former pilot-turned-Boeing-consultant Republican Dan Matthews, whose platform is littered with dog whistles such as “school choice” and “women’s rights to fairly compete in sports.” Yikes. We’ll take a market urbanist over a transphobe any day! Vote Heck.

Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs

Incumbent Secretary of State Steve Hobbs said that he and the SECB agree 80% of the time, and that’s going to have to be good enough for us, because no other candidate in this race is really qualified to do the job. And that’s not so bad, really.

In his first full term, Hobbs hired a team to do outreach to disenfranchised voters, started a civics course for incarcerated people, and gave counties money to tighten up election security. He also told us he got Dungeons & Dragons unbanned from prisons, which we did not know we should have been advocating for all along. This is why tabletop gamer representation matters, people!

The office definitely still has its issues, though. At the top of that list: It rejects more ballots from people of color than white people. Hobbs said he’s working on it, and he hopes to start a pilot program that allows people to cure their ballot via text message. Advocates also pointed their fingers at Hobbs when his office rejected nearly 70,000 ballots in the presidential primary because voters did not check the box for party affiliation. Hobbs seemed less confident about how to prevent that situation in the future—the Washington State Legislature would have to change a law, and he thinks the parties would probably fight it—but he’s establishing a work group to think up some solutions.

His only Democratic challenger, Marquez Tiggs, didn’t impress us. He didn’t have much of a handle on the issues, he defended the turnout-killing practice of odd-year elections, and he even argued against changing laws so that noncitizens could vote in local elections, which would include his own husband. To be fair, Hobbs doesn’t want to get rid of odd-year elections, and he doesn’t want noncitizens voting either, but he’s got a much better grip on the issues and the responsibilities of the office. Vote Hobbs.

Attorney General
Nick Brown

Experience wins out with Nick Brown, who rightly pointed out in his endorsement interview that no other candidate knew the Washington State Attorney General’s Office (AGO) as well as he did. Though we think State Senator Manka Dhingra is plenty qualified for the role, and though we liked her criminal justice policies better than his, Brown’s understanding of the department and his breadth of knowledge in the civil law arena tipped the scales in his favor.

Brown’s experience makes him right for the job. As the former US district attorney for Western Washington, he has already run a large public firm. During our interview, he demonstrated his familiarity with the AG’s role when he stressed the importance of tending to client services, the less-flashy work the office does to advise state agencies on how to avoid lawsuits. He argued the office could do more to intervene when they see agencies repeatedly dealing with the same issues, which could help prevent problems from developing to the point where the state ends up in a federal settlement such as Trueblood. That’s the kind of eye-bleeding specificity and unsexy-but-practical problem-solving we’re looking for from people seeking to run unwieldy bureaucracies.

We also liked Brown’s promise to focus a bunch of the agency’s resources on housing. He said he wanted to launch lawsuits against companies that collude on rent prices and to keep a better eye on ensuring compliance with the Landlord-Tenant Act. To be honest, he had us at the prospect of suing corporate landlords.

We appreciated his plan to create a new unit dedicated to actively investigating wage theft and to supporting labor rights, as well as his acknowledgment that wage theft was far more detrimental to the economy than organized retail theft.

We liked Brown less on criminal justice reform. In particular, he offered disappointing answers on drug decriminalization. He said he would support decriminalizing drugs more if the state had a proper treatment system in place, but he also said that jails don’t really provide the help people need, which raises the question of why we should jail people for suffering from health problems in the first place. After all, it’s not just that jails don’t help people suffering from substance use disorder—they increase the risk of overdose and can prevent people from accessing the very things they need in order to stabilize, such as housing.

Dhingra gave great answers on criminal justice reform issues, and we also liked her proposed focus of tackling consolidation in the health care industry. However, her campaign made our eyes twitch after right-wing media accused her of lying in her campaign materials by calling herself a King County senior deputy prosecutor, despite leaving the office in 2017. In Dhingra’s defense, she has returned to her prosecutorial duties a couple times since taking her state Senate seat. Still, the prosecutor’s office asked her to clarify in her campaign materials that she no longer worked at the office.

Title kerfuffle aside, Dhingra’s strongest argument for the job revolved around her experience with the criminal legal system, but criminal work makes up just a small portion of what the AG does. All in all, we believe that Brown is more prepared to hit the ground running in 2025, which we’ll need in the advent of a Trump kingship.

Speaking of reality TV stars, we almost made it through the entire endorsement without mentioning the thing Brown should be most proud of, which is the fact that he once competed on Survivor. He lasted 30 out of 42 days, people! Vote Brown.

Commissioner of Public Lands
Dave Upthegrove

Tree nerds already know, but your choice for public lands commissioner is probably the most consequential vote you will cast on this primary ballot. Thanks to some recent court cases going the planet’s way, Washington’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) can now manage its lands for the good of the public and not just for the good of the timber industry, and it can work with organizations to sell carbon credits instead of only tree trunks. Plus, the agency can now use money from the state’s new cap-and-trade program to conserve mature forests that would otherwise fall to chainsaws.

Only one person in this race wants to take full advantage of those opportunities: King County Council Member Dave Upthegrove.

After outgoing Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz beefed up our wildfire response, Upthegrove wants to focus on prevention and community resilience to reduce the number of fires that start in the first place. We love a pound of prevention. He also wants to work with tribes and other communities to map out appropriate areas to deploy more clean energy infrastructure and to build more affordable housing to help address the climate and housing crises. We love the commitment to early and consistent outreach. Finally, he wants to go full-steam ahead on DNR’s new program to conserve 10,000 acres of forests for carbon sequestration. We love sequestering anything, especially carbon.

Upthegrove’s decade in the Legislature will help him get the money he needs to fill our firefighting and fire prevention coffers, and his three terms on the county council arm him with the political skills he’ll need to make sure local governments actually implement these policies. But it’s his stance on protecting older forests from the buzzsaw that makes him stand out among the million or so candidates running in this race.

Unless you brunch with the Lorax, you may not know about the extremely heated debate around protecting Washington’s so-called “mature legacy forests.” In brief, these forests aren’t old-growth, but most were logged before World War II and haven’t been logged since. They’re more structurally complex and biodiverse, and preserving them helps store a ton of carbon, maintain healthy watersheds, and provide space for recreation. Upthegrove and a broad coalition of environmentalists want to protect them, and no other viable candidate running for this seat wants to do that as much as he does.

Detractors in this race point out that timber sales help fund school construction and sometimes make up large portions of county budgets. Furthermore, they argue that older forests have a higher risk of bark beetle infestations, and wildfires might burn them up anyway, so it’d be better to cut down those forests and sell them rather than feed the beetles and fires.

However, both beetles and fires present more of a problem on the eastern side of the state, and the vast majority of mature legacy forests grow west of the mountains. Plus, more diverse forests help keep beetles away. Plus, DNR can manage those forests to help prevent infestations and wildfires, and Upthegrove said he’s down to do both. Plus, these mature legacy forests only make up about 3% of DNR’s forestlands anyway, and Upthegrove presented several convincing ways to get counties and schools the money they’d stand to lose from those sales. So, no, actually, we don’t have to cut down the trees.

Now, we’re well aware that the rest of the state may be tired of “elites” from King County telling them how they should live their lives and manage their lands, but we’re tired of “elites” in the timber industry keeping the state’s small towns dependent on one crop and then holding them out for ransom against tree huggers who want to diversify those economies while also saving the planet. The choice between saving the trees and saving rural economies is a false one—we can and should do both.

Unfortunately, none of the other candidates in this race think we can. We loved the energy and expertise that Makah Tribal Council Member and DNR Tribal Relations Director Patrick DePoe brings to the conversation. As he put it to the SECB in our meeting, he doubled Native American representation at DNR by hiring a second Native person. Moreover, if elected, he’d be the first member of a Washington-area tribal nation elected to any level of government in the state. Representation matters, and we want to see more Native Americans running shit at DNR, but he opposes saving legacy forests from the saw, and he’s taking timber money, so we’ll pass.

Democratic State Senator and firefighter Kevin Van De Wege is running to the right of both DePoe and Upthegrove, and he basically just buys the junky arguments put forth by industry lobbyists, which is frankly what we’ve come to expect from him, so we’ll pass there, too.

Former Republican Congresswoman Jamie Herrera Beutler belongs to a party that seeks to burn down the planet, and the Trumpy Washington State Republican Party is backing Sue Kuehl Pederson, so none for us, thanks!

Finally, as fervent supporters of the gay agenda, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention that, if elected, Upthegrove would be the first openly gay executive in Washington State history. What does that mean? Well, for one thing, he told us he was “not opposed” to making all the trees gay. Vote for gay trees. Vote Upthegrove.

Superintendent of Public Instruction
Chris Reykdal

Anyone with a kid and/or a newspaper subscription knows that Washington schools face budget crises driven by all manner of systemic issues, stealthy and overt assaults from the right, and a recalcitrant Legislature unwilling to tax the rich in order to fulfill the state’s constitutional duty to fully fund basic education. The only candidate running with the brains, the energy, and the savvy needed to solve these problems is two-term incumbent Chris Reykdal.

In the face of persistent teacher shortages, Reykdal knows the best way to retain teachers is to “fucking pay them,” which is probably why he has so much support from teachers unions. It’s also partly what drove him to propose a living wage for paraeducators.

He also knows that the state currently spends way less than it should be spending on education generally. Reykdal says he needs an additional billion dollars minimum to get schools where they need to be, and he plans to shake down the Legislature for that cash. Given his own time in the Legislature and his current understanding of the power players in both chambers, he knows just where to get it.

Reykdal’s only formidable opponent, former education nonprofit CEO Reid Saaris, didn’t respond substantively to the question of how he’d break the political morass that prevents us from funding schools. Sad.

Private schools and the rise of charter schools also ultimately threaten public school funding. Reykdal didn’t just reject charter schools in our meeting—he said he wanted to shut them down. Meanwhile, Saaris has written that he opposes charter schools and would be open to “pissing them off,” but he wouldn’t firmly commit to publicly denouncing any PAC money from charter schools that might come his way. And we wouldn’t be surprised if that money is coming, as some of the biggest charter school advocates in the state have already donated to his campaign.

Saaris said to close the opportunity gap for students of color and low-income students, the state needed to provide “equitable funding” by investing 30% more in low-income schools. He said he’d desegregate advanced programs like he worked to do at his nonprofit, and he suggested vaguely that solving this gap came down to money, teaching, standards, and quality pathways. This problem should be solved in public education, but disparities in grade point averages, test scores, and Bachelors degree attainment start in grade school or earlier. Overhauling a complex, racist social system requires more than an abstract vision.

Now, Reykdal hasn’t closed that gap, either, but he has supported the programs that are helping, including early access programs and a transitional kindergarten program to complement them. He also wants to expand the state’s early literacy program, ensure schools have multiple ways to screen children for accelerated programs, bolster one-on-one support for kids with reading challenges, and convince the Legislature to wipe out fees for AP classes. Saaris didn’t get that specific.

In general, Saaris’s opaque, ambiguous proposals did not fill us with trust in his ability to take the reins of an agency that the Legislature consistently hobbles. When he and Reykdal agreed on a topic, Saaris knew less. And every time Saaris took a potshot at the department, either we or Reykdal disproved them on the spot. Lots of swings and misses from Saaris. Vote Reykdal.

Insurance Commissioner
Patty Kuderer

The insurance commissioner runs one of the more important agencies you’ve likely heard little to nothing about. This department of nearly 275 people negotiates prices with companies who want to offer health insurance on the state’s exchange, regulates perhaps the most vampiric industry known to capitalism, and investigates all manner of complaints related to those companies. The place is also in trouble.

The agency endured a major exodus after a bunch of alleged racist and derogatory assholery from longtime Commissioner Mike Kriedler, who decided not to run for reelection for obvious reasons. We now need someone to right the ship and carry on the good work of staring down Olympia’s phalanx of insurance lobbyists, and that person is undoubtedly State Senator Patty Kuderer.

Kuderer has represented the Redmond area in the Legislature for the last seven years. During that time, she’s done a pretty remarkable job of defeating perhaps the only lobbying group worse than insurance stooges: landlords. She helped pass 2018’s raft of major tenant protections, a right to counsel for low-income tenants, and subsequent tweaks to Washington’s Landlord-Tenant Act that gave renters a little bit more power. Those wins give us confidence in her ability to dismiss industry bullshit and fight for consumers, as does her leadership on a handful of pro-consumer insurance bills she helped pass in recent sessions.

If elected, she plans to “pursue” a regional single-payer health care system informed by the findings of Washington’s permanent Universal Health Care Commission, which she helped create. She also wants to throw her weight behind a bill to make gun owners buy insurance to incentivize safe storage practices. And in general, she wants to focus the agency’s priorities on advocating for the consumers rather than the companies who squeeze us dry. We love all that.

Finally, no one else in this race is more equipped than Kuderer to help improve morale at the department. During her long career as an attorney, she’s represented people who faced sexual harassment and discrimination in the workplace, and she said she’s literally written employee handbooks. On day one, she plans first and foremost to listen to the agency’s staff and learn what they need to feel successful and safe, and then work to make those improvements.

Speaking of other candidates in this race, the only one who returned our meeting request was John Pestinger, a project manager for the agency who has little money and who seems a little too cozy with the insurance companies for our tastes. Also, a Democratic voter database lists him as a “strong Republican” voter. When we asked him why that might be, he said, “As a veteran, I tend to vote pro-veteran. So I can see how that skewed the votes Republican.” When we asked which Republicans he voted for, he declined to answer directly and insisted he was “a liberal and a progressive.” We disagree! Vote Kuderer.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 1
Victoria Hunt

As an experienced urban planner with a PhD in computational ecology, Issaquah City Council Member Victoria Hunt is an urbanist’s dream. But she’s more than just a dream. She showed us that she walks the talk—or, rather, rides it—when she took a 45-minute bus ride on the #544 to meet with us. Major transit swoon.

Her primary opponent, former Sammamish City Council Member Jason Ritchie, is no slouch when it comes to urbanist policy, either. (Literally, he spent a lot of the meeting just kind of aggressively leaning forward when we pressed him on stuff.) And we liked that he resigned from his council seat in 2021 after his colleagues voted to obstruct more housing growth in the wealthy enclave. But he’s running to the right of Hunt for bullshit reasons.

Hunt, for instance, enthusiastically supports rent stabilization, but Ritchie said he’d only support the bill if lawmakers tied it to more housing development. Hunt argued that such a provision would only slow down the bill, which is correct.

Hunt also took issue with Ritchie’s ideas for increasing the state’s housing stock, especially when it comes to affordable units. His pitch mostly focused on changing city codes to allow more fourplexes and accessory dwelling units, but Hunt rightly pointed out that those policies wouldn’t do much to meet our affordable housing needs. What we need is much larger investments in the state’s Housing Trust Fund.

On non-urbanist matters, Hunt voiced opposition to putting school resource officers (SROs) back in schools. To support that position, she gave us an informed, clear answers based on her conversations with parents during her time on council, which was nice. Ritchie, on the other hand, said he opposed cops in schools but wanted school districts to know they had the Legislature’s support in keeping their schools secure, and that for some schools, that may mean a cop working as an SRO. So … he does support cops in schools, though he does oppose those cops carrying guns and mace. Whatever the case, we don’t support Ritchie. Vote Hunt.

Legislative District No. 32
Representative Position No. 2
Lauren Davis

State House Representative Lauren Davis spends most of her time and considerable talent in the Legislature trying to improve Washington’s inadequate behavioral health system and its dismal criminal justice system. After six years in office, she knows both still need plenty of work, but that’s not for lack of her ingenuity, curiosity, and sheer grit.

Knowing full well the Legislature’s aversion to passing progressive taxes, she puts in the hours combing through Washington’s list of tax loopholes, searching for the millions of dollars the state could be collecting to fund treatment facilities, recovery housing, jail reentry programs, and other starved, neglected, or practically nonexistent systems.

In 2022, for example, Davis tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to end a tax break for companies that warehouse opioids and other drugs. Eliminating that loophole could have added an estimated $53 million to Washington’s coffers. The bill failed, but Davis vows to keep pushing.

Davis has had several successes in the House, though, such as a bill she helped craft that requires hospitals in Washington to send every overdose patient home with a naloxone kit. Previously, hospitals would send people home with a script for naloxone that patients rarely filled. She also proudly touted her bill to eliminate an overly broad law that required the state to revoke a person’s license after any felony conviction involving the use of a car. The change makes it easier for people to follow sentencing conditions, such as meeting with their probation officers or maintaining employment.

The only drug Davis uses is sugar—and she admits to using it quite heavily—but she’s supported drug decriminalization in the past, so she doesn’t let her wise lifestyle choices get in the way of good policy, though she is more open to taxing vices than we are. Still, we’d happily take Rep. Davis and a maple bar over her no-show Democratic opponent and her election-denying Republican opponent any day. Vote Davis.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 1
Tana Senn

For someone who represents Mercer Island, State House Representative Tana Senn isn’t so bad. She sponsored and passed a bill to allow the Washington State Patrol to actually destroy the guns they confiscate, ending the State’s role as a gun dealer. On housing issues, she voted for rent stabilization and supports a 7% cap on rent increases. She also passed funding for electric school buses, which she highlighted as part of her passion for policies that address climate change.

She’s quietly pretty good on criminal justice stuff, too. In 2024, she championed a bill to make it easier for children convicted of a sex offense to apply for removal from the sex offender registry, so long as they complete certain court requirements. That’s a just and potentially controversial bill that not a lot of legislators would take on.

And she’s certainly better than her opponent, Republican challenger Emily Tadlock, who ran around in 2022 knocking doors to try to find illegal voters. We strongly encourage Tadlock to get a fucking life.

We do have concerns about Senn on the topic of Israel and Palestine. Senn seemed a little dismissive of Israel’s genocidal campaign against the Palestinians, calling it “totally sad that all of those people are struggling and dying from famine,” but then she shifted the conversation to Hamas failing to care for Palestinians and the Hamas government spending all its funds on building tunnels. Senn’s shallow arguments gave us pause, but, at the end of the day, US foreign policy doesn’t often intersect with state politics, and she does want to cap our rents, so, for now, vote Senn.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 2
My-Linh Thai

When the SECB interviewed State House Rep. My Linh Thai, we asked her what she was most proud of from her last two years in office. She said, “I thought you said this would be a short interview,” and then laughed at herself for a solid 15 seconds. In our view, Thai has earned the right to that level of confidence, and probably more.

Since we last endorsed her in 2022, Thai’s taken on the landlord lobby. She fought for and won more money in the state budget to represent tenants in eviction court. She also sponsored and pushed through a law that protects renters from greedy landlords stealing their security deposits.

If we elect her again, she said she will dedicate every single word that comes out of her mouth to advocating for a wealth tax to help flip Washington’s notoriously upside-down tax structure right-side up. The wealth tax she sponsored last session did not get very far, and she blames her fellow Democrats—after all, they have a majority, but they just gotta use it! Thai said she thinks it is a realistic goal to pass the wealth tax by 2025. She’ll do it by working with state Senator Noel Frame to build a coalition of advocates to lobby their hand-wringing colleagues.

After that, Thai said she’s pretty tired and would like another refugee to take her spot. But right now, she’s got Republican challengers to beat, landlords to piss off, and a whole lotta wealth to tax! Vote Thai.

Legislative District No. 43
Representative Position No. 2
Shaun Scott

For 30 years, House Speaker Emeritus Frank Chopp sat in this seat, which covers the University District, Wallingford, South Lake Union, Capitol Hill, and Madison Park. From that perch, in the wake of the 1994 red wave he rebuilt a durable Democratic House majority that now successfully contests and holds seats in exurbs, even as it tries to foster progressive talent with new ideas closer to the cities. Now that he’s ready to step down, he hopes to pass the torch to Shaun Scott, who is by far the only candidate in this race worth passing it to.

With his focus on housing, renter protections, and the needs of the poor in general, Scott ranks as a worthy successor to Chopp, who got his start as a rabble-rousing housing activist. True to form, Scott supports rent stabilization and all manner of tenant protections. In a district where more than 70% of the households rent, he’ll be a particularly powerful voice in that conversation.

He also supports progressive taxes, and, like Chopp, he’s smart about tying them to the things that they pay for. For instance, to address the immediate need for much more affordable housing, he supports an increase to the Real Estate Excise Tax, using a fraction of the sale of McMansions and massive apartment buildings to pay for affordable units. He’d also raise the Oil Spill Response Tax to fund schools and social services, which would help the people disproportionately affected by dirty industry.

In areas where Chopp’s leadership position (or genuine beliefs) occasionally made him meek, we think Scott will be bold. Whereas other liberal and lefty politicians running this year waffled on the question of passing a state law to ban police unions from bargaining over accountability measures, Scott was clear that he would. Whereas some liberal politicians look the other way as their cities pointlessly and expensively sweep homeless people down the street, he’s unequivocal that sweeps are harmful and ineffective.

As a lobbyist for the Statewide Poverty Action Network, Scott knows how Olympia works, and he knows just who he needs to talk to in order to advance his ideas. And as an organizer with the Bernie Sanders and Nikkita Oliver campaigns, he knows the work he needs to do to get to the Capitol in the first place.

Of the many people (and doofuses) The Stranger interviewed for this round of endorsements, Scott numbered among the most informed candidates. His primary opponents cannot include themselves in that count.

When we asked which piece of legislation candidates would be most passionate about passing, middling Democrat Daniel Carusello told us he’d want to set limits on AI technology and increase data privacy, but he seemed generally uninformed about similar efforts at the national level that would preempt state action. He supports progressive revenue taxes, and he doesn’t think police accountability should be bargainable, but his answers did not have anywhere near the specificity of Scott’s.

Stephanie Lloyd-Agnew did not show up for our meeting, so we don’t expect she’d show up for the people she aims to represent.

Last and least, there’s Andrea Suarez. The executive director of We Heart Seattle is a “homeless advocate” who’s reviled by homeless advocates in Seattle and King County. She opposes housing-first solutions to homelessness and has implied on social media that needle exchanges enable drug addiction. (When we asked her to clarify, she told us that she supported them, but she wanted them to better collect needles). She’s running as a Democrat, but she associates with conservatives, and her rambling answers resemble the free-associative style of the right-wing talk show hosts who adore her. She knew nothing about the process of police bargaining, and she could not give us an answer when we asked if transgender children had the right to make medical decisions in consultation with their doctors. Those responses and her general lack of knowledge more than disqualify her from representing perhaps the bluest, queerest, renter-heaviest district in the Legislature. Vote Scott.

Legislative District No. 46
Representative Position No. 1
Gerry Pollet

Writing an endorsement for State House Rep. Gerry Pollet feels a little bit like living in that meme where an army dude kneels in front of someone’s bed, shielding them from missiles as they sleep. We are the army dude putting our young, hot bodies on the line to protect a sleepy, 12-year incumbent, but not for no reason.

Let’s start out with some good stuff. In his last term, Pollet raised the cap on special education funding. Good on him! And double good on him for committing to get rid of the cap altogether in his next term. If we elect him again, he promises to be a fierce ally to Seattle Public Schools, which could potentially close 20 elementary schools. To save the schools, Pollet said he will propose a $1.1 billion increase to their budgets, but that will not solve some of the structural problems driving closure. He said Seattle must also plan for affordable, family-sized density near public schools so families can afford to live near and fund the district.

That brings us to some less-than-flattering moments for Pollet. Over the last couple years, he pissed off a lot of urbanists by watering down the so-called “missing middle” housing bill, which increased housing density in some areas across the state. But through all the booing, Pollet stands by his actions, saying he did it all in the name of displacement.

He doesn’t think he’s the NIMBY King the urbanist types make him out to be. Earlier this year, he sent Mayor Bruce Harrell a six-page letter, complete with footnotes, blasting his housing growth plan for not increasing density enough. Harrell also disappointed him when it came to protecting vulnerable residents. Pollet said it is “ironic” that the urbanist types who gave him so much grief about his so-called anti-displacement crusade got mad at the Mayor for removing anti-displacement strategies from the housing growth plan. He wants to pass a law requiring cities to include anti-displacement strategies in their comprehensive plans to prevent that bullshit in the future.

Not sure if we can convince any urbanist types to forgive Pollet, especially when he wants to make the transit-oriented development bill less profitable for developers, but hey! He wants to pass rent stabilization!

And if that’s not enough, at least he’s not his Republican competitor, who has the transphobic equation “woman = adult human female” in her Twitter bio. Nor is he his Democrat challenger who no one’s heard of, and who declined an interview with our endorsement board. Vote Pollet.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 2
Chris Stearns

To put it nicely, State House Rep. Chris Stearns contains multitudes on the issues of criminal justice reform and taxation, but ultimately he’s the best choice for this Covington-area seat.

Stearns voted, not very happily, to recriminalize public drug use last year. But if we elect him again, he will continue his work to retroactively strike “juvenile points” that judges can use to add years to someone’s sentence. He came close to passing the policy last session, but it died in the Ways & Means Committee because some lawmakers thought it cost too much. Stearns feels more confident in 2025 because his colleagues won’t be so worried about reelection.

On the more questionable side of his judgment, last year, Stearns pushed a bill to give cities the authority to impose sales taxes to pay for cops, courts, and treatment without taking it up with the voters. The bill didn’t go far, and he probably won’t reintroduce it again in its exact form. He gets that regressive sales taxes suck, but he correctly argued that cities do not have many options to raise revenue. But we correctly argue that pearl-clutching cities would just use the authority to throw away money on cop bonuses during a national police shortage, under the guise of providing “treatment” in a cynical attempt to ameliorate progressives. Could you imagine Bellevue spending a penny of such a tax on a new treatment center? Get real.

ANYWAY, on the less questionable side of his judgment, if we reelect him, he’ll support a wealth tax and secure more progressive revenue to make our tax structure less burdensome on working people.

Even with his flaws, Stearns outshines Republican and apparent sadist Brian Lott. Lott advocates for “tougher penalties” and less government spending at a time when we need public health solutions and much more money to fund schools, housing, transit, et cetera. Vote Stearns.

Justice Position No. 2
Sal Mungia

Sal Mungia wants to join the state Supreme Court to expand access to the legal system for all people and to ensure the courts treat people fairly regardless of their race, and we endorse him in the hopes that he’ll achieve those goals with the quickness. Given his enthusiasm for lawyering and for civil rights, we think he’s got a good shot.

For a lawyer, Mungia seems genuinely dedicated to making sure the legal system treats people equally. Early on in our conversation, he said he agreed with the legal reasoning behind “the bright-line Rhone rule,” which helps judges to prevent attorneys from eliminating jurors based on their race. He also decried the bias against Black plaintiffs in the civil legal system, which he witnessed firsthand as a personal injury attorney for Gordon Thomas Honeywell in Tacoma. And his pro bono work has led him to support a litany of worthy causes, including his push to secure improved jail conditions for people held at Pierce County Jail.

One of the more equitable, useful, and all-around good things the State Supreme Court could do for the people of Washington is overturn the stupid 1933 court decision that outlaws a progressive income tax. We tried many different ways to figure out how he would rule if the Legislature tried to force the court’s hand on that issue, but he repeatedly (and wisely) thwarted us with “No comment.”

However, his opponent, Federal Way Municipal Court Judge Dave Larson, admitted that he would have sided with the conservatives in viewing the capital gains tax as an income tax and not an excise tax. That made the choice easy for us haters of regressive taxes.

We found Larson pleasant, and we like his preference for treatment courts. But for all his promises to remain neutral on the bench, in June, he spoke at an event with GOP gubernatorial candidate Dave Reichert and said, “‘It’s time that we take back the judiciary in Washington state,’” according to the Chronicle. In his defense, Larson said he only meant that the people needed to take back the court to have it better serve them, but we find that hard to believe. Instead, we believe in supporting the candidate who hasn’t aligned himself with a brain-dead Republican bigot. Vote Mungia.

Council Position No. 8
Alexis Mercedes Rinck

The SECB’s shriveled heart grew three sizes when we met the progressive challengers to Council Appointee Tanya Woo; one size for community organizer Saunatina Sanchez’s moxie, one size for professional policy wonk Alexis Mercedes Rinck’s prop copy of the City’s Comprehensive Plan, and one size for the good humor of Tariq Yusuf, the Robin Hood of tech bros. We like that guy! In fact, we like all of them!

But we felt most confident in Rinck’s ability to beat Woo. Woo may not be the evilest of masterminds on the city council, but she represents a dependable vote for big business, landlords, and the mega wealthy—and there’s plenty of that on the council already.

Don’t get us wrong! Progressives don’t sacrifice anything by voting for Rinck. She’s more than just a safe bet to knock out Woo. Of the three progressive challengers, Rinck would be the strongest, most consistent fighter for progressive revenue, which we desperately need to keep libraries open, labor standards enforced, and homelessness services running.

But there’s a few tinfoil-hat-wearers on SECB who alleged some kind of conspiracy based on Rinck’s long, long, LONG list of endorsements. She’s got the full weight of the Democratic Party behind her, plus countless progressive advocacy groups. Given all the fractures on the left, racking up that many supporters counts as quite the feat, and serving them all raises questions about whose concerns to prioritize. Indeed, in our meeting, we bullied Yusuf into arguing that Rinck would be the most likely of the three progressives to “sell out” (our words) because she’s got so many constituencies to please. Sanchez argued a similar point, calling her an “establishment Democrat” akin to US House Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Rinck shut that shit down real fast, though she couldn’t decide in the moment if the AOC thing was that insulting, lol. Her ability to attract so many endorsements while maintaining progressive positions speaks to her political skills, which will make her a force on the conservative, do-nothing city council. In the immortal words of Hannah Montana, Rinck gives Seattle “the best of both worlds.” She’s got some residual lefty grime from her protesting days, and she’s got experience in the belly of the beast of bureaucracy, the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. In fact, she gets credit for one of the biggest wins in that shitshow authority—convincing the suburbs to pay into the regional approach to homelessness. If she can get Bothell to fork over cash, maybe she can get Council President Sara Nelson to support one single renter’s right? Or at least build an opposition caucus that the left can build upon in 2025 and 2027. Either way, we win. Vote Rinck.

The Stranger's August, 6, 2024 Primary Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 16 Jul 2024 07:50:00 -0700

The Stranger's 2024 August Primary Election Cheat Sheet. by Stranger Election Control Board

The Stranger Endorses Uncommitted Delegates for the March 12, 2024 Presidential Primary Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 27 Feb 2024 12:16:00 -0800

Vote uncommitted delegates. by Stranger Election Control Board

If the two genocidal geriatrics leading the polls this primary season do not excite you, then you’re in good company. Most Americans do not like the top choices in 2024, since they’re the exact same choices we had in 2020, except now they’re that much older.

Feels bad.

Now, don’t get us wrong. Though we here on the Stranger Election Control Board do consume enormous amounts of extremely high-potency cannabis products, we draw no equivalence between the openly fascistic Republican party and the corporate-friendly but socially progressive Democratic party.

We’re just kinda wondering: In a country of more than 330 million people, is the Democratic party’s answer to American fascism really a guy who bent over backwards to help Israel displace and annihilate Palestinians, flout International Court of Justice orders to prevent genocide, and continue apace with an illegal occupation? A guy who lurched hard to the right on immigration, using Trump-era rules to limit asylum-seekers and promising executive action to limit access to asylum even further? A guy who failed to fully cancel student debt, who rejected court reform even after Dobbs and multiple corruption scandals, who let US Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema take his job for the first two years? A guy who’s older than Pop Tarts and credit cards?

A quick glance at the sane side of the ballot reveals that, yes, in fact, that guy, President Joseph R. Biden Jr, is the best that Democrats think they can do against former President Donald Trump this year.

The other options just suck. Democratic Congressman Dean Phillips is a corporate “gelato tycoon” who’s basically self-funding a campaign to increase his name recognition. Self-help author Marianne Williamson seems fun at parties, but she’s already suspended her campaign. Writing in “Ceasefire” or “Mickey Mouse” simply amounts to throwing away your vote–according to state law, officials only have to tally write-in votes from candidates who filed “timely declarations” of a write-in candidacy and who also exceed the number of votes earned by the second-place candidate. In other words, no one is going to see your write-in vote.

But the Washington State Democratic party did provide an option on our ballots that allows voters to express our disapproval of war crimes without throwing the country out with the bathwater: “Uncommitted Delegates.”

What are “uncommitted delegates?” Um, give us two short paragraphs to explain.

To win the Democratic party’s presidential nomination, a candidate must rack up 1,968 delegates at the Democratic National Convention in August. Washington State will contribute 92 delegates to that national tally, and the state party will award a certain share of those delegates to any candidate that wins more than 15% of the primary election vote.

Uncommitted delegates simply do not have to cast a vote at the convention for a specific presidential candidate during the first round of balloting the way delegates who pledge to vote for a certain candidate do, so they can make noise in a very public way if the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians hasn’t stopped by then.

And Washington’s uncommitted delegates likely wouldn't be alone. In Michigan, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib launched an informal campaign asking people to select uncommitted delegates to support the call for a ceasefire. With about 200,000 registered voters who identify as Muslim in a state that Biden only won by a little more than 150,000 votes in 2020, he will be paying attention.

Campaigns to vote uncommitted in other states, including right here in Washington, are revving up as we speak.

But let’s be real. If Biden lives to see the convention, he’ll likely win the nomination, and Washington’s uncommitted delegates will serve only as a measure of our primary electorate’s disapproval. But unlike a protest vote for Phillips or a throwaway write-in vote, voting for “uncommitted delegates” delivers a message to Biden in a language he can hear and understand.

Sure, even we screaming socialists must admit that Biden has chalked up some impressive wins while working with a functionally divided government. He signed the Inflation Reduction Act, which included a historically large investment in combating climate change. He signed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act, which included the “largest investment in public transportation in history.” He helped execute a soft landing after inflation shot up. After Uvalde, he signed a gun safety law that the NRA hated. We can buy birth control over the counter now. And, though he could be doing much more, he’s the most pro-union president we’ve had in recent memory.

But the potential benefits of pressuring Biden to do the right thing on the global stage outweigh the potential benefits of backing him outright in the primary.

First of all, though presidents hold the most direct power over foreign policy decisions, they almost never have to heed public opinion on those issues because of the structure of the national security apparatus and the fact that voters tend to focus on domestic concerns at the ballot box. Joining a movement to vote for uncommitted delegates to support a ceasefire gives us the rare opportunity to speak directly to the president on this issue, and the humanitarian disaster unfolding in Gaza is simply far too dire not to take advantage of that opportunity.

That said, we’re aware of the potential folly here. Looking at the polls, 82% of Democrats approve of Biden’s performance in office. That means there’s a real chance that voting for uncommitted delegates will quantify the exact size of the “ceasefire left” as part of the Democratic base, which will show Biden exactly how little he may need to care about us. And will winning Washington 80% to 20% instead of 90% to 10% scare him into doing the right thing on foreign policy and immigration? Probably not.

But, again, Trump and Biden are basically tied in the polls right now. In a race with margins that tight, Biden needs everyone to knock doors, to make phone calls, to email family members who live in swing states. And if he wants that level of support–especially from the youth and from other members of the winning Obama coalition–then he’s going to have to respond to our demands in real, material ways. And he should want that level of support, since that work will do a hell of a lot more to help his electoral prospects than touting a Washington primary endorsement months ahead of the general.

Look, we know Biden is the answer to the general election question because Trump would be worse in every conceivable way. He’s worse on Israel, he’s literally “planning militarized mass deportations, and detention camps” at the border, and on social media he repeatedly promises to destroy the “radical left.” With Republicans favored to take the Senate and maintain control of the House, he’ll have all the power he needs to do whatever he wants for who knows how long.

But let’s make one thing clear: The reason we will eventually have to make that easy but somewhat depressing choice is because white men designed our institutions to preserve white power, which Trump so totally embodies. The electoral college that elects the President continues to dilute the Black vote, as the “framers” designed it to. The President and the Senate, a minoritarian body that inflates the power of white voters, seat the members of the Supreme Court. Using judicial review, the Supreme Court–perhaps the most minoritarian institution in government–holds an ultimate veto over the legislative and executive branches. Though the House of Representatives most directly represents the people, they face reelection every two years, which means they’re not incentivized to solve problems. Until we abolish the electoral college, abolish the Senate or at least the filibuster, and reform the Supreme Court, then none of this governance shit is going to get any better.

A Trump victory would set back those goals indefinitely, and a Biden victory keeps them in reach. But right now, it’s the primary. And if we can’t push the likely Democratic nominee to do what we want now, then when can we push him?

Vote uncommitted delegates.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Hannah Kreig, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Ashley Nerbovig, Megan Seling, a tipsy go-go dancer in a jock strap, and Rich Smith.

General Election Night 2023: Stop the Corporate Takeover

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 17:54:00 -0800

2023 general election night party coverage. by Stranger Election Control Board

📌

Good evening, friends and enemies!

If you are reading this before 8 pm and you have not voted, then stop what you're doing, read this explainer, and act accordingly. Then hurry back here!

For the rest of you: Welcome to The Stranger's 2023 general election night party coverage!!!

Tonight, the lightly stoned and certainly starving members of the Stranger Election Control Board have fanned out across the city to corner candidates, chat up parents, shakedown political operatives, and review snack platters at every crammed, sweaty little election night party that would have us. From now until like 10 pm or so, we'll give you all the gossip, election results, hot takes, and cold cut assessments that you can handle.

The King County Elections department expects to drop the first batch of election results around 8:15 pm. Once that happens, we'll begin to learn the answers to the following questions:

Did a bunch of Trump donors and real estate moguls successfully buy themselves a city council to pair with the Mayor they bought in 2021?
Will Dan Strauss become king of the council???
Will Teresa Mosqueda and Jorge Barón make history as the King County Council's first Latino members?
Are we on track to electing a functional school board, or nah?
Will Seattle approve the housing levy renewal, showing that we stand ready to spend a fraction of the amount of money we need to spend to end the housing crisis?

Seatbelts, everybody. And keep your eyes glued to SLOG.

DRINKING UNION WINE, EATING UNION CAKE
9:52 PM Mosqueda and Barón, having their union cake and eating it, too. Eventually. Courtesy of Teresa Mosqueda's Campaign

We could hear Stranger-endorsed Seattle City Council Member Teresa Mosqueda practically beaming through the phone when she answered the SECB’s call from the group party at the Westin. The union staff had just delivered a surprise cake, and she was sipping a union-made cabernet sauvignon from Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery as we chatted—all a nod to the union support that may help her over the finish line.

The mood felt festive not only because Mosqueda led her challenger, Burien Mayor Sophia Aragon, by a point—a lead that will almost certainly grow in the coming days—but because both she and former Northwest Immigrant Rights Project executive director Jorge Barón are on the cusp of making history as the first Latina and Latino elected to the King County Council.

Barón leads Assistant Attorney General Sarah Reyneveld by 13 points. Since later votes lean leftward, he’ll almost certainly extend that lead. But Barón had something Mosqueda didn’t have—an endorsement from the Seattle Times.

Though he recognizes the “important milestone” of very likely becoming the first Latino ever elected to the County Council, he said for him the large lead was also about "creating pathways so the governance structures in the County and across the state better reflect the communities they’re serving."

If elected, he’s “excited” to dive into the implementation of the newly passed crisis care center levy. And if Mosqueda maintains her lead, then her first order of business will be looking at budget investments for public health, and her second order of business will be adding more King County water taxis to “our friends on Vashon Island.”

But first things first: UNION CAKE.

UNION CAKE. Courtesy of Teresa Mosqueda's Campaign NOT CONCEDING BUT EXHALING
9:27 PM ChrisTiana ObeySumner and the crew, thinking about the future at Rickshaw. COURTESY OF CHRISTIANA OBEYSUMNER

“I’m exhaling,” ChrisTiana ObeySumner said when they called the SECB to chat about the first batch of election results, which showed her trailing to former King County Superior Court Judge Cathy Moore by more than 40 points.

The policy wonk and equity consultant said they felt proud of their showing after so many considered their campaign unviable, and after enduring “an almost $200,000 smear campaign” from Independent Expenditure committees that backed Moore. “We put in 250%. At the end of the day, that’s all that matters,” they said.

Despite Moore’s rather large lead, ObeySumner isn’t ready to throw in the towel quite yet—“there’s always a miracle that could happen”—but they’re realistic about their slim chances. As a Buddhist, they believe their entire life’s mission is “to work toward the liberation from suffering of all sentient beings,” and they’ll continue to do that wherever they go next. “If the universe says not now, then I accept that and I’m grateful for that. We will see what happens,” they said.

CHEERS AND TEARS AT MORALES'S PARTY
9:10 PM Okay, but was the megaphone really necessary? STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Our computer seems to be the first device at Baja Bistro to load the election results. Morales leans over our shoulder to see her challenger, Tanya Woo, leading by nine points—54% to 45%—with about half the votes still left to count. After Morales walked away, preparing to speak, the people behind us asked us to scroll through the results of other progressive candidates lagging far behind their challengers.

“I really want to thank all of Seattle’s very progressive voters who wait for the last minute to vote,” she said with a megaphone a little loud for an indoor space.

She told the crowd that election night can be a little “anticlimactic,” and stressed that early returns are very different from what returns will look like. She was confident that returns will sway in their direction with subsequent ballot drops, and told supporters that District 2 cannot be bought—despite the influx of cash from real estate groups and landlords into the race.

“Why do I think that?” she asked.

“Because it's the truth,” a man yelled from behind Morales.

Despite the results, the Morales supporters cheered during her speech, although a few holding campaign signs behind her had watery eyes.

Morales teared up thanking her husband for filling the gaps at home over the past year, and her kids for all the missed basketball games and dance recitals.

“This community is looking for real solutions for this city,” she said. “That is the job of the next Seattle City Council.

DISTRICT 1'S MAREN COSTA WAS ROB-BED (PROBABLY) BY OPPONENT ROB SAKA
9:01 PM Eyes are glued to the TV at Costa's election party as they wait, unfruitfully, for her percentage to budge. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Dang, Maren Costa’s party really filled out! We counted 65 people by 7:45 pm, and there were only like eight or nine people, um, not that long before. Sorry. We have had a wine. What an eleventh-hour turnaround, though! And isn’t that just so Seattle for everyone to show up 45 minutes late?

At 7:50 pm, we got our much-hyped announcement, preceded by 10 minutes of thank-yous from Costa. That was nice! Along with her volunteers, of course, she thanked Mosqueda and Jayapal. “You have undoubtedly moved the needle in this race,” Costa said.

To kick off her pre-ballot drop speech, she announced, “I only want to be the labor candidate; I NEVER want to be the bought-by-billionaires candidate.” Supporters wooped and cheered. “Our community needs us, and our world needs us,” she went on, “so we will start right there, working together to make District 1 and our city one of the best places to live, where we can thrive.” Costa is a natural enemy of climate change and unaffordable housing in Seattle, FWIW, and she closed her speech by announcing the city is ready for change, leading the crowd in a chorus of “We are ready!”

For change, we assume. Not climate change, though. Another kind.

Cruel bummer. Costa trails her opponent, Rob Saka, by, uh, a lot. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Things turned gloomy after the ballot drop, though, with Costa reeling in just under 41% to centrist military lawyer Rob Saka's 59%, five percentage points behind the 46% that campaign manager Kyler Parris had publicly predicted. Parris lamented a “terrible voter turnout,” but he reminded the crowd: “We know that the most progressive candidate always gets the later swing in the ballot.”

He then quizzed the crowd on when they actually voted, and not a small number of people waited until the last fucking second, e.g., today. “So that’s the progressive swing we’re looking for.” By press time, though, it looks like it's pretty much over.

Meanwhile, Parris attempted to cheer things up by telling the crowd “We knocked on over 30,000 doors!" and letting them know that, regardless of the election results, the city will live to hear the name of Maren Costa again. Parris later pulled us aside to double down on this: "Maren's too good at this to not run in another election and win."

Why do these tiny cheeseburgers taste so good? The ghost of an Australian lamb? STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Crowd chattiness diminished, and we wandered back to the snack zone. Man, those brioche burger sliders were actually really good. Do they maybe have lamb in them? That would be kind of Australian! We think they had lamb in them.

Back at the bar, a friendly man saw us picking up our free drink ticket, which we had momentarily dropped on the floor not because we were drunk, we’re not sure why, things just happen sometimes, and we made a joke about how we were glad it didn’t get yoinked off the counter because that would have been the tackiest thing in the world, to have to ask for another drink ticket for a party we’re crashing in the first place—and he just handed us HIS drink ticket. “No, seriously!” he insisted. “It’s all yours!” Oh, no, it’s cool, that's not what we were asking, but then he just walked away, so we kept it.

Another glass of house red kept the party goin’. Hoping for more of that eleventh-hour power for Costa in the days to come, but yeahhhhh.

THE MOOD IS SUBDUED, RON DAVIS GIVES A SERMON, MIKE O'BRIEN INSTALLS HEAT PUMPS NOW
8:53 PM Davis addresses his supporters after seeing the first round of results. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

The mood after the ballot drop? We wouldn't say it's, as the kids might say, jumpin'. Davis came out with 44% of the vote. Everyone, all clad in their jackets because it's fucking COLD at Magnuson Brewing, gathered around while Davis hopped on a chair and gave "a sermon."

There was a lot of preamble, some God stuff, some very respectable "this is important to me but it really doesn't have to matter to you" stuff, but the main takeaway was Davis is thankful for the band of people who carried him through this campaign ("I owe each of you a canvas Trader Joe's bag," he said) and the results are not great.

"The results are exactly what we expected: ambiguous," Davis said. "This district is an uphill battle and it usually goes to the Seattle Times candidate."

Before the drop, Davis's campaign coordinator, Diego, said if the vote was as low as 44% then that would be cause for concern, then "we'd be down to the wire."

Still, the campaign is hopeful. He signed off his sermon by saying, "We have some ballots to count and a city to fix."

Hugs. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Davis hugged a green-plaid-clad former Council Member Mike O'Brien. Shaggy-haired and grinning, O'Brien told us he's been out of the politics game for a year now and installs heat pumps for a living.

"I sent him a note saying, 'No matter what happens tonight, you've run an amazing campaign,'" O'Brien said.

When he hugged Davis, we think he said something in his ear that sounded a lot like, "You're what democracy needs."

Our fingers are basically falling off now and the Lockheed Martin guy just came up to us and asked if we wanted to exchange numbers. We need to leave STAT.

Everyone—us included—is wearing their jackets. It's cold and hard to move around in this tiny event space that is—we have to reiterate—OUTSIDE.

Campaign coordinator Diego set the expectations ahead of the ballot drop. According to Diego, 32% of District 4 voted ahead of Election Day. Diego said he was hoping for a big bump on Election Day.

"People in Seattle vote really, really, really late. It's a cultural thing," Diego said. "We also do our taxes the latest."

That mythic waterfall of late votes could carry Davis to victory.

"If we see Ron get between 47 to 50% we're feeling really, really good. If it's 46 to 47% there's wiggle room, we're optimistic. If it's 45 to 46% it'll be a nail-biter and we're all going to be sitting here refreshing. Below 45% and we're down to the wire."

LEWIS COUNTING ON LATE VOTE TO SAVE HIM
8:51 PM Andrew Lewis hugs his wife Laura Lewis as he tears up about how the two met. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Andrew Lewis said he expected to be down tonight; late voters love him more than the early birds. But right now Bob Kettle has captured 56% of the vote to Lewis’s 44%. Still, Lewis said to the crowd of people gathered, “the late vote breaks progressive.” Only a portion of the vote is in right now, Lewis said. (Quick mid-speech update, Lewis teared up about how he met his wife, Laura Lewis, and how even if he loses tonight he’d do it again because he met her through his first campaign.)

We asked Lewis before the results came in what he’d do if he lost. He said he’d accomplished a lot and took a lot of pride in what he’s done on the Council. He said people could expect to see him around in the civic arena of Seattle.

Barbara Oakrock of the 36th Democrats worked on Lewis’s first campaign and said if he loses tonight it will be a great loss and the result of a “political misunderstanding.” People don’t understand what it's going to take to recover from the pandemic, Oakrock said. She acknowledged that Lewis came back after starting down in his first campaign, and pointed out the traffic jams around the ballot boxes tonight. Becka Johnson Poppe, former candidate for the King County Council, said she’s also optimistic for the future for the progressive candidates. Still, the murmurs around this party register as concerned.

PROGRESSIVE WIPEOUT ON CITY COUNCIL
8:40 PM

Welp! It really is looking like a bunch of Trump donors and real estate moguls successfully bought themselves a city council to pair with the Mayor they bought in 2021. In District 1, Maren Costa is down 18 points. In District 2, Seattle City Council Member Tammy Morales is down nine points. In District 3, Alex Hudson is down 17 points. In District 4, Ron Davis trails by 11 points. In District 5, ChrisTiana ObeySumner trails by more than 40 points. In District 6, Dan Strauss is down two points. In District 7, incumbent Seattle City Council Member Andrew Lewis is down 12 points. From our vantage, Strauss will likely make it out alive, and Morales MIGHT be able to come back, Lewis MIGHT squeak out a victory, but otherwise, the progressive slate is toast. What happened? Turnout in the 2019 general election hit 49%. King County Elections estimates 40% turnout for this year.

HUDSON STILL HOPEFUL FOR CHANGE
8:35 PM Hard to take a good photo when your soul is crushed, sorry. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

A computer hacker-type showed the SECB some sneaky results early. We do not understand his methods but we respect the hustle. He coaxed us through the initial shock, psychological damage, and sense of impending doom, but the SECB knew. We knew how bad it was and we watched everyone drink and laugh and live in complete ignorance.

A fan of the blog stood by us, looking at the results over our shoulder. "Oh fuck!" he said. "Really?" He collected himself and with a long drawn-out sigh. "I wasn't gonna drink tonight, but now I need to."

The SECB and our new hacker friend waited for minutes on end for someone—anyone—to react to the news. Maybe someone could soothe our disturbed souls.

Doomed, but still smiling. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Still, Alex returned triumphantly to her supporters.

"Obviously tonight, the results are all like whatever," she said. With less than half the votes counted, she said it's not worth dwelling on.

She entered the race because she knew there was "something better" possible. Better than paying half our paycheck in rent, better than our buses being late, better than people sleeping outside. She's still hopeful she'll deliver that.

THE RESULTS ARE IN
8:22 PM

Check them out here. Snap analysis forthcoming.

WE BECAME TV STARS AT MORALES'S PARTY
8:07 PM See that TV? We were on that TV. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Tammy Morales’s party at Baja Bistro started at 7:30 pm. Like Magnuson Brewery, it does not have wifi, but it's a lot warmer and smells delicious. We forgot how many cable channels there were. The bartender must have flicked through hundreds of cable channels to find Fox 13. Suddenly, we are on the screen. The restaurant cheers. We can see our shadowy figure at the bar writing this sentence!

Campaign staff are seated on barstools on a long table near the front door. The bartender places a glass of water behind our laptop screen and we nearly send an unseen candle rocketing across the room when we reach for it. Morales’s campaign manager Kelsey Hamlin greets us at the bar. We asked how it’s going and she said “It’s going.” For election night, the atmosphere is relaxed.

Tammy Morales is here, looking confident and making her rounds from table to table to speak with her supporters. The incumbent for District 2, Morales led her challenger Tammy Woo by more than 10 points in the primary (52 to 42.5).

She’s The Stranger’s pick for the seat because (as she put it during our SECB meeting) she’s the only candidate in the race. Morales is also the most left-leaning remaining incumbent and Seattle’s savior on tenant's rights.

LEWIS EXPECTS HE'LL BE DOWN
8:05 PM

We caught up with Andrew Lewis for a second after talking to his dad. He says he fully expects to be down tonight, but he’ll ultimately win.

That's what happened in 2019, too. He was down by a point on election night but ultimately won by 6 points.

We. Shall. See.

WE THINK WE MIGHT HAVE JUST GOTTEN HIT ON AT RON DAVIS'S PARTY
7:52 PM Davis's snack spread. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Wow, a lot is happening. Ron is here. He’s bald and beaming. He’s feeling good about the vote. One of his children said that Ron might have been late to his own party because he was getting a massage, but we did not confirm this with anyone who is old enough to drive.

While we were milling around waiting to talk to Ron, we were approached by a very kind operations engineer (we think this was the title but there is no way to know) from Lockheed Martin. He likes skiing, snowboarding, and doing calisthenics in the gym. We liked him just fine, but our conversation lasted longer than we expected. Were we being hit on? By a sexy urbanist at the ultimate Urbanist Daddy’s campaign party? We are CHARMED. Though, we really had to excuse ourselves to take a picture of the food (loaded tots, saucy wings, salad) and the snacks (an assortment of Whole Foods-y bites for the kids). Also, it turned out this Lockheed Martin guy knew our cousin.

“I’m feeling optimistic, excited, and ready for it all to be over,” Davis said. He’s anticipating an initial drop that won’t be super in his favor. We don’t blame him. We saw the hoards of late voters ourselves. His campaign staffers saw a lot of the same stuff.

There are a bunch of kids running around and a bunch of just-out-of-college campaign staff/volunteers networking. A car alarm is going off. This party is lit!

MORALES APPEARS AT LEWIS'S PARTY BEFORE HE DOES
7:51 PM Tammy Morales showed up at Andrew Lewis’s party ready to show her colleague up in stunning red. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Tammy Morales showed up with a posse to steal the show at Andrew Lewis’s election night watch party. Stunning in red, Morales planned to make the rounds to all the election parties around town tonight. “I’m late for my own party,” she confided before bopping over to take some photos with Laura Lewis, A. Lewis’s incredibly interesting wife. An assistant attorney general, L. Lewis showed up early to the Here Today Brewing + Kitchen to welcome her husband’s supporters. As soon as we made a joke about the missing council member she stayed on message. He’s still getting out the vote, she says. We’re starting a rumor he Lyft drives people to the ballots. Honestly, Lewis’s stand-ins continue to do wonders for our opinion of him.

Take his dad, Steve Lewis, what a guy. S. Lewis sent his son through all the alternative Seattle schools, Salmon Bay K-8 (called something else back in the day) and then the Center School. “Alternative schools, that was breaking new ground back in the day,” S. Lewis said. S. Lewis rocks. He said he told his sons to be whatever they wanted, just not to be like him. We disagree. We love S. Lewis and can’t wait to see this “scatterbrained” “artist” (his words) run for office.

Damn, A. Lewis just arrived. Oh my god, he tells us he was actually driving people to ballot boxes. Incredible. He also says he knocked on a total of 29,000 doors this campaign. [EDITOR'S NOTE: MAKE IT 30K, SLACKER!]

ONLY IN SEATTLE (AND ANY OTHER CITY WITH A MUSIC SCENE, PROBABLY)
7:50 PM

Polls close in minutes. MINUTES! And there is a party with live music at this Capitol Hill ballot box.

There’s a voting party happening at the Capitol Hill ballot drop box right now. Video courtesy @block_m3 who’s not covering the election tonight but can’t resist a good drum beat pic.twitter.com/eeqd9Q3Dux
— Josh Cohen (@jcohenwrites) November 8, 2023

COSTA'S GOT CROSTINI
7:42 PM Maren Costini. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

The scene's chill and neighborhoodly at Arthur’s in the Admiral Junction, where District 1’s Stranger-designated city council pick, Maren Costa, is electioning tonight. At 7 pm, setup’s a little behind skedge. “We're going to have an announcement in a few," we're told, although they’re still taping down the AV cords.

Arthur’s does Australian-adjacent sandos and drinks and so SECB’s curiosity in the snack spread was strong, although it turns out that the hors d'oeuvres aren’t identifiably Australian. Burg sliders on brioche, cauliflower and rainbow carrots with tzatziki, fries. Still delicious! The smoked trout crostini is the easy winner. Très dilly. We think there might be Vegemite in one of the fry sauces. An unnamed solo partygoer, upon trying a fry, loudly exclaimed, “Well, that’s incredible!”

District 1 Seattle City Council candidate Maren Costa kibitzes with supporters while we all wait in suspense! STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

The party seems to have organically concentrated itself in the bar half of the restaurant, and with drink tickets flowing in the meanwhile, it’s an easy wait. Paula Abdul, Dolly Parton, and Peter Gabriel on the aux are fine company. There’s a bright purple mocktail on the menu ("Cruel Summer") and an intense conversation at the bar about how to grow butterfly pea flowers, inspired by it. Can you grow them indoors? We say yes.

HUDSON GREETS GUESTS WITH GIRL SCOUT SALUTE
7:35 PM The Flubber Shot at Olstead—tequila, blue curaçao, turmeric, and pineapple. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

A gaggle, a murder, whatever you call a group of urbanists, filled up the back room of Olmstead to await the results of Alex Hudson's election for District 3, which includes the Central District, Madison Park, and Capitol Hill. One brave member of the SECB got COVID the last time she went to Olmstead, but we will forgive Hudson's poor location choice in exchange for government secrets should she win.

Based on the photo-finish primary, attendees expect a close, close race. After taking a shot, former city council candidate Alex Cooley predicted Hudson will be behind by about 6 points (8 at most) and then she'll win by the Friday drop. "Says me, who's been in one race," Cooley said.

Party decor. STRANDER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Hudson, who showed up 20 minutes late and greeted her guests with a Girl Scout salute, said she feels good about her chances.

"We worked our asses off and I'm a really good candidate!" Hudson said.

One of her supporters agreed and said she looked forward to seeing her serve on the council. She, in her usual charm, said "serve," but in a cool Gen X, gay way.

WE ARE LITERALLY THE FIRST ONES AT RON DAVIS'S PARTY
7:04 PM Where are you, Ron? STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Davis's party starts at 7 pm. We are here, at Magnuson Brewery, the jewel of northeast Seattle, but where is Davis? Where are his little urbanist children (literal children and also his supporters)? We got here, learned that Davis wasn't here, and that his party will be held on the Magnuson Brewery patio which, while covered and sufficiently heat-lamped, is still exposed to this lovely, biting breeze coming off Lake Washington. To top it all off, Magnuson Brewery doesn't have any wifi. It will be a hotspotty night for us. Wait, we hear some Davis supporters coming up the stairs. But we don't see any sign of his beautiful, bald head. We are going to go grab our coat from our car, which is parked between two Subarus. BRB.

Okay, now that we’re back two Davis helpers are here and they are just now setting up (reader, it is 7:04 pm). Some small children just ran up the stairs, saw the signs, and gasped, “Ron Davis!” We believe these are Davis’s brood. Now the children are helping put up the signs.

The patio gathering area is, well, cozy. We are settling in. Appetizers are supposedly coming. We are excited for those. And for Ron.

TOKE UP, OHIO
6:50 PM

Decision Desk HQ projects Ohio Issue 2 has passed.#DecisionMade: 9:12pm EST

Follow more results here: https://t.co/8sug2Xq9ic pic.twitter.com/kKAhIEhyXk
— Decision Desk HQ (@DecisionDeskHQ) November 8, 2023

Many outlets are reporting that Ohio’s Issue 2, which would legalize the possession and sale of weed, will pass. In 30 days, the good people of Cleveland (who are over 21) can spark up a joint and wonder why the hell Dems aren’t running on this as a national issue. And unlike in Washington, people in Ohio will be able to grow the plant, too.

YUSEF SALAAM WINS NYC COUNCIL SEAT
6:42 PM

The Associated Press is reporting that Yusef Salaam has won a seat on the NYC city council, representing a central Harlem district.

Salaam and four other young Black and Latino men were wrongfully accused and convicted in the 1989 Central Park Five rape case. He spent nearly seven years in prison before DNA evidence overturned the convictions of all five men.

Exonerated “Central Park Five” member Yusef Salaam has won a seat on the New York City Council, more than three decades after he was wrongfully accused and convicted as a teenager in the rape case. https://t.co/EqpDiInJWs pic.twitter.com/KPjobkGFDZ
— The Associated Press (@AP) November 8, 2023

Remember when he did this when Trump was indicted? LOL.

GOOD NEWS IN VIRGINIA
6:15 PM

Dave Wasserman of Cook Political Report reports via X that "Democrats retain control of the Virginia Senate, blocking a trifecta for Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R)."

Plus! It's looking like Danica Roem will win her race for state senate and she will become Virginia's first transgender senator! Congrats!

Danica Roem's race is being called, and she will become Virginia's first transgender Senator!

She was in a very hard fought race, where hecklers openly shouted transphobic slurs at her in town halls.

Anti-trans politics does not win elections.

Congratulations, Senator Roem! pic.twitter.com/Pr0TATyIey
— Erin Reed (@ErinInTheMorn) November 8, 2023

TURNOUT LOOKIN’ LOW
6:06 PM

According to a spokesperson at King County Elections, slow returns caused them to revised down projected turnout from 45% to 40% for the general election. Turnout in the August 1 primary came in at 31%. There’s still time to turn this train around—get out there and VOTE, people!

HUDSON SUPPORTERS CHEER FOR VOTERS
5:45 PM

This just in from Hannah: Alex Hudson's supporters on Capitol Hill might try to talk to you. Beware, introverts.

These canvassers say that Hudson supports union workers, "sweet coats" like one of the people passing by was wearing and "sharing Netflix passwords." Vote before 8pm! pic.twitter.com/JhekRhCxld
— Hannah Krieg (@hannahkrieg) November 8, 2023

ABORTION APPEARS TO WIN IN OHIO
5:33 PM

I've seen enough: in a victory for the pro-choice side, Ohio Issue 1, a measure to establish a right to an abortion in the state constitution, passes.
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) November 8, 2023

If Cook Political Report senior editor and elections analyst David Wasserman is correct, and he usually is, then voters in Ohio just enshrined the right to an abortion in the state's constitution. According to the Washington Post, the amendment grants the "treating physician the authority to determine, on a case-by-case basis, whether an unborn child is viable, and grant exceptions for abortions at any stage of pregnancy to protect the health or life of the mother."

WHAT FUCKERY IS THIS?
4:30 PM

Any idea what this is, @kcelections.
It’s next to the ballot drop box at Seattle Central College. pic.twitter.com/lsbTOPsZJh
— Rich Smith (@richsssmith) November 8, 2023

There's some kind of fake USPS mail box next to the ballot box on Seattle Central College's campus. Don't put your ballot in there. Put your ballot in the big, metal, white-and-blue ballot box next to it. The SECB has tagged King County Elections on x.com about this and we will keep an eye on it.

If you're the person who built the fake mail box, then do us all a favor and go fuck yourself.

TERESA MOSQUEDA STARTS EARLY
12:30 PM Seattle City Council Member Teresa Mosqueda, pictured here the salmon-colored jacket, aims to leave the city behind for a seat on the County Council. Courtesy of Teresa Mosqueda

When the SECB reached Seattle City Council Member and King County Council District 8 candidate Teresa Mosqueda by phone this afternoon, she was packing up signs and materials ahead of the big hoorah tonight at The Westin, where she'll join her probable future colleagues, Girmay Zahilay, Claudia Balducci, and Jorge Barón. (We know we're jinxing it, we don't care.) That crew plans to "reclaim" the hotel lobby bar, which gave so many Democrats PTSD during the general election night party in 2016.

As for snacks, she'll nosh on the union-made fare at the bar, courtesy of Unite Here Local 8: French fries and pizza for the kids, some veg options and chicken skewers, and "hopefully some union-made Chateau Ste. Michelle wine."

Mosqueda said she's feeling "cautiously optimistic" about the results tonight, and she's got plenty of reason for that optimism. She emerged from the primary way ahead of her challenger, and she's seen a ton of support throughout her campaign. Though she didn't place a yard sign on Vashon Island herself, people told her they saw her signs everywhere there. "That's a good sign," she said, in that it means communities she hasn't represented before stand ready to support her. And unlike with other campaigns, for this one she only had to spend a couple days on the phone asking friends to chip in, rather than hours every day cold-calling names on a list. "I'm grateful for that," she said.

We here at the SECB are grateful, too. We're grateful that Mosqueda spent the afternoon battling NIMBY forces on the council, even as she prepares for a promotion to a County seat, and we're grateful that she plans to bring her family's salsa to the election party at The Westin tonight. She gave us a bottle when we interrogated her during the August primaries, and we practically guzzled it.

The good stuff. Mosqueda said Jason Momoa stops into her family's restaurant in Des Moines, Iowa, and he loves it. Courtesy of Teresa Mosqueda JORGE BARÓN IS POUNDING THE PAVEMENT
12:00 PM Barón on the beat. Jorge Barón

At the lunch hour, the SECB called up King County Council District 4 candidate Jorge Barón and found him north of Green Lake, stuffing flyers into door jambs and trying to get out the vote. He'd spent the morning waving signs with his daughter on the Ballard Bridge in an effort to spread the good word. With endorsements from the Seattle Times, The Stranger, and several other much more venerable institutions, he should do well in his contest against Assistant Attorney General Sarah Reyneveld, but he's taking nothing for granted.

"Sarah is a good candidate and she has a lot of good connections and has worked really hard, so I’m not letting my guard down. I honestly feel really good about whatever the result might be. The only thing I feel bad about is turnout. I wish it were higher, but I’m hoping people were just procrastinating," he said. Hence the sign-waving all morning.

Later tonight, he said he planned to munch on union-made snacks at The Westin alongside Seattle City Council Member Teresa Mosqueda and King County Council Members Girmay Zahilay and Claudia Balducci. The latter two candidates are running unopposed, so he joked that they'll all be celebrating at least two wins tonight.

Regardless, Barón won't be celebrating too hard, at least not until after he gives his speech. "I’ll have a beer after the results come in and I’ve had a chance to thank the folks there," he said. Cute.

The Stranger’s Endorsements for the November, 7, 2023 General Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 19 Oct 2023 07:13:00 -0700

The Stranger's endorsements for the November 7, 2023 General Election. by Stranger Election Control Board

Just commit to dressing up as a slutty Republican Speaker of the House for Halloween already and listen up!!!

We have a major local election to discuss. How major? Well, there’s a $1 billion housing levy to chew on, a school board to set straight, and seven of nine city council seats up for grabs. Pretty fucking major! Especially those city council seats. Whoever grabs 'em will determine the trajectory of the city for a generation.

In the next few years, we need to complete a once-in-a-decade urban design plan without fucking it up this time, draw up a transportation levy that will make it possible to live in Seattle without a car, tax the rich to fund more housing, and pass more protections for workers in our increasingly gig-ified and AI-ifying economy.

Of course, big corporations, landlords, and commercial real estate interests want to control all of that, so they bought a slate of council candidates to pair with the Mayor they bought a few years ago. Those NIMBY concern trolls spent all year exploiting legitimate fears while offering bullshit solutions as a salve, promising to hire cops that don’t exist, get drug users into treatment programs that don’t exist, and sweep homeless people into shelter beds that don’t exist.

They feel confident in spouting all that nonsense because they think you won’t do your homework. But here you are in class, looking fabulous in your Halloween costume, ready to participate in democracy. As ever, we here on the Stranger Election Control Board have come prepared to serve.

We’ve selected a slate of candidates who want to build more housing, expand and speed up transit projects, scale up police alternatives, and otherwise create a welcoming, walkable city that actually feels like a city and not a playground for rich people with bad taste.

As usual, we came to all of our decisions after grilling these power-hungry maniacs in a crammed conference room, researching their backgrounds, and reporting out their dirty little secrets. Read all our infernal manifestos below, but, if you’re in a rush, then feel free to consult our handy dandy Cheat Sheet and move on with your one precious life. And, hey, while you’re in the mood, why not tip us for saving you some time? Did we mention how great you look in that costume?

Anyway, you know the drill. Your ballot is either sitting in your mailbox right now, or it’s on its way. If it doesn’t arrive by October 23, then call King County Elections to find out what’s going on. When your ballot arrives, grab your favorite pen, fill out the bubbles in accordance with our legally binding endorsement guide, stuff the ballot in the envelope, SIGN THE ENVELOPE, and then stuff that big beautiful package into the nearest drop box or into your very own mailbox–no stamp required! Do it all before 8 pm on Tuesday, November 7, and you’ll be golden.

Not sure if you’re registered to vote? Check here. Need to register to vote? Do it here. Want to track your ballot after you send it in? Bam.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Hannah Krieg, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Ashley Nerbovig, Megan Seling, a high-ranking member of the “graffiti society,” and Rich Smith. The Stranger does not endorse in uncontested races, or in races we forgot.

Director of Elections

Julie Wise

No one in King County knows how to run the elections department better than two-term incumbent director Julie Wise. She's devoted 23 years of her life to the agency, including nearly three years working as deputy director before voters chose her to lead the place.

During that time she’s successfully overseen 32 elections, led the charge on pre-paid postage for ballots, launched voter outreach initiatives, installed 68 new ballot drop boxes (impressive, but one more would have been nice hehe), and added four languages to the department’s full suite of voter materials, bringing the total number of languages covered to seven.

That history of accomplishment gives us faith in her ability to manage the little tornado of structural challenges headed her way in the coming years, from the inevitable shit-show of the 2024 presidential election to standing up Seattle’s ranked-choice voting system to ensuring the smooth transition from odd-year elections to even-year elections for some King County offices.

When she’s not handling all that, she plans to shore up security, promote civic engagement in schools, and add more options to the ballot verification process so that we’re not only relying on signature-matching, which disadvantages the youth, whose tender scribbles change with age.

You will not find the same level of passion for election nerdery and voter outreach in her opponent, Doug Basler, an election-denying Republican freakazoid who makes a habit of challenging unbeatable Democratic incumbents for reasons that have nothing to do with his digital media company, we’re certain!! To the degree that this loser has a platform, it’s ending mail-in voting and undermining democracy, two things we’d actually love to keep around, thanks. Vote Wise.

Metropolitan King County Council District No. 4

Jorge Barón

Both of the candidates running to represent the fine people of Belltown, South Lake Union, and the greater Ballard area would do a fine job, but Jorge Barón is your best bet here.

He ran the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project for 15 years–sometimes literally running through airports to stop unlawful deportations. During his tenure, he helped build the organization from a small nonprofit into a major operation, where he successfully advocated for laws to keep cops off the backs of immigrants and convinced the state to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in immigrant relief funds.

His success in lobbying the Legislature to move on immigration bodes well for future success in other tough lobbying efforts on behalf of the county, like trying to squeeze more progressive tax dollars out of the state. His coalition-building skills and his relationships with key lawmakers in that arena–including state Sen. Noel Frame, who endorsed him–increase our confidence in his ability to complete the mission.

But even if the state keeps dragging its feet, Barón’s expertise with the immigration system puts him in a strong position to swiftly roll out policies that could help solve one of the county’s biggest problems: staffing. We need more people to fix and drive the buses, watch kids at child care facilities, administer medicine for the public health department, and lend a hand everywhere else. Barón’s ideas for speeding up immigration paperwork can help with all that, and his union bonafides will mean those new workers won’t get the shaft.

Our only real beef with Barón involves his lukewarm feelings about a newly proposed sales tax to increase access to arts, science, and heritage programming countywide, a yearslong effort to help spread King County’s cultural treasures more equitably. After looking at the first draft of the proposal, though, Barón now tells us he “feels a lot warmer about it,” which makes us feel a lot warmer about him.

Though Assistant Attorney General Sarah Reyneveld strongly supports that measure, there’s no other real policy daylight between the two candidates. We like the emphasis and urgency Barón drums up around progressive taxation and immigrant rights, so we’re going with him. Vote Barón.

Metropolitan King County Council District No. 8

Teresa Mosqueda

We like Seattle City Council Member Teresa Mosqueda because she likes to tax the rich for more affordable housing, win worker protections and pay raises, push funding toward evidence-based solutions to crime, and use her bully pulpit to fight back against all the hatred and contempt that too many people have for the poor.

Her six years of experience managing mayoral and councilmanic egos in one of the most contentious political environments in the country more than qualify her for retirement a seat on the King County Council. From that post she promises to stay laser-focused on expanding child care services, securing higher salaries for care-givers and social workers, and making larger investments into public health to treat the sick and the dying–and she’s not afraid to tax big corporations to get the money, as she so ably demonstrated on council.

Since we last spoke to her in June, Mosqueda’s opponent, Burien Mayor Sofia Aragon, voted to ban sleeping outside at night. Adding insult to injury, she justified her cruelty with half-truths and some disingenuous language around equity. And all the while, her command of policy seems weak as ever. In policy interviews with other outlets she’s still just wandering through vagaries while continuing to run a back-the-blue grievance campaign that she found on the clearance rack from the 2021 Seattle elections.

Judging by her embarrassing performance in the primary, voters thankfully do not seem to be buying her bullshit. We hope she takes that rejection as a sign to escape her bubble and parlay what little power she’s amassed into another line of work, but it looks like she’ll just return to making the lives of poor people in Burien more miserable. Boo. Vote Mosqueda.

Commissioner Position No. 5

Fred Felleman

Port Commissioner President Fred Felleman deserves a third term because he knows how to expand our overstuffed airports and port terminals without polluting the sky or nuking the orcas. Or, at least we're certain that he’ll do a better job of all that than the corporate tool running against him.

But before we substantiate our praise, we must admit that the intensity of Felleman’s love for marine life sometimes goes a little too far. At the end of September, the Port’s ethics board slapped him on the wrist for using his position to try to attend leadership meetings for Washington Maritime Blue’s Quiet Sound, a program from a nonprofit group that works to muffle underwater noise from big ships that can disorient passing orcas. According to the Seattle Times, Felleman tried to attend meetings after they told him he couldn’t, and he was rude to a Port employee at some point in the process. Nothing he did resulted in any financial or electoral gains, and Felleman said he just wanted to help the project succeed. Still, he acknowledged his “words and actions sometimes lack respect and courtesy.” The SECB would never.

While we tend to reserve our discourteous words for our highest-paying clients, we do support the work Felleman has done for the environment over the years. Early in his career, he helped strategize the best way to clean up marine debris. He started pushing for state regulation of cruise liners all the way back in the 2000s, when the companies first docked in Seattle. In his 2015 campaign for commissioner, he promised to make the Port greener, and he followed through on that promise by banning the practice of cruise ships dumping untreated wastewater in Puget Sound. All very good things, in our view!

His opponent, Jesse Tam, is a former member of the banking industry and a board director for the Greater Seattle Chinese Chamber of Commerce. He’s hyper-focused on using the Port to spur development, which makes sense given how much money his campaign has taken from developers and realtors. He also wants the Port police to waste time cracking down on minor offenses. In contrast, Felleman sports donations from unions and cool people with jobs such as “healer/guide.” Vote Felleman.

Council District No. 1

Maren Costa

Maren Costa made a name for herself by standing up to the bosses at Amazon, and she plans to bring that pro-worker spirit to the Council. She’ll tax the rich, she’ll push for density across all neighborhoods, and–god willing–she’ll stop the sweeps.

Could she be a stronger critic of the police? Hell yes. In a particularly awkward moment during The Stranger’s Candidate Survivor, she said she wanted to see “anti-racist police,” which, our sister in Christ, is an oxymoron.

Nevertheless, she’s leagues above her competition, Rob Saka. The SECB’s disdain for big tech lawyer Saka goes back more than a year, when (very credible) rumors spread about Mayor Bruce Harrell hand-picking him to replace one of his many political enemies. Given the Mayor’s terror campaign against the unhoused and his undying love for the cops, we did not have high hopes for his stooge.

Lo and behold, Saka proved to be the vapid twat of our nightmares. Before the primary, it felt like pulling teeth to get him to talk about anything besides himself. Nice backstory. We loved it the first five times we heard it. Now, can we get to the policies? No? Gonna wait ‘til the month before the election? Okay. We’ll wait.

We should have known to be careful about what we wished for. When he finally started to take stances, they sucked so bad we understood why he kept pussyfooting around our questions. In one recent memorable moment, he said we cannot only “root cause” our way out of the homelessness crisis, which is a nice way of saying we must humiliate and punish homeless people with expensive and unhelpful sweeps while we wait years for housing to come online.

Speaking of homelessness, he thinks we can solve the crisis via corporate donations, and by “donations” he doesn’t mean $1 billion per year in taxes for the next ten years, which is what we actually need. And like the others on his slate, he wants to hire 500 more cops, even though we all know that number is wildly unrealistic. Even with Harrell offering $30,000 in hiring bonuses, the police department hasn’t come close to meeting its recruitment goals.

By no means are we alone in our criticism of Saka’s campaign. All of his former competitors endorsed Costa, even the ones that aligned more closely with him on the issues. But don’t feel too bad. Saka can cry on the shoulders of the CEOs and Trumpers who pumped tens of thousands of dollars into his campaign. Vote Costa.

Council District No. 2

Tammy Morales

SECB members collectively blush, lie on our bellies, and kick our feet in the air when we think of Council Member Tammy Morales. Writing an endorsement for Morales feels like composing a sappy diary entry in glitter gel pen about our middle school crushes. Except our middle school crushes did not tirelessly advocate for the working people of Seattle.

Morales votes the right way on every issue. Cops? She won’t give them more money. Renters? She goes to bat for them. Sweeps? She decries them. Housing? She wants to decommodify it. When a contentious vote comes before the council, she rarely gets a frantic call from our City Hall reporter to ask which way she’s going to go. (Thanks for that, by the way. It saves her some time.)

Morales also advocates specifically for her district, which includes the Chinatown-International District, Beacon Hill, and Rainier Beach. When the Mayor cut funding to programs to prevent violence against Asian-American Pacific Islander communities last year, Morales brought the money back. When the council allocated money for traffic safety, Morales called dibs to invest on Rainier Avenue. When summer sun brought South Seattle to a boil, Morales funded community resiliency hubs for her constituents to beat the heat. And as rising rents push more Black and brown people out of Seattle, Morales pushes for social housing like no one else.

Besides, there is no one else in this race—unless you count Tanya Woo. You know, the woman who led protests alongside the King County Republicans against expanding a shelter in SODO. And no, she did not make that fuss just because the County did not “hear” the community on that issue. She did it because she thought a “mega-shelter” would bring in the riff raff. As we said in August, the mask slipped in our endorsement meeting.

Woo will not bullshit you when it comes to other bad ideas, though. She actually called for “down-zones,” which would stifle density in the midst of a housing crisis. Ms. Woo, no serious person has suggested down-zones since the first Bush administration, and that’s being polite!

Furthermore, in classic conservative fashion, she does not support generating new progressive revenue, nor does she name the vital programs she’d kill to balance a budget without it. You’d think she’d have a list ready, since she’s so informed and so plugged into local politics–psych! She’s only ever voted in two local elections in the 30 years she’s been old enough to vote. And she also lied to The Stranger about that!

So, if you want a NIMBY corporatist with a fibbing problem, then Woo is the one for you! If you want someone who will actually make Seattle a more livable city, then Morales is the only choice. Vote Morales.

Council District No. 3

Alex Hudson

When Council Member Kshama Sawant declined to run for re-election, the SECB went through all the stages of grief. And now, comrades, we must enter the acceptance phase by selecting a new council member to replace the most tenacious lefty elected official this sorry town has ever seen.

We might not follow any of the potential Sawant replacements into gunfire, but we believe former Transportation Choices Coalition Executive Director Alex Hudson outlines a better vision for Seattle than her competition, cannabis-grower and third-generation Seattleite Joy Hollingsworth.

If you’re hoping for someone to stand up to big business, neither of these candidates fit the bill. The Downtown Seattle Association, which represents the interests of giant corporations and landlords, said Hudson and Hollingsworth both felt “aligned” with their values. Neither candidate seems 100% strong on progressive taxation, with Hollingsworth only “maybe” in favor of a capital gains tax and Hudson iffy on expanding the payroll tax on the City’s biggest businesses.

But Hudson’s transit chops far outshine Hollingsworth’s. With a new transportation levy to shape soon and a certain regional transit agency that could use at least one other unwavering champion for transit riders on its board, Hudson brings the policy expertise we desperately need in that arena.

And really, this race comes down to who will support more housing density in a housing crisis. That’s Hudson. She’s already had a hand in developing many units of affordable housing during her time on the board at Bellwether Housing, and as a council member she would support bold zoning reform to allow more people to live in Seattle.

Conversely, in 2017, Hollingsworth tried to block the construction of a small apartment building explicitly to save her view of Bellevue. She was still complaining about the development in 2020. The building was never built.

So what? She did a NIMBYism five years ago, and then again three years ago. People change, people grow. Well, we aren’t convinced she has. When she tried to defend herself, she failed to address the thrust of the critique leveled against her and instead gave a history lesson in displacement, a concern she did not raise in her battle against development on a major arterial. But what did we expect? After all, she took the weakest, least imaginative stance on zoning reform of any candidate we interviewed in the District 3 race.

We cannot rely on someone who opposes new, relatively cheap apartments over concerns about diminished views of a mall city to take the housing crisis seriously, especially since the upcoming council will vote on the comprehensive plan, a once-in-a-decade overhaul of the City’s zoning laws. We cannot afford to fuck up that plan again. Literally. Vote Hudson.

Council District No. 4

Ron Davis

Urbanist Father™ Ron Davis is going to put bike lanes in places you didn’t even know needed bike lanes. He’s going to fill the city with apartments wallpapered in Amazon’s money. He’s going to leave a handprint on your landlord’s face after he slaps them with anti-rent gouging laws. He’s going to make Seattle a walkable utopia—or at least keep the NIMBYs from winning every fight in the midst of a housing crisis.

In addition to being the urbanist boss at the end of the video game, the SECB also trusts Davis with the sacred responsibility of replacing Council Member Teresa Mosqueda as Seattle’s queen of progressive revenue. Davis wrote bold, well-informed, pro-tax propaganda before he even announced his candidacy, and he has not wavered since. This makes him one of the few–if not the only–remaining candidates in the City to stay 100% consistent on strong support for taxing the rich. With a looming budget shortfall of potentially half a billion dollars, we need an entire city council of tax dweebs like Davis.

But don’t get us wrong. He called the council’s promise to cut the police budget by 50% a tactical error, and he needed some education on the problems that come along with targeting street dealers for arrest, so he's going to need some more guidance in that department.

But at least he's open to dialogue and change. His competition, Maritza Rivera, loves cops with a fervor that we must assume comes from a clinical overconsumption of true crime podcasts and paranoid dribble on NextDoor. Don’t count on her to tax the rich, either. A bunch of loaded CEOs and Trump donors poured tens of thousands into her campaign, buying her political influence if she wins. Oh, and did we mention she’s allegedly a nightmare to work for? According to 26 workers at the Office of Arts and Culture, where she used to hold the position of deputy director, she’s a middle manager from hell.

To review: Rivera is a bad boss, a bootlicker, and a big biz pawn. Davis is an urbanist and a progressive taxation champ who admittedly could use some work on cop issues. Vote Davis.

Council District No. 5

ChrisTiana ObeySumner

North Seattle faces unique challenges that the City Council often ignores–an appalling lack of sidewalks, high traffic fatalities, a new light rail station in desperate need of density, and sex worker safety along Aurora Avenue. The SECB trusts no one to have a better command over those issues more than we trust ChrisTiana ObeySumner.

As a social equity consultant and a policy wonk, ObeySumner has an in-depth answer for any question you throw at them. They boast plenty of experience working on policy with current elected officials, so they can dive right into the nitty gritty if they win the seat—they’ve even already read the employee handbook!

Moreover, the issues that North Seattle faces are personal for ObeySumner. As someone who uses walking canes and wheelchairs, they deal with the City’s total disregard for disabled pedestrians on a daily basis. As someone who experienced homelessness and housing insecurity as a child, they know what it feels like not to have a safe place to sleep at night. As a Black person and the grandchild of a Black Panther, they understand the long-overdue calls to end racist policing and brutality. As a former sex worker, they know what a safe Aurora looks like.

Unlike most of the council races, ObeySumner’s competition has gained legitimacy with some progressives. Former King County Superior Judge Cathy Moore supports progressive taxes, social housing, and she looks really cool in a leather jacket.

But don’t be fooled. Moore wants to hire 500 more cops, restrict density to preserve neighborhood character, and she does not support a ban on sweeps during extreme heat or cold.

Moore won the primary, and that made some so-called progressives preemptively admit defeat, as though ObeySumner cannot win an election. News flash, bozos: They can. You just have to get your ass to the ballot box and tell all your progressive North Seattle friends to do the same. Vote ObeySumner.

Council District No. 6

Dan Strauss

Really? None of you scrappy leftists rallied around the coolest gal in the Signal thread and mounted a write-in campaign against this guy? Really?? Ugh. (Joking. Kinda. Not really.)

Anyway, the SECB regrets to inform you that you must grit your teeth and fill in the bubble for incumbent Council Member Dan Strauss.

With all the constitution of a pile of sugar-free Jello, Strauss spent his first few years on council following the lead of other progressive politicians. But as his re-election approached, he pivoted harder and harder to the right.

He held his tongue on most contentious votes, such as the council’s drug war reboot, but then he inevitably sided with the worst people on the dais. And you are who you vote with, Ballard Dan (pejorative).

During his campaign, he similarly avoided taking sides on big issues—most egregiously, the zoning overhaul he's leading as chair of the land use committee. He only keeps it real on two issues: Pulling cops out of his ass to fill the department's vacancies (boo), and raising more progressive revenue (yay).

If not for his support of new taxes on the rich, it would have been a close call. His opponent, Pete Hanning, agrees with Strauss about most stuff, including putting people with substance use disorder in jail and giving the cops a blank check from taxpayers. The SECB preferred his bluntness in our meeting to Strauss's canned answers and Stepford Wives smile.

But Hanning denies the existence of gaping holes projected in the 2025 and 2026 budgets, insisting that the council can find all the money it needs in the couch cushions. Seen that movie before. With half a billion in budget cuts on the line, voters should not give the time of day to any candidate unwilling to tax the rich. Vote Strauss.

Council District No. 7

Andrew Lewis

Andrew J. Lewis sends the SECB into an existential crisis—and not in a cool I-saw-God-when-I-took-DMT way, but in a much sadder, how-do-we-tell-Seattle-to-vote-for-the-straight-Pete-Buttigieg way.

Right now, he needs votes from cool, left-leaning voters to beat his challenger from the right, but at the same time, he has not earned a sash and crown from the progressives.

Lewis pissed off the bootlickers when he voted against the council’s first attempt at cracking down on public drug use. But then he pissed off the left by voting for an eerily similar bill after it went through the good ole Seattle Process behind the scenes.

Similarly, he got an earful from The Stranger when he joined landlords in opposition to a measure to cap fees for late rent at $10. But then, to the dismay of conservatives, he changed his mind on that one.

Lewis also championed a slew of protections for gig workers, but he supported an amendment to severely limit who gets those basic rights, siding with big business against the good advice of his co-sponsor.

One more example: He voted on a resolution to defund the Seattle Police Department in 2020. Woohoo for the left. But then he backtracked, calling a promised 50% cut demanded by thousands of protesters a “mistake.”

Though Lewis has a mixed record, the record his opponent wants to start stamping into law looks worse. Bob Kettle, a Sara Nelson protégé, supports carceral “solutions” to public health problems, wants to somehow sweep homeless people around town even harder, and refuses to support new revenue, which means austerity for all–except, of course, for the police department, which he will shower with ghost cops.

Though the SECB cannot in good conscience gush about Lewis, we can say that his malleability may be his saving grace. If Seattle elects a majority conservative council, then he and Kettle would probably perform more or less the same way on the dais. However, if Seattle elects a progressive majority to council, then Lewis falls in line. Vote Lewis.

Proposition No. 1

Property Tax Levy Renewal for Affordable Housing

Yes

Without question, filling in the “yes” bubble to renew Seattle’s housing levy will do more good than filling in any other bubble on this ballot.

Over the next seven years, City staff expect the tax to raise $970 million for affordable housing, including nearly 2,900 new units for renters making up to 60% of the area median income, which translates to about $57,000 per year for one person. Most of the construction and preservation money—60%—will build apartments for renters who make less than $29,000 per year, a group of people the market simply declines to serve. If those units don’t get built–and they won’t if we don’t pass the levy–then all those people will wind up on the streets.

The levy also aims to preserve an additional 600 affordable units, keep up maintenance on current buildings, pay the people who work in those buildings better wages, help nearly 300 households buy their first homes, and prevent eviction for thousands.

To do all that work, the City will charge a property tax of $0.45 per $1,000 in assessed value, which will cost the owner of a median-priced home ($855,000) about $380 per year.

Sadly, though that annual cost to homeowners will triple compared to the expiring housing levy, these funds will not triple the number of units we’ll get out of this one. In fact, that number will probably stay pretty flat. (Thanks, inflation!) That said, Seattle-area home values have risen 55% over the same period (thanks, inflation!), so owners should be more than fine. (And those who aren’t fine can apply for an exemption.)

Nevertheless, we know landlords will point to this property tax increase as a reason to raise rents even higher. The only thing you can really do about that is elect a city council that will stand up to the landlord lobby and propose tax credits for renters, better tenant protections, and more generous relocation assistance programs. Luckily for you, we only endorsed the most renter-friendly candidates, so vote the whole Stranger ticket.

Another reality we must face: though $970 million is a lot of money, it will come nowhere near close to solving the city’s affordable housing problem. Recent reports show we need 30,000 affordable units yesterday and somewhere between 112,000 and 120,000 new units by 2044, depending on who you talk to. Very roughly speaking, to make a real dent in those numbers we’d need to quintuple the cost of this proposal, or else hold a general strike until the federal government dramatically increases its investments in housing–neither of which is going to happen.

But if we don’t pass the levy, then the housing crisis worsens, which would, well, be worse. At least we can take some comfort in the fact that the last housing levy exceeded its performance expectations in all but two categories, and it appeared on track to meet expectations in those two categories by the end of this year, according to the latest report from the oversight committee.

This is the best neoliberalism is gonna do, folks. Vote yes.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 1

Liza Rankin

Seattle Public Schools (SPS) needs to claw its way out of a budget deficit while ensuring it stays steadfastly dedicated to improving outcomes for Black boys, and School Board Vice President Liza Rankin is the best person in this race to accomplish those goals.

She demonstrated her dedication to equity in her first term by helping to transform the district’s Highly Capable model into one that allowed students in any classroom to access advanced learning curricula. She also helped ban the practice of punishing students using isolation, a punishment that staff used at disproportionately high rates against Black students, students with disabilities, and those in the foster care system. More recently, Rankin pushed for the district to act with more transparency and fairness when accepting parent-teacher association donations.

Though Rankin performed well in the primary, the district’s recent teacher reconfigurations seemed to piss off people enough for them to erroneously blame the school board, a furor that Rankin’s opponent, Debbie Carlsen, used to support her argument that Seattle needs to elect her to help better manage the district.

But we don’t see much evidence to support that claim. First off, her response to the district’s deficit seems confused. She simultaneously believes the district can find more money in the couch cushions and yet also needs to advocate more aggressively for progressive revenue at the state level.

Okay, it’s true that some fat may exist in the budget, but not enough to fill a $100 million deficit. We would all love more progressive revenue for the district–including Rankin–but we don’t think we can blame a lack of high-intensity lobbying from Seattle’s school board for the Legislature’s foot-dragging on that issue, because lots of those lawmakers wrongly think that Washington schools have too much money as it is. And while we’d love to see Rankin more aggressively push for progressive taxes to fund our public schools, it’s not like her more diplomatic approach hasn’t paid off. Last session, she helped secure a 9% increase for special education statewide, a move that she said miffed more than a few legislators. Moreover, Rankin’s endorsements from state lawmakers, including state Sen. Joe Nguyen, who will hold a powerful position on Ways & Means next session, puts her in a better position to shake down those losers for more money.

However, Carlsen’s endorsement from the Seattle Education Association (SEA), which supported Rankin in her last election, did give us pause. Sometimes, Rankin makes noises that make the union frown, like when she told the Seattle Times she felt “nauseous” when she signed a labor contract that blew a hole in the district’s budget, but the important part is that she signed it anyway. She’s stood with labor in the past, she signed the last contract, and she tells us she’s “on great terms with the rank-and-file members” of the SEA.

At the end of the day, the school board faces a broad array of issues too important to entrust to someone who doesn’t understand what they’re talking about, and, point-for-point, Rankin knows both SPS and Washington’s education system better than Carlsen. Vote Rankin.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 2

Lisa Rivera Smith

As the only candidate in this race who has experienced homelessness in a state with one of the “largest homeless student populations in the country,” Director Lisa Rivera Smith brings a valuable perspective to the school board. That perspective helps her see Seattle's affordable housing crisis as a primary driver of lower enrollments, which gives her two handy tools: a more equitable lens to use as the district attempts to deal with the deficit, and plenty of armor to use against wealthy parents who shout the loudest about cuts they don’t want to see.

She also wants to stick with the new governance model that will help make the board more effective while still molding it to better fit our district. We think the model reduces unnecessary delays, duplicative work, and ultimately allows the board to step back and focus on the big-picture goals of SPS.

However, we want her to remain true to her values. Her openness to putting cops back in schools after voting with the rest of the board to suspend that program makes us raise our eyebrows and look around at each other with faces of concern. She said some members of the Latino community told her cops in cafeterias would help their kids build friendlier relationships with police. We think that’s a bad idea. Schools aren’t Bumble BFF for kids and cops. Social workers or other kinds of counselors could serve as a more effective resource than a living embodiment of the school-to-prison pipeline.

Rivera Smith’s opponent, former Whitman principal Christinia Posten, opposes putting cops back in schools, which is cool. She also wants to focus on a way to provide special education students with consistent services districtwide as they age, which sounds nice but okay how? Plus, she told us she didn’t trust the board’s new government model because it didn’t give members enough direct oversight over the superintendent. Sounds like someone who wants to micromanage pet policies and district staff, which is exactly the kind of impulse that has made the board so acrimonious and ineffective over the past several years.

She also sent us an email after our meeting that sounded like she planned to drop out of the race if we didn’t endorse her. We understand that it’s nice to plan ahead, but the lack of commitment to running for school board made us think her heart was only half in it. Vote Rivera Smith.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 3

Evan Briggs

Evan Briggs deserves your vote because she has a solid backbone and creative ideas for assessing student success. Plus, between our interview with her this summer and now, she started working on a jazz program for incarcerated youth, which is cool.

She showed some serious spine in 2019, when she stood up to some parents and staff at Thornton Creek Elementary to help another mom draw attention to a civil rights investigation that the district mishandled. After realizing that the school community had no interest in changing how it treated Black students and families, Briggs ultimately transferred her kids to the more racially and economically diverse Sand Point Elementary, where she now volunteers with the PTA.

She pitches strong, realistic ideas for progress, such as establishing policies to ensure that schools benefit equitably from parent-teacher association funds. But she also pitches good big ideas, such as ditching the standard grading system and moving to one where teachers assess students based on how well they managed to learn the core concepts of a specific course.

The fact that she can point to specific plans she wants to oversee puts her head and shoulders above Ben Gitenstein, who makes broad critiques of the district but offers zero real solutions. When pressed for any specifics during our interview, he made weird claims that showed he lacked a basic understanding of the district and its history. For example, in trying to show how the school district mismanaged its money, he criticized the Rainier Beach High School remodel, a school with a long and well-documented history of needed renovations.

Finally, he sends one of his kids to private school. We cannot support a candidate for school board who does not support public schools. Vote Briggs.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 6

Gina Topp

A former policy advisor and chief legal counsel to King County Executive Dow Constantine, Gina Topp knows what she’s talking about when it comes to education policy, and she’s ready to hold the district and the superintendent accountable when they fuck up. Honestly, that’s all we’re asking for–not sure why it’s so hard.

In our endorsement meeting, her opponent, Maryanne Wood, a retiree running for director because she wanted a “project” to keep her busy, offered shallow criticisms that lacked the depth of knowledge Topp brings to the issues. Wood’s main critique of the district centered on inadequate parking around a remodeled Alki Elementary, which she described as a “mega school.”

In a demonstration of how she’ll likely act on the board, Topp led her response with expertise, but she pulled no punches. Though everyone would prefer the smallest schools with the most individualized attention to children as possible, she noted that the state’s funding model incentivizes districts to create schools with a minimum of 400 kids–or “mega schools,” as Woods would call them–to get more resources to serve more students. Though she thinks kids can still get a good education at a larger school, she agreed that the district’s poor messaging about the remodel created avoidable suspicion around the project. As a board director, she vows to communicate more clearly and holistically with parents, and we think that approach will serve the district well as it prepares to make budget cuts in the near future.

Topp also promises to keep cops out of schools, lobby the City and County on affordable housing for SPS families, and call out the superintendent if he fails to live up to the board’s expectations. What more could we ask? Vote Topp.

The Stranger's November 2023 General Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 19 Oct 2023 07:06:00 -0700

The Stranger's cheat sheet for the November 7, 2023 General Election. by Stranger Election Control Board

Primary Election Night 2023: The Results Are In and The Stranger's Still Got It! 💅

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 01 Aug 2023 18:11:00 -0700

The Stranger's coverage of the the 2022 August primary election. by Stranger Election Control Board

📌

Good evening and happy Election Day, Seattle!!!

If you are reading this before 8 pm and you have not voted, stop what you're doing, read this, and act accordingly.

For everyone else: Welcome to the party.

Once again and as ever, we here at The Stranger have dispatched our trusty, tenacious, and charmingly stoned Stranger Election Control Board to election night parties all across town. We'll be shaking down candidates, judging snack tables, getting trapped in conversations with parents, dodging political operatives, and reporting back on every last festivity we can possibly find so that YOU don't miss a beat.

Oh yeah, and at 8:15 pm we will all FINALLY learn the answers to several burning mysteries:

Will Seattle City Council incumbents survive, and what will be left of them?
Will primary voters favor candidates who want to solve problems with evidence-based solutions or those who want to solve problems with vibes?
Will Teresa Mosqueda and Jorge Barón be on track to become the first Latina/o King County Council members?
Does Seattle still care about seniors, veterans, and poor people?
Do voters want a functional school board or nah?
And finally, perhaps most importantly, will two-term Port Commissioner Fred Felleman retain his title against less-than-qualified candidates????

STRAP IN AND KEEP YOUR EYES GLUED TO SLOG.

CHRISTIANA OBEYSUMNER HAS A NEW BUDDHA 9:34 PM Lucky buddha. ChrisTiana ObeySumner

ChrisTiana ObeySumner “got out of tara medication later than I thought” and kept their phone on airplane mode all the way back home. When they got to their lawn at around 9:15 pm, their team revealed their close second-place finish: only 300 votes ahead of neighborhood advocate Nilu Jenks and 1,400 votes behind Seattle Times-endorsed retired judge Cathy Moore.

“Oh my god. Ohhhhh. Hahahahahaahah!?” ObeySumner said of the initial count.

They feel “confident” the votes will keep trending their way throughout the week as King County Elections continues to tally the results, especially now that they’re in possession of a brand new Buddha. (The people at the temple knew they were running, and so gave it to them this evening as a gift.)

They attribute their strong showing to their “small little spot of a team,” who gave up their weekends and nights, door-knocked in wheelchairs, and hustled for vouchers after a rough start to a campaign. (ObeySumner switched consultants in the middle of the campaign.) They also tipped their hat to The Stranger for the endorsement, which they said “helped put us over the edge.”

ChrisTiana ObeySumner's dog Barkley and his human friends. COURTESY OF CHRISTIANA OBEYSUMNER

If they end up coming in second, the campaign plans to “reach out in good faith and in good will” to other candidates who were aligned with their views. “We all ran because we care about this district, and I’ve always said we’re taking multiple pathways toward shared goals,” they said.

But tonight, the plan is to listen to “some Y2K emo rock song” and go nuts. As if on cue, their fundraiser, Matt, busted into the room and yelled, “WHERE’S THE DANCE MUSIC?”

MAREN COSTA IS "A LITTLE SHOCKED" SHE'S IN THE LEAD FOR DISTRICT 1 9:10 PM Shocked, but not too shocked to drink a little celebratory champagne. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

As the sun set on Maren Costa’s sister’s patio, things were just getting started for the progressive District 1 candidate and SECB’s favorite Maren Costa who had a solid 29% lead in the first ballot drop. Costa led Seattle Times’ minion Rob Saka, who pulled in 25% of the vote, and administrative judge Phil Tavel, who eked out 21%.

Campaign manager Kyler Parris read out the numbers, and Costa’s supporters gave out jubilant cheers when they heard their candidate was in the lead, clearly thankful (as is the SECB) that the folks in West Seattle seem to want more housing, a stop to homeless sweeps, and actual alternatives to policing. Costa thanked her volunteers, who she said had knocked on some 11,000 doors (are there that many homes and apartments in West Seattle? Apparently so!).

“I’m a little shocked,” Costa admitted to us after champagne had been handed all around. “Some of the candidates had an earlier start, so this is a big deal.”

Costa said she looked forward to making housing a priority if she succeeds in the general. When asked if this former Amazon employee who once challenged Jeff Bezos to make his company more environmentally friendly was looking forward to taxing all those billionaires once she’s on the council, Costa replied, “They need to pay their fair share.”

Campaign manager Parris, who was beginning to see SECB’s presence at his campaigns as a good luck charm, was happy with the results, especially since the share of votes still to be counted over the next will likely tip progressive. “This is definitely not unreachable,” he said of Costa’s chances in the general.

But with two pro-business candidates taking more than 40% of the total that might be a big ask.

OH YEAH, THE JELL-O! 8:56 PM Imagine having to chill each layer before adding the next. Pour, chill, pour, chill, pour, chill. It must've taken a whole day! Or longer! STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Can we please take a moment to appreciate the patience required to make these rainbow-layered Jell-O treats at Ron Davis's party?

OH YEAH, THE LEVY! 8:55 PM

As we suspected, King County really likes Veterans, Seniors, and Human Services, because “approve” is winning by 70%. Tax fatigued our tipsy little asses!!!!!

ANDREW LEWIS FINDS THE PROMISED LAND 8:47 PM More like Inter-beer, are we right? COURTESY of ANDREW LEWIS

After breaking his promise to drink only District 7 beers this evening, incumbent council member Andrew Lewis celebrated his 8-point lead over Bob Kettle at Holy Mountain Brewing in Interbay.

He seemed unbothered not to crack 50%. With The Stranger’s endorsement, he predicted being on track to “trend above 45%.”

As a freight train rumbled by, he kicked back in the last of the summer sun with Mariner (the brewery’s Kolsch), and looked forward to a pizza somewhere on Capitol Hill later. At least he’s getting his steps in.

LIKE NO ONE AT DAVIS'S PARTY LIVES IN HIS DISTRICT 8:45 PM Ron Davis addressing his supporters and supportive frisbee players. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Ron Davis clearly felt pretty good as he told the crowd he’d hit the sweet spot with his 41% lead in District 4. Maritza Rivera trailed behind with 34%. The crowd seemed unsure how to react, though a few wooed and clapped just at the fact Davis led the pack.

Davis acknowledged he’d hoped to face Ken Wilson, who placed third in the primary with 22%, because Wilson ran as a more outright conservative. Davis said he'd gotten into the race to oppose the policies of Donald Trump, and he also didn’t mind replacing the man who currently held the district seat, Council Member Alex Pedersen. People in the crowd started doing some of the math for what Davis needed to win the general election, including one of Davis’s young sons who started quoting some percentages about conservatives voting early (what a star).

Ann Barnard, a District 5 resident who had to check the SECB endorsement page to remember who she’d voted for, said she didn’t know much about Rivera, but she liked Davis and planned to keep spreading the word about him. Switchback ultimate frisbee team member Brendan Wallace* also admitted to not living in the district but planned to double down on volunteering to get Davis elected. One SECB appreciated that Davis passed out free champagne.

*Frisbee Boy made us put his team's name in the story, he's very serious about ultimate becoming a player in city politics.

DAN STRAUSS CRACKS 50% 8:37 PM Shirt’s lookin’ CRISP. COURTESY OF DAN STRAUSS

Hanging out among friends, family, and neighbors at Reuben’s The Barrel House, incumbent City Council Member Dan Strauss said he felt “very good” after taking a commanding lead in the District 6 race, which was an understatement. Initial results showed him heading the pack with 51% of the vote—the only incumbent council member to crack 50% on election night—followed by Fremont Chamber of Commerce dude Pete Hanning at around 30% of the vote. Since Strauss scored the coveted Stranger endorsement, his lead will likely grow.

The council member said he felt this win at the doors, but you just never know with these low-turnout primaries. “You can never been be sure until you sure. The numbers don’t lie.”

His plans now? Find him a Reuben’s brew.

ALEX HUDSON IS HAPPY AND FULL OF HUGS 8:36 PM Hudson hugging family after tonight's ballot drop. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

When the results dropped, District 3 candidate Alex Hudson, climbed halfway through a window to hug her 14-year-old kid outside the bar. She held the teen for a few seconds, muttering something that we couldn’t hear without totally killing the sweet moment. Her supporters chanted her name, willing her to speak. She approached the projector screen, gave her 32.4% a look, and said, “This is really good.”

She’s right. As the left-leaning candidate, it’s only up from here for Hudson. Late voters, who tend to be more progressive, will add to her lead in the coming days as King County Elections tally the ballots. Will she overcome Joy Hollingsworth, who leads with 40%? Probably not! But she lives to fight another few months. She managed to out-hustle candidate Alex Cooley, who despite his hustle, only earned 658 votes in the initial drop.

MORALE IS STILL HIGH AT MORALES'S PARTY 8:30 pm "Tammy!" STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

District 2 Seattle City Council Member Tammy Morales didn’t crack 50% of the vote—she’s leading with 48.14% over Woo’s 45.41%—but that didn’t keep the crowd from wooing when the ballot drop came in.

Morales grabbed a megaphone and thanked her team, the volunteers, and her supporters for all the work and all the phone calls. She reminded them it’s just the first drop, and they’ll continue getting progressive votes.

“And she’s winning!” one man called out, getting a laugh.

Morales gathered with the partygoers for a photo.

“When I say ‘Let’s go,’ you go 'Tammy,'" she said. “Let’s go!”

The smiling crowd enthusiastically cried out “Tammy!”

One woman could not stop woop-ing.

As the excitement settled down, the good vibes remained at Taco City. Tom Tom Club was playing on the bass-y stereo. Mescal shots were drunk. Morales, dancing by our table, said she needed another taco. It was a summer night.

During the endorsement meeting with the SECB Morales said she’s “the only candidate in this race.”

We asked if she still felt that way, and Morales laughed. She said she’s the only candidate in this race who has the experience and the training to deal with Seattle’s big issues and craft policy that helps it grow. Morales said she’s confident the subsequent drops will widen the gap between her and Woo.

“For me, this race is about offering real solutions to the crisis we have, offering real suggestions about how we fund things and focus on prevention, or treatment, or things that can move people into the stability they need,” she said. “The answer is not to push them to the next neighborhood—the answer to that is to give them treatment options and give them housing.”

Volunteer Nathan Wall plopped into the chair next to us with a slanted grin. He knocked on 90 doors for Maren Costa today, and 50 more for Ron Davis. They're both leading tonight. Walking by, Morales’s campaign manager Kelsey Hamlin talked up his volunteer skills. Wall would have liked to see Morales in the lead with 55% of the vote ("But that's not realistic"). He feels good about Seattle’s progressive candidates.

“Everything is gonna get better,” he said.

MAREN COSTA'S PARTY IS A FAMILY AFFAIR 8:14 PM The Costa sisters. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

On a sunny balcony in a West Seattle home, with a lovely spread of appetizers and pizza, District 1 candidate Maren Costa’s election night is a low-key, family affair. The home is owned by Costa’s twin sister, Maia, who could very easily be mistaken for her politically-minded sibling. Maren Costa lives across the street and has been a denizen of West Seattle for many years.

I asked Maia if she had any deep dark secrets to reveal from her sister’s childhood, but alas there were none. She says they grew up in a fairly conservative family in a small Minnesota college town known for “corn, Christians, and conformity.” They did occasionally kiss boys in rebellion, she said.

Maia says she’s occasionally been mistaken for her sister on the campaign trail and anticipates that will no doubt happen increasingly if her sister ends up working at City Hall. As a twin, she says she’s committed to serving as Maren’s fall guy if there’s some scandal. “I’ll be her Jeb Bush, definitely!”

Costa (the Maren variety) was cheery and optimistic and when asked how she’d get to work if she got the job at City Hall, she said without missing a beat, “The C-Line.” Transit nerds rejoice!

In a moment of deja vu, we chatted with Costa’s campaign manager Kyler Parris, who it turns out was also campaign manager for Nicole Thomas-Kennedy’s ultimately unsuccessful run for city attorney against Ann “Jail Will Get You Off Fentanyl” Davison, which we covered in 2021. Parris says he’s hopeful his candidate this time will emerge even more successful from the field of eight candidates. “We’re hopeful about winning in the general,” he said with the sun shining behind him…

THE RESULTS ARE IN!!!!!!!! 8:11 PM

The King County results are live!

Stand by for more analysis and party coverage.

AND IN THE BEGINNING, THERE WAS THE SECB (AND ONLY THE SECB)
8:07 PM No yellowjackets were harmed at this election party. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

We were the first to arrive at Tammy Morales’ election party at Taco City Taqueria, arriving before the candidate, even. We were early enough for a lone angry yellowjacket to have no other target under the hot plastic patio roof. So early that the hostess asked if we knew how the tab was divided. We said no.

We told two unsuspecting couples the empty reserved patio section was reserved for the Tammy Morales party, and to have a good night.

“They actually have this whole section,” we said. The server said the event was supposed to start at 6 pm. We laughed. She knew the wifi and brought a cool glass of water. Thank god. It is hot. There was no food, but a QR code and a key to the Taco City menu, unusually tasty for an election soiree.

Morales’s staff trickled in 10 minutes after the party started. Everyone got caught in traffic, supposedly. The small crowd cheered with Morales arrived. We went in for the handshake. She went in for the hug. Very personable! It was not awkward.

The campaign ran out of literature yesterday, and she’d been working the phones all day. Her field director was still working the phones. Her big opponent, Tanya Woo, has been raising money fast, so we asked if she’s nervous. She is a little nervous, she said, but she believed she’ll get through the primary. It’s just a matter of how much.

Morales’s stepson, Josh Teicher, liked her chances. Andrew Hong liked them too. Hong first volunteered for Morales’s campaign in 2019, when he was a 17-year-old student at Cleveland High School. Tonight, he’s just a 21-year-old supporter with a busy college schedule who didn’t have the time for campaigning. Hong is still as enthusiastic about Morales and her commitment to addressing racial disparities without big business help.

Hong doesn't like Woo’s politics, including her opposition to the shelter expansion in the Chinatown-International District. Hong respected her place as an Asian American community leader fighting for the district but said the city has to stand up for unhoused people and those on the fringes of society. “Tanya has demonstrated that she’s not going to do that,” he said.

Woo’s reaction to the shelter expansion disturbed Alouise Urness. She said Morales has consistently been on the right side of homelessness in Seattle, and the city needed all the progressives on the council it can get. “She’s a dependable one,” she said.

RON DAVIS MANAGED TO BOOK GIRMAY (BUT NOT HIS OWN PARENTS) 7:50 PM Girmay grabs a selfie at Ron Davis's party. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Ron Davis captured the hearts of the ultimate frisbee-loving voting block, according to a couple of his attendees. At Davis’s party, Brendan Wallace told us he’d seen Davis’s platform and Matthew Mitnick’s and couldn’t see a major difference between the two candidates, so he put the question out to Twitter. Chronically online Davis responded quickly, snaking Wallace’s vote. Wallace has the potential to be a powerful ally for Davis, as he seeks to form a coalition of frisbee players to compete with the endorsement power of the SECB. We watched Wallace closely.

We also appreciated Davis’s party for having the wherewithal to get the El Camion food truck. We scarfed down a delicious burrito and obsessed over the fact that Davis’s father-in-law is also named Ron.

Davis’s own parents couldn’t make the party at the Burke-Gilman Brewing Company due to a pre-planned vacation, but his two sons and his wife (a doctor of family medicine) showed up to support the man of the hour, who told us he’d knocked doors for about three hours before his party.

Oh shit, King County Council Member Girmay Zahilay just showed up to take a selfie with the crowd. We heard Davis call Zahilay the future governor of Washington. Honestly, almost an insult to Zahilay, who we suspect aims for a seat in DC.

ALEX HUDSON IS YELLING AND BLOWING BUBBLES AT PEOPLE ON THE STREET 7:34 PM BUBBLES! 🫧 STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

“Is that a ballot right there?” Alex Hudson yelled at an unsuspecting passerby.

He lifted it up to show her the envelope and the Hudson crew went wild.

Hudson and her campaign spent the very final moments before the ballot deadline cheering on voters in front of the Capitol Hill light rail station.

“There’s a voter!” she yelled as another last-minute voter walked through the gust of bubbles blowing from their bubble machine.

She said she likes the positive affirmation, but frankly, we would die from embarrassment if someone clocked us as a voter. What will the anarchists say?

Hudson joined friends, supporters, and urbanist Twitter—OOPS WE MEAN X—royalty Ben Maritz and Rian Watt for an intimate election night celebration at the Jilted Siren. Her consultant, former Stranger writer Sandeep Kaushik informed the SECB that the event was not, in fact, an open bar. It’s the damn democracy voucher program capping all the campaign spending tsk tsk.

YOU STILL HAVE 33 MINS TO GET A STICKER AND FREE ICE CREAM (AND VOTE) 7:27 PM

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Come drop off your ballot and get your sticker tonight until 8 pm sharp! https://t.co/Nc2Z2m2DA1 https://t.co/uxer8Xks3Q
— King County Elections (@kcelections) August 2, 2023

ANDREW LEWIS ALREADY BREAKING PROMISES 6:49 PM The offending Manny’s. COURTESY OF ANDREW "FREAKIN'" LEWIS

As he popped between neighborhood block parties in West Queen Ann, District 7 Council Member Andrew “Freakin’” Lewis vowed to stick to in-district brews only for the evening. He’d just sipped a Holy Mountain sour called Sacrament, a high-ABV brew that comes in a champagne-style bottle. (He hopes the festive vessel portends a first-place finish tonight, contra the wish-casting going on in right-wing medialand.)

BUT THEN, delayed block party plans caused him to duck into Targy’s Tavern, where he ordered a quick pint of Manny’s, a District 1 brew, breaking his D7 beer pledge. Tsk tsk. (Though honestly, the ubiquity of Manny’s may ultimately render it district-neutral. We’ll leave it for the commenters to decide.)

As he walked and we talked of all the doors he’s knocked and all the pavement he’s pounded in the run-up to the primary, four people recognized him on the street and told him they’d voted for him. Not a bad sign.

DAN STRAUSS IS WORKING TOWARD A BREAKFAST 6:37 PM We don’t know why his bagel is all wet. COURTESY OF DAN STRAUSS

District 6 City Council Member Dan Strauss had just polished off a mighty bagel with lox, cream cheese, capers, and onions when we called to chat about his pre-drop plans. When asked if the 5 o’clock bagel counted as a late lunch or early dinner, he said it was “hard to tell,” given he’d only had a couple eggs for breakfast. The SECB was SHOCKED to hear a noncommittal answer coming from one of the council’s swing voters.

Ontological questions about meals aside, Strauss said he felt “good and excited” to see the election results tonight, though he acknowledged that King County Elections expects low voter turnout. He declined to estimate his election night vote share but did remind the SECB that he won the 2019 primary with 34% of the vote and ended up winning the general with 55%.

As he awaits these returns, he planned to stop by a couple neighborhood block parties before ending up at his election night watch party at Reuben’s Barrel House, where he will likely toss back a Three Ryes Men, a brew he suggests “consuming in small portions.”

OLGA SAGAN’S MINI MUSIC FESTIVAL AT THE SHOWBOX 6:26 PM District 7 candidate Olga Sagan's Showbox stage is ready to rock. STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Olga Sagan’s election night party is less about rubbing elbows with the who’s who of Seattle politics and more about having fun. She’s basically throwing a mini music festival at the Showbox, complete with enough piroshkis to feed a small army. Her sister said she’s looking forward to the election party even more than her own birthday.

An event coordinator came into Sagan’s dressing room (very famous, we know) and asked her if she wanted a rock band on the set list to tone it down. The coordinator joked they could play “Kumbaya” if that better suited the event. Sagan waved her hand and said they should play as loud as they want. History would suggest incumbent Andrew Lewis and Seattle Times endorsed challenger Bob Kettle survive the primary over her. But if she’s going out, Sagan said she wants to go out with a bang. If it ends tonight, Sagan said she’s grateful for the experience— especially the reel she made with The Stranger (“It was so funny! [The commenters] just don’t get my humor!”)

EN ROUTE TO THE MONASTERY 5:45 PM District 5 candidate ChrisTiana ObeySumner and Barkley on a little pre-drop walk. Courtesy of the Campaign

We caught up with ChrisTiana ObeySumner, The Stranger’s pick for the crowded race in north Seattle’s District 5, on their return home from a Fred Meyer. In addition to walking their dog, Barkley, “who is running for Doggie Delegate of D5,” they brought home a little picture frame, some water, some grapes, and a pack of Camel Crush Silvers “which I feel bad about,” they said with a laugh over the phone.

ObeySumner picked up the habit in 2021 and tried to quit last week, but running in a stacked race troubled that effort. For the record, they crush their Camel early, which sounds like some kind of omen.

Rather than host the standard election night party, ObeySumner plans to attend a tara ritual at a nearby Buddhist monastery. “It’s a ritual practice to remove obstacles and grant courage and wisdom,” they said, perfect for election night. In the meantime, they’ll watch YouTube videos (they like nerd stuff about black holes), destress with games on their phone (Animal Restaurant and Revenge of the Queen), listen to some pump-up jams (chiefly Muse’s “Get up and Fight”), and probably burn one.

Stranger Suggests: Seattle Art Fair, Octavia Butler Avenue Dedication, Blackberries, Renegade Edo and Paris: Japanese Prints, VOTE!!!

Charles Mudede — Wed, 26 Jul 2023 13:30:00 -0700

One really great thing to do every day of the week. by Charles Mudede WEDNESDAY 7/26

FIFA Women’s World Cup Watch Party

(SPORTS) As resident soccer fan Nathalie Graham wrote on Slog, if you're planning on watching Wednesday's US vs Netherlands game in the Women's World Cup, get to wherever you're going early. Last week, despite arriving at Ballard's Rough & Tumble two hours before game time, Graham wasn't able to snag a seat at the at-capacity women's sports bar. This city loves women's soccer! Thankfully there are several spots in town showing the game—EverOut has a list of all the local watch parties here. One particularly enticing option is the FIFA Women's World Cup Watch Party at Westlake Center. Watch the game outside on a 17-foot LED screen! There will also be food trucks, music, family-friendly activities, and appearances from "pro players." Probably not Rapinoe, though—she has a game to play. Festivities start at 4:30 pm, game starts at 6 pm. GO USA! (Westlake Park, 401 Pine St, 4:30 pm, free, all ages) MEGAN SELING

THURSDAY 7/27

Alex Pappademas and Joan LeMay: Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and Other Sole Survivors from the Songs of Steely Dan

Meet the authors at Third Place Books Lake Forest Park Thursday, July 26. UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS PRESS

(BOOKS/MUSIC) Smooth, sunny groovers Steely Dan are, as we all know, the true titans of '70s soft rock—and if you're not familiar with them, do your "dirty work" and listen to Aja. (Listen, I tried really hard not to make that pun, but it happened anyway. I'm sorry.) Let's move on! In Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and Other Sole Survivors from the Songs of Steely Dan, author Alex Pappademas conjures the strange characters that populate Steely Dan songs, interpreted through imagery by artist Joan LeMay and expanded upon in short essays. If you're into dad rock, cultural context, and laughing a lot, grab a copy and catch this convo with Pappademas, LeMay, and Stranger arts and culture editor Megan Seling. (Third Place Books Lake Forest Park, 17171 Bothell Way NE, Lake Forest Park, 7 pm, free, all ages) LINDSAY COSTELLO

FRIDAY 7/28

Seattle Art Fair

Seattle Art Fair is at the Lumen Field Event Center July 28-30. COURTESY OF SEATTLE ART FAIR

(VISUAL ART) Returning to Lumen Field for the seventh year, Seattle Art Fair will continue to offer Seattleites the opportunity to see cool, cutting-edge contemporary artwork from all over the world without leaving town. Plenty of local institutions and artists get involved as well, making for a jam-packed weekend of incredible art-viewing opportunities; I'm stoked to see artists like Catalina Ouyang, whose experimental furniture navigates themes of language, space, and power dynamics, get attention this year. The fair promises to be a bit like last year's—a hectic weekend of avant-garde, artsy goodness that rivals its pre-pandemic days—with public projects by big names like Marita Dingus, Sharita Towne, Tariqa Waters, and Jeffrey Gibson, plus talks on AI art and gallerists visiting from near and far. (Lumen Field Event Center, 800 Occidental Ave S, Fri-Sat 11 am- 7 pm, Sun 11 am-6 pm, $35-$65, all ages) LINDSAY COSTELLO

SATURDAY 7/29

Bandella Concerts and Octavia Butler Avenue Dedication

(MUSIC/BOOKS/SCIENCE) Remember Chris Hadfield? His performance of David Bowie's "Space Oddity" on the International Space Station went viral in 2015. Though Hadfield's space days are now in the past, his music is not. He has a band, and all but two members of it, called Bandella, are former astronauts. People who have been to space are rocking on Earth. That's all I need to know to go to the show at the Museum of Flight. Just think about it. There will be a day in the not-too-distant future when we (humans) send the last of our kind to space, which is, as we discovered 50 years ago, mostly empty and too harsh for words. A human will never wake up, let alone walk on, lifeless Mars. The closest you will ever get to the stars is watching these former astronauts rock and roll in a museum. That said, the great Black American science-fiction writer Octavia Butler never went to space, but she does have her name over it: on one of the mountains Charon (Pluto's moon); on an asteroid in the Astroid Belt (Butler is the only Belter), and the site where NASA's robot, Perseverance, landed on Mars. This Saturday Butler, who is mostly known for her 1979 novel Kindred (which was recently made into a terrible FX TV series that was rightly canceled after the completion of its first season), will name a street in down-to-earth Lake Forest Park. Originally from Pasadena, California, Butler spent the last years of her life in Lake Forest Park. The city recently rediscovered her incredible fame and decided to honor it with: "Octavia Butler Avenue," which is "along Lake Forest Park's 37th Avenue, between NE 165th Street and NE 162nd Street." (Museum of Flight, 9404 E Marginal Way S, Tukwila, 6:30 and 8:30 pm, $40-$50, all ages; Lake Forest Park at NE 165th St and 37th Ave NE, 10 am, free, all ages) CHARLES MUDEDE

SUNDAY 7/30

Renegade Edo and Paris: Japanese Prints

Yoshida on the Tōkaidō, from the series Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, CA. 1830-32, Katsushika Hokusai. COURTESY OF THE SEATTLE ART MUSEUM

(VISUAL ART) To begin with, this show connects two twilights: the Edo period (1603–1868) and Belle Époque Paris. (Edo is now called Tokyo.) The former era was brought to an end by the Meiji Restoration (or Revolution), which ended Japan's isolation and, ultimately, restructured its class system. What brought the latter to an end was the war that did not end all wars, the First World War. The Belle Époque can be described as Europe's farewell to its dominance in the capitalist world system. This farewell was marked by the ascendance of financial capital. What marked the end of the Edo period, also known as the Tokugawa period, was the ascendance of a class that was poorly regarded, the merchant class. Making money in pre-Meiji Japan was not at all respectable, and nor were the prints and subject matter of the prints in this show. This was not the stuff of the warrior class. This was the floating world of fleeting and popular pleasures: music, theater, whore houses. Also fleeting was the nightlife of Belle Époque Paris brilliantly and famously captured by the prints of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Also around his time was the craze in all things Japanese. This exhibit, expertly curated by Xiaojin Wu, makes this (the craze) and other important connections to produce what I can only describe as a double dusk. (Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E Prospect St, Fri-Sun 10 am-5 pm through Dec 3, free-$17.99) CHARLES MUDEDE

MONDAY 7/31

Pick Blackberries

Ripe for the pickin'! MEGAN SELING

(FOOD) You’ve probably noticed that Seattle is fully saturated with wild blackberry vines, and yes, it’s perfectly safe to eat this sumptuous free food from nature. You may wanna soak ‘em for ten minutes first to get all the fruit fly larvae out (unless you’re into that), although it’s more of an issue later in the summer. Discovery Park is absolutely teeming with berries in every direction, the east end of Carkeek Park behind Viewlands Elementary has a loopy path lined with 12-foot-high blackberry hedges, and there’s a massive block-long patch on Fourth Avenue North on the edge of Queen Anne Hill, on the steep slope just above (west of) the Fremont Bridge and that giant billboard. Perhaps the most appropriate place to pick them is Mercer Island’s Luther Burbank Park—botanist and horticulturist Luther Burbank, inventor of the plumcot, is the reason the entire Puget Sound region is inundated with Himalayan blackberries. Seemed like a good idea at the time. (Get more summer activity tips on EverOut) MEG VAN HUYGEN

TUESDAY 8/1

VOTE! VOTE! VOTE!

The great Seattle shake-up begins! GABI GONZALEZ-YOXTHEIMER

(CIVIC DUTY) Stop trying to get ChatGPT to show hole for literally one second and listen up! We’ve got a primary election on August 1, and it’s the most important local election of our lifetimes since–well, since the last one. With seven of nine city council seats up for grabs this year, Seattle has a chance to do what we should have done 20 years ago: BUILD ENOUGH HOUSING FOR EVERYBODY, create a justice system that actually rehabilitates people, and make it safer to walk or roll to a bunch of fun little shops!!! All you have to do is vote exactly the way we tell you. You should have received your ballot by Monday, July 17—if you didn't, then ask King County Elections what’s up. Now, just carefully fill in the bubbles we tell you to fill in, slide it into the little lingerie sleeve it comes with, stuff the whole package in the envelope, and then mail it in by Friday, July 28—no need for a stamp! Did you miss the recommended postmark date? That's okay! Just drop it into a nearby dropbox no later than 8 pm on August 1 and your vote will still get counted. (Read The Stranger's election endorsements here; find our Cheat Sheet here) STRANGER ELECTION CONTROL BOARD

Prizefight!

Win tickets to rad upcoming concerts!*

Boygenius

The Gorge
July 29
Contest ends July 27 at 10 am
ENTER HERE!

Alicia Keys

Climate Pledge Arena
July 30
Contest ends July 28 at 10 am
ENTER HERE!

*Entering PRIZE FIGHT contests by submitting your email address signs you up to receive the Stranger Suggests newsletter. You can unsubscribe at any time.

The Stranger’s Endorsements for the August 1, 2023, Primary Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 13 Jul 2023 01:08:00 -0700

Seattle's only endorsements for the 2023 August 1 primary elections. by Stranger Election Control Board

Stop trying to get ChatGPT to show hole for literally one second and listen up! We’ve got a primary election on August 1, and it’s the most important local election of our lifetimes since–well, since the last one.

With a major city growth plan due next year and seven of nine city council seats up for grabs this year, Seattle has a chance to do what we should have done 20 years ago: BUILD ENOUGH HOUSING FOR EVERYBODY, create a justice system that actually rehabilitates people, and make it safer to walk or roll to a bunch of fun little shops!!!

Forty-five people applied to finish those jobs, all hoping to snatch up an open seat or topple a wobbly incumbent. After spending a couple months researching their backgrounds and grilling them in a conference room, we here at Stranger Election Control Board Headquarters feel extremely confident about one thing: almost all of them suck.

Seriously. With a very few exceptions, we’re looking at a bunch of grifters hoping to coast to power on a wave of misplaced anger at a “progressive” council that was waylaid by a pandemic and sabotaged by a pair of recalcitrant, conservative mayors. But that’s another story.

The new recruits basically split into two different factions: one that wants to solve problems with evidence-backed solutions, and one that wants to solve problems with vibes.

A similarly bleak situation is playing out with the school board elections. Pandemic fallout, enrollment declines, and directors working for almost no pay means we’ve got two open seats and two incumbents running scared. Whoever fills those seats will need to patch a $130 million budget hole, oversee school closures, and–worst of all–deal with Seattle’s particularly persnickety parents.

On the bright side, most of the King County Council candidates look pretty good, and we do get the opportunity to renew a VERY important levy. And, hey, the Port Commission race is a real riot!! (Not really.)

Regardless, it’s a lot to wade through. Believe us, we know. We’ve been digging through candidate records, sending tense follow-up emails, and arguing with each other for hours about which candidates will inflict the least amount of harm on working people and the poor.

The only thing that got us through the process was knowing that we’d save you all–our beloved readers, our dearest friends, our closest enemies–lots of time and energy better spent on reserving pickleball courts, or whatever the fuck you all do now that the pandemic is over but also not over and yet everything still feels so weird when you really stop to take stock for a second.

Anyway, now all you have to do is vote exactly the way we tell you, and tip us if you like what you read–and especially if you don’t.

You’ll find all the arguments to support our endorsements below. If you’re in a rush, just consult our trusty Cheat Sheet.

If you are registered to vote in King County, then your ballot should be in the mail. If you’re not registered, then take care of that here. If you’re unsure either way, then check here. If your ballot doesn’t arrive by Monday, July 17, then ask King County Elections what’s up.

When your ballot DOES show up in your mailbox, rip it open, use a pen (any color you’d like!) to carefully fill in the bubbles we tell you to fill in, slide it into the little lingerie sleeve it comes with, stuff the whole package in the envelope, and then mail it in ASAP—no need for a stamp! If you don’t trust the mail, then just drop it into a nearby dropbox no later than 8 pm on August 1. Not so bad!

Finally, a special message to our fellow youths (those aged 18 to 24): All the evidence says you will sit out this election, which means mostly well-off, older, or retired people will pick the politicians who will shape our future. While some of those people are cool, most of them suck. We would much rather live in your future than in theirs, so please vote!

The Stranger Election Control Board is Hannah Krieg, Vivian McCall, Charles Mudede, Ashley Nerbovig, Megan Seling, a guy Bruce Harrell grew up with, and Rich Smith. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races, races with only two candidates (those go straight to the general), or races we forgot.

King County Proposition No. 1

Veterans, Seniors and Human Services Levy

Approved

Welp, six years have elapsed since the last time King County overwhelmingly passed the Veterans, Seniors and Human Services Levy (VSHS). Now they want us to renew it, and we absolutely should.

The VSHS is the backbone of the county’s human services funding. Failing to renew it would snap the spine of programs that keep tens of thousands of seniors sheltered and fed, thousands of veterans housed and financially stable, thousands of domestic violence and sexual assault victims connected to helpful hotlines, thousands of immigrants hooked up with legal specialists, and lots of social workers employed.

This version of the levy proposes pay increases to help recruit and retain those workers and doubles investments in senior centers, but the rate remains identical to 2017, so the owner of the median-valued home will only pay about $17 more per year in property taxes for this levy than they did for its last iteration.

If you want the eye-glazing specifics, the tax rate will remain at $0.10 per $1,000 of assessed home value based on the prior year, which works out to about $83.75 per year for the median home in King County, which clocked in at $694,000 in 2022.

The County estimates the levy will raise $564.7 million over the course of another six years to fund capital costs (buildings) and operational costs (employees, etc.) for the programs.

Think all that money winds up between a couple mattresses in Dow Constantine’s basement? Think again. The county maintains a dashboard that shows where your tax dollars go. That dashboard also includes progress reports and audits, so you can see how many seniors got their houses fixed, how many vets reported finding jobs, how many affordable houses this money helped build, and how much the levy helped reduce veteran homelessness (the County pegs that reduction at 40%).

Feeling a little property tax fatigued? Good! Funnel all that anger into weekly emails to your state representatives, demanding that they pass an income tax. Until then, check this webpage to see if you qualify for property tax relief.

The bottom line is that the VSHS provides basic-shit-that-everybody-likes funding, and voters have renewed it every six years since it first passed in 2005. Let’s keep the trend going. Vote approved.

Metropolitan King County Council District No. 4

Jorge L. Barón

We pulled our hair out trying to find policy daylight between the three overqualified do-gooders running to replace outgoing King County Council Member Jeanne Kohl-Welles. Ultimately, Jorge Barón’s nearly two decades of battle on behalf of immigrants, who compose nearly one quarter of King County’s population, stood out above his competition.

As the director of Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, Barón successfully pushed for laws that stopped local cops from ratting out immigrants to ICE and from hovering like vultures outside of courthouses to arrest them. He also helped secure funding for legal services that helped immigrants navigate our deliberately confusing, degrading system. The current council could use a member who knows that system well, especially given the potential for connecting more immigrants to solid jobs that will help the county solve its workforce woes.

But he isn’t just a paper-pusher or a well-connected lobbyist. When Trump initially imposed the Muslim ban, Barón literally ran through SeaTac to stop a plane from leaving with two people who Customs and Border Patrol attempted to deport back to Yemen and Sudan in violation of an incoming court order. That’s the kind of hustle we expect him to bring to this role.

Our only knock on Barón involves his skepticism of an upcoming sales tax proposal to fund greater access to arts and culture institutions. He won’t rule out support for the idea completely. He wants to read the fine print to make sure the funds from such a regressive tax will primarily serve people of color and those with low incomes, who the tax will disproportionately burden. Fair enough.

King County Budget and Policy Manager Becka Johnson Poppe and Assistant Attorney General Sarah Reyneveld pledged support for that proposal, which we liked, but not more than we liked Barón’s expertise on immigration policy and the urgency he drums up around lobbying the state for the authority to raise progressive revenue at the county level.

Moreover, though Poppe’s budgetary policies impressed us, her ideas for drug decriminalization were a little too incremental for us.

And though they’re all political insiders to some degree, Reyneveld sits most closely to entrenched political power. Amazon’s general counsel donated to her campaign, as did King County Prosecutor Leesa Manion, who hasn’t been acting like the progressive prosecutor she promised she’d be. Sure, the Seattle Times Editorial Board also endorsed Barón, and that’s about as entrenched as you can get, but a broken clock is right twice a day. Vote Barón.

Metropolitan King County Council District No. 8

Teresa Mosqueda

Seattle City Council Member and Budget Chair Teresa Mosqueda showed up to our endorsement meeting armed with concrete proposals that will help solve the county’s problems AND ALSO a bottle of her family’s salsa. Both offerings make the world a better place. The salsa boasts a fruit-forward punch with some heat on the finish for balance, and Mosqueda’s policies will make our enemies cower in fear and give working people—and those who cannot work—a helping hand or ten.

During her time on the city council, she championed new protections for domestic workers, hotel workers, gig-workers, and ride-hail drivers. She also helped secure hazard pay for grocery workers (for a bit). Perhaps most importantly, she successfully led the fight to pass the payroll tax on big business, which significantly increased the City’s affordable housing and Green New Deal investments. All of that was difficult to do in the middle of a pandemic in a town where big business holds massive sway, but Mosqueda got it done, thanks to her unmatched political skill and tenacity.

She’ll bring those skills to the County, where she wants to bolster our public health approach to tackling problems such as substance use disorder. She’ll fight for higher wages for nurses and social workers just like she fought for (and won) cost-of-living raises despite opposition from two different mayors. She’ll fight for more child care and better working conditions for human service workers. She’ll fight to increase and expand public health clinics. These are the sorts of fights we need to win to help people live nice long lives with fewer interventions from our blunt and extremely expensive criminal legal system.

At the other end of the table sits Burien Mayor Sofia Aragon. Despite her law degree and her tenure as a mayor of a small city, in our meeting she failed to demonstrate a basic understanding of the way the justice system works. After a light grilling about police policy, she admitted she wasn’t “an expert on public safety.” A weak mayor, indeed! Honestly, we anticipated more informed defenses from someone who bashes “Defund the Police efforts” in the first sentence of her website’s “priorities” page.

As head of a nonprofit that aims to expand the nurse pipeline, we also expected some level of expert knowledge about the health care system, but she failed on that score, too. She gave vague and/or weird answers for how to increase the number of nurses–e.g., make “hospitals more competitive.” Okay?

She also seemed ignorant of the County’s extremely limited treatment and recovery service capacity when she floated the idea of offering people caught with drugs a year in treatment or a year in jail, which is an unrealistic ultimatum for a million reasons we don’t have time to get into.

As if all of that weren’t disqualifying enough, a few months ago she joined the group of Burien council members who endorsed kicking homeless people off the City Hall's lawn, declined $1 million from the County to service the encampment when those people moved to another plot of land, and voted to lease that land to a business owner who plans to turn it into a dog park, which ultimately resulted in a private sweep. The whole thing was a totally mismanaged, inhumane shit-show, and Aragon didn’t have much to say for herself. Hard pass!

Mosqueda understands the job and she’s got good ideas for making progress. Vote Mosqueda.

Commissioner Position No. 5

Fred Felleman

The two candidates challenging two-term Port Commissioner President Fred Felleman seem very nice, but one is a clear business stooge and the other lacks the depth of Port knowledge that Felleman brings to the table, so we’re sticking with him for another go-round.

We like his background as an orca biologist and his history of standing up to big polluters. As an environmental consultant fighting marine pollution, he started inconveniencing the cruise industry with the truth when those floating cities first landed in Seattle in the 2000s. Later on, he helped lead the fight against Shell’s arctic drilling rigs and bomb trains.

In his first four years on the Port, he created the Energy and Sustainability Committee, which tracks and aims to lower the port’s emissions. When the port required upgrades, he pushed for a rail line to limit idling trucks and supported the effort to allow ships to plug into electrical power at the docks. The Port’s advocacy also helped pass a state law incentivizing the use of so-called Sustainable Aviation Fuel, which still creates emissions but at least isn’t pulled out of the ground.

Speaking of sustainability, Felleman also wants to fix our clogged airport in the near-term while pushing for longer-term solutions like high-speed rail, though he seemed deflated at the prospect of trying to get that rail built. In the meantime, he said he already asked Joint Base Lewis-McChord if we could use runways for cargo planes to reduce air traffic at SeaTac, but the military basically told him to fuck off. Now he wants to try to send some of Seattle’s air traffic to Portland.

Former military engineer Todd Curtis actually suggested the military base first as a place to offload SeaTac air traffic, which we found impressive, but he offered less-detailed answers on other issues, relying a little too heavily on broad principles from his engineering background.

Felleman’s other opponent is a guy from the banking industry, Jesse Tam, who thinks port police should stuff our overflowing jails with people who commit minor offenses. No thanks! Vote Felleman.

Council District No. 1

Maren Costa

Council Member Lisa Herbold ditched her West Seattle seat for fear of a challenge from antifa, or whatever the propagandists call the cool kids these days. The SECB thinks she overreacted. None of these District 1 candidates will usher in the revolution, and most of them would amount to a huge downgrade from Herbold.

The only one who might not disappoint is Maren Costa. Costa organized thousands of tech workers to pressure online retail giant Amazon to be slightly less shitty to the environment. She kept sticking it to Bezos until the company illegally fired her after an attempt to build solidarity between tech workers and warehouse workers during the pandemic. With Amazon's greatest enemy, Council Member Kshama Sawant, leaving City Hall, we’ll need a new pro-worker champion to grab big business by the spheres.

Compelling backstory aside, Costa is good on the issues. She supports the most progressive growth plan, she wants people to come in contact with cops as infrequently as possible, she would propose a local capital gains tax, and she plans to take money from the sweeps budget and put it toward affordable housing. Failing to put Costa in this seat means we’ll likely get none of that.

As for the others, we were pleasantly surprised by Eltana Bagels owner Stephen Brown. He supports density, progressive revenue, and he’s just really nice, okay? But Costa beats him on criminal justice issues.

The SECB was also initially quite smitten with Jean Iannelli Craciun, who took the hardest stances against cops and said she would put an RV safe lot right in her back alley. But her fundraising isn’t competitive, and her intersectional lens could use a buff.

Despite his undeniable charm, social worker Preston Anderson was too cozy with cops for us. He even praised the Tacoma Police Department during our meeting, a famously brutal crop of cops.

Administrative law judge Phil Tavel didn’t say much in our meeting and left early before he could piss us off, but he also prays at the altar of Police Chief Adrian Diaz, and he’s a total NIMBY.

But out of all the candidates we interviewed this year, tech lawyer Rob Saka troubled us the most. He could not answer a SINGLE question directly. Every time we asked him something he would defer to an undefined “community” that would somehow pass through him like the Holy Spirit and deliver an answer to our tough questions… after he took office.

Lots of candidates defer to “community” to dodge questions they don’t want to answer, but after a while it became clear that Saka just didn't know anything about local issues. When we asked him to name the growth plan he liked, he asked us to “double-click on that” and explain the options to him. When we asked him about taxes, he said he was curious to learn more. When we asked him if he could name any issue on which he would stand up to the Mayor, he wouldn’t name one, and then he got mad at us for suggesting that he was the Mayor’s pick, which was funny because sources VERY CLOSE TO THE MATTER told us he was the Mayor’s pick. Puh-leez.

It is genuinely stunning that someone as clueless as Saka could raise as much money and collect as many endorsements as he has. Though, we shouldn’t be surprised. He’s following the tried-and-true path to power in Seattle: Fill yourself so full of hot air you float straight to the top.

Truly, any one of these other candidates would make for a better council member than Saka. At best, he will condemn every decent proposal to death in a task force. At worst, he will simply take orders from the Mayor. Vote Costa.

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Council District No. 2

Tammy J. Morales

As she said in our endorsement meeting, Seattle Council Member Tammy Morales is “the only candidate in this race.”

In her first term, she supported progressive taxation, voted to protect renters, allocated funding to pedestrian safety in the South End, and started, defended, and expanded many programs to benefit Black and brown communities.

Aside from her support for light rail station placements in the Chinatown International District (CID) that will fuck over transit riders, she’s basically done everything right from the SECB’s POV.

However, her opponent, Rainier Beach resident Tanya Woo, clearly disagrees. She argues that Morales doesn't visit “community” enough, particularly the CID, an offense that partly prompted her run.

Woo certainly has clout in the CID. Her dad opened Seattle’s first Chinese bakery in the neighborhood, and her family currently owns the historic Louisa Hotel building. Her own community advocacy took off in 2020, when she joined CID Community Night Watch, which patrols the neighborhood to deter crime, give out water bottles, and distribute Narcan.

Sounds nice, right? Well. You also may know her for leading the protests against a shelter expansion in nearby SODO, joining forces with the King County Republicans, NIMBYs, and closeted NIMBYs who probably would have opposed the expansion even if they got the community outreach they felt the County denied them. The protest led the County to pull the plug on the project, leaving fewer beds for a neighborhood that sees a lot of visible homelessness. Not exactly a forward-thinking move in our view.

As if blocking a shelter weren’t bad enough, Woo tried to bullshit us about it. First she said she didn’t want to stop the expansion, she just wanted the community to be “heard.” When we asked what the community wanted to say, she just repeated the line about wanting to be heard. But then later in our conversation she slipped on her own bullshit and said “our concerns for the mega-shelter was with public safety.” When we called her out on that, she insisted that they really just wanted to be heard. Well, Woo, you may not have heard what the protesters you led had to say, but we did. They didn’t want the shelter! Just say it! Quit bullshitting! Fuck!

And it turns out that Woo was bullshitting about Morales’s presence in the district, too. According to Morales, it’s true that the pandemic forced her to engage with the community from her kitchen table for the first half of her term. But throughout 2021 and 2022 she says she held biweekly meetings with constituents in the CID and regular meetings in Rainier Beach, Mount Baker, and the other neighborhoods she represents.

Morales also saved funding for anti-Asian hate programs the Mayor planned to slash, she funded the CID community safety plan, and her staff is currently working on a multilingual guide of numbers to call besides the cops.

Maybe someone else could convince the SECB that Morales does not give a fuck about particular neighborhoods in her district, but Woo could not provide solid counter-arguments that didn’t just boil down to her own ignorance of the incumbent’s work on the council.

And even if Morales were disconnected from specific neighborhoods, the SECB would be more concerned about Woo’s disconnect from reality. In the face of a housing crisis and a projected City deficit of $200 million, Woo opposes greater density and new progressive revenue, which is a recipe for making our housing problems worse and more painful for poor people.

And, oh yeah: Though she’s been eligible to vote for nearly 30 years, she’s only ever voted in two local elections. She’s never even voted for the seat she currently seeks. On that note, vote Morales.

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Council District No. 3

Alex Hudson

Chapter II, Section III of the Blogger Code requires all bloggers to support all other bloggers on their quests for power, which renders us duty-bound to endorse Alex Hudson, “editor emeritus” of Seattlish, a defunct “tumblog" about city politics.

Fortunately for District 3, Hudson inarguably boasts the broadest and deepest technical knowledge of the housing and transportation issues that will come before the council in the next few years, she knows how City Hall works, and she’s in the best financial position to beat the more corporate candidate who will most likely to make it through to the general election.

As a former director of the First Hill Improvement Association and as a board member for the Bellwether Housing Group, she’s got some experience convincing concern trolls to accept housing and homeless shelters. And as executive director of Transportation Choices Coalition, she successfully helped to lobby lawmakers to pass a transportation budget that expanded transit across Washington. We hope she can leverage all of that establishment glad-handing to get some housing built and some public transit funded with progressive revenue–even if it means pissing off the business interests who are cozy with some of those groups.

But we have our doubts.

As you might be able to tell, we wish Hudson retained more of the irreverence she showcased in her blogging days, but she just hasn’t. During our first interview with her in January, she delivered a “hella mid” vision of her platform, to borrow her own phrase.

Back then, she didn’t know if she supported social housing, didn’t know which progressive taxes she might like, deferred to “neighborhood stakeholders” on transforming the Pike/Pine corridor into a pedestrian superblock, and she seemed generally mushy on everything except for building the downtown streetcar.

Since then, though, she’s done a little better. She’s proposed a measly 2% capital gains tax for social services, she says she voted for the social housing initiative and promises to give the new developer “the funding it needs,” and she laid out a public safety plan that more or less just expands emergency response programs the City has already piloted or plans to. Bare minimum shit, but at least she doesn’t want to give the cops more money.

Despite her somewhat lackluster ambition on these fronts, her personal experience with the criminal legal system gives us some confidence in her gestures toward taking a public health approach to dealing with substance use disorder. In our meeting, she said a Court ordered her to rehab “twice” after arrests for drugs and alcohol, and so she deeply understands that “getting arrested and forced to go to rehab isn’t what makes peoples’ lives better, it’s having a pathway out” of that life. Having a counterbalance to Council Member Sara Nelson, who weaponizes her own struggles with substance to push for punitive measures, may prove persuasive and lead to more lives saved. Hopefully.

As for the other 500 million candidates in this race… *deep breath*

Drama Kid Ry Armstrong proposed some, um, unorthodox housing proposals (they want to turn a battleship into apartments), but they really lost us when they floated a “three-strikes-you’re-out moment” for prosecuting drug possession and public use. We don’t think politicians should pass drug policy based on sports penalties. Next!

Cannabis producer Alex Cooley really, really wants to legalize drugs, which is nice, but it’s a little quixotic for a local election. Though we loved his energy, we’ve got qualms with some of his policy proposals and theories of change. Cool dude, though.

We came close to giving the nod to Seattle LGBTQ+ Commission co-chair Andrew Ashiofu, who articulated strong housing proposals. We also came close to endorsing Efrain Hudnell, a deputy King County prosecutor, because we liked his militant urbanism and his abolitionist-adjacent stance on criminal justice. But neither of them have built up the campaign infrastructure necessary to take on cannabis business-owner Joy Hollingsworth, the clear corporate favorite in this race, and the one who the Mayor has already endorsed.

Hollingsworth is chill and gay and vegan and says she wants the City to provide sanitation services to people living in encampments instead of sweeping them, and we love all that. But, as with the other candidates who we expect to pull in cash from big business, she generally displayed an alarmingly shallow understanding of policy and implementation.

Like the Mayor, she’s all vibes. Here’s a typical example: Though she says she supports standing up a police alternative–along with 75% of Seattle–her solution for forcing the Mayor to stop foot-dragging in the face of police union recalcitrance is to… make sure that the police officers’ guild “understands that this [demand for alternatives] is coming from community voices” and not from some “performative… march down 23rd.” The cops know the request is coming from “community voices,” Joy, they just don’t like the community! And, wait, why doesn’t a march down 23rd count as a legitimate expression of community voice that the cops should listen to???

She also said she’d need to “do more research” to name a policy that would prevent her from ratifying the police contract while running to represent a district that the cops tear-gassed for days. She would support a capital gains tax, which is positive, but she wouldn’t put a number on it, which is craven. Finally, she won’t fight for the growth plan that would allow for the most housing, and she also opposes rent control. So… not doing all we can to dig ourselves out of the housing crisis while allowing rent-gouging to continue apace. Got it!

Meanwhile, Hudson says “no alternatives, no [police] contract.” She supports rent stabilization. She’ll push for abundant housing solutions. Vote Hudson.

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Council District No. 4

Ron Davis

Putting Ron Davis in this seat might represent the biggest glow-up for any other district in this election cycle. We’d be trading outgoing Council Member Alex Pedersen–the NIMBYest landlord simp known to man–for an eat-the-rich urbanist with premium policy chops and a fire in his belly to fight for dense housing, anti-rent-gouging policies, transit, progressive revenue, and pedestrian safety. That’s great, because there’s really no other option.

Davis, an entrepreneur, is running against civil engineer Kenneth Wilson and Seattle Office of Arts and Culture Deputy Director Maritza Rivera. Do not take those candidates seriously.

The SECB said it once and we’ll say it again, Wilson should stick to building bridges, because holy shit his platform sucks. Standard-issue NIMBY bootlicker nonsense. And when we talked about whether or not jail helps people recover from addiction, he said he “can’t wait” for his own brother to go to jail to dry out, which is kinda fucked if you’ve read the studies we’ve read. His sentiment did not inspire confidence that he would champion restorative justice policies that follow expert consensus or basic compassion.

Rivera also loves punishment–and not in a cool way. She, too, is running on a vague platform that appeals to fear-mongering Facebook trolls. She’s also pretty nakedly exploiting a gun violence tragedy by claiming she “never expected” to run for office until a kid shot another kid at Ingraham High School, where her children attend. In reality, she applied for an appointment to the city council in 2019 after Council Member Rob Johnson ditched his seat early.

It would seem very much “expected” for Rivera to continue climbing up the ranks in the municipal government. She failed up from her job as a staffer for Mayor Jenny Durkan to her current gig in the City’s art department, where she serves as a supervisor from hell, according to the 26 workers who signed a letter to the Mayor complaining about her incompetence and the way she treated them. Some of her old employees told The Stranger that she’s more of a “just following orders” kind of manager than a ring-leader, but that leads us to believe she will just fall in line with the Mayor.

Vote Davis.

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Council District No. 5

ChrisTiana ObeySumner

ChrisTiana ObeySumner would bring a wealth of lived experience to the City Council as a disability justice advocate, a former sex worker, and someone who has experienced homelessness. They’re also a tax wiz, a big-time density advocate, and a social equity defender who has worked with local governments. In a city that is failing to prioritize pedestrian safety and resisting efforts to build enough housing, the council needs the depth of knowledge and the power of presence that ObeySumner would bring to the council.

The decision to endorse them did not come easily, though, but that’s no fault of ObeySumner’s. At this moment, all the candidates in the race are running slightly to the left of outgoing Council President Debra Juarez, which is pretty easy to do, but each sucks in their own complicated little way.

We loved Shane Macomber’s happy-warrior energy, his support for renters’ rights, and his focus on wealth inequality, but we think ObeySumner’s advocacy portfolio better matches a district that hosts Aurora Ave and that desperately needs more sidewalk improvements.

Former King County Superior Court Judge Cathy Moore would be our last pick. She took the weakest stances on housing, supported the Mayor’s unrealistic demand for 1,400 cops, and regurgitated KOMO-pilled takes on the current council. “The prior councils determined that poor peoples’ voices didn’t count and only the Chamber’s voice counted. Now we’ve got the flip-side,” she said. We strongly disagree with that characterization for several reasons, but, at the end of the day, that kinda talk tells us that Moore wants to amplify the voices of well-off homeowners, which are already plenty loud enough.

Surprisingly, though, she’s better on taxes than our second-to-last choice, Nilu Jenks. Jenks had some good takes on criminal justice, climate change, and housing density, but she seemed a little too willing to defer to big business in her tax policy. She said she’d be reluctant to increase the payroll tax on the likes of Amazon if the budget nerds projected a recession. She also said she’d be reluctant to tax in general if a business could show her that it “hurt” them. They’re always going to say it hurts them, Nilu!!!!! That’s their whole fucking thing! UGH.

In the meeting, mutual aid organizer Tye Reed rightly pointed out that hauling in progressive revenue before a recession is exactly what the city would need to do to reduce the pain and suffering of people who recessions actually hurt. And that wasn’t the first time Reed impressed us. We liked her realistic, harm-reduction approach to homelessness (stop the sweeps, service the encampments, build social housing), and we know she would call out the spineless libs on council every chance she got.

But we didn’t love her idea of abolishing the King County Regional Homelessness Authority, and we know she tweeted a bunch of shit that pearl-clutching voters will find indefensible. We know what a few bad tweets can do for even the strongest of candidates, and we don’t want to make it easier for our enemies to boost candidates backed by our corporate overlords. But don’t take our word for it, just ask our Republican City Attorney.

That said, we also know it’s unfair to reduce someone to bad tweets–especially a Black woman tweeting at the height of the 2020 protests–so we fought about it, we drank about it, we truced about it, and we fought about it some more.

Ultimately, we were won over by the specificity of ObeySumner’s answers. They knew exactly where they wanted to site new permanent supportive housing, they gave percentages for their tax proposals, and they laid out a more detailed plan to make sex work safer.

We do hope that if they get elected they will adopt some of Reed’s willingness to call out “progressives” who stand in the way of progress, but we’re not too worried about that. ObeySumner is far from a push over–they clapped back at literally every person in our conference room at least once. And despite some cringey consultant-speak, we whole-heartedly endorse their vision for a brighter, more equitable, and sultrier Seattle. Vote ObeySumner.

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Council District No. 6

Dan Strauss

Our commitment to endorsing in every race forces the SECB to use the “lesser-of-two-evils” justification more often then we’d like, but Council Member Dan Strauss made it difficult to lift that old saw, even against his challenger, Pete Hanning, the executive director of the fucking Fremont Chamber of Commerce.

In our meeting, the two men agreed on basically everything. Strauss would say something and Hanning would repeat it in a less-informed way. Or Hanning would say something dumb and Strauss would agree but in wonkier terms. They shook hands several times because they felt so aligned on some issues. We wish we were joking.

They were two peas in a pod when it came to backing the blue. They think Seattle needs more cops and more money for the Seattle Police Department (SPD). They also said they would support the continuation of the SPD hiring incentive program, even though Strauss seemed to admit the incentives do not appear to be bringing in more recruits. They also believe that putting people in jail for low-level crime deters repeat offenders, which is pretty much bogus.

They twinned again by failing to pick a favorite draft growth plan. That’s so them! Hanning said he did not know enough about the proposals and would wait until he got elected before taking a side on the biggest decision the council will make next year. Strauss said he shouldn’t take a side because he is leading discussions about the plan in his Land Use Committee. The SECB wishes he would use his powerful position to crush the NIMBY opposition, but no. He, as an elected politician, should stay neutral so as to better listen to EVERYONE, even when some people want to make our City less livable. Eye-roll.

The candidates also circle-jerked over Mayor Bruce Harrell. Hanning was hip to Harrell from the get-go, voting for him in 2021 over former Council President Lorena González. Strauss told the SECB that he voted for his more progressive opponent, but if he had a time machine, he would go back and change his vote to Harrell. We can think of about 10 billion better uses of a time machine, but we understood this comment as a slightly hyperbolic signal of his undying loyalty to the Mayor, who–if you’re new here–we do not hold in high regard.

ANYWAY! Here’s where the “lesser of two evils” happens. Strauss and Hanning disagreed on the undeniable need for new progressive revenue. Strauss told the SECB that he supports a local version of the state’s new capital gains tax on the wealthiest people in the city. Hanning said the only tax he wants is a state income tax, but that’s a state-level issue. We asked him to name a real proposal while Democrats in Olympia figure out how to actually exercise power, and he said the City did not need any new tax revenue because there is no budget deficit. He is wrong by about $200 million, and we are embarrassed on his behalf.

The City quite plainly needs more revenue to fill the budget deficit and to fund programs to meet Seattle’s growing needs for housing, safety, transportation, and all the stuff candidates pretend to care about. If we elect Strauss, he’s one more vote for taxing the rich on a new council that may be hostile to those sorts of good ideas.

We also like Strauss for leading the charge to make many streeteries permanent, speeding up the process of building affordable housing, passing updates to improve energy efficiency in buildings, and proposing a viable plan to finally fix the Burke-Gilman Trail’s “missing link.” Vote Strauss.

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Council District No. 7

Andrew J. Lewis

We begrudgingly endorsed Andrew J. Lewis in 2019, and now it is with a heavy heart that the SECB endorses him once again. He’s not all bad. He substantially lowered the cost of building permanent supportive housing, he secured money for the less-cruel approach to sweeps, and he supported the payroll tax on big business. He also rides a bike downtown, which is important to people who think politicians should lead by example when it comes to bikes.

But he could really use a stronger spine. He sponsored a bill that gave gig-workers a minimum wage and then supported an amendment to leave a bunch of workers out. He watered-down the winter eviction moratorium. He backpedaled support for defunding the police. And he initially sided with Council Member Sara Nelson on a petty amendment to raise the $10 rental late fee cap.

Though he got smart with us in the endorsement meeting about whether or not we need more tax revenue to fill the $200 million budget deficit, he said he supports generating more progressive revenue. He likes a proposed tweak of a tax on wildly expensive real estate sales that Olympia might allow cities to use next year, and he also backs a capital gains tax. We do not expect him to become the next progressive tax god when Council Member Teresa Mosqueda (most likely) graduates to the King County Council, but on that issue and on every other he beats his competition by a means-tested mile.

Self-described “girl dad” Bob Kettle thinks he is the President of the United States of America. Like Council Member Nelson, who sources say recruited him, he’s heavy on paternalism and light on policy.

Kettle did not take a hard stance on which taxes he would support in our endorsement meeting, but he went off and told the Seattle Times that he wants to make sure the City was not lying about its budget deficit before he approves new taxes. We wonder why Kettle does not just check out the budget online, and why he thinks he is so much smarter than the nonpartisan numbers people on central staff.

And though he talks a big game on public safety, he doesn’t understand basic aspects of the state’s new drug possession and public use laws, which of course he supports wholeheartedly despite demonstrating very little knowledge about our municipal criminal legal system.

Piroshky Piroshky owner Olga Sagan also said she did not support new taxes, progressive or otherwise. She’s so anti-tax that she refused to call her vacancy tax proposal a tax, even though it is a tax. She even said she would cut funding to housing because she believes the City really only needs about 10,000 new units to house unhoused people. That’s certainly a perspective, Sagan.

Oh yeah, and she wouldn’t tell us whether she voted for Trump in 2020, but a source told us she definitely told them she voted for Trump, and she declined to answer when asked if the source was a liar. So. There’s that.

But would we hang out with Sagan on the weekends and read horoscopes? Any time. Would we die for her? Some of us would. Would we vote for her? Absolutely not. Vote Lewis.

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Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 1

Liza Rankin

A former Seattle Public Schools (SPS) student and longtime advocate for Seattle schools, incumbent Director Liza Rankin has delivered on her campaign promises from 2019, such as banning the practice of using isolation to punish students and expanding equity requirements for the district’s Highly Capable Services and Advanced Learning Programs, which will make sure the district provides higher-level learning opportunities to students regardless of which school they attend.

She’s effective, and we need someone steady to react to SPS’s budget crisis, declining enrollment, and significant achievement gaps for students emerging from the pandemic.

She does need to cool it with the iPad, though. During our meeting, she wielded the machine aggressively to show us charts and graphs to support her points. We love it when politicians show their work, but that’s the beauty of the follow-up email, Rankin. (She sent several of those, too, btw.)

As for dealing with the deficit, Rankin wants to start with cuts to administration, but, if need be, she said she’s open to cutting educational programs that do not improve the educational outcomes for Black boys. Cuts suck, but Rankin’s elimination rubric aligns with securing the best basic outcomes for students, even if it means losing out on mock trials and beloved jazz bands.

We’re a little concerned about Rankin’s views on school resource officers in schools. In 2020, she voted for the temporary suspension of school resource officers at SPS because she says she didn’t want armed officers in schools. Now she says she wants something firmer than a temporary suspension of the program, but she wouldn’t commit to keeping cops out of schools. She hears some members of the Black community say they believe an officer who knows the students can actually reduce the likelihood of arrests. Studies do not back up that belief.

Still, of the three candidates in the race, Rankin seems the most willing and able to wrangle the more tedious parts of running a school board, such as the nightmare of implementing a policy review schedule.

Blaine Parce is also an excellent candidate, though she admittedly had some pretty deep holes in her policy portfolio. She started advocating for Native American learners in SPS with the Urban Native Education Alliance (UNEA) more than 10 years ago while raising six kids and working for a Grocery Outlet in Lynnwood. UNEA supports charter schools, though, and that’s a deal-breaker for us.

Debbie Carlsen talked a lot but didn’t say much. Overall, she failed to support her arguments against current board policy with concrete evidence, and she leaned heavily on her LGBTQ+ advocacy in a way that felt pandering and largely non-applicable to SPS. At one point, Rankin basically suggested that the issues facing the school board were too important to leave to someone who didn’t know what they were talking about. We agreed. Vote Rankin.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 2

Lisa Rivera Smith

Despite trying to poison the SECB by bringing us school lunches to sample, we support a second term for school board incumbent Lisa Rivera Smith.

Both Rivera Smith and her challenger, Christina Posten, agree on major issues–no charter schools, teachers deserve more money, and so forth–but Rivera Smith’s experience tipped us in her favor. She grew up in poverty and experienced homelessness, and she still volunteers with Stop the Sweeps. Given the high rate of homelessness in Seattle Public Schools (SPS), the district could use Rivera Smith’s guidance to best serve these students and families. Plus, she likes to challenge the status quo of the school board, and we love to see it.

We also agree with Rivera Smith about the existence of a link between SPS’s declining enrollment and Seattle’s affordable housing crisis. Anyone who ties people leaving SPS purely to disliking the schools and the lack of extracurriculars or whatever ignores how unaffordable the city is for families, especially single parents. But Rivera Smith gets it.

Our least favorite topic of conversation, which still dominated a lot of these meetings, was the new Student Outcomes Focused Governance (SOFG) model, which the school board permanently adopted in June. Regardless of how you feel about the model, you can support Rivera Smith. She voted in favor of adopting SOFG, but she said she wanted to shape the model to fit the needs of SPS. In this way, she’s a mild wild card. She rarely shies away from criticizing the board majority, but she’s thoughtful about it.

On cops, Rivera Smith voted with the rest to suspend the Student Resource Officer (SRO) program–aka cops in schools–but says she may reconsider her position because some members of the Latino community told her they like the idea of their children getting used to cops. Well, we like the idea of using that hypothetical SRO money to hire more school nurses, social workers, and counselors to address student behavior rather than using it for a fucking cop who’s going to criminalize youth behavior and undoubtedly target students of color for punishment more than white students. She gains a single point for saying she wouldn’t allow armed cops back in schools.

Posten almost swayed us when she said flat out she wouldn’t vote to restore SROs. And her experience as a former principal at Whitman Middle School gave her some interesting views on how schools need to provide continuity of special education services district-wide. But then a couple days after her interview she sent us a confusing email indicating she might drop out of the race.

While we love a little chaos, SPS needs a reliable leader on its Board of Directors. Vote Rivera Smith.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 3

Evan Briggs

We know, we know. School District Board President Brandon Hersey encouraged independent documentary filmmaker Evan Briggs to run for this position, and our endorsement of Briggs only goes to show that the SECB is merely an unwitting pawn manipulated by shadowy forces behind closed doors and yada yada yada…but, honestly, we liked Briggs’s ideas, priorities, and her demonstrated commitment to helping not only her kids but all other kids do well in school.

Briggs got some attention back in 2019 when she and another mom at Thornton Creek Elementary called out the district’s mishandling of civil rights violations. After the school culture became too toxic for Briggs and her family, she transferred her kids to Sand Point Elementary, where Briggs volunteers with the PTA.

She wants to expand the ways schools assess student learning, citing an openness to mastery-based learning and testing, which ditches standard grades to assess students based on the core concepts a given course aims to teach. She also wants to work to find ways to more equitably distribute PTSA funds across schools and to dramatically improve community outreach. All stuff we can get behind.

In the meeting, the school board’s adoption of a new governance model, Student Outcome Focused Governance (SOFG), again dominated as the BIG controversy. Briggs promised to continue to work within the model. Though we know that’s an unpopular opinion in some progressive circles, we’re just not convinced that the drawbacks outweigh the benefits, especially since we do not pay these board directors for shit.

Our defense, in brief, for those who care: The school board has been a dysfunctional mess for years partly because of the way the previous structure incentivized information siloing, back-biting, and low-quality community outreach. We think SOFG will help the board set clear goals and guidelines that will cut down on confusion and acrimony, and we think the board will have more control over policy than its detractors give it credit for. End rant.

We also liked Christie Robertson, a member of the Seattle Special Education PTSA executive board and a fervent advocate for special education. She’s just hyper-focused on that topic, which ultimately requires a lot of state-level advocacy to change, and so we preferred Briggs’s slightly broader perspective for this local position. But if Robertson ever wanted to find a way to run for State Senate against Lisa Wellman, then, hey, call us! ;)

In any event, either Briggs or Robertson would be better than reply guy Ben Gitenstein.

During our conversation, Gitenstein complained in general terms about the schools heading in the “wrong direction,” but he couldn’t point to anything concrete he would do to fix things. And when we asked for concrete examples, he said weird or flippant shit!

He also didn’t understand the difference between an operating budget and a capital budget, and he complained about the lack of debate over the Rainier Beach High School remodel, a long-overdue upgrade for a school that primarily serves students of color. He displayed only a surface-level familiarity with major issues currently facing the school board and has exactly ZERO actual ideas for fixing them, which made sense when we learned that he sends one of his kids to private school. Meanwhile, Briggs is over here organizing to overcome racial inequities and living her public education values. Vote Briggs.

Seattle School District No. 1

Director District No. 6

Gina Topp

No contest here. Gina Topp, former chief legal counsel and policy advisor to King County Executive Dow Constantine, walked into our interview with a three-ring binder ready to talk about making real, measurable change to a district she had no problem criticizing.

By comparison, her opponent, Maryanne Wood, said she entered the race because she was “retired” and now had the time to take on “a project.” Wood’s big beef with the district involved the construction of what she called “mega-schools,” and her primary problem with “mega-schools” mostly involved a lack of parking, lol. The third candidate, Rosie McCarter, didn’t show, so we gave her an F.

Topp shined in every policy discussion, including on Wood’s “mega-school” turf. Though Wood finds such large schools inexcusable, Topp pointed out that school sizes in Seattle reflect the way the state funds education. For every 400 kids in a school, a district gets state funding for a building’s worth of staff, complete with a principal, a vice principal, a librarian, and, we assume, one of those giant rainbow parachutes for gym class. Topp criticized the way the district spoke to the community about the Alki Elementary remodel, saying she wished the district’s messaging inspired joy about a new school, because ultimately a larger school can still provide a great education. Wood kept banging on about parking.

Topp also gave the best answer on the controversy over the school board’s adoption of a new governance model, Student Outcomes Focused Governance (SOFG). She argued that if SOFG lets the board set policy and hold the superintendent accountable for results, which it does, and if the superintendent doesn’t deliver on implementation, which he might not, then the school board will still be able to delve into the policy work to ensure the district delivers on the board’s goals, which it could. At one point she even quoted from the district’s dashboard on the matter, *chef’s kiss.*

She also wants to keep cops out of schools and lobby the City and County on affordable housing issues. What’s not to like? Vote Topp.

The Stranger's August 2023 Primary Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 13 Jul 2023 01:08:00 -0700

The Stranger's August 2023 Primary Election Cheat Sheet by Stranger Election Control Board

Vote “Approved” on King County’s Crisis Care Centers Levy

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 06 Apr 2023 12:45:00 -0700

King County Elections mailed ballots this week. You should find yours in the mail soon, if you haven't found it already. by Stranger Election Control Board

It feels like every day people in Seattle suffer and die due to our piss-poor mental health system.

Overdoses are off the charts. Cops kill people in crisis, or else people in crisis call the cops for help, and then the cops kill someone else en route to the scene. People go into crisis and hurt or kill other people, and they go into crisis and kill themselves.

When they’re not dying, poor people with mental health issues and drug addictions endure daily indignities and sneers, and everybody else walks around town feeling variously helpless, anxious, resigned, and fed-up.

We could prevent some of these tragedies and a lot of this agita if we had a place where anyone in crisis could go for help. Unfortunately, right now, in all of King County, we only have one of those places: DESC’s Crisis Solutions Center downtown. The center has 46 beds to serve a population of 2.3 million, and people can’t just walk in—a cop or some other first-responder needs to hand them off. Not great!

That’s why you and everyone you know must vote to approve King County’s Proposition No. 1, the Crisis Care Centers Levy.

The levy would impose a property tax that would raise $1.25 billion over the course of nine years. The funds would build five behavioral health urgent care facilities across King County, with one specifically geared toward youth. The first one might go up as soon as 2026, and the last one would go up before 2030.

These crisis care facilities would stay open 24 hours per day, seven days per week. Anyone could walk in and receive “immediate, on-site crisis support with 23-hour observation” in units that serve around 20 people at a time, according to the County. If people need more time to stabilize, they can access behavioral health treatment “for up to 14 days” in a 16-bed unit. People with substance use disorder would be eligible for help with immediate needs and referrals for treatment elsewhere if appropriate (and available). No insurance? No problem. And, if they see fit, cops and other first-responders can drop off people at these places instead of booking them into jail.

The levy also aims to construct 111 new long-term mental health residential beds, which would restore the system’s capacity to 2019 levels. (We’ve been bleeding long-term beds as facilities shut down due to lack of state funding.) To make sure we don’t lose any more long-term beds or any of the new short-term beds, the levy reserves tens of millions of for maintenance costs over this nine-year period.

Finally, to entice people to work at these facilities, there’s also money to create apprenticeship programs and to boost pay for mental health care workers.

Will those higher salaries potentially lure people away from other mental health facilities where we desperately need workers? Probably, but the pipeline programs will help, and the state won’t be totally useless in this regard, either.

Will these centers solve the county’s mental health facility needs? HAHAHAHAHAH. No. The state and federal governments have been so negligent for so long that passing this bill will keep us humming at crisis levels rather than total-meltdown levels. But hey, that’s capitalism.

Do property taxes suck? Yes! This one will tax property owners 14.5 cents per $1,000 in assessed home value, which adds up to around $120 in 2024 for owners of median-priced homes (~$700,000). But seniors, poor people, and disabled people can apply for an exemption. And, remember, we don’t have an income tax. Until we get one, they’re going to keep hiking property taxes and sales taxes to pay for stuff we needed 10 years ago. If you want to change that, then email your state representatives and tell them you want them to pass an income tax yesterday.

In the meantime, vote “approved" by April 25.

Vote Yes on Initiative 135

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 09:00:00 -0800

Technically speaking Initiative Measure No. 135 by Stranger Election Control Board

In case you haven’t noticed, the people of Seattle are getting absolutely bodied by the housing affordability crisis. Last summer, the median rent for a one-bedroom apartment increased 9% year-over-year to a whopping $1,710. Over the course of the last decade, median monthly rents in the Seattle area shot up 64%, pushing the poorest residents out of town or onto the streets.

While state and local politicians nibble around the edges and hike property taxes to fund increasingly expensive subsidized housing, House Our Neighbors (HON), the political arm of Real Change newspapers, has a solution that could eventually get us out of this mess for good: Initiative 135, a new law to create a social housing developer.

Neither HON’s representatives, nor the Stranger Election Control Board, nor anyone else thinks this solution will solve the immediate, pressing need to build thousands of affordable housing units tomorrow. But with enough time and political will, this solution could make the affordability crisis a thing of the past.

By no means is this initiative perfect. But Seattle sucks at thinking ahead, as we have demonstrated time and time again when we’ve killed plans to make this city livable. We owe it to the future to think smarter than the generations before us. And for that reason, Initiative 135 is worth your YES vote.

Initiative 135 takes the first step toward the dream of housing for all by creating a public developer equipped with the tools to “build, acquire, own, and manage” housing that will stay affordable forever. Not market-rate housing, which people with low incomes can only afford when the economy crashes. Not government-subsidized housing, which developers can put back on the unaffordable market in 20 or 30 years. But social housing; publicly owned and operated, with rents forever capped at 30% of a tenant’s income.

This developer would scoop up old hotels or else build new, green housing, all financed with bonds against expected revenue from rents. The units would be available to Seattleites making between 0% and 120% of Seattle’s Area Median Income (that is, between $0 and around $121,000 for a family of four). The mixed-income approach would help service the debt on the bonds and avoid the problems that come along with concentrating poverty. Renters and experts in the housing field would govern the places, with renters maintaining a one-seat majority.

Sounds great, right? Right.

But, as we said, it’s not perfect.

The public developer can’t buy or build anything without any money, and voting “YES” on Initiative 135 doesn’t fund anything except for some in-kind startup costs. But that’s by design: the campaign feared courts would strike down the law if the initiative contained a funding mechanism in addition to setting up the agency.

Thankfully, the campaign has powerful allies in Rep. Frank Chopp (D-Seattle) and Seattle City Council Member Tammy Morales, who could use their leverage to convince their colleagues to invest in the new agency. If the politicians fail, then HON will run another initiative to secure an unspecified progressive revenue source.

But even if they get the money, building and even buying housing takes time–and we don’t have time. As we here at The Stranger have been screaming for years now, we needed thousands of units of affordable housing yesterday.

Then again, we can walk and chew gum at the same time. That is, we can work to solve the immediate homelessness crisis while also steadily building toward a future of cross-class social housing across the city. This is especially true if a future campaign secures a separate, progressive funding source. Then the public developer wouldn't compete with current affordable housing programs for the same pots of money.

But even if we granted the agency the time, does it even make sense to use public dollars on housing half-filled with benevolent tech bros? Yes, because guess what? No one should be spending over 30% of their paycheck on rent, even tech workers making more than the average bro.

Though a public developer wouldn’t solve our housing problem tomorrow, it’s obvious that our current system isn’t solving our problems any time soon, either. But establishing a public developer now would plant a seed that could grow into a sane, sustainable system of the kind already operating in places such as Austria, France, Singapore, and Montgomery County, Maryland (sort of).

Let’s choose to make housing a public good. Let’s choose to run it sustainability with union labor. Let’s think of the future, for once.

Vote yes on I-135.

General Election Night 2022: How Screwed Are We?

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 08 Nov 2022 15:59:00 -0800

The Stranger's election night coverage. by Stranger Election Control Board

📌

Hello and welcome to The Stranger's 2022 general election night coverage!!! In the next few hours, we'll better understand just how far America will slide toward fascism this year. 🙃

Nationally, if Democrats lose control of both the House and Senate, which would align with historical trends, then we can all look forward to Republicans holding the government hostage while the world melts. If you didn't block out the last two years of Obama's last term, it'll be just like that—except this time with election-deniers.

Closer to home, we'll begin to learn whether Washington will send one or two election-deniers to Congress, whether state Democrats will reinforce their blue wall in Olympia, whether King County voters will reboot the war on drugs, whether Seattle voters will change the way they vote in primaries, and much, much, more!

As always, you will not be alone with your nerves and your doom-scrolling. Tonight, Stranger Election Control Board members will pack their pre-rolls and head out to election night parties all over town. Expect wall-to-wall snack coverage! Gossip! Tears! Cheers! More tears! And lots of cussing.

Okay, buckle up, let's go!

FETTERMAN WINS, OZ LOSES
9:55 PM

BREAKING: Democrat John Fetterman wins U.S. Senate race in Pennsylvania, NBC News projects. https://t.co/NqjTEpNhkv pic.twitter.com/34lAQYk4KR
— NBC News (@NBCNews) November 9, 2022

John Fetterman just won Pennsylvania's Senate race, defeating Dr. Oz.

"We held the line," he said in his acceptance speech. "I never expected that we were gonna turn these red counties blue, but we did what we needed to do and we had those conversations across every one of those counties.

"And tonight that's why I'll be the next US Senator for Pennsylvania. Thanks to all of you!"

APPROVAL VOTING HAD A BABY
9:43 PM Welcome to earth, baby Max.

Though Seattle Approves campaign manager Logan Bowers didn’t secure a win for her preferred voting reform, he and his wife, Jerina Pillert, did welcome Maximus to earth about half an hour after election results dropped. He’s 8 lbs 9.2 ounces, and he and mom are doing “fantastic,” Bowers said in a text.

“He already has opinions on voting reform,” he added.

SCHRIER AND HOBBS ARE FEELIN' PRETTY DARN GOOD
9:40 PM Schrier was so happy.

“There are lots of votes to count, but at this moment, we’re feeling pretty darn good,” said Democrat Kim Schrier, the pediatrician who represents Washington’s 8th Congressional District, which ranges from suburban Redmond to sagebrush Chelan county. A cheer filled the Bellevue Westin ballroom at the relatively surprising result (and defeat for the man with the corniest tagline: Matt “Make Crime Illegal Again” Larkin). Washington Democrats looked like they will be sending a solid slate to the House, including a strong showing by Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who was leading pro-Trump troglodyte Joe Kent in Washington’s 3rd District in Southwest Washington.

Meanwhile, Democrat Steve Hobbs was excited to become the new Secretary of State, overseeing elections in Washington state at a time when election officials are the nationwide target of rightwing chuds. “I gotta tell you, I was really nervous back there, I really was,” Hobbs said, noting that he was getting emotional (but in a pretty deadpan way) and then highlighting his Japanese American heritage. Washington voters seemed ready to throw in the trash can the argument that the Secretary of State’s office should be nonpartisan (which his opponent Julie Anderson claimed was a better approach).

The SECB felt a wave of relief coursing through the packed ballroom. Washington did its part to prevent a Republican red wave of blood-soaked trauma from flooding across the country.

Hobbs speaking at the Bellevue Westin. DARYA AND HER DAD DANCE FOR JOY
9:30 PM

As if we were going to lead this wrap-up of Stranger-endorsed Darya Farivar’s election night lead over Lelach Rave with any other anecdote, please. Once the results came in and showed Farivar up 56 percent to Rave’s 43 percent, Farivar said her dad “dragged her around the party, dancing for joy.” We have no choice but to stan, Mr. Farivar.

In a phone interview, she told the SECB that she felt “excited, overwhelmed, and humbled” by her campaign’s success. Farivar attributed her victory to her campaign team’s passion when speaking with voters, after leading by nearly 4,000 votes despite getting outraised by nearly $150,000. “You can’t put a price tag on passion,” she said.

Farivar said she hopes her victory provides a model for other young women of color to take the plunge and run for office in their communities and expressed hope that her win could signify a limit to the power of money in politics. We haven’t checked the latest federal results while writing this blurb, so we’re going to breathe in some of Farivar’s hopium and ride that high through the next several days until we know whether the insurrectionists took control of Congress.

SEATTLE DOESN’T APPROVE OF SEATTLE APPROVES
9:21 PM

Seattle Approves’s volunteer co-lead Troy Davis said he felt disappointed about his preferred election reform trailing ranked-choice voting (RCV) by 48 points in the first ballot drop, but he’s proud of the work he, campaign manager Logan Bowers, and the whole approval voting crew has done. “People have been talking about voting reform for two decades, but we actually acted, and as a result, it looks like some voting reform will pass here in Seattle this year.”

With the “yes” vote for election reform only trailing by a point, he might be right. But if Seattle does end up deciding to change the way it votes in primary elections, he hopes other cities are watching and learning from the contentious battle that played out between both the approval voting and RCV campaigns.

He called the City’s decision to pit the reforms against one another “unfortunate.” He pointed to polling from nine months ago that showed 72 percent of voters expressing approval of approval voting, which is much higher than the 26 percent vote share the reform pulled on election night. He figures RCV would probably poll higher than the 49 percent the “yes” vote is getting right now.

“We all kicked sand on one another, and that doesn’t serve voters well. Hopefully, future voting reform can happen collaboratively and not between adversaries. That doesn’t do anyone any good,” he said.

CHIPALO STREET TAKES A 10-POINT LEAD OVER EMIJAH SMITH
9:20 PM

It’s looking good for Chipalo Street, the one landlord SECB’s ever met that we like, but things could still change. (With the vote, that is. We’ll still like him.) For now, he’s got a healthy lead over Emijah Smith, 54 percent to 44 percent. But only a quarter of the ballots have been counted, so who knows what the future holds?

Street planned on gathering with supporters this evening at Taste of Caribbean, and we suspect he might’ve tucked into the rum punch a little early because he’s been unresponsive to calls and emails. Whatever, he’s earned a break from talking to nosy reporters.

No matter how this race winds up going, we’re fortunate that both candidates are pretty strong. Street won the SECB over by speaking from personal experience with police violence and dealing with outdated zoning laws, but Smith expressed a healthy appetite for taxing the rich to pay for social services. If we have to say bon voyage to Kirsten Harris-Talley, at least we’ve got some pretty worthy candidates vying to step into her shoes.

MURRAY SPEAKS IN BELLEVUE
9:16 PM

Democrat Patty Murray, elected to represent Washington for another six years in the Senate, arrived in the Bellevue Westin ballroom hugging her family and supporters (she has a LOT of family, being from a family of nine she told the crowd). The diminutive, white-haired defender of abortion rights and supporter of gun control limits said President Joe Biden called to congratulate her on her sixth term in office: “Thanks Joe, and by the way, we need to get childcare done,” she said she told him.

“I want to thank all of you who donated and texted and did everything you could to throw yourself into this fight to keep our democracy a democracy,” Murray said.

Murray noted she would continue to work to protect abortion rights and protect the social safety net.

“Do you believe that climate change is real? Do you believe that everyone should be able to count on Social Security? Do you think Mitch McConnell should be the [majority] leader? We're gonna make sure he isn’t.”

The SECB isn’t sure the muppet-mouthed Republican won’t be denied this cold-blooded ambition, but at least Washington state can’t be blamed if he does.

JUDGE SHADID IS HEADING TO MEXICO TO CELEBRATE
9:15 PM He was two perfect Manhattans in when we called.

Incumbent Seattle Municipal Court Judge Damon Shadid said he was “unbelievably thrilled with the results” of his nearly 40-point lead over Nyjat Rose-Atkins, who works as a prosecutor in the Seattle City Attorney’s office.

“My opponent decided to make this a referendum on community court and therapeutic courts in general, and the city of Seattle has shown they’re solidly behind my programs,” he added.

In the short term, he and his wife will breathe a “sigh of relief” and enjoy their trip to Mexico next week. In the long term, he plans to “double-down on therapeutic courts as the way forward for criminal justice in Seattle.”

POOJA VADDADI’S FAITH IS RESTORED
9:10 PM They’re gonna play video games now.

Reached by phone, public defender Pooja Vaddadi described her 13-point lead over incumbent Seattle Municipal Court Judge Adam Eisenberg as “amazing, surreal, just absolutely insane.”

“I’m also maybe two or three glasses of champagne into the evening, so things might feel a little extra ordinary,” she added.

As she celebrated her strong initial showing with her husband and her campaign staff on Zoom (thanks, COVID), she praised the city that may very well elect her.

“I just have restored faith in Seattle. People believe in restorative justice, people believe in second chances, people believe in what works. Seattle wants better, and I’m better. That might be the champagne talking,” she said, laughing.

“She really is better, and that’s me talking!” her husband, James Barker, chimed in.

She hopes her big election night lead will inspire other lawyers to challenge judges, whose races so often go uncontested. “Maybe in the next four years we’ll see a fully contested Seattle Municipal Court ballot. Wouldn’t that be something,” she said. It certainly would be.

CLAUDIA KAUFFMAN'S SUPPORTERS CHEER HER EARLY LEAD FROM A SEAFOOD PARTY IN KENT
9:09 PM

You can feel cautiously optimistic about Claudia Kauffman in LD 47, where she’s taken the lead with fifty-three percent to Bill Boyce’s forty-six. But only 28 percent of ballots have been counted so far, so don’t pop your champagne corks yet.

Kauffman was busy meeting with supporters at a gathering in Kent this evening, but sent along a generally upbeat statement: “I am honored that the voters of the 47th District send a clear message about their trust in me to do the people’s work in Olympia,” she wrote. “Their trust is an honor of a lifetime.”

Aside from Kauffman and Boyce, 37 votes went to a write-in—not 37 percent, 37 total, or about fifteen-hundredths of a percent. So, if you were hoping that a write-in would carry the day, welp, better luck next time, weirdo.

ALL BUT ONE STRANGER-ENDORSED CANDIDATE IS LEADING RIGHT NOW
8:49 PM

In the open State House seat in the 47th Legislative District, Auburn City Council Member Chris Stearns is way out ahead of Stranger-endorsed candidate Shukri Olow. Everyone else we picked is leading. Just sayin'.

WINE-SOAKED CHEER AND HUGS FOR MURRAY
8:47 PM Murray just arrived, hugging family and supporters.

A wine-soaked cheer went up at the Bellevue Westin ballroom when MSNBC announced that Sen. Patty Murray is expected to hold her seat for another six years. Results from the Secretary of State’s office were pretty striking in Murray’s favor, especially after a few gut-check recent polls showing her losing ground in the final days. Murray was leading with 544,755 (62.5 percent of the vote) over Tiffany Smiley, with 325,089 (37 percent).

Meanwhile, in the race for Secretary of State, Democrat Steve Hobbs was narrowly leading with 808,255 votes (50.39 percent) over nonpartisan candidate Julie Anderson who had 747,775 votes, (46.62 percent).

As expected, the 8th Congressional District’s Kim Schrier, the Democrat, was in a close race with challenger Matt “Make Crime Illegal Again” Larkin, with 102,017 votes for Schrier (52.7 percent) versus 90,950 for Larkin (46.99 percent).

So, it’s clear there was a huge collective sigh of relief Washington wouldn’t be giving another senator to the Republicans. On the other close races, well as the old saw goes, “it’s too close to call.” Though I will call the snacks here abysmal.

NBC PROJECTS MURRAY VICTORY, WA DEMS LEAD CONGRESSIONAL RACES
8:43 PM

Washington’s 30-year incumbent, Patty Murray, is leading Republican Tiffany Smiley by 16 points. In the final few weeks, dumb poll averages made this race seem tighter than everyone knew it was, and everyone seems to be right for now. NBC already called it for Murray:

BREAKING: Democrat Patty Murray wins re-election to the U.S. Senate in Washington, NBC News projects. https://t.co/MytYyh5ZHC pic.twitter.com/DwOJPzNCNI
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) November 9, 2022

In the two swing Congressional Districts, US Rep. Kim Schrier leads Trumpy Matt Larkin by about 11,000 votes, 53 to 47. And somewhat amazingly, Democrat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez leads extreme right golden boy Joe Kent by about the same margin, 53 to 47. Places outside King County typically shade a little red over time. We’ll see how these go.

REPUBLICANS FAIL TO DELIVER FOR FERRELL ON ELECTION NIGHT
8:38 PM Not much appetite for the cruditè after Ferrell's poor initial showing. Leesa Manion leads Jim Ferrell by more than 43,000 votes in the election night ballot drop, 55 percent to 44 percent. Let this be a lesson to law-and-order politicians running in even year electorates: cross the SECB at your own peril. Our Instagram Reel game is unstoppable. In a speech to about a hundred supporters dressed in their finest attire for their trip into the city they love to complain about, Ferrell said the race was far from over. He said his campaign believes there are still about 600,000 ballots to be counted and that the “real direction” of the race will become clear in tomorrow’s ballot drop. It’s certainly possible that Ferrell could still come back and win this, as Kshama Sawant overcame a larger percentage deficit in her 2019 city council race. To repeat Sawant’s success, Ferrell would need a significant shift in the Election Day ballots. In an interview before the results dropped, Ferrell’s campaign manager said that if Manion was ahead by a “sizable margin” on election night, they would be in trouble. When we tracked him down after the results dropped he declined to say whether 11 points is “sizable”, but it certainly seems fairly “sizable” to us. Ferrell’s campaign manager did say that the gap wasn’t enough to draw an election night concession, and questioned why King County Elections didn’t include more of the ballots already received in the initial drop. After running a campaign strategy that relied on every Republican vote in Washington’s bluest county, the SECB is starting to wonder if the real “bunch of crazies” are the folks running Ferrell’s campaign. SPIRITS ARE HIGH AT RANKED-CHOICE PARTY
8:35 PM The RCV crew lookin' confident, happy, on edge. There’s no way to know what’s going to happen with ranked-choice or approval voting, but early signs suggest that if we switch to either system, voters strongly prefer ranked choice (where you vote in order of preference) to approval voting (where you check as many boxes as you like). With about a third of precincts reporting, RCV is way out in the lead with 74 percent versus 26 percent. But whether we adopt any change will depend on a separate vote, and that’s still too close to call: pretty much a dead heat at 49 percent for changing things and 51 percent for keeping them as they are now. “I think spirits are pretty high,” said Ben Chapman with RCV for Seattle. Campaign volunteers gathered at Comet Tavern to watch the results come in, and the scene was raucous enough that Chapman had to step outside to talk. “I think the best part is that there’s a lot of folks here who’ve been organizing in different parts of Seattle, different parts of the state, even, who met each other virtually through the pandemic,” he said. “And it’s really great for folks to get to meet each other for the first time.” For now, the plan is to get a good night’s rest, Chapman says. “And then be ready to watch for the next drop of results.” KING COUNTY ELECTION RESULTS ARE LIVE
8:08 PM

Read them here. We’ll be processing shortly. Check statewide results here, but be aware that not all counties may be reporting.

THE APPROVAL VOTING CROWD IS CASUALLY PLAYING BINGO
7:50 PM The drink in the owl is called a “Polly Want Cachaça,” with cachaça, matcha coco syrup, and almond.

The members of the Seattle Approves campaign who are not having a child at the moment are drinking booze out of owls at Olmstead on Capitol Hill as they casually play BINGO and watch the east coast results come in.

When asked if any of them had won a BINGO game yet, Troy Davis, the campaign’s volunteer co-leader, said he was “not playing actively enough, alas.” He blamed conversation and the national results.

“Definitely endorse Olmstead bingo, though,” he added.

Meanwhile, at the hospital, campaign manager Logan Bowers reports that the baby will enter the world “any minute.” Lol if baby Max drops when these results drop, then we’re going to buy him a ballot box

CAUTIOUS EBULLIENCE AND SAD POPCORN
7:49 PM Sigh.

The snacks at the Democratic Party campaign event at the Bellevue Westin sat lonely in a corner, dry and non-offensive, ignored and introverted. Only someone desperate for a few calories to offset the effects of pinot noir or IPA would grab a handful of the sad popcorn, pretzels, or trail mix. Apparently, the Dems saved the money to send out a couple more mailers for Patty Murray.

The mood was fairly ebullient but cautious. None of the major candidates are expected to give speeches tonight—along with Senator Murray, the 8th Congressional District’s Kim Schrier, and Secretary of State candidate Steve Hobbs aren't expected at the Westin ballroom until later in the evening.

Hana Tadesse, press secretary for Rep. Schrier, was cautious and guarded in her enthusiasm, saying that the campaign doesn’t expect to call the race tonight. “This is a very purple district, a very competitive district. It’s a mix of urban and rural, kind of like a little United States.” Tadesse wouldn’t say if she supported ranked-choice voting, but when asked how she would rank pie, ice cream, and cake in a close race, she gave a very diplomatic answer, finally coming in strong for 1. pie (sweet potato tips this one for her), 2. ice cream, and 3. cake. (“Though a good sheet cake from Costco can be very good,” she said.)

Washington State Democratic Party chair Tina Podlowski was also cautiously optimistic, even if the rest of the country could be making a slow descent into fascism (ugh, J.D. Vance is leading in Ohio, oof). She was encouraged, however, at reports from a voter registration center at Lumen Field: “What’s making me excited is the fact that there’s a two-and-a-half hour wait at Lumen Field for people to register. They've moved people inside. They're given folks chocolate and water and anybody who’s in line still has an opportunity to vote. So don't leave the line!”

She also noted that there was a line at the Ballard vote box (that may be one of the most Seattle things I’ve ever heard of—a patient line of people waiting to put their ballots in a vote box). She was cautious about predicting Sen. Murray’s chances but said that if early numbers come in below 50 percent for Murray, that wouldn’t be a good sign.

When asked by the SECB about ranked-choice voting, she noted county Democrats defied the SECB’s endorsement (such impudence!) and urged Seattle folks to vote yes for ranked-choice voting (1B). And on the important question of ranking ice cream, pie, or cake, she ranked them 1. cake, 2. ice cream, 3. pie. “You know, crust can be really dry.”

Meanwhile, while the focus has long been on Senator Murray’s footwear (again with the tennis shoes?) the award for best footwear at the Westin ballroom goes to Olivia Teague, who works for the Washington State Democratic Party. On the glorious pink sequin Uggs she received 10 years ago as a kid, she says, “I like to wear them at special events.”

Glorious. WE’RE JUST DOING GOOD NEWS STUFF RIGHT NOW
7:38 PM

BREAKING: Democrat Josh Shapiro wins Pennsylvania governor's race, NBC News projects. https://t.co/wrzeMhSpST pic.twitter.com/DNyTuKiNB4
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) November 9, 2022

NBC called the Pennsylvania Governor’s race for Josh Shapiro, which is very good news for those of us who still want to try out this whole democracy thing for a while. Trump-humping, election-denying, antisemitic-consulting Republican Doug Mastriano went down in a ball of fucking flames. Good riddance. The Senate race between Fetterman and Oz is too close to call, though progressive-leaning election watchers see some home in Fetterman’s performance in some rural Pennsylvania counties.

In other good news, Virginia’s 7th Congressional District re-elected Democrat Abigail Spanberger to the US House of Representatives. After redistricting, and after the state’s Republican Governor won the district last year, the GOP was foaming at the mouth for this one.

FERRELL TRIES TO "CONFOUND EXPECTATIONS" IN A COP BAR FULL OF EXACTLY WHO YOU'D EXPECT
7:26 PM SPOG president Mike Solan, defender of insurrection-curious cops and Ferrell's number one fan, holding court among Seattle's finest.

After burning down an entire 10-pack of pre-rolls to subdue the anxiety of spending an entire evening with Seattle Police Officers Guild president Mike Solan’s favorite candidate in a bar that looks like a set from The Wire’s Irish wakes, the SECB caught up with Federal Way Mayor Jim Ferrell as he waited on tonight’s results with his wife and son.

Ferrell said he spent the morning sign-waving in West Seattle with some of his supporters among Seattle’s more conservative building trade unions and got lots of (presumably) positive honks of support. With Solan perched on a stool over his shoulder, we had a bit of a hard time focusing on Ferrell’s pablum of generic statements about running an “issue-focused” campaign that he feels good about going into tonight’s first drop of ballots. Then we remembered that we live in a civilized state (for now) where being obviously blazed while interviewing a law-and-order cop isn’t something for which Solan’s buddies in blue could send us to the slammer.

The SECB also got a few minutes with Ferrell’s campaign manager before he realized our eyes were glazing over in boredom while he struggled to make it through a sentence without contradicting himself. While calling GOP voters “a bunch of crazies” who held their ballots until election day due to rampant conspiracy theorizing among right-wing media, the staffer said the campaign had no compunction about raising “all the Republican money we can” before uttering a fervent prayer for incumbent Democrat Patty Murray to pull out a victory tonight. Apparently not even inhaling a metric shitton of Seattle’s finest herb can make a centrist’s politics make sense…

MOMMA FARIVAR'S NACHO BAR MAIN ATTRACTION IN LAKE CITY
6:53 PM

After pounding the pavement on the campaign trail for nearly a year, Team Farivar is ready to kick back and celebrate—as soon as they finish setting up their election night party, that is. The SECB reached Darya Farivar by phone in the midst of some last-minute preparations, but she reassured us that her mom’s nacho bar (with chicken, beef, and vegetarian options for other election night guests with the munchies) would be ready by 7 pm sharp.

Farivar practically beamed with pride when discussing her team’s work over the last 12 months, and said they’ve done “everything they can possibly do” ahead of tonight’s results. Regardless of how the early returns from tonight’s drop turn out, Farivar and her squad are ready to crack a bottle of champagne to toast all that hard work.

When we asked what the candidate herself would be knocking back to cut loose after ballots dropped tonight, Farivar clearly had more important things on her mind. “Gosh, I am the wrong person to ask this question to,” she said. While she couldn’t name the Washington wines and beers she said a campaign staffer had secured for the evening, she showed no hesitation in praising the empanadas she’d been snacking on from local Argentine bakery Seatango, a mainstay at all Farivar campaign events.

TEXAS ELECTS BAD GOVERNOR AGAIN
6:40 PM

BREAKING NEWS: Gov. Greg Abbott will remain in the Governor’s mansion for a third term. He defeats high-profile Democratic candidate Beto O’Rourke. https://t.co/4zyNWFbTBM pic.twitter.com/EmyNsi8HBd
— Fox News (@FoxNews) November 9, 2022

Oy. Fox News called the Texas Governor’s race for Greg Abbott. You know, the guy who signed the bounty hunter abortion bill into law, the guy who claimed he’d “eliminate rape,” the guy who sucks at running the election grid? That guy. Good luck, Texas.

STILL A LONG LINE AT LUMEN FIELD, BUT REFRESHMENTS HAVE ARRIVED
6:29 PM Thanks, anonymous snack hero!

“An anonymous hero” showed up with five or six boxes of Papa John’s pizza to feed hungry people waiting in line to vote and addressing ballot issues at King County’s Lumen Field voting center, according to Meg van Huygen, the Stranger’s Last Word cocktail columnist and food writer extraordinaire. There were also boxes of Top Pot donuts for dessert.

To give you a sense of how fast the line is moving, Meg arrived at the voting center at 3 pm and finally voted at 6 pm. She says the line is “still very long,” with several people waiting outside in the 40-degree cold. At around 6:26 pm, officials announced they were moving everyone inside so they didn’t have to wait in the cold.

In a Tweet, King County Executive Dow Constantine told people to stay in line if they can. “Your vote will count as long as you’re in line by 8 pm.” The elections department says it is dispatching staff to the center to help out. Stay strong!!

The line. MASSACHUSETTS GOT ITS FIRST GAY AND FIRST WOMAN GOVERNOR
5:52 PM

Democrat Maura Healey became the first openly gay governor in Massachusetts' history. She is also the first woman elected governor of Massachusetts. https://t.co/VmdLpMcTjF pic.twitter.com/7jgL88lZOZ
— The Associated Press (@AP) November 9, 2022

Polls are closing on the east coast, and we’re getting some expected good and bad news.

First up: Maura Healey beat a Trumpy little freak to be the next governor of Massachusetts, according to a projection from the Associated Press. The Democratic Attorney General will also be the first Democrat to run the state in eight years. Yay, Healey.

Democrat Wes Moore will also become Maryland’s first Black Governor, according to the Associated Press. Thanks for flipping Maryland blue, Moore!

Democrat Wes Moore was elected as Maryland's first Black governor. Only two Black politicians have ever been elected governor in the United States. https://t.co/ht4f5wyrxb pic.twitter.com/pHvbfGj6dn
— The Associated Press (@AP) November 9, 2022

Meanwhile, AP projects Ron DeSantis to win his reelection as Governor of Florida, and Marco Rubio beat Democrat Val Demings to keep his US Senate seat. But what can you do—it’s Florida.

JUDGE SHADID’S WIFE MAKES THE BEST MANHATTANS
5:05 PM Did not peg Shadid as a Scrappy’s man.

The SECB caught up with the incumbent Seattle Municipal Court (SMC) judge while he was at the PCC picking up bitters for his wife. “My wife makes the best Manhattans in the world,” he said. Tonight he plans to be sipping one or two of those alongside his family at home while he waits for the results to drop.

His kids, who are aged 10 and 7, have gotten a crash course in democracy this year as he’s attempted to best his challenger, Nyjat Rose-Akins, a prosecutor under Republican City Attorney Ann Davison and liaison to the Seattle Police Department. “They’ll be very excited to see how daddy does this election,” he’s said—as will his in-laws.

With endorsements from the Seattle Times and the Stranger, he should do okay, but who knows. That endorsement in the Times wasn’t exactly flattering. In the face of the paper’s seemingly reluctant support, Shadid said he was “absolutely thrilled to have their endorsement” and similarly “thrilled about the homework they put into it.”

Aside from his own race, he’s got his eye on the other SMC court battle on the ballot, which pits his colleague Adam Eisenberg against public defender Pooja Vaddadi. He’s also looking at the Northeast District judge race between Stranger-endorsed Judge Michael Finkle and his challenger Joshua Schaer, who’s an assistant attorney general. Shadid praised Finkle for his mentorship and work on therapeutic courts, but says he may be “facing some headwinds” given the general political environment.

APPROVAL VOTING IS HAVING A BABY
2:45 PM Seattle Approves campaign manager Logan Bowers and his wife, Jerina Pillert, wait on the arrival of baby Max (or, depending on how the vote goes, Avery). "She took point on the Max project," Bowers said.

Seattle Approves campaign manager Logan Bowers will miss all the election night "fun" tonight due to the fact that his wife Jerina Pillert is, well, due.

"We've got two projects shipping today," Bowers said of his forthcoming baby boy and the approval voting initiative, one of two competing election reform measures on Seattle's ballot.

Bowers said the couple will either name the kid Max or Avery. Pillert put the choice up for a vote on Twitter—"sadly it couldn't be an approval poll"—and they're currently leaning toward Max.

Twitter friends: we have ~3 weeks to go before Baby B ships and 4 potential names! @loganb and I need your vote or he might end up named Baby Boy Bowers until he can talk and choose his own. 😂 vote 👇
— Jerina Pillert (she/her) (@Jerinap) November 4, 2022

As for his other project, he thinks "it'll be an interesting one."

"We're in as good a place as we can be given that we were outspent by dark money 3 to 1 in the last closing month of the election," he said.

"Regardless the outcome," he added, "One thing is clear: having two voting reform groups fight in public is not good for voting reform. We have taken the L as vote reform enthusiasts. For the price that FairVote paid to fight with us, they could have passed voting reform in three Seattles or 20 towns in the state."

Though he's not planning to spend much time looking at election results tonight, Bowers may try to sneak an old-fashioned in the birth room. "No one will mind if I drink a cocktail while I watch," he said.

RANKED-CHOICE VOTING WOULD LIKE TO THANK RADIOLAB
2:40 PM

“This day feels incredible,” says Stephanie Houghton, managing director of FairVote Washington, the organization behind this year’s ranked-choice voting campaign. “It feels like we have a team taking us over the finish line.”

It’s a day that Houghton has spent years waiting for. Back in 2019, she says, she was working on a thirteen-way race that included one candidate who was running specifically to prevent her candidate from winning. “I just thought there’s got to be a way to run on ideas,” she said. “You can’t just run against a person.”

That’s when she heard an episode of the podcast Radiolab about ranked-choice voting. “I thought, 'That’s going to be really tough to implement,'” she said, “and then I found myself at FairVote Washington and saw people are working on this, and we’ve got a real shot.”

One of the most promising signs of the campaign came early on, when they held a conference call to announce their plans and sixty people showed up. “I’ve worked on campaigns for a decade, and getting sixty people to show up on a call at the last minute is no small feat,” she said. “That’s the moment I was like, 'Oh, wow this is something special.' I’ve been carrying that this whole time.”

The campaign will convene at Comet Tavern on Capitol Hill tonight to watch the results come in. Houghton’s been so focused on the race that it was only during a call this afternoon that she realized she has no idea what drink she’ll order. “Oh gosh, I have not thought about that, which is mortifying,” she said. “I probably won’t have anything until late tonight. But I will have a glass of something ... that’s as far as I’ve gotten.”

6:09 pm update: Houghton says she will be drinking "bubbly." 🍾

CHIPALO STREET FINALLY CHECKS HIS MAIL
2:35 PM Street apparently checks his snail mail as often as we do. Courtesy of Chipalo Street

Chipalo Street is of two minds today. “The analytics side of me is optimistic,” he said this afternoon. “The candidate in me is a ball of nerves.”

His campaign for an open State House seat in South Seattle's 37th Legislative District has been harrowing at times, he said, recalling an incident during his door-to-door canvassing involving a homeowner who didn’t believe he was a candidate for office and threatened to pull a gun. “No matter how many campaign flyers I showed her . . . she was still very hesitant” to talk, he said.

Other memorable interactions from the campaign included a conversation with a voter whose politics were very progressive except for one: she was staunchly anti-abortion. “Having that conversation was really interesting,” said Street, who listened to the woman describe how she’d lost her progressive friends over the issue and felt isolated. “I am one hundred percent pro-choice, but out of all the anti-abortion folks, I had the most empathy for her.”

He’ll be spending this afternoon trying to keep his nerves at bay with some busy-work: sorting the mail that’s piled up over the last three months. Then he’ll be heading to Taste of the Caribbean for a get-together around 7 pm, where his drink of choice will probably be a rum punch.

“I’m optimistic about how this race plays out,” he said, though he’s nervous about the rest of the country. “I have a bad feeling, like it’s a little like 2016.”

CATS, CHAMPAGNE, AND VIDEO GAMES
2:30 PM Vaddadi will be watching tonight's returns with her husband (not pictured) and her two cats. She named this cutie Spartan John 117 Master Chief Vaddadi, aka "the demon," after the main character in the Halo franchise. SELFIE

Pooja Vaddai WANTED to throw a big election party tonight with staff and others to watch the results come in, but then the COVID got her husband, James Barker, an attorney at the video game company Bungie.

To prevent the spread of a deadly respiratory virus, they're now planning to stay in with champagne, tacos, and a game of Destiny II on deck as they wait to find out if Vaddadi might upset Seattle Municipal Court Presiding Judge Adam Eisenberg in one of the two local judicial races on the ballot.

Barker said he felt as if the campaign had "put it all out on the field," and that they'll have a "very decent shot" at victory.

If she ends up winning, Vaddadi will celebrate with a bottle of champagne, video games, and a vow to plan her actual wedding. (She and Barker recently wed for his health insurance, and also "for other reasons, too" she said, laughing.) Her first order of business on the bench, though, will be to improve morale at the Court so it runs more efficiently and to renew the Court's commitment to restorative justice practices.

No matter what happens, Vaddadi hopes her candidacy will lead to more contested judicial races. "I don't like that more often than not these races are uncontested. It makes judges too comfortable ... makes them take their job for granted ... and [the job] stops being a civic duty and more like an entitlement," she said.

In the meantime, Vaddadi, who teaches law as an adjunct instructor at Seattle University when not working as a public defender, said she'll calm her election-night nerves in the classroom. This afternoon, she's teaching a class on persuasive legal writing.

LONG LINE AT LUMEN FIELD VOTE CENTER
2:27 PM

If you're looking to register to vote or fix a problem with your ballot, the elections department recommends trying one of the county's other voting centers.

Hey folks, we've heard the line at the Vote Center @LumenField is long. If you're unable to wait in that line and seek assistance at a Vote Center, we have five other Vote Centers where lines are currently shorter. https://t.co/HB5N6ecxTr
— King County Elections (@kcelections) November 8, 2022

KAUFFMAN'S FEELING CHIPPER
2:15 PM Hittin’ the streets.

Claudia Kauffman, the Stranger-endorsed Democrat running against a Republican in one of King County's only swing districts, is in a pretty chipper mood today. She spent the day meeting with volunteers and waving signs, and she plans to relax for a few hours before results start coming in.

“I’m optimistic,” she said. “I’ve been working so hard and knocked on thousands of doors and met with so many people.”

How did she keep her energy up? “It was really my dedication to public service that got me into this race,” she said. “And then winning the primary race was so invigorating. It really strengthened my resolve to move forward and continue.”

This evening, she’ll be gathering with friends at Duke’s Seafood in Kent and toasting her campaign volunteers. “This is truly an opportunity for the volunteers ... who’ve dedicated so many hours to the campaign,” she said. “That’s the intent of tonight, to thank all my supporters for an outstanding race.”

Her drink of choice? “I don’t know,” she said. “I think I’ll just have some iced tea for tonight.”

TURNOUT LOOKIN' LOWER THIS YEAR
2:00 PM

King County Elections (KCE) expects 72% of registered voters to cast a ballot in the election, which is down from the last few even-year elections. When Trump was on the ballot in 2020, the county saw 87% turnout. In 2018, we saw 76% turnout. Right now we're sitting at 43.4% turnout.

The department plans to drop 430,000 ballots tonight. Subsequent drops will hit at 4 pm every day this week. If it all plays out the way it has in the past, then Wednesday's drop will show little movement, Thursday's drop will reveal trends in the later ballots, and Friday's drop will reveal how big those trends are. King County's results typically shift bluer over time due to later ballots leaning progressive, and the rest of the state typically shifts redder over time.

The Stranger's Endorsements for the November 8, 2022, General Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 20 Oct 2022 01:28:00 -0700

Vote by November 8 at 8 pm. by Stranger Election Control Board

For once, we’d love to cover a chill midterm election where the future of American democracy didn’t depend on the whims of suburban voters in states gerrymandered by racist psychopaths, but unfortunately this is not one of those years.

At the federal level, we need to make sure Democrats hold both chambers of Congress, or else ogres will take over the Capitol, attempt to seize every womb in the country, and waste two years trying to impeach some man named Brandon.

Closer to home, Washington must reinforce its blue wall in Olympia so we can finally make some fucking progress on the housing crisis, the behavioral health crisis, and the climate crisis. We also need a strong bloc of progressives to prevent the concern trolls on both sides from rebooting the failed War on Drugs.

Meanwhile, King County will decide whether or not to expand democracy, save green spaces for all forever, and reduce crime through smart, data-driven strategies. Similar decisions need to be weighed here in Seattle, where tech bros (no offense) and progressives are duking it out over competing proposals to change the way the city votes in primaries, and where reformers face off against prosecutor-pilled judges.

That’s a lot of big decisions! Some of which are very difficult to make! And they all appear on this kinda weirdly designed ballot that switches between state and county and city offices a couple times in a way that some may find confusing!!!

But that’s why the Stranger Election Control Board is here. We spent the last two months grilling candidates through a cloud of wildfire smoke, reading bone-dry research on election systems, harassing lawyers, digging through records, gossiping, and endlessly debating amongst ourselves to produce a (legally binding) election guide that makes your voting life easier.

With our endorsements in hand, you can spend less time panic-flipping through the voter pamphlet and more time constructing a shrine to Julio Rodríguez. Priorities, people!! All we ask in return is that you vote The Stranger ticket and, if you have the budget, contribute to our efforts so that we have enough money to eat after transferring most of our paycheck from our boss to our landlord. All contributions go directly to our journalism.

Below, you’ll find all the arguments supporting our endorsements. If you’re short on time, jump straight to our Cheat Sheet.

Your ballot should arrive in your mailbox by Oct 21 or Oct 24 at the latest. If it doesn’t arrive, then call King County Elections at 206-296-VOTE (8683) and ask what’s up. If you’re not registered to vote, then register here. If you’re uncertain about your registration status, then check on VoteWA.

Once you get your ballot, fill it out using any pen color you like–we like black to match our bile. Then seal it, sign it, and drop it in your nearest drop box by November 8 at 8 pm. Want to slip it in the mail instead? Great idea! You don’t even need a stamp! But the elections department recommends you mail in the ballot on the Friday before election day (11/4) to make sure it gets postmarked on time.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Matt Baume, Will Casey, Jas Keimig, Hannah Krieg, Charles Mudede, a Negroni … Sbagliato … full of blood, and Rich Smith. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races or in races we forgot.

Advisory Vote 39
Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill 5974

Maintained

Again with this shit.

Every time you see an advisory vote on your ballot, we recommend you do two things. First, call your state representatives and tell them to pass the bill to abolish these useless, manipulative, conservative push polls THIS SESSION. Tell them you’re tired of wasting your taxpayer dollars just so state Republicans can clutter the ballot with MEANINGLESS–we repeat–MEANINGLESS non-binding results. That’s right. No matter how you vote on this measure, it doesn’t change anything.

The second thing you must do is curse Tim Eyman. He’s the grifter who devised this wasteful “advisory vote” scheme to make you feel bad about your democratically elected leaders passing taxes to solve large problems we can only solve through collective action. This particular “advisory vote” refers to one such large problem: namely, climate change. As part of the massive transportation package the Legislature passed last year, lawmakers increased the tax on aircraft fuel from $0.11 per gallon to $0.18 per gallon. The money goes into an account that the state uses to fund grants for the maintenance of public airports. That’s good! Vote maintained.

Advisory Vote 40
Engrossed Substitute House Bill 2076

Maintained

Boiling rage forced us to go long on that last one, so we’ll keep this one short.

Republicans want you to feel bad about lawmakers cutting a deal with the local Teamsters union and ride-hail companies (aka “transportation network companies”) such as Uber and Lyft. As we reported earlier this year, the drivers wanted higher wages and benefits. The ride-hail companies wanted the state to classify drivers as independent contractors so the companies could continue to skirt federal labor laws. This bill caved to the corporations in exchange for forcing them to pay higher benefits and wages for the drivers, which is what the local drivers wanted. Lyft and Uber backed this bill. The drivers backed this bill. The only reason you’re looking at this text is because it’s technically a premium imposed by the Legislature. Vote maintained.

Charter Amendment No. 1

Yes

Most “One Neat Trick” policy proposals don’t work, but this one does.

Approving this measure would move elections for 12 county offices from odd years to even years, including the executive, the assessor, the elections director, and all nine county council members.

According to a King County Council staff memo, this one move could increase voter turnout by as much as 30% on average in those races, which is fucking bonkers. Elections officials do so much to increase turnout by a bit here and bit more there, but, as it turns out, simply holding elections on years when everyone’s talking about elections can expand the electorate by a ton, amplifying the voices of young people, people of color, people with low incomes, and other “low-propensity” voters.

Expanding the electorate is good because it will encourage elected officials to listen to people they usually don’t need to listen to in order to win under the current rules. King County Council President Claudia Balducci, who’s part of the group leading the charge on this measure, admitted that she only realistically needs to appeal to seniors who own homes to win. “But if this gets passed, I’ll have to care a lot more about renters, people of color, and young people,” she said. “Caring more” about those groups means passing more legislation to support those groups, which could kick off a virtuous cycle of people in those groups caring more about politics.

None of the potential drawbacks of making this switch even come close to touching the benefits. The elections department says the move won’t cost any more money in terms of operations, so funding isn’t a problem. The ballot length will only increase by one or three boxes depending on where you live in the county, so “voting fatigue” shouldn’t be a problem. And, sure, The Stranger’s bottom line might take a hit with fewer campaign ads circulating around on odd years, but you’ll help with that. Right? Please help with that—it’s hard out there. Then vote yes.

Proposition No. 1

Approve

In practical terms, approving Prop 1 will refresh a property tax the county uses to buy up land to preserve urban green spaces, forests, rivers, trails, and farmlands forever. You like all that stuff, right? You didn’t move here or stay here on account of that good-old-fashioned Pacific Northwest hospitality, did you? We ask, but you’re reading The Stranger, so we know. <3

Anyhow, approving this measure will cost homeowners 6.25 cents per $1,000 of assessed value, which works out to a mere $22 more per year for owners of median priced homes. If you can afford a house in Seattle, then you can afford this. (If you can’t because you’re house-rich but cash-poor, then the County has you covered.)

In the past, the County tapped these funds to preserve parts of Tiger Mountain and Cougar Mountain, and to restore parts of the Green River, the Cedar River (where Seattle’s water comes from), and Bear Creek to improve salmon habitat.

Passing this levy now will help fully fund Executive Dow Constantine’s plan to preserve 65,000 acres of open space, which includes a $160 million pot to buy and build out green space in south King County, where there’s a massive shortage due to systemic racism.

The benefits of preserving this land in perpetuity are obvious and hard to overstate, but detractors do exist, and we talked to them, though we wished we hadn’t. In fact, the level of swaggering stupidity and casual bile spewed by the opposition to this measure serves as a perfect rejoinder to calls for more “intellectual diversity” on college campuses.

Michael Fisette, who runs a financial services firm in Issaquah, co-authored the “statement in opposition” to the levy in the voter guide. For starters, the first claim in his statement is false. King County does not, in fact, already “control/own 61.2% of the land.” That much land in the county is public, but King County only “controls/owns” 4.1% of it—cities, the state, and the federal government own the rest. The “land grab” this levy would allow would increase the county’s holdings by a few percentage points.

In the endorsement meeting, Fisette went on to compare city-dwellers to rats (“…when you put too many people close together they get violent, like rats,” he said in defense of sprawl), suggested that the levy essentially served only to advance a communist plot to buy all private land (we wish!!), called homeless people living in the woods “woodsies,” claimed that the county’s failure to pick up some trash near publicly owned land abutting his property proved that governments had no incentive to maintain land for all, and embarrassed himself on arcane matters of real estate investment.

These are the shallow, fitful arguments of a baby. An apparently rich baby. But a baby nonetheless. But even dumb rich babies deserve open space. Vote approved.

United States Senator
Patty Murray

Sen. Patty Murray has represented the great state of Washington for 30 years, and we want her in D.C. for another six.

After the U.S. Supreme Court decided to strip bodily autonomy from half of the population, abortion access became a top issue on the national stage. Murray has been hip to the cause all along, voting against abortion restrictions since the 1990s. But she hasn’t just been playing defense. Most recently, she voted for the Women's Health Protection Act of 2021 to protect health care providers who perform abortions.

Sure, she hasn’t found a way to codify Roe v. Wade, but at least she’s one vote in favor. That’s more than we can say for her Republican challenger, Tiffany Smiley, who would probably be heckling pregnant people outside a Planned Parenthood right now if she weren’t so tragically under-caffeinated.

Okay, we haven’t seen Smiley personally trying to guilt someone into a forced pregnancy, but she’s definitely anti-chioce. Though she claims she doesn’t support a nationwide abortion ban, she supported the Dobbs decision from a states rights perspective–a classic (and bullshit) argument for depriving people of basic health care. We bet she’d fall in line if the GOP wins back the chamber. After all, like every other Republican, she’s anti-trans, and anti-worker, and anti-environment. Murray’s on the right side of all those issues. Vote Murray.

United States Representative
Congressional District 1
Suzan DelBene

We don’t expect much from Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Microsoft), who leads the corporate wing of the Democratic caucus. No matter which party ends up controlling the chamber, she’ll likely find some success in blocking meaningful data privacy protections, extolling the virtues of Pokémon GO tech, nudging forward a bill to make a few pro-industry tweaks to Medicare, standing up for abortion rights, and maybe proposing some tax credits for affordable housing construction.

We’ll take that mixed bag over her competition, Vincent Cavaleri, a Trump-loving cop (yikes) and current Mill Creek City Council Member (double yikes), who refers to the FBI as “a corrupted arm of the justice department”—and not for cool reasons. When not apparently slathering his dome with vaseline, he’s on television describing immigrants as an "invading" force, and he’s on the internet describing Democrats as Marxists. If only! Vote DelBene.

United States Representative
Congressional District 7
Pramila Jayapal

Probably the easiest choice on the ballot. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal knows how to motivate progressives when Republicans hold the House, she knows how to play hardball with centrists when Democrats take charge, and she somehow manages do all that while dodging assholes with weapons at home and in the workplace.

Returning Jayapal to Congress means returning a politician who will continue to push the President to cancel more student debt, advance Medicare for All, work with Republicans where possible, and hopefully-maybe-please-lord replace one of the octogenarians (no offense) leading the Democrats deeper into the wilderness.

Though her opponent, Cliff Moon, has a sweet name, he’s also a Republican who repeatedly describes himself as a “normal American”—whatever that means. If elected, he wants to wage culture war against the PC police who defunded common sense and brainwashed our children, etc, etc, etc. See ya on Facebook, Cliff. Vote Jayapal.

United States Representative
Congressional District 8
Kim Schrier

Washington state will give two MAGA dorks an opportunity to help seize power in Congress. One of those dorks, Matt Larkin, hopes to do his part by toppling Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier here in this central WA seat. The two-term incumbent failed to crack 50% in the primary, and her redrawn voting district includes new rural territory that could sink her. That’s scary.

But Schrier knows all this, which is why she has spent a chunk of her $8 million war chest on TV ads that praise the police (yawn), that press Biden to suspend the gas tax (lol), and that pitch herself as a protector of abortion rights (yay). But she’s not just a TV ad. If elected, she vows to help create “sustainable forests,” and to make incremental progress on health care affordability.

All that inoffensive, purple-district nothingness sounds better than the conspiratorial nonsense Larkin spouts whenever he opens his mouth. Larkin, who works as an attorney for his family’s pipe manufacturing business (bootstraps, baby!), wouldn’t tell the Seattle Times whether Joe Biden beat Donald Trump. He plays cute with that question even around his fellow Republicans. He also supports a national abortion ban. WA Attorney General Bob Ferguson humiliated Larkin with a 13-point defeat in his statewide race back in 2020. Schrier likely won’t do that well with less territory, but let’s try, huh? Vote Schrier.

United States Representative
Congressional District 9
Adam Smith

On domestic issues, Democratic Rep. Adam Smith puts up a progressive front. Recently, he cosponsored bills to help shore up pay for airport workers, introduced a bill to open up federal funds for Behavioral Crisis Care Centers around the Puget Sound, and he supports Medicare for All and the Green New Deal.

That’s all well enough and good, but that’s not where he spends most of his time. He spends most of his time holding down the so-called liberal international order from his position as chair of the powerful House Armed Services Committee.

From that perch, he’s overseen the staggering increase of the Pentagon’s budget, which currently sits at $840 billion. Most of his work in that area involves negotiating with hawks, doves, and conservative Senators content to stomp on any deal that doesn’t include enough contracts for weapons manufacturers in their states, or else one that goes too easy on whomever they consider a terrorist this week. As we mentioned in our primary endorsement, Smith has weaseled his way around that aviary to the general satisfaction of the defense contractors who line his campaign’s pockets, even if he objects to buying death machines of dubious value more often then the next four or so Dems in line for his job.

While we still long for a lefty challenger who can pose a serious challenge to Smith, we’ll take him over prolific Republican loser Doug Basler. As a perennial GOP candidate, he is running the perennial GOP playbook. Immigrants bad. Democrats crime. Yada yada. Vote Smith.

Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs

Regular Stranger readers know of our longstanding beef with Steve Hobbs, a former state Senator who Governor Inslee appointed as Secretary of State (SOS) in a transparent political ploy to overcome Hobbs’s objections to key environmental legislation. Like Inslee, we also want Hobbs as far away from Senate committee chairs as possible. Luckily for voters, he boasts plenty of relevant experience for this job.

His work as a lieutenant colonel in the Washington State National Guard prepared him to run large operations, such as the August primary he just administered–apparently without much of a hitch. His education at the Department of Defense’s information school gave him skills to combat misinformation and disinformation, skills he’s already had to employ as the current SOS. And as a centrist power-player in Olympia, he knows where to find the money to fund the kinds of programs he wants to support, which include efforts to increase turnout in underserved communities.

His opponent, Pierce County Auditor Julie Anderson, is an experienced elections administrator who is running as a nonpartisan. We like her experience and we love her desire to set statewide standards for ranked-choice voting, but we don’t like her position on nonpartisanship.

If elected, she really wants to make the SOS a nonpartisan office, and she really wants to increase the number of nonpartisan county auditors. We think those are bad ideas.

Though making a race nonpartisan sounds like a good way to restore faith in elections, it only rewards the latest crop of anti-democratic Republicans. A 2007 study found that nonpartisan races benefit the minority party. Since Republicans represent a minority in Washington, making the SOS nonpartisan would likely help them win back this seat at some point. And when partisan cues don’t appear next to candidate names on the ballot, white supremacy can fill the information gap. Remember when WA State Supreme Court Justice Steven González was in danger of losing his race to an unqualified candidate just because of his last name? We do.

Rewarding Republicans by making it harder to identify them on ballots is a dangerous move, especially as they continue their attempts to overthrow our democracy. Vote Hobbs.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 1
Bill Ramos

Democratic Rep. Bill Ramos’s strong showing in the August primaries proved that thoughtful leadership on issues that matter to people, such as improving pedestrian safety along State Route 169 and trying to address congestion in growing towns, plays pretty well in the suburbs. Who could have guessed?

Ramos’s incremental approach to legislating probably wouldn’t turn any heads in Seattle, but he’s a reliable ‘yes’ vote on issues like funding our schools, improving our roads, and trying to help people financially recover from the pandemic. Meanwhile, all his anti-mask, Loren-Culp-loving opponent has to offer is some garden-variety Republican fare about resisting new taxes. Vote Ramos.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 2
Lisa Callan

Lisa Callan teaches the density-phobic, corporate drones on the Eastside how to stop worrying and love ideas like “affordable housing,” which should help get some desperately needed housing legislation passed next year. Those Eastsiders listen to her because she’s delivered for her district.

From her seat on the House’s capital budget committee, Callan leveraged her expertise to snag funding to renovate the Issaquah Food and Clothing Bank, upgrade the sewer system in Fall City in preparation for more population growth, and help a senior center that provides affordable housing in Snoqualmie.

Are those issues sexy? Not in the slightest. But no-nonsense, competent governance is in short supply, and she’s got buckets of it. Her opponent–a Dino Rossi wannabe who says he’s campaigning for “re-election” despite not holding the seat since 2016–does not. Let’s live in the present. Vote Callan.

Legislative District No. 11
Representative Position No. 1
David Hackney

Rep. David Hackney may have only just completed his first term in Olympia, but he’s already chalked up some meaningful accomplishments, especially on climate issues.

This year, he landed $37 million in the budget to help weatherize low-income homes. He also helped pass legislation to reduce harmful methane emission in landfills, and he sponsored a bill that prevents condos and homeowners associations from banning electric vehicle charging stations.

If you give him another term, he promises to decrease the energy burden for low-income communities by passing bills to help poor people buy heat pumps and to electrify diesel-glugging drayage trucks.

You’re not going to get such pro-planet legislation from his Republican challenger, Stephanie Peters, who copy/pasted the same “election-integrity” boilerplate that the MAGA people are running with this year. Vote Hackney.

Legislative District No. 11
Representative Position No. 2
Steve Bergquist

The SECB would love to have fewer landlords, corporate shills, lawyers, and outright demons in the State Legislature and more high school Social Studies teachers such as incumbent Rep. Steve Bergquist. Though we technically prefer gay English teachers, Social Studies teachers still get points with us, so long as they don’t call the Civil War the “War of Northern Aggression.”

Bergquist doesn’t forget about his students when he’s in Olympia. This last session, he won funding to restart the before/after school programs in Tukwila, and he helped tinker with the education funding formula to secure more funding for nurses, counselors, social workers, and psychologists.

If we keep him, he’ll expand eligibility for our College Bound Scholarship program to help students who didn’t get a 2.0 GPA find more opportunities to succeed. He’ll also work with the Lieutenant Governor’s Office to double the size of the Legislative Youth Advisory Council, which would give students more power to advise lawmakers, so that those oldheads at least have to feel a little bad when they vote on something that will make the future worse.

Besides, what’s his competition, Jeanette Burrage, gonna do if we pick her? Slap a six year-old autistic kid on a bus again? We’re all for restorative justice, but, sheesh. Vote Bergquist.

Legislative District No. 30
State Senator
Claire Wilson

We wish there were a higher bar to clear in 2022 than refusing to fearmonger about homeless people causing a crime wave, but we do not live in a good country. We live in a country where someone like Republican Federal Way City Council Member Linda Kochmar vilifies homeless people to try to score political points with wealthy homeowners in the suburbs.

In a good society, we’d recognize that people living unsheltered and struggling with substance use disorder need housing and harm-reducing medical care, not scorn or disdain. Incumbent state Sen. Claire Wilson is working on bringing us closer to that society by pushing for more money for crisis recovery centers, recruiting more skilled workers to treat people struggling with addiction, and repairing our tattered social safety net. This one’s not complicated. Vote Wilson.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 1
Jamila E. Taylor

Despite only having a single term in Olympia under her belt, Rep. Jamila Taylor has already earned quite the reputation among her fellow House members. Her colleagues selected her to chair the Legislative Black Caucus, where she’s helped the body’s most diverse group of legislators in history navigate a system built for the comfort of those with lots of money and/or time while also getting a ton of good shit done for her district.

In just two years, Taylor helped pass major renter protections that helped prevent a wave of evictions from hitting during the pandemic. If we send her back, she aims to build more housing and to un-fuck our tax code so that the people struggling to stay housed don’t get stuck with the bill. Meanwhile, her Republican opponent appears to be a walking personification of a cop union. Vote Taylor.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 2
Kristine Reeves

We entered our primary endorsement interview with Kristine Reeves, an equity consultant and a former State Rep, skeptical about her commitment to passing badly needed renters protections. But her time in the wilderness since she last represented this district appears to have changed her mind. She now says she's ready to back bills that would lift the statewide ban on rent control and cut down on rent-gouging, which makes sense given South King County’s housing affordability crisis.

To eventually end that crisis, Reeves wants to sanction cities that consistently fail to meet affordable housing targets, but she’s only “open to the concept” of legalizing more housing near mass transit stops. Her constituents should keep badgering her on this issue, but we’re confident she’ll be more receptive than her opponent, a career hack for the Washington State Republican Party. We’re also confident Reeves is the only one of the two who would prioritize banning scammy “crisis pregnancy” centers that try to mislead women seeking abortion care. Vote Reeves.

Legislative District No. 32
State Senator
Jesse Salomon

If you’re a progressive living in Shoreline who knows at least three of your neighbors, you should seriously consider running for this seat in 2026. Start hitting those farmers markets and summer festivals, because we need better talent in this office than the two people on this ballot. We’re backing the incumbent, Sen. Jesse Salomon, even though he mostly sucks, but only because his opponent struggled to give any specifics about her policy agenda.

Salomon’s main (and only) claim to fame in Olympia is protecting salmon habitats. He’s supposed to be working on an important police accountability bill, but he wants more buy-in from the powers-that-be among the unions, which means that bill won’t see the light of day unless someone else takes it up. Sadly, that someone else isn’t on this year’s ballot. Vote Salomon.

Legislative District No. 32
Representative Position No. 1
Cindy Ryu

Yes, six-term State House Rep. Cindy Ryu works as a commercial landlord in Shoreline, but she’s generally okay on some housing stuff, and honestly we love her style. She gives it to us straight. And what she’s been giving lately has been medium-good!

She carried the legislation that allowed King County to transform empty hotels into shelters and permanent supportive housing. She also sponsored legislation to cut down on catalytic converter theft by imposing new rules mostly on scrap metal buyers. That seems like the right approach, but we certainly don’t like everything in the law.

If we send her back to Olympia, she aims to find funding for the catalytic converter theft bill and to fight for legislation that would make it easier to finance more affordable housing. Though she opposes strict rent controls (we told you she’s a landlord), she’s open to anti-rent gouging legislation, which could help keep that affordable housing she wants to build affordable for a little longer.

She’s also 1,000 times better than her competition, Lori Theis, a Trump "election integrity party" clown who loves telling news outlets how divisive Democrats are for impeaching her own personal Jesus. In the voter’s pamphlet, she describes herself as a “trainer of homeless youth and their animals,” which sounds pretty divisive to me. Go fuck yourself, Lori. Vote Ryu.

Legislative District No. 32
Representative Position No. 2
Lauren Davis

Rep. Lauren Davis might be the fastest talker in the House Democratic caucus, but that’s only because she’s got so much shit to do and so little time in which to do it. In a state with an ongoing homelessness emergency and a behavioral health crisis, Davis has done yeoman’s work in gathering all the pieces we need to finally stand up a non-cop crisis response system, and Shoreline voters should send her back to Olympia to make sure none of her less-informed colleagues fuck up the implementation of those bills.

If she keeps her job, Davis will spend her next term figuring out a permanent “fix” to the state Supreme Court’s Blake decision, which decriminalized simple possession of drugs, without resuming the failed mass incarceration policies of the 1990s. She’s also got a long checklist of additional ways the state needs to support kids dealing with anxiety and depression. Those sound like worthy goals to us.

Her opponent doesn’t even have a functioning campaign website. Vote Davis.

Legislative District No. 33
State Senator
Karen Keiser

Twenty-six-year incumbent state Sen. Karen Keiser often presides over the chamber during votes in her capacity as President Pro Tempore, and she chairs the Senate labor committee. Those positions give her a lot of power. We’d love to see her use that power to push through truly transformational bills, such as a statewide universal health care system or the Worker Protection Act, but … she hasn’t.

That’s not to say she's NOT doing good work to make living with a human body more affordable. She is. This last session she lowered the cap for the cost of life-saving insulin on state-funded insurance plans from $100 to $35 a month, which will help three million Washingtonians. If re-elected, she said she’ll help get frontline service workers better wages. Sounds like a plan!

The only person who showed up to challenge Keiser is some random crank who is “appalled by the sexualization of our children and the disrespect of parental rights,” which is Republican-speak for opposing books for queer kids and accurate U.S. history lessons. Vote Keiser.

Legislative District No. 34
State Senator
Joe Nguyen

In case you haven’t noticed a clear pattern, we like Joe Nguyen. Like, a lot. In fact, one dork on the SECB once called him “an AOC of the Washington Senate.” But we’re still waiting for him to fully live up to that title by wearing the controversial “tax the rich” dress to some fundraising event with the city’s “Seattle is Dying” contingent.

Haha, jk. He doesn’t have to do any silly virtue-signaling for our endorsement. He’s gotta actually work to correct Washington’s upside-down tax structure. And the man has!

Down in Olympia, Nguyen helped to nudge the long-awaited Working Families Tax Credit over the finish line, and he pushed for the capital gains tax. If we send him back to Olympia, he’ll keep fighting for the little guy with tax reform, zoning reform, and criminal justice reform.

You’re not going to get any of that with his opponent. Republican challenger John Potter hates everything cool. In his short voter’s guide statement, he equated protests to tantrums, called gender affirmation surgies “genital mutilation,” referenced the War on Christmas, and asserted that the libs only care about Black people after they exit the womb. Needless to say, even if you’re not as smitten with Nguyen as the SECB is, he’s definitely better than that dumpster fire. Vote Nguyen.

Legislative District No. 34
Representative Position No. 1
Emily Alvarado

West Seattle has the good fortune of getting to choose between two tenacious, smart, and progressive candidates. Because the options are so good, that choice is incredibly difficult.

After one of the most heated SECB meetings of the summer, the board decided to endorse former Seattle Office of Housing Director Emily Alvarado. In the context of our ongoing housing crisis, we know Alvarado will bring her expertise to the fight alongside other SECB favs, such as Reps. Nicole Macri and Jessica Bateman. After all, you can thank Alvarado–at least in part–for the eviction moratorium during the pandemic.

Alvarado is great, but this wouldn’t be a fair assessment of the race if we didn’t mention that we also love Leah Griffin. Griffin is a librarian, but she’s a familiar face down in Olympia who is known for her fierce advocacy for survivors of sexual assault. Not only did she work with Rep. Tina Orwall to address the state’s rape kit backlog, she also pushed U.S. Sen. Patty Murray to introduce the Survivors’ Access to Supportive Care Act, which Congress incorporated into the new and improved Violence Against Women Act. And she did all that without using survivors as political pawns to further entrench us in a police state.

With another great candidate on the ticket, we endorse Alvarado with high expectations, especially when it comes to protecting renters, changing zoning laws, and increasing the state’s stock of affordable housing. If Alvarado switches up on us and smuggles in some former Durkan-staffer bullshit, we will eat our words. Literally, we will print out this endorsement and eat it.

So far, she’s given us no reason to doubt her commitment. Vote Alvarado.

Legislative District No. 34
Representative Position No. 2
Joe Fitzgibbon

As chair of the House’s environment committee, 12-year incumbent Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon was instrumental in pushing through the state’s massive cap-and-trade program, its plan to reduce the carbon intensity of transportation fuels, and its strategy for making buildings more energy efficient. All that work should help WA reach carbon neutrality by 2050.

If we give him another round in Olympia, he plans to keep his eye on the implementation of those big climate bills as he refocuses his energies on one of the other intractable problems facing our state: the housing crisis. He’s already helped move a slew of little bills to streamline the permitting process, but now he’s joining forces with a core group of lawmakers dedicated to addressing the supply shortage and to stabilizing rents. For starters, he wants to remove onerous parking regulations for housing construction, and we want him to do that, plus propose the “30 or 40 different housing solutions” he claims to have in the hopper.

After losing to Fitzgibbon by a mile in 2016, standard-issue Republican Andrew Pilloud is back with his vow to protect “unborn babies” and his fact-free approach to crime. Dumb, boring. Vote Fitzgibbon.

Legislative District No. 36
State Senator
Noel Frame

Rep. Noel Frame is the Legislature’s progressive revenue queen. As someone who just led a five-year-long, bipartisan effort to study ways to completely restructure our state’s regressive tax code, she knows more about the issue than anyone else. Those corporate drones in the Senate will need her leadership in this discussion if we’re to make this place even just a little fairer any time soon.

Meanwhile, her challenger, Kate Martin, who is running as a Democrat for reasons we do not understand, scoffs at the implication that our tax structure is messed up at all. That kind of thinking only makes sense if you believe that forcing poor people to pay a much larger share of their income on taxes than rich people isn’t messed up.

To make housing more affordable, Frame supports lifting the ban on rent control and changing zoning laws to promote density. Martin doesn’t support those policies because she thinks the answer to the housing crisis lies in everyone living in shared homes with a trailer in the backyard, like she does. We’re, uh, not sure if that scales.

Martin also all but laughed when we asked what the state could do to shore up abortion access, arguing that we’ve already done enough. She then repeated the Republican talking point about abortion as Black genocide in a just-asking-questions kind of way.

“The predominance of women having abortions, they’re Black, they’re in their thirties, they already have a couple of kids. Why is that happening? … Is this some kind of weird genocide?” she said, having clearly never satisfied her curiosity by reading a single article. She then asked her question again, but in a more insulting way. “People know where babies come from. These women getting abortions have already had a couple. So, it’s curious why all this is happening. We’ve got a lot of people ... a lot of men getting women pregnant,” she added, before proposing a policy to offer money to men to get vasectomies.

We’re all for men getting snipped, but Martin’s invocation of ignorant, harmful tropes in an attempt to hide her ignorance on abortion policy is inexcusable. We wouldn’t want these weird, racist, genocide theories floating around Olympia any more than they already are, especially when actual Democrats are trying to keep religious hospitals from limiting reproductive rights. Vote Frame.

Legislative District No. 36
Representative Position No. 1
Julia G. Reed

Equity consultant Julia Reed wants to tax the rich, protect abortion rights, lift the ban on rent control, decriminalize sex work and simple possession of all drugs, and finally secure universal health care in Washington.

That progressive platform somehow also won her an endorsement from the Seattle Times Editorial Board (STEB, lol), which made us a little nervous about our read on Reed. Was this a moment of true unity from Seattle’s dirtbag left and a Homeowners Association posing as an editorial board, or did Reed play us?

After some poking around, we learned she used some code to appeal to the STEB–she wanted to make business “part of the solution,” and she wished Dems didn’t beat up on the Catholic church so much. In a follow-up, she told us she still wanted to tax those businesses, and that she didn’t defend the child rape and homophobia, which was enough for most of us.

That’s more than we can say for her opponent, Jeff Manson. He works as an administrative law judge and served as the former chair of the 36th District Democrats. He agreed with most of the policy positions that made us like Reed, but he said he doesn’t want to eliminate single-family zoning. You know what single-family zoning is, right? The modern-day version of redlining that keeps us from adding the critical housing stock we need to solve the crisis that is putting Seattleites on the streets? Yeah, he’d rather have bungalows, we guess.

His loss! Vote Reed.

Legislative District No. 37
Representative Position No. 1
Sharon Tomiko Santos

As chair of the House Education Committee, Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos spends much her of time fighting the good fight against Republicans who confuse accurate instruction of American history with critical race theory, a branch of graduate-level scholarship that is, incidentally, correct in its view of racism—particularly anti-Black racism—playing a foundational role in our legal and cultural systems. To that end, in the last couple years she’s carried or helped advance bills to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion training among teachers and staff.

If elected to her 13th term in the House, she’ll continue that work while trying to pass legislation to address the teacher shortage. She also plans to check in on some task forces studying ways to better integrate inclusive learning practices that help special needs kids learn, and also implement standards-based systems that help all kids learn.

By no means do we love everything Santos has done in office. Her initial opposition to the sex ed bill fucking sucked. But she’s better than John Dickinson, who is unfit for office despite possessing impeccable style and a campaign website that a black-pilled, post-vaporwave Gen Z dork would die for. Vote Santos.

Legislative District No. 37
Representative Position No. 2
Chipalo Street

Chipalo Street, a tech manager at Microsoft, doesn’t just hold the right policy positions, he’s got life experience that should be helpful in keeping swing-district Dems from watering down those policies.

While we’d love to see another abolitionist replace former Rep. Kirsten Harris-Talley in this seat, Street bluntly framed his commitment to police oversight in his experience of getting beat by the cops in college after refusing to show them his ID. He’s also dealt with the difficulty of our current mess of zoning laws when trying to add density to a property he rents out, an experience we’re counting on him to relate when squishy moderates in his caucus start whining about the fates of craftsman-style homes to undermine bills geared at increasing housing density statewide.

We also admired King County Equity Now’s Emijah Smith, a longtime advocate for the community who showed zero hesitation for taxing the rich to pay for social services. Having to choose between these two when other districts feature such mediocrity kept us up at night, but we rested easier after realizing that Smith will provide a strong opponent in two years if Street backtracks on his commitment to working against his own class interest. Vote Street.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 1
Tana Senn

Unless you want some Trump dick-rider from the “election integrity party” to join the small but extremely annoying hyper-conservative faction in the State Legislature, we suggest you vote to keep Rep. Tana Senn around for another term. Need we say more?

Okay then, for the record, we will. Senn is all about gender pay equity, making child care more affordable, and preventing gun violence.

In our assessment, she’s experienced a few hiccups on that last priority. Senn said she used to think creating new felonies for gun possession would reduce gun violence. That take fails to acknowledge that such laws extend and deepen the injustice of mass incarceration by leading to the over-policing of Black men. But after someone called her out on that, she killed a bill that would perpetuate that problem. She said her future gun violence prevention policies slap people with misdemeanors with “learning components,” which is an improvement. She also said she wants more funding for programs that address the root causes of violence, which is often poverty.

We like a lawmaker who’s willing to adjust her views based on new research and community voice. Vote Senn.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 2
My-Linh T. Thai

We don’t mean to simp, but if every State lawmaker woke up tomorrow as a Rep. My-Linh Thai clone, Washington would have the funniest law-making body on the planet, and we’d probably end all poverty and suffering in a few years. Rep. Thai is that good.

Okay, okay enough flattery. Here’s what she’s done for us lately.

In her most recent term, Thai helped pass the Working Families Tax Credit, which her predecessors had been working on since the Obama administration. Not only did she tie up those loose ends, but she also worked proactively to expand abortion access by passing a bill that required student health plans that cover maternity care to also cover abortions. Last session, she championed the Affirm Washington Abortion Act, which aimed to incentivize qualified health care workers to offer abortion care and changed some exclusionary language to extend bodily autonomy to people of all genders.

If elected, Thai will fight for better, more complete health care access and mental health coverage, address behavioral health problems in school, and make this hellish state more affordable for renters. Vote Thai.

Legislative District No. 45
State Senator
Manka Dhingra

Manka Dhingra has no time for anyone’s bullshit. As chair of the Senate’s Law and Justice Committee, she refused to mince words about taking on the Supreme Court if those circle jerks tried to force Washington state to help prosecute pregnant people seeking abortions here.

In our endorsement interview, she also refused to take the latest iteration of bad-faith copaganda seriously. Though the cops suggest otherwise, she’s not convinced that people with criminal histories in Washington gathered at the annual Crime Conference or whatever and decided to start fleeing more often after she and her colleagues made our roads safer by restricting the police’s ability to engage in vehicular pursuits. She’s right to be skeptical. Cops often juke their stats to suit their political goals, and they also lie all the time. (So do politicians, but Dhingra hasn’t pulled any of that on us…yet.)

Given the chance to return to Olympia, Dhingra will continue leading the charge to build out the behavioral health care system we need to achieve real public safety across the state. She’s already passed sustainable funding for the state’s new 988 crisis hotline through the Legislature, and she is playing a key role in making sure that local governments don’t accidentally bungle the rollout. She also plans to use her experience as a King County prosecutor to lend some steel to her colleagues’ spines when the cop lobbyists try to roll back common sense police reforms or oppose new oversight measures.

Her opponent is barely even campaigning, having only cashed in two donations in the entire month of September. Honestly, we get it. This isn’t anywhere close to a contest. Vote Dhingra.

Legislative District No. 45
Representative Position No. 1
Roger Goodman

Voters should return Roger Goodman to Olympia so that his sonorous speaking voice may continue to resonate beneath the Capitol dome for at least another two years. The man’s velvet baritone, even in casual speech, soothes the soul in these trying times. It may even, by the sheer virtue of its gravitas, convince cop lobbyists to listen to reason, though we have our doubts.

As chair of the House Public Safety Committee, Goodman helped manage the dozen police accountability bills the Legislature passed in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, which was good! But he also managed the Democratic effort to roll back some of those accountability measures, which fucking sucked. Next year, he plans to revisit a bill to make it easier for cops to engage in deadly vehicular pursuits, which also fucking sucks. We sure hope he doesn’t put too much credence in that cop data, which they often manipulate!!!

But when he’s not trying to navigate his party’s soft-on-crime nonsense, he’s pretty good on criminal legal issues. “I want a more cost-effective, evidence-based justice system. I don’t like the whole retributive, vengeful, pound-of-flesh approach. I think we should be more compassionate, and restorative, and reduce our racial disparities,” he said during our interview.

To realize that vision, in the upcoming session he wants to pass a bill that makes law enforcement at agencies such as the gambling commission and the liquor and cannabis board subject to the same accountability standards as city cops. He listens to the science on drug possession and addiction, and he wants to majorly overhaul the state’s sentencing guidelines, which is way overdue.

His competition, Cherese Bourgoin, is a Republican and the president-elect of the Greater Kirkland Chamber of Commerce. She would essentially just be a pawn for big business, and Kirkland already has that in Rep. Larry Springer. Vote Goodman.

Legislative District No. 45
Representative Position No. 2
Larry Springer

It is with a heavy-heart that we once again endorse the truly milquetoast Rep. Larry Springer. Feels bad.

We have shamed the lawmaker so much that he nearly turned us down for an interview because we gave him “the most non-endorsement endorsement” he had ever seen two years ago.

In possibly the last interview he’ll do with us, he marketed himself as the “most bipartisan legislator in the state.” So basically, he plays for both teams: the team that doesn’t care if you live or die, and the Republicans, who only care if your fetus lives or dies.

In that bipartisan spirit, Springer’s bill to spend $125 million every two years to suppress wildfires garnered unanimous support from both sides of the aisle. But he’s also used his moderate approach to help kill a modest bill to allow developers to build more types of housing near transit, which avoided what he called “civil war” within the Dem caucus. Yikes.

He’s running against a no-name Republican. The dude still cares about that sex-ed bill from literally years ago. Get a fucking life.

At least Springer pretends to be a Democrat. Vote Springer.

Legislative District No. 46
State Senator
Javier Valdez

Rep. Javier Valdez impressed us with a strong commitment to racial justice and a willingness to embrace restorative justice revisions to some otherwise well-intentioned bills he championed, but otherwise we expect him to more or less toe the slightly-left-of-center Democratic party line in the State Legislature.

His competition, King County Deputy Prosecutor Matt Gross, talked a good game on housing, but his funding pitches were hazy, and he has less experience than Valdez. Vote Valdez.

Legislative District No. 46
Representative Position No. 2
Darya Farivar

Darya Farivar, the public policy director for Disability Rights Washington and the daughter of Iranian immigrants, impressed us with her willingness to push no-brainer Democratic policies into more progressive places, which is exactly the kind of energy the Legislature needs more of.

Northeast Seattle primary voters saw something in her, too. Against better-connected, more funding-savvy opponents, Farivar took the top spot in that contest. As we suspected, she now faces off against Lelach Rave, a well-funded candidate who held the most conservative policies on housing of the bunch. Rave fucked up her chance at our support when she asked for “more nuance” on inclusionary zoning reforms and used the phrase “mom and pop landlords” unironically. No thanks!

Think we’re being a bunch of puritanical lefties? The other candidates from the primary don’t want Rave, either. Literally every other candidate in the primary consolidated around Farivar, the clear progressive candidate. Join the club. Vote Farivar.

Legislative District No. 47
State Senator
Claudia Kauffman

Of all the alleged swing districts in King County, the 47th LD, which covers Kent and Covington, might be the toughest one for Dems to hold even after winning by promising margins in the primary against incompetent Republicans. That’s why we’re glad primary voters honored their contractual obligation to vote for SECB-endorsed Claudia Kauffman in August. Her history of representing this community as the first Native American woman in the state Senate back in 2006 should give her a leg up in November’s contest.

Kauffman promised to speak out against new highway construction and to lift the statewide ban on rent control, which would make her district a more affordable, less polluted place to live. She also has her finger on the pulse of the district’s public school parents, siding with their desire to have alternatives to police in schools so that kids don’t get sucked up into the school-to-prison pipeline after a scuffle on the playground.

Her opponent on the general election ballot presents the toughest challenge among GOP swing-district recruits, so keeping this seat blue won’t be easy. Republican Bill Boyce overcame North Carolina’s segregated school system to become the first Black man elected to the Kent City Council. However, that life experience hasn’t led him to value systemic change to ease the pathway to the middle class for the next generation of kids of color. He has fully embraced the cops’ political support, and he talks a lot of shit about WA Cares, a first-in-the-nation benefit that helps the elderly afford nursing homes and at-home caregivers.

Since the rest of their challengers went down in flames in the primary, look for the GOP to pour resources into this race to save face. To overcome that deluge of bullshit political ads, the district needs someone with a track record of getting shit done in Olympia. Vote Kauffman.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 1
Debra Jean Entenman

We rate Rep. Debra Entenman highly for sponsoring legislation to stand up the state’s Office of Independent Investigations, which should eventually reduce bias in investigations of police killings once it really gets going. We will rate her even more highly if she maintains her commitment to standing up an independent prosecutors office, which would further reduce the criminal legal system’s favoritism toward cops. Her support for a sex ed bill and gun safety legislation—both relatively tough votes her in district—give us confidence that she’ll push through the Blue Lives Matter crowd to get it through despite their inevitable histrionics.

We do not rate Entenman highly for her support of charter schools, which sap resources from public schools that need every dollar and every good teacher they can find.

Reviewers on Angi rate Entenman’s Republican opponent, Kyle Lyebyedyev, highly for his flooring work, though a few people alleged scheduling issues. We think far less of his platform, which amounts to Republican copypasta. Nor do we value his experience in government, which amounts to nothing. Stick to flooring, Lyebyedyev. Vote Entenman.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 2
Shukri Olow

To borrow a couple phrases from an email written by Republican House Minority Leader J.T. Wilcox, it’s been months since three “selfish candidates” from that “unserious party” split the conservative vote roughly evenly and allowed two Democrats–Shukri Olow and Auburn City Council Member Chris Stearns–to advance to the general election in what’s supposed to be a hotly-contested swing district, and we’re still cracking up over the clusterfuck.

We like Olow in the race because she took a hard stand against more climate-killing highway expansions, which is a bold position in a largely suburban district.

Olow impressed us with more than just her climate bonafides, though. She’s got plenty of professional experience working with city and county governments that will be crucial in crafting legislation to speed up affordable housing construction, fully fund our schools, and cut childcare costs. After all, it doesn’t matter how much money Olympia appropriates if local governments slow-roll the spending and implementation.

We believe Olow’s in-the-weeds knowledge of how those sporadically cooperative “partner” governments operate will serve the 47th’s historically marginalized people well and create a safer, more affordable community for all. Vote Olow.

Legislative District No. 48
State Senator
Patty Kuderer

Sen. Patty Kuderer continues to exceed our expectations for a Bellevue lawmaker who represents Medina. Before COVID hit, she beat landlord lobbyists in the trenches to pass modest reforms to our state’s backward-ass eviction regime. When COVID hit, she and her compatriots in the House acted to prevent a tsunami of evictions by giving low-income renters facing the boot access to an attorney.

Now we want to send her back to the state Senate to take the fight to the Association of Washington Cities (AWC), a lobbying group that represents the biggest roadblock to our housing shortage. In our interview, she said current talks pit AWC’s need for “flexibility” with our need for a fucking house to live in. She added that the Legislature has “a lot of work ahead of us,” but she’s set on establishing “a statewide floor” for housing density.

Besides working to solve the housing shortage, Kuderer also plans to carry the bill to ban assault weapons. She’s aware of the limits of a carceral approach to the issue and says she’s exploring other, more effective consequences for breaking that law, should it pass.

Her opponent, perennial-libertarian-turned-perennial Republican challenger Michelle Darnell, is yet again running to lose this seat. Darnell has long sought to burden poor people with a relatively heavier tax code, and she continues carrying that mantle to this day. As the planet melts, she stands firmly against light rail and “bike lanes and all that other stuff” proven to reduce emissions. Vote Kuderer.

Prosecuting Attorney
Leesa Manion

The person who voters pick for this seat will determine whether or not King County reboots the War on Drugs and perpetuates the failed policy of mass incarceration in the coming years, which makes this probably the most important race on the ballot. But the choice here isn’t hard.

Though Leesa Manion and her opponent, Jim Ferrell, are both basically cops, they’re two different breeds of cops.

Manion, who worked as the chief of staff to the current King County Prosecuting Attorney for 15 years, understands that 30 years of research shows that jail has no effect on recidivism, and that it can even make people more likely to commit crime. She’s spoken out in defense of data-driven diversion programs that Ferrell has attacked without evidence, and she’s earned the support of reformers such as King County Council Member Girmay Zahilay as a result.

By contrast, Ferrell, who’s the mayor of Federal Way, has his head stuck so far deep in the sand of 1990s era law-and-order politics that he couldn’t understand why forcing “criminals” into small cages with other criminals might not “hold people accountable” so much as it makes them better criminals who are more reliant on crime, since the current system makes it nearly impossible to find a job and housing upon release. Trying to explain that simple, well-documented concept to him during our endorsement meeting felt like trying to explain to Joe Manchin why continuing to burn coal will kill the planet. He’s simply so deeply embedded in the status quo that he can’t seem to grasp that the policies he’s pushing will lead to even worse overcrowding at our fucked-up jails and, in turn, even more crime.

We don’t want to elect someone who will create more crime. Instead, we want to elect someone who favors solutions that actually reduce crime, and who would be the first woman of color to have the job. Vote Manion.

Northeast Electoral District
Judge Position No. 6
Michael Finkle

Judge Michael Finkle deserves another four years on the bench, mostly because his opponent, former Issaquah City Council Member and Assistant Attorney General Joshua Schaer, didn’t give us enough of a reason to trade his ambition for Finkle’s experience.

Schaer, who also has years of experience as a fill-in judge, says the right stuff about wanting to act more quickly on reforms to our unjust criminal justice system. But when pressed about which reforms he wanted to move on, he mentioned a pledge to donate $10,000 of his personal salary to civil aid programs, and also an idea to screen clients for public defenders in criminal cases immediately. Not exactly big structural change. Finkle did a little better with his suggestion to mandate cultural competency training for all judges. They both want to expand therapeutic courts, and other nice stuff. All told, kind of a wash there.

But Finkle helped build the therapeutic courts that he and Schaer want to expand, and he trains attorneys and judges on them all the time, so we’re going with Finkle.

Finkle did have a red flag, though. In this year’s judicial survey, the lawyers who have tried cases in his courtroom rate their time in front of him in the low fours on a scale of 1 to 5. His worst mark (3.8) was in the “administrative” category, which accounts for promptness and control of the court. Finkle blamed his low marks on the time he takes to “make sure everyone getting sentenced or signing a deal knows what rights they’re giving away,” which is worth the wait. Vote Finkle.

Judge Position No. 3
Pooja Vaddadi

Pooja Vaddadi will be the exact kind of judge you’d want handling the case if a cop arrested your kid for shoplifting, or if someone stole something from your small business. She boasts years of criminal trial experience as a public defender in Snohomish, King, and Pierce County courtrooms. She also brings a comprehensive vision of public safety to the role, one that includes making sure the cops, the prosecutors, and the defense attorneys all do their jobs without corruption or bias.

Despite coming off as a generally nice guy during our endorsement interview (he volunteers with high school mock trial nerds!) Adam Eisenberg’s record as a Seattle Municipal Court (SMC) judge leaves a lot to be desired. More attorneys who practice in his court made the effort to rate him than any of his colleagues, and they gave him the lowest score on impartiality of any judge in that court. (In this context, impartiality measures whether a judge seems to favor the defense or the prosecutors more when it comes to stuff like admitting possibly sketchy evidence or addressing each side’s attorneys or witnesses.) We were ready to dismiss that critique as a bunch of whiny public defenders exercising a grievance against a judge who rubbed them the wrong way, but then those public defenders came with receipts.

Given Vaddadi’s years of experience watching people get fucked over by biased rulings from the bench, we believe that she’ll make both the prosecution and the defense earn every conviction or acquittal, fair and square. Just as importantly, her lack of hesitation in affirming that jail doesn’t reduce recidivism (as the research proves) gave us confidence that she’ll avoid reflexively siding with prosecutors when they ask to lock people up before trial.

Impartiality is especially important in a court like SMC, which is full of baby lawyers dealing with misdemeanor crimes, which carry a maximum punishment of less than a year in jail. Many of those cases hinge on discretionary decisions made by the judge about which evidence to admit, and we’d prefer an umpire with a bit more skepticism of our Republican City Attorney’s latest hardline approach. Vote Vaddadi.

Judge Position No. 7
Damon Shadid

This isn’t a close call. Judge Damon Shadid believes in using the legal system to secure services for people accused of committing low-level crimes instead of repeatedly locking them up for brief stints of pointless punishment, which, as we will keep screaming until everyone reads the data, does nothing to reduce recidivism.

Shadid stood by his principles as the only judge on the court to speak out against Republican City Attorney Ann Davison’s move to categorically bar people she classifies as “high utilizers” of the criminal justice system from accessing Community Court, which connects those people with supportive services instead of sending them to jail.

We think Shadid’s move showed courage, and we think Davison’s move there was dumb. Though some people on her naughty list really aren’t good fits for Shadid’s harm-reduction court, he was already screening out most of those people from the program anyway.

Considering the fact that a majority of the people on her list struggle with mental illness and are likely homeless, we’re backing the guy with a plan to create a new jail release toolkit to help those people get stably housed so they will actually stop committing low-level crimes instead of further complicating their recovery with minor jail sentences.

But wait, you might be thinking, why are you all framing this contest as a race between Ann Davison and Shadid, when his opponent is a totally different person?

Well, Nyjat Rose-Akins has worked at the City Attorney’s Office for the last several years, and she declined every opportunity we gave her in our endorsement meeting to distance herself from her latest boss, or to disagree with Davison’s policies. We specifically asked her whether she disagreed with any of Davison’s criticisms of Community Court, and she told us she did not. We further asked if she had literally any criticisms of her boss, or a single example of when the office had done something she disagreed with, and she told us that saying so would be “awkward” since she still works for Davison. That lack of independence doesn’t give us much confidence that Rose-Akins would be a fair and impartial administrator of justice from the bench. Vote Shadid.

City of Seattle
Proposition Nos. 1A and 1B

1. No
2. Proposition 1B

The wording on this two-part ballot question sounds technical and confusing, so let’s just start by stating its meaning plainly. Question 1 essentially asks whether you think Seattle should change the way it votes in primary elections at all. Question 2 refers to two different voting systems–approval voting (AV) and ranked-choice voting (RCV)–and asks which system you think we choose, regardless of whether you think we should change it up at all.

After much deliberation and many annoying manifestos sent via Slack, we recommend you vote No on the first question and Proposition 1B on the second question.

We know, we know. Voting ‘No’ on the first question aligns us with a bunch of odious conservatives who drop tens of thousands of dollars on local elections every year in an attempt to hoard their treasure. We know those same oligarchs dropped a bunch of money to back the ‘No’ campaign on this very measure, too. But they’re voting ‘No’ because they don’t want to learn new tricks. We’re voting ‘No’ because we want the best form of ranked-choice voting, and we want to make sure it sticks.

The short version of our argument goes like this: We love ranked-choice voting, and we vastly prefer it to approval voting, and so we really really really want you to choose Proposition 1B on the second question. That would send a clear message to state and local politicians that you want RCV.

But choosing this particular version of RCV in this particular way could create more hurdles to implementation than need be. We think taking a more *plugs nose* orderly approach to changing our electoral system could bring the best of all possible RCVs to Seattle with fewer headaches, and we think we could still do it on a timeline that more or less tracks with the 2027 deadline that this measure would impose. If that’s enough reasoning for you, then vote ‘No,’ and then vote ‘Proposition 1B,’ and then move on with your beautiful life.

If you want the longer version of our argument, then grab a machete and join us in the weeds.

First, let’s go over the basics. Approval voting allows people to vote for all the candidates they “approve” of in a given race. Do you like the Dem, the radical socialist, and the libertarian stoner? Then fill in all those bubbles, you freak. Conversely, ranked-choice voting allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference. You like the radical socialist but fear you might “spoil” the election and wind up with the libertarian? Then rank the socialist #1, the Dem #2, and write in Ralph Nader.

Both of these systems aim to solve the problem presented by our current system, which forces some people to vote “strategically” or else risk “wasting” a vote, leading to winners that large swaths of the population don’t like. For example, let’s say the top-two winners in a crowded city council race won 43% and 32% of the vote. That means 25% of the people in that district are effectively disenfranchised in the general election, in that they have to pick between two people they probably don’t like even a little bit. That sucks.

Both of the proposed systems get rid of that problem by allowing voters to express approval of multiple candidates or else rank their favs, which can lead to candidates that more people generally like. That said, both systems have major potential benefits and drawbacks worth considering.

Seattle Approves, the campaign that brought the approval voting option to Seattle, used hundreds of thousands of dollars from California tech bros (no offense) to pay signature-gatherers to put their pet system on the ballot. It’s difficult to prove the positive claims the campaign makes about AV outside of a few theoretical models because so few jurisdictions around the country have actually dared to try it. The fact that Fargo, North Dakota and St. Louis, Missouri are the only two cities that have done so is enough to make us pass.

Early-adopter skepticism aside, AV may also dilute the voting power of minority voters. In St. Louis, one analysis found that voters in majority white wards cast multiple votes more than voters in majority Black wards, effectively drowning out the “approval” of Black voters. Though a Black woman won that race in Missouri, we could see that same scenario playing out with different results in Seattle. We also see approval voting in the hands of Seattle’s primary voters as a recipe for getting not one but two centrist corporate simps through to the general election every cycle. Fuuuuuck that.

That leaves ranked-choice voting on the table. There are several different strains of RCV, but the particular strain on your ballot asks voters to rank candidates in order of preference. When it comes time to tally the votes, elections departments use software to eliminate candidates with the fewest number of first-choice votes and then redistribute each voter’s next choice up the chain until only two candidates remain. Those two candidates would then advance to a general election, where voters would choose either option.

There’s some evidence that the version of RCV on your ballot would make campaigns nicer, and also some evidence that it will encourage more people of color to run for office by fixing the “spoiler” problem. And though RCV sounds more complicated than just picking one candidate, survey data shows that high percentages of people from all ethnic and racial backgrounds claim to understand the system when they use it. All of that sounds nice.

However, there’s also evidence that campaigns might seem nicer under RCV, but then PACs spend more money going negative, so it might be kind of a wash. As for the diversity claim, one study shows a 9% increase in POC candidate participation but no increase in women candidates. And though one study shows that RCV cities increase turnout by nixing the primary and just holding a general election with RCV, another study points to a small turnout decline (3 to 5%) in RCV cities compared to non-RCV cities.

If we vote ‘Yes’ on this measure, then Seattle would not reap the benefits of increasing turnout (and saving money on election administration) by collapsing the primary and general election. That’s because Washington state law prevents cities from nixing their primaries. However, in this upcoming session, lawmakers in Olympia will likely consider legislation that would allow local governments to combine the primary and the general into one November election and use RCV if they’d like.

We’d like to wait until the state gives Seattle and other jurisdictions that green light. If we jump the gun, a whole bunch of unknowns present themselves. If the state doesn’t pass the bill, then we’d be stuck with a version of RCV that could cost the city millions in voter education efforts but not lead to higher turnout or the other benefits.

If the state does pass the bill, then the City would need to do something to combine the primary and the general elections, but lawyers gave us conflicting answers about what that something would be. It could be something as simple as the City Council passing an ordinance to make the change, or it could require another citywide initiative vote, which would mean more money and time–and what if the voters rejected it?

What if we took a beat to review a few of the different versions of RCV to figure out what works best for Seattle? Right now, Portland is considering changing its election system to multi-member districts with proportional RCV voting, which seems … intriguing. If we press state lawmakers to pass the local options bill, and then press Seattle and/or King County to take a year to study and recommend some options, then the City could feasibly set up a better RCV on a timeline similar to the one prescribed in this measure.

We know–we hate the task forces and the process, too. Especially when it comes to stuff like passing progressive taxation for social services or changing zoning laws to make way for housing. But changing a city’s entire election system seems worth it in this case.

After all, we only have to answer this question with these options right now because the approval voting campaign used its tech money to get the issue on the ballot, and in doing so they supplanted a growing movement advocating for RCV at the state and local levels, which prompted the Seattle City Council to put RCV on the ballot so that voters could have a choice.

Voters should choose RCV. But we’re not convinced we need this particular version using this particular process. Vote No. Then vote Proposition 1B.

City of Tukwila
Initiative Measure No. 1

Yes

The minimum wage should be $30 per hour, but, in lieu of that, raising the minimum wage in Tukwila to somewhere in the range of its next-door neighbors, SeaTac and Seattle, is a no-brainer.

Honestly, some of us thought the historic 2013 SeaTac initiative sorta swept in Tukwila as well, but unfortunately that is not true.

What is true is that many of the corporate chains at the Westfield Southcenter Mall—one of the area’s big employers—only pay the state minimum wage, which will hit $15.74 in January. At that same time, Seattle’s wage will rise to $18.69 (nice) and SeaTac’s wage will rise to $19.06. That disparity will leave workers in Tukwila—where most people rent, and where most people speak languages other than English at home—losing out on $3 per hour just because they work across the street. Nonsense.

The research is pretty clear. Raising the minimum wage helps lift people out of poverty without killing jobs, and it closes wage gaps. This particular measure exempts small businesses (those under 15 employees with less than $2 million in gross revenue), gives medium-sized businesses a phase-in period, and tells the big boys (500+ workers) to start paying up by the summer of 2023. The legislation also includes a clause that prevents businesses from cutting worker hours to avoid paying benefits. This should have happened years ago. Vote yes.

The Stranger's November 2022 General Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 20 Oct 2022 01:27:00 -0700

The Stranger's November 2022 General Election Cheat Sheet by Stranger Election Control Board

Want more information about these candidates and issues? Read our full endorsements here.

Primary Election Night 2022: Signs of a Red Wave or Nah?

Stranger Election Control Board — Tue, 02 Aug 2022 18:05:00 -0700

IT'S ELECTION NIGHT, BABY, AND WE'RE EVERYWHERE. by Stranger Election Control Board

📌

Happy midterm primary election night, Seattle and the Greater Seattle Area! (And an extra special hello to all of you who've been pushed out of the city due to disaster gentrification. See ya soon!)

By 8:15 this very evening, we will FINALLY see some election results that should clear up a few major mysteries that we members of the Stranger Election Control Board have been thinking about all election season long. Namely:

Will a bunch of progressive Seattle insiders graduate to the State Legislature, or will a bunch of progressive Seattle outsiders upset the bureaucrats?
Will the big bad red wave loom large over the state of Washington, or will it only lap the shores of the suburbs "with tremulous cadence slow," as the late great 19th-century English poet Matthew Arnold would have it?? (Please do not mock us for making use of our humanities degrees on the blog.)
Speaking of red waves: Which flavor of Republican will take on milquetoast moderate Rep. Kim Schrier in central Washington's 8th Congressional District?
Will the progressives and socialists challenging the establishment Democratic U.S. House Reps in western Washington prevail, or at least do a little better than last time?

As always, your faithful and immoderately stoned election correspondents have fanned out across town to bring you bite-by-bite coverage of the election night parties. Meanwhile, other members of the SECB will hop on the horn to provide live updates from parties around the state (Everett!), around the country, and even around the globe (State House hopeful Shukri Olow is in Turkey!!!).

KEEP YOUR EYES ON THIS FEED. LET'S ROLL.

WHAT RED WAVE?????
9:37 PM

The Democrats look fine statewide judging by nearly every indicator. Over the phone, Washington State Democratic Party Chair Tina Podlodowski said the expected red wave was "not even a red drip at this point.”

She’s right. Senator Patty Murray is way ahead of Republican challenger Tiffany Smiley.

Democratic incumbents are doing well in other Congressional races, too. None of the socialist challengers will advance, and the establishment Dems are way ahead.

Meanwhile, in the purple 8th Congressional District, where Republicans are spending a bunch of money looking for a win, Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier is leading the pack with 49% of the vote. Right now, it’s looking like Republican King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn or failed Trumpy Attorney General Candidate Matt Larkin will make it through, but they’re both hanging low with around 15% of the vote. This is maybe the scariest race for the Dems, but not a bad showing for Schrier.

In the State Legislature, Dems are looking fiiiiiiine as well. The party is leading in the swing districts it was worried about—the 26th (Bremerton/Gig Harbor), the 10th (the islands), 24th (Olympic Peninsula), the 30th (Federal Way), and the 47th (Covington). And up north in the 42nd LD, which covers Whatcom County, Dems miiight even be looking at pick-up opportunities. The results don't look THAT great for Dems there—none of their candidates pulled in more than half the votes, but time and attention in the area may repay efforts. “If this holds, we have the potential to pick up between one and four seats in the House, and at least one seat in the Senate,” said Podlodowski.

The general election tends to lean bluer, so if these trends do hold—and if Democrats keep knocking doors, hitting phone lines, and dumping gobs and gobs of money into Schrier’s race—Washington’s blue wall will stand tall. As for the rest of the country? Well, that’s another post.

RANDALL SLAYS ON PRIMARY NIGHT
9:32 PM Good news for Bremerton, Gig Harbor, and the rest of us.

Good news for the good people of Bremerton, Gig Harbor, and anywhere else in the 26th Legislative District who would like a Senator mature enough to be trusted with a district office. Incumbent Senator Emily Randall earned 16,541 votes (53.32%) which outpaced her Republican opponent Jesse Young’s comparatively meager 13,215 votes (42.6%).

In a text that the SECB managed to decipher despite having lost track of the number of excellent Ballard Beer Company pints we’d imbibed at Julia Reed’s victory party, Randall said the results proved her team’s hard work paid off. On a night when even Kansans realized that the GOP has fully gone round the bend on abortion rights, Randall credited her unequivocal stand for reproductive rights as a key to her healthy lead.

THE STRANGER’S SLATE IS DOING QUITE WELL
9:05 PM

Let’s take a quick little trip around Seattle:

Legislative District 34 (West Seattle)
Former Seattle Office of Housing director Emily Alvarado will very likely head into the primary with sexual assault survivor advocate Leah Griffin with a substantial lead. She’s currently ahead 52% to 32.5%.

Legislative District 36 (Ballard)
Julia Reed is looking like an incumbent with 53% of the current vote share. As she mentioned to the SECB this evening, it helps that she picked up endorsements from the SECB and the Seattle Times. Administrative attorney Jeff Manson is coming in second at the moment with 15% of the vote, likely because he made it absolutely clear to everyone he met that he does not want to eliminate single-family zoning to build more housing in Seattle.

Legislative District 37 (South End)
Stranger-endorsed technology sibling and landlord (we explain ourselves here) currently leads the race with 40% of the vote. Emijah Smith, a well-known advocate in the district, comes in second with 34%. Hard to say where votes for Seattle LGBTQ+ Commissioner Andrew Ashiofu and educator Nimco Bulale will end up, since they all leaned progressive.

Legislative District 46 (Northeast Seattle)
In this expensive-ass race, physician and mental health advocate Leach Rave, who called for more “nuance” on the question of legalizing apartments everywhere in her interview with the SECB, leads this crowded field of progressives with 30.6% of the vote. But Stranger-endorsed candidate Darya Farivar is right on her heels with 27% of the vote. Either Melissa Taylor or Nancy Connolly could surge at the end, but with the Stranger’s endorsement, our HUMBLE guess is that Farivar will make it through. If she does, she’s gonna need plenty of money.

STEVE HOBBS LEADS, NEEDS TO RETURN TO DENTIST IN FOUR MONTHS
9:00 PM Steve Hobbs, his wife Pam, and a nautical theme.

Last we saw Democratic Secretary of State Steve Hobbs he was laid up in a dentist chair getting ready for a tooth cleaning. After the election results dropped, we gave him a ring and asked him how it went. He reported “a little bit of soreness” in his gums and said his dentist scolded him and told him to come back in four months for another cleaning. “It doesn’t help when your dentist is someone you went to high school with, so she can unload her dissatisfaction on me and my carefree teeth pretty easily,” he said, laughing. NICE WORK, DENTIST! KEEP HIM HONEST.

Hobbs felt much better about leading a crowded field with 41% of the vote share. Hanging out with friends and family at Scuttlebutt Brewing in Everett, he said he took a swig of his IPA and celebrated a little.

“I was blown away,” he said over the phone. “But it doesn’t surprise me that people are picking the Secretary of State that has the experience of dealing with cyber security and misinformation and disinformation and focused on voter outreach and communication, because that’s what we need now.”

Second place is still anyone’s guess, but former Pierce County Auditor Julie Anderson currently holds a slim lead over Bob Hagglund, who enjoyed prime placement on the ballot, with 13% of the vote. Even if Anderson doesn’t get through, though, Republicans aren’t looking great in this race. Tallied up, the Democratic candidates for this race are sitting at 49% of the vote, and the Republicans have 45% of the vote. If the general election leans bluer, which it typically does, then the Democratic lead here should hold.

SCHRIER LEADS THE PACK, DUNN OOZES BEHIND
8:54 PM

Absolutely nobody is surprised to see Dr. Kim Schrier way ahead of the pack in the 8th Congressional District. She’s got 49.4% of the total vote, with the closest competitor, the loathsome Reagan Dunn, oozing far behind with 15.04%.

While we don’t want to count all our chickens just yet, we’re probably looking at an easy victory for Schrier in the general election, as Dunn is uniquely off-putting. In past elected positions, he had a reputation for missing a ton of votes, including on a bill he co-sponsored; he suggested he was practicing law when he wasn’t a lawyer; he voted no on a resolution to support abortion access; and his big solution for homelessness is to build more walls around parks. Even the Times wouldn’t endorse him. Down with Dunn! Here’s a tour of his tacky mansion.

Earlier in the night, the Schrier camp sent us a pic of the campaign staff hanging out and enjoying a pizza, and it must have tasted very good indeed when paired with these results.

SERIOUSLY, JUST THE CHILLEST OF VIBES AT THE CHIPALO CAMP
8:48 PM The look of pure unbridled joy.

The vibe at Chipalo Street & Co.’s party at Tutta Bella was relaxed and joyous as the results came in. We, in fact, were the first to inform Street of his victory, as Team Chipalo crowded around our computer for a look at the numbers. (We hurriedly closed all our Slack windows to hide our colleagues’ gossiping, lol.) Street nabbed 40.4% of the vote with Emijah Smith coming in second at 33.6%. Because the two other candidates—Nimco Bulale and Andew Ashiofu—didn’t even crack 15%, it’s looking like Street and Smith are going to duke it out in November. And the ever-cool Chipalo is visibly pretty stoked. “We couldn’t ask to be in a better place, that’s for sure,” he said as he looked at the results on his computer.

As for the road ahead, Street and his campaign manager Travis Jones said the key to beating Smith in the general is knocking on doors and canvassing. Street is confident that his experience in tech—especially in the age of post-Roe state surveillance —as well as his labor associations are what’s going to push him above Smith in November. For now, Street told us he has no plans to celebrate, just to get back to work. He’s a super lowkey guy, c’mon. After the ballot drop, more of Chipalo’s friends and volunteers filtered into the party, laughing and gossiping about how much money candidates raised in the 46th. To us, Chipalo admitted that despite the whole running for office thing, he actually doesn’t like being the center of attention. But, boy, he should he get used to it!

NOT THE BIRTHDAY PRESENT LEAH GRIFFIN WANTED
8:47 PM

Heading into the general election down 20 points is enough to kill anyone’s primary night vibe, but for Leah Griffin the disappointing results doubled as the world’s worst imaginable birthday present for a political candidate. When we spoke with her earlier this afternoon before the results came in, Griffin told the SECB she was proud of the grassroots campaign she ran and appreciated every single one of her 500 donors for believing in her ability to make a difference. She stood by those comments when the SECB reached her by text after results dropped, promising to continue advocating for regular people by telling their stories.

KAUR V. KAUFFMAN WILL BE A SQUEAKER
8:38 PM

The 47th Legislative District’s State Senate race is neck-and-neck: Satwinder Kaur has 4,519 votes (27.29%) and Claudia Kauffman has 4,633 (27.98%). It’s too close to make any predictions, so the only thing we can say with any confidence is that Claudia will be treating herself to a steak at the end of the night.

This result is likely disappointing to Kaur, who had a more robust campaign and more money. The SECB went with Kauffman over Kaur in part because Kauffman has a long track record of success dating back to 2006, and had a better command of the issues in our endorsement meeting.

Whichever manages to pull ahead will go up against Bill Boyce, the Republican who was endorsed by The Seattle Times (and one of the obstructionists who prevented a housing bill from passing last session). He’s currently got 7,380 votes (44.76%), which is less than Kaur and Kaffman’s combined total, but not much. A real nail-biter on the Dems’ side, though! Whoever wins will be replacing Senator Mona Das—very big shoes to fill.

STATE RESULTS HAVE DROPPED
8:31 PM

Find them here. Stand by for analysis…

OLOW TRAILS STEARNS IN THE 47TH
8:28 PM

It’s not looking good for Shukri Olow in the 47th Legislative District, who’s clocking in at 2,969 votes (17.96%) compared to incumbent Chris Stearns with 5,953 (36.01%).

“I’m grateful for everyone who took time to fill out their ballots and vote, and grateful for the people who supported me and offered their kindness,” Stearns says following the first ballot drop. “I’m feeling really grateful.”

Olow came into this race having never held an elected position, but quickly assembled a robust infrastructure for her campaign—one of the reasons we endorsed her. Stearns may benefit from some name recognition as an Auburn City Councilmember, but his positions aren’t as inspiring: He’s less eager than Olow to reduce freeway dependency, and Olow would come to the job with some particularly strong expertise regarding family services. He also raised less money than Olow.

Meanwhile, over on the Republican side, Barry Knowles managed to pull off a victory (so far) over Seattle Times-endorsed Carmen Goers. Barry is, of course, dreadful; his website opens with a message about how public schools are sending 13-year-olds to get “transgender therapy, abortions, birth control.” Barry’s leading the Republican pack with 17.89% of the vote, with Ted Cooke (also dreadful) pulling in 14.13% and Carmen trailing in third place with 13.88%. Nelson-laughing-dot-gif.

Barry Knowles is, let’s not mince words, a real weirdo, and his rambling misspelled manifestos and conspiracy theories will hopefully be a turnoff to most voters in the general election. But who knows!

“Most of the 47th Legislative District is in the 8th Congressional District, and that’s a national target,” says Stearns. “It’s going to be a battle. I know it’s going to be tough.”

AN UNDERDOG VICTORY FOR FARIVAR
8:24 PM

Darya Farivar arrived at her election party around 7:30 pm. She said hi to the SECB right away. She said she was trying not to think too much. She stood right next to us as we scrolled through the results, then mysteriously disappeared, probably to go happy-dance, because by the look of the initial drop, the underdog fucking did it.

Before the ballot drop, Farivar had told the SECB that she was worried about her smaller pot of money, but said she wouldn’t rule herself out because her campaign had already “shattered expectations.” Lelach Rave has raised more money than any House candidate in the state besides Republican Minority Leader J.T. Wilcox. Melissa Taylor has also brought in a shit load of money. Still, Farivar earned second place in the initial drop with about 27%, which is MUCH closer to first (Rave at 30%) than third (Taylor at 19%).

Some partygoers had called it, including Farivar’s mom, who said even before the results came in that her daughter’s campaign served as proof that a young woman with the right ideas and enough spunk can win without raising hundreds of thousands of dollars.

When Farivar took the mic, all she could say was “Thank you.” As soon as she wrapped up her brief initial remarks, her friends, supporters, and campaign manager ran up to hug her.

REED EARNS COMMANDING LEAD
8:23 PM She’s got a nearly 40-point lead.

After some brief but tense technical difficulties with a projector no one seemed to know how to operate, Reed’s crowd of supporters erupted in cheers upon learning she held a nearly 40-point lead heading into the general election. Reed thanked her supporters for tolerating her incessant (but successful) fundraising asks, along with her campaign interns and staff who helped her knock all those doors.

She gave each of her family members in attendance heartfelt thank-yous, shouting them all out by name as a crowd of several dozen strangers made them each the center of attention in turn. She wrapped up her remarks with a twinge of regret for choosing to hold the event at a brewery, since there were no shots on hand for her to share with her supporters or (presumably) the SECB.

Based on her dominating performance in the primary night ballot drop, no one at the Ballard Beer Company seemed to regret any of the lavish spending on the evening’s celebrations. Reed’s mom seemed particularly overjoyed, and told the SECB that watching her daughter come out victorious was the most proud she’s ever been, even ranking ahead of the time Reed brought her to meet President Obama in the White House.

RESULTS HAVE DROPPED FOR KING COUNTY
8:16 PM

Find them here. Stand by for analysis...

CHARACTERISTICALLY CHILL VIBES AT CHIPALO STREET’S PARTY IN COLUMBIA CITY
7:48 PM The pizza spread is generous and varied. We’re glad we skipped dinner for this!

Despite have to take TWO buses to get to Tutta Bella in Columbia City, we somehow arrived before a soul to 37th District Position 2 candidate Chipalo Street’s Election Day fête. We were nursing a German-style ale and making friends with the bartender (renter to renter), when the Microsoft tech manager and his crew finally rolled in around 7:20 pm. After inhaling the rest of our candied hazelnuts and ale, the SECB got a chance to talk to him. And to literally no one’s surprise, Street was unbelievably chill. Like, I’ve got this in the bag-type chill. As we questioned whether Street was more stoned than we were (he wasn’t) the candidate invited us to eat as much of the fluffy-yet-crispy pizza as we’d like.

Reflecting on the race, Street said he and his team spent the day responding to constituents and text-banking. Street felt confident that he’d put in the work, and now was simply the time to see the fruits of his labor. “I’m just cautiously optimistic,” he said in the most unbothered way possible. Street hedged when asked who he expected to round out the top two with him—he’d noticed that Nimco Bulale has a strong social media game, but had actually seen Emijah Smith’s people out canvassing. “Each candidate has their own strength,” he said, leaning up against the table and looking as calm as anyone we’ve ever seen running for office. The intimate gathering feasted on pizza and Caesar salad, laughing and gabbing with one another in a way that made the SECB feel like they were imposing on a friend group hang. Someone pondered aloud when results would come in. We’ll have whatever they’re having…

KANSAS REJECTS ABORTION AMENDMENT
7:38 PM

The AP is calling it and so are we: Kansas is keeping its state-level protections for abortion. We are happy for Kansas.

WHO DOES THAT?
7:30 PM

An update from the Kauffman camp: “It was great to sign-wave; however, a man in a vehicle threw a rock at one of my volunteers sign-waving for me! It hit her!”

SMALL YET FANCY WEDDING VIBES FOR DARYA FARIVAR
7:00 PM

Candidate for the 46th Legislative District Darya Farivar hosted her election night celebration at her parents’ beautiful Lake City home whose view of Lake Washington finally made the neighborhood’s name click. (“Oh, LAKE City! Huh!”) The only downside: Not a ton of transit or parking. Farivar was kind enough to suggest a parking spot and we were stupid enough to ignore her. We did not ignore her very sweet neighbors, who directed us to Farivar’s party when we looked very obviously lost. They said: “We hope she gets a lot of votes tonight.” Don’t tell that to the other neighbors with the Rave sign.

Despite all our misadventures we showed up 20 minutes early and enjoyed a mostly empty front yard venue that could have hosted a small yet fancy wedding. Farivar’s dad offered us iced tea (or a hit from the keg) and swore “the kids” would be there any minute. In the meantime, we settled in for a nice chat on the lawn furniture. Farivar’s dad is excited for her, but doesn’t know why anyone would want to be in politics. She’s worked so hard that she has a callus on her finger from door knocking.

The parking became a larger problem then the SECB initially anticipated. According to party gossip, the candidate got blocked in by another car! And the kids did not get there soon!

KANSAS ABORTION AMENDMENT LOSING SO FAR
6:40 PM

We love to see it.

LINE AT THE BOX
6:00 PM
On our (two-bus!!) route to Chipalo Street’s get-together in Columbia City, we noticed this line forming at the drop box near the Garfield Community Center. If you haven’t voted yet, there’s still time!!! Find a drop box by 8 pm. Here’s our cheat sheet to make it easier. SIGN-WAVING WITH CLAUDIA KAUFFMAN
5:40 PM

Claudia Kauffman took a break from twirling a sign on the side of the road to express her optimism for tonight. “I’m feeling great,” she says of her chances in Legislative District 47 against Satwinder Kaur.

Kauffman’s enjoyed the experience of campaigning and hearing about top-of-mind issues like the economy, housing affordability, and tax relief. Doorbelling’s been her favorite part of the last few months, she says. “You get people on their porch… it’s been really great and invigorating, inspiring. People place their trust and their vote and their dollars [in candidates].”

She’ll be waving signs at various locations for awhile longer, she says, and then plans to head home. While she has no particular plans for a cocktail (“I’ve been drinking a lot of water”) she does have a treat to look forward to after the first round of results drop around 8:15: “I don’t have that big of a menu item,” she says, “other than a big steak at the end of the day.”

SHUKRI OLOW HUNKERS DOWN WITH FAMILY
5:35 PM

Legislative District 47 candidate Shukri Olow is going into family-seclusion tonight, and not doing any interviews. But Olow’s field director Matthew Lang says spirits are high: “We are feeling really good about where we stand,” he says. “We raised almost $90,000. We knocked on over 6,000 doors. We’ve text-banked, we sent tens of thousands mailers, and are confident that we contacted every democratic voter in the district.”

Emerging from those points of contact, he says, is a clear message that voters are particularly concerned about the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson’s Women’s Health Organization ruling and attacks on reproductive care.

“Folks are really worried that Republicans are targeting this district,” he says, pointing to heavy Republican fundraising behind the GOP’s Carmen Goers. “A lot of the money coming in for the Republican side is oil and gas, the big corporate monstrosities that don’t speak for people but really speak for profit,” says Lang.

With Olow hunkered down with family, Lang says he’ll be texting her the results as they come in. He’s not entirely sure what the menu is for tonight, but “if I know Shukri there’s going to be an amazing Somali dish, probably cooked by her mother with a side of banana.”

DR. KIM SCHRIER RAGES AGAINST SCOTUS
5:35 PM

In Congressional District 8 (east of the city), Dr. Kim Schrier is feeling excited—not just for this election, but also “to move on to the general and see who my opponents are going to be.”

That’ll probably mean Reagan Dunn, a King County councilmember whose primary interest is shrinking services and “re-funding” the police; but there’s a chance it could be Jesse Jensen (a former Army guy who wants more military spending) or Matt Larkin, a “secure-the-border” Republican running such a tepid campaign we keep forgetting his name and having to look it up.

Throughout the campaign, Schrier’s been hearing from voters about economic issues like inflation and gas prices, “but the one where I’m really hearing a lot of passion and outrage is about choice, and what’s happening with the Supreme Court and the extreme policies Republicans are bringing.” Increasing funding for Planned Parenthood is a key element of her platform.

As results come in tonight, she’ll be hanging out with staff, and reliable sources inform us that there will be a plentiful supply of pizza. Her drink of choice: “If I’m involved, there’s always going to be caffeine,” Schrier says, “even though it’s 8:30 at night.”

THE SECRETARY OF STATE IS AT THE DENTIST
5:05 PM Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, keeping his dentist appointments on election night. Secretary of State Steve Hobbs is not stressing on election night. He's not anxious. He's not worried. He's taking care of himself. Earlier in the day, he was getting pumped at the gym. And right now, he's getting his teeth cleaned at the dentist. "I have to because the army requires it," said Hobbs, who serves as a lieutenant colonel in the Washington State National Guard when he's not overseeing the state's elections. Honestly, the SECB has never had more respect for this man in our entire lives. BRB, we gotta go burn a roach in the alley and wonder if maybe it's time to start turning our lives around.
SEN. MURRAY PARTIES WITH 99 OF HER CLOSEST FRIENDS
4:45 PM Patty's on the job. Senator Patty Murray didn’t invite us to her election party, because there is no party. She’s in DC doing her freaking job! The grind never stops! This afternoon, a spokesperson from Murray’s campaign told us she’s celebrating election night by voting on legislation to get veterans who have been exposed to toxins the care they need. Then she’s working to advance legislation to lower to cost of prescription drugs and healthcare. We were kinda hoping she would be doing shots and whacking a GOP-elephant piñata, but this is probably more meaningful, even though less cool. Her spokesperson did say she’s snacking on chocolate-covered potato chips (from Washington State, of course) to get her through the busy election night. A MAN WITH NO PARTY SAT (MOSTLY) ALONE ON ELECTION NIGHT
3:59 PM

The SECB refused to go to Chris Vance’s election night party, almost entirely because he isn’t having one (we also thought it would be boring, which turned out to be true). Instead, the independent candidate vying to replace avuncular climate arsonist Phil Fortunato as Senator for the 31st Legislative District sat at home alone and chatted with the SECB on the phone while waiting with his wife to find out whether he’ll advance to the general election.

While the SECB didn’t miss out on whatever constitutes election night snacks for an independent centrist (Miracle Whip on a Saltine cracker?) Vance did tell us that he kept up an election day tradition by taking his wife out for lunch at Puyallup’s Farm 12 restaurant. He said he put in a full day at his job working from home for King County, so the couple only had an hour to scarf some suburban salmon before Vance had to clock back in.

At this point, the edibles that made this entire experience tolerable for us began to really kick in and we may have dozed off while Vance rambled on with milquetoast predictions on who would win tonight’s battle in the “ongoing war between the left and the far-left.” But we did jerk awake long enough to process Vance’s projection of confidence about tonight’s results. He told us he knocked 3,000 doors in his rural district and raised enough cash to send a bunch of mailers, which made him feel “really good” about his chances of advancing.

NO DAY-DRINKING IN BREMERTON
3:30 PM Team Emily Randall meets to fend off the Legislature's biggest brat. The SECB refused to trek across the Sound to drop in on state Senator Emily Randall’s primary night pre-gaming for fear the edibles we just ate would kick in too early and cause us to miss the ferry home. But from the look of things in her stereotypically dingy campaign office, we’re glad we saved ourselves the trip.

The only food on hand in the campaign’s office was Randall’s favorite Kirkland Signature brand organic roasted seaweed snacks–an assault on anyone with edible-induced dry mouth. The drink options were just as sparse, with only buckets of coffee on tap to fuel the campaign’s last-minute phone calls, reminding the lazy fucks who haven’t returned their ballots yet to vote–which you can do until 8 pm!

When we asked how she was feeling ahead of the first batch of results in her race against Olympia’s biggest brat, Randall nearly burst with more earnest excitement than the increasingly stoned SECB could handle. She told us she started the day at the uncivilized hour of 6:30 am to wave signs with volunteers. Since then, the campaign has lured several volunteers into the office with promises of pizza in exchange for a marathon session of getting hung up on over and over again. Details were scarce on the ’za.

The SECB suggested that cracking a few local IPAs would help pass the longest couple of hours of the election cycle, but Randall stubbornly insisted on sobriety in the office until after results drop. Sorry, overworked volunteers. We tried.

The Stranger's August 2022 Primary Election Cheat Sheet

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 14 Jul 2022 01:16:00 -0700

The only sheet you need come August 2. by Stranger Election Control Board

Want more information about these candidates and issues? Read our full endorsements here.

The Stranger's Endorsements for the August 2, 2022, Primary Election

Stranger Election Control Board — Thu, 14 Jul 2022 01:15:00 -0700

The red wave stops here. by Stranger Election Control Board

If you think living in bright blue Washington keeps you safe from theocratic Republican fuckery, then congratulations! You really have successfully checked out of the news cycle and started prioritizing yourself and your needs after a long period of isolation. Love that for you.

But if you didn’t have to set down your “Abort the Court” protest sign to read this, then it’s time to check back in. We have some news.

If this year’s elections go the way election nerds think they could go, a red wave will crash over the Cascades and give the GOP one more seat in Congress, control of the Washington State House, and near parity in the state Senate.

Goodbye, expanded abortion access and more LGBTQ+ rights! Hello, police state, drug war, election deniers, anti-vaxxers, corporate tax cuts, loud prudes, recalcitrant trolls, and the general stampede of nightmares that our state’s Democratic majorities barely keep at bay.

But we do not have to bring back that much of the early aughts. We can have boot-cut jeans, bucket hats, and our civil liberties. All we have to do is pick the strongest candidates to advance through the upcoming August 2 primaries. If we do that, then we can actually slightly increase progressive majorities in Olympia and stop the Congressional bleeding ... a little. We'll at least be doing our part.

Luckily for you, the Stranger Election Control Board has already done 99.9% of that work. We’ve grilled all the serious candidates running for state and federal offices, dug into their records, endlessly debated amongst ourselves, and produced the list of the candidates who can halt this red wave and start to turn the tide in favor of justice, bodily autonomy, and lower fucking rents.

All we ask in return is that you vote precisely the way we tell you to, donate to an abortion fund, and, if you have any money left over, contribute to our efforts to save you enough time to vote and pound a khachapuri in a single afternoon. (Sure, it's a lot of cheese for lunch. But live a little!)

Below, you’ll find all our arguments in favor of each candidate. But if you’re in a hurry, consult our trusty Cheat Sheet.

If you are registered to vote in King County, then your ballot should be in the mail at this very moment! Look for it to arrive by Monday, July 18. If it doesn’t arrive, then call King County Elections at 206-296-VOTE (8683) to see what’s up. If you’re not registered to vote for some reason, then register here. If you’re uncertain, then check your status on VoteWA.

When the mail carrier drops the ballot in your mailbox, rip open the envelope, fill out the ballot with a pen, stuff it in its little envelope, and then mail it back ASAP — no need for a stamp. If you’d like to stretch your legs, then drop it in a nearby dropbox no later than 8 pm on August 2.

And if your friends are black-pilled on voting because blah blah blah, then pump their fucking stomachs. Tell them we’ve never had the democratic system they’ve already lost faith in – we’re still building it. Tell them voting isn’t the only way to fix society’s problems, but it is one VERY EASY way to help — thanks mostly to people VOTING for politicians who fight to expand ballot access. And tell them their silence only helps the status quo that they hold responsible for ruining everything in the first place. And if they’ve got a problem with any of that, tell them they can talk to us.

The Stranger Election Control Board is Matt Baume, Will Casey, Jas Keimig, Hannah Krieg, Charles Mudede, the tide pool that Jenny Durkan dropped her phone in, and Rich Smith. The SECB does not endorse in uncontested races, in races where only two candidates filed (those go straight to the general election! we’ll endorse in those races in October!!), or in races we forgot.

By reading our endorsements, you accept the SECB’s terms of service. SECB endorsements are legally binding.

United States Senator
Patty Murray

Long-time incumbent Democrat Sen. Patty Murray and her Republican challenger, Tiffany Smiley, have been engaging in some mom-on-mom crime. Smiley claims to be the “new mom in town,” an obvious jab at Murray for constantly calling herself a “mom in tennis shoes” to relate to the peasantry.

At least here in Seattle, we know that being a mom with a “couple of kiddos” is really powerful stuff. But we ask that you refrain from voting strictly based on your mommy issues. This race is not about who is more mommy – the mommy dommy, if you will – but rather which one of these candidates will protect your right not to become one.

Smiley is proudly anti-choice. After the Supreme Court pursued its forced-birth agenda, Smiley seemed glad that the states would get to decide how much they should deprive people with uteruses of essential health care. She also tried to paint Murray as some radical, pro-abortion extremist.

We wish Murray was the extremist that Republicans believe she is. The senator has been in office since the 1990s. Though she’s defended abortion at the highest levels the whole time, Democratic majorities never codified Roe.

Murray did help pass the American Rescue Plan, though, which, among other things, gave Americans the third stimulus check. That vote brought the total direct aid to a whopping $3,200, which, as we all know, has kept everyone afloat to this very day.

If we elect her, she’ll continue to defend the right to choose, even if a red wave overtakes the Senate. She’s a little dependent on this idea of “voting harder” to keep abortion rights, but she said if we elect her and a bunch of other Democrats, we can worry a little less about defending abortion from Republicans, and she’d have a better chance at getting her bill to expand access to childcare off the ground. Vote Murray.

United States Representative
Congressional District 1
Suzan DelBene

As chair of the conservative New Democrat Coalition, Rep. Suzan DelBene leads the party’s corporate drones down the path of mealy-mouth centrism and inefficient incrementalism. That bloc has yet to find a universal program it didn’t want to means-test to death, nor a civility norm it didn’t cling to.

For instance, the GOP already packed the Supreme Court, and DelBene is over here with this brave take on Court expansion: “You could expand the Court, but so could the Republicans if they’re in the White House….What happens if one side does and the other side does, too, how does that play out?” Good question! We said we’d call her after the Republicans take the Senate and do whatever the fuck they want anyway.

That said, it’s not like DelBene has done nothing good during her decade in office. Last session, she led the charge to cut child poverty by increasing and expanding the child tax credit in one of the COVID relief bills. In 2020, she pushed through a landslide preparedness bill that shoveled more money into early detection systems and better topographical maps. With another two years, she’ll work with the probable Republican majority to stop insurance companies from delaying care to seniors on Medicare and to expand a tax credit to help build more affordable housing.

Of course, as the Representative from Microsoft, we expect DelBene to continue fighting to slow down good anti-trust bills and to protect tech companies from civil lawsuits when they violate our rights. But she’s leaps and bounds better than all her challengers — insane Republicans to a man. The guy with the most money in the race is a culture war cop who writes pissy blog posts about the importance of upholding the gender binary. Vote DelBene.

United States Representative
Congressional District 7
Pramila Jayapal

As chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, it’s up to Seattle Rep. Pramila Jayapal to save the Democrats from themselves. Since she clearly has much more work to do, we need to send her back to DC to keep building the progressive caucus — which swelled to more than 100 members during her tenure — and to keep pushing power players to change.

We need her to keep pressing President Biden to enact his own agenda via executive order, so long as he refuses to play hardball with President Manchin. We also need her to keep pressing Biden to cancel student debt. And we need her to keep the ball rolling on Medicare for All, as she did when she convinced her colleagues to hold the first-ever hearing on the bill.

But we also need her to keep winning for Washingtonians and other people across the country. In the last few years, she got Biden to sign a bill that freed upwards of 60 million workers from contract language forcing them into arbitration to settle complaints of sexual assault and harassment in the workplace. Along with Sen. Patty Murray and Leah Griffin, who happens to be running for a State House seat in the 34th Legislative District this year, she also got Biden to sign legislation that increases access to sexual assault examiners.

Locally, she hounded Transportation Secretary Booty-Judge Judy Buttigieg to secure $11.2 million for the West Seattle Bridge, and she got $20 million for other transportation improvements in the infrastructure package. Not a bad haul alongside the $4 million in pork “community project funding” she brought back last year from the appropriations store. That money will help turn the Pacific Apartments into actual apartments for the homeless, fund restorative justice programs in south King County, and build a community center for the Coast Salish, among other things.

And unlike SOME members of the progressive caucus, Jayapal doesn’t just play a progressive on TV. She uses her clout and her fundraising skills to fund progressive races in open seats across the country, and she’s even boosting moderates on the ropes. A no-brainer: Vote Jayapal.

United States Representative
Congressional District 8
Kim Schrier

Those who aim to stop the red wave in Washington should start knocking doors for Rep. Kim Schrier.

She decisively snatched the central WA district from the clutches of commercial real estate robot Dino Rossi back in 2018, but the place still looks purple as ever. Her support slipped by a point in 2020, and all forecasting bodies rate this year’s race a tossup. With that much blood in the water, the contest for the 8th has drawn the most “serious” Republican challengers of all the other races.

Anti-choice Republican King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn leads the red team in terms of name recognition and nepotism; his mom used to represent the district in Congress. Jesse Jensen and Matt Larkin, a doof and a kook, respectively, are neck-and-neck in fundraising. Recently, Jensen spread false information on his YouTube page about the state’s capacity to “detain you or your family for anything regarding the Covid vaccine.” Larkin wouldn’t tell the Seattle Times whether he believed Joe Biden won the election.

Meanwhile, Schrier is a pro-choice pediatrician who bends over backwards to work across the aisle. She’s hosted “almost” 100 town halls to hear concerns from all over the district. Trump and Biden have signed measures she’s worked on – mostly moderate tweaks on health care issues.

To direct her pork-barrel spending requests, she said she convened an advisory board that included “Democrats, Republicans, business owners, environmentalists, and former mayors.” That bipartisan process returned $11 million to the district in the form of funding for water treatment facilities, repairs to a senior center in Enumclaw, and $700,000 for a treatment and mental health resource center in Auburn.

No matter who’s holding the gavel next year, Schrier wants to focus her energies on creating sustainable forests and making relatively small but important changes to our broken health care system. We might not love Schrier’s slow, bipartisan approach, but we like it a hell of a lot more than Republican goonery. Vote Schrier.

United States Representative
Congressional District 9
Adam Smith

Before you burn down our office building, hear us out. Yes, we are endorsing Adam Smith’s 14 millionth term in office. No, we are not happy about it.

In fact, after we finalized the initial vote, chaos reigned. One member of the SECB threatened to remove their name from the entire endorsement package. Another did something worse: he convened a follow-up meeting.

Though we ideologically aligned with Smith’s lefty challenger, teacher and union leader Stephanie Gallardo, she did not demonstrate a strong command of the policies that get us up in the morning, nor did she produce realistic plans for navigating Congressional gridlock. After more than a year on the campaign trail, we were looking for a little more than bromides about needing to build the movement.

And though it makes us cringe to say this, we think that cutting off the head of the powerful House Armed Services Committee at this particular moment would probably make American foreign policy more hawkish.

Assuming Rep. Rick Larsen continues his bid for leadership on the Transportation Committee, Connecticut Rep. Joe Courtney would probably take Smith’s place as the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee due to seniority. Courtney is known regionally as “Two-Sub Joe” for bringing home two submarines to the base in his district. Unlike Smith, Two-Sub Joe is not even nominally in the Congressional Progressive Caucus. And unlike Smith, Two-Sub Joe voted for the unconscionable $23.9 billion increase to the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, the defense spending authorization bill that “must pass” every year.

If 2022 looked to be the year progressives finally rose to power in Congress, giving them the ability to shake-up committees and move legislation, then encouraging you to vote Gallardo would be worth the risk of Two Sub Joe. But right now, we’re looking at an 87% chance of a red wave crashing into Congress, so we’d rather back an experienced negotiator to run interference in a powerful committee than a green dove starting up the ladder in some other committee.

So, vote Smith this year. But let’s make one thing clear: Adam Smith is a weasel.

In his capacity as chair of Armed Services, every year he leads negotiations on that defense package, and every year he finds some way to evade responsibility for the death and destruction it authorizes.

Though its price tag has risen by $30 billion during his tenure as chair, Smith only wants to take credit for the good stuff in the packages, including policies to reduce sexual assault in the military, to rechristen bases named for Confederate traitors, to create a paid family leave program for federal employees, and so forth.

This weaselly disposition finds its purest expression in his foreign policy philosophy. He draws a nonexistent distinction between “domination” and “deterrence” when it comes to increasing the size of our arsenal. He agrees that we use sanctions “way too much” but believes they’ll work on Russia, who continues to grind Ukraine to a pulp each day despite heavy sanctions. He supports strong policy to end U.S. complicity with the Saudi war on Yemen when that policy is doomed to fail, but he hems and haws when quick action could be decisive.

His weasel mode also extends to domestic policy. Though he’s a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, he’s also been a member of the conservative New Democrat Coalition. Sure, he sponsors the Green New Deal and Medicare for All, but he does nothing meaningful to move those bills.

Unlike his colleague, Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, he fails to use his influence to build a progressive majority in Congress that would actually pass those bills. Roe’s death? Don’t blame him — he’s only been in Congress the last 25 years. Right-wing extremists taking over elections? He’s got nothing but a penchant for tone policing.

Ultimately, Smith is a standard Democrat in “progressive” clothing, but he knows which levers to pull to get some good stuff out of that miserable chamber. Vote Smith.

Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs

We want Steve Hobbs to keep his job as Secretary of State because we want him as far away as humanly possible from the Senate Transportation Committee. His decision to hold up key climate legislation in that committee slowed the state’s attempts to hit emissions reduction targets, which hurt Mother Nature!!!

Luckily for the state’s election infrastructure, Hobbs actually has relevant experience to fill this role effectively. As a lieutenant colonel in the Washington State National Guard, he’s got experience running large operations and combating security threats. As someone who studied at the Department of Defense’s information school, he’s equipped with the skills to squash misinformation and disinformation circulated by GOP nutjobs and Russian trolls with cute usernames. And as an extremely centrist lawmaker, he knows how to move legislation through Olympia and who to call when it stops.

Though he’s only held the job for a little while, he’s already acted on some good ideas to improve turnout, including a text messaging program that contacts people with rejected ballots and a trusted-messenger program to increase voter outreach statewide. He says he’s also mostly defused a Republican conspiracy theory about Albert sensors, tools counties use to track election data.

The other candidates are far-right Republicans, but nonpartisan candidate Julie Anderson’s years of experience overseeing elections as Pierce County’s auditor showed through in her thorough answers to our questions. However, we part ways when she starts stumping for the biggest plank in her platform: creating more nonpartisan races for election offices.*

Though her emphasis on creating more “nonpartisan” races sounds like a smart way to reduce tribalism, it’s not. A 2007 study found nonpartisan races benefit the minority party. Since Republicans represent a minority in WA, switching couple one statewide race to “nonpartisan” and working to increase nonpartisan prevalence down-ballot the number of nonpartisan county auditors, as Anderson says she wants to do, would effectively help the GOP.

And when people don’t see a D or an R next to a candidate’s name, white supremacy fills the information gap. Just ask WA State Supreme Court Justice Steven González. In 2012, 43% of voters in his ~nonpartisan~ race chose a totally unqualified opponent just because he had a white-sounding name.

You know what else helps the GOP? Testifying against a bill to add ballot drop boxes to college campuses, which Anderson did back in 2013. Suddenly, Anderson doesn’t seem so “nonpartisan” to us. Vote Hobbs.

* This endorsement originally misstated Anderson's view on increasing the number of statewide nonpartisan races. She only wants to make the Secretary of State nonpartisan. We regret the error.

Legislative District No. 5
Representative Position No. 1
Bill Ramos

Many expect this year to hurt for down-ballot Dems, but Rep. Bill Ramos plans to overcome with the strategy that landed him in this east King County seat during 2018’s blue wave: knocking as many doors as possible.

Ramos could probably win support at the doors simply by standing there and projecting the Boy-Scout-Troop-Leader energy that beams out of him, but he won’t. He’ll point to his support for some suburban-friendly transportation measures, including pushing for funding to expand Highway 18 (yuck) and pushing for pedestrian safety improvements on Maple Valley’s Highway 169 (nice).

He may not be a dyed-in-the-wool Seattle progressive, but this one’s not complicated–especially because he’s running against a Loren Culp stan, a Dino Rossi acolyte, and a guy who besmirches the good name of elves by identifying as a member of “The Elven Way Party” and calling for us to “coagulate into well regulated communities of fervent character growth.” No thanks! Vote Ramos.

Legislative District No. 30
State Senator
Claire Wilson

While she portrays herself as a common sense-oriented consensus-builder, Claire Wilson isn’t afraid to draw a line in the sand against the increasingly deranged assaults on basic human decency coming from today’s Republican party. She absolutely refuses to tolerate any attempts to roll back abortion rights or villainize the LGBTQ+ community, which seems like a low bar to clear, but this is the world we live in.

Wilson understands that one reasonable reaction to a housing crisis is to repair the social safety net to meet people’s basic needs, not throw them away because visible poverty makes homeowners uncomfortable. To that end, she wants to double down on investing in crisis recovery centers. She also wants to prioritize funding for a public health approach to people with substance use disorders instead of returning to the failed policies of the War on Drugs. Plus, if you check out her personal Facebook page, she documents her door-belling trips across her district with idyllic pictures of yonic rocks and landscaping, which is pretty cool.

And all of that is certainly more than we can say for her opponents. One of them wants to turn people without housing into scapegoats for Federal Way’s perceived increase in crime, and the other blames the teachers in Uvalde for failing to secure their school. We’ll take a Senator with some basic human decency any day of the week–and twice on Election Day. Vote Wilson.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 1
Jamila E. Taylor

House Rep. Jamila Taylor has only worked in the Legislature for two years, but she’s quickly risen up the ranks.

Last year, her colleagues elected her chair of the Legislative Black Caucus, where she helped organize legislative victories while also steering her colleagues through the Legislature’s “toxic” work environment, to borrow a phrase from former Rep. Kirsten Harris-Talley, who declined to run for reelection this year due to the bullshit she faced from a system built for people with gobs of time and/or money.

In light of all that, Taylor aims to leverage her burgeoning clout to pass progressive taxes that balance our tax code on the backs of the wealthy rather than the poor, restore the safety net she says the pandemic “set on fire,” and build more housing to give people in marginalized communities a foothold in the market.

We trust her to deliver on some of that stuff because she’s already made a habit of keeping her promises. In 2020, she promised to protect renters in the Legislature, and in 2021 she supported bills to extend just-cause protections statewide and to provide rental assistance and mediation programs to hold off an eviction tsunami. She also spearheaded a couple common-sense bills to improve the lives of people with developmental disabilities.

A handful of doofuses have challenged her, including a Republican veteran who implies that he’s afraid to go shopping “after dark,” a cop who apparently wants to contribute to the woeful shortage by spending his winters in Olympia, and someone who has raised zero dollars. Big yawns all around. Vote Taylor.

Legislative District No. 30
Representative Position No. 2
Kristine Reeves

Kristine Reeves should return to her post in the State House as a representative of Federal Way because she boasts the most experience in this race, and because her views on tenant protections have finally come into alignment with her district’s views–or so it appears.

Though Reeves couldn’t be bothered to back modest eviction protections during her 2.5 terms in the House, she’s since changed her tune. She now supports bills that would lift the statewide ban on rent control and cut down on rent-gouging, which makes sense given Federal Way’s overwhelming support for renter protections.

As for increasing housing supply and therefore housing affordability: She wants to sanction cities that consistently fail to meet affordable housing targets, but she’s only “open to the concept” of legalizing more housing within 1/2 mile of rapid transit. Not exactly the line we were looking for, but not a flat-out denial.

First AME Church Pastor Carey Anderson, on the other hand, supported legalizing apartments everywhere statewide, and he convinced us that he’d stand up for the district’s working poor. However, he struggled to think of concrete policies that would actually expand and protect abortion rights. Reeves quickly ticked off a handful. She wants to close scammy “crisis pregnancy” clinics across the state and push for guaranteed universal Plan B access. We want that, too. Vote Reeves.

Legislative District No. 32
State Senator
Jesse Salomon

Shoreline progressives, set your calendar reminders for January 2026. Do it now, we’ll wait.

Back? Great. You’ve got four years to find a better butt to fill your Senate seat than Jesse Salomon. Hell, if you’re a candidate from a neighboring district who sees an opportunity here, send the SECB an email and at least one of us will help you move. Jesse Salomon sucks, and he’s only getting the nod because his opponent came across as wholly unprepared for the job during our endorsement interview.

Aside from protecting salmon habitats, Salomon doesn’t have much to point to as proof of his effectiveness in Olympia. He sponsored a pretty good psychedelic mushroom legalization bill that got turned into a task force. He also sponsored a decent bill that would set some statewide standards for how police departments investigate serious misconduct. HOWEVER. He didn’t do the work to calm the nerves of uneasy organized labor groups who perceived that bill as a threat to collective bargaining, so it died in committee. If he gets that thing passed, we’ll repent. But we’re skeptical. After all, he’s the only former public defender we’ve ever heard begin a sentence with the phrase “When I talk to police officers…” and not end it with a profanity-laced tirade. Vote Salomon, but only because the SECB doesn’t believe in leaving any race on your ballot blank.

Legislative District No. 34
State Senator
Joe Nguyen

The State Legislature should be overjoyed that Joe Nguyen lost to Silver Fox Dow Constantine in the race for King County Executive. After all, he’s proven himself to be a pretty progressive lawmaker, and he’s one of the few elected officials at the Capitol who knows how computers work, which was clutch during the remote sessions.

In office, Nguyen passed a bill to make the state’s welfare program slightly more generous when unemployment is bad, signed onto the Working Families Tax Credit, and helped push the capital gains tax. If reelected, he hopes to pick up where he left off. Name any progressive cause–eliminating single-family zoning, moving to even-year elections, decriminalizing simple possession of all drugs–and he’s supported the bill to do it!

Those of you who question his commitment to the district after his unsuccessful run for King County Executive should know his competition is pretty weak. Freshy's Cafe owner Amber Bennett put her name in the hat for the position as a fiscally conservative, socially liberal independent. When we spoke with her, she didn’t take a clear stance on almost any question, and said she needed to do more research. The competition only gets worse from there. No offense, Goodspaceguy. Vote Nguyen.

Legislative District No. 34
Representative Position No. 1
Emily Alvarado

The endorsement meeting for this West Seattle seat got pretty heated. No two candidates approached the SECB meeting with as much intensity and expertise as former Seattle Office of Housing Director Emily Alvarado and librarian and advocate Leah Griffin. Not much separates the two candidates on the issues, but they occupy different niches.

Griffin is a longtime advocate for survivors of sexual violence. She helped Rep. Tina Orwall address the state’s rape kit backlog, and she inspired Sen. Patty Murray to introduce the Survivors’ Access to Supportive Care Act. Parts of that bill got slipped into the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, which President Biden signed in March.

She brings a unique, near-abolition approach to combatting sexual violence, which would serve as a strong counter to Republicans constantly using rape victims as a pawn in their never-ending quest to put more people in jail.

Alvarado demonstrates a keen focus on housing, and though at times she slipped into bureaucratic nothingspeak to describe her policy ideas, she impressively got down to brass tacks real quick when pressed.

Sure, she worked for Durkan, but she played an active role in pushing Seattle and the state to ban evictions during the pandemic. The SECB has previously demanded that Washington voters transform one-third of the Legislature into Rep. Nicole Macri clones, and Alvarado has the potential to be another Macri.

While Griffin said she would champion the same housing policies Alvarado proposed, Alvarado said she would champion the same survivor policies Griffin proposed. Washington’s housing crisis pushed us over the edge. Vote Alvarado.

Legislative District No. 36
Representative Position No. 1
Julia G. Reed

The Ballard-area Democrats could not get their shit together before the filing deadline, and so the SECB had to choose between four Pod Save America types with nearly identical policy positions–and also Waylon Robert, a gay union booster with an unplaceable drawl and the vibe of a guy who is one personal tragedy away from packing up his bindle and hopping on the next freight train to god knows where for god knows how long, but, man, sometimes, when that railroad calls you answer.

Robert loves the cops and cop unions, so we passed. (But god bless and keep rollin’, brother.) Jeff Manson and Tyler Crone opposed eliminating single-family zoning statewide, so we eliminated them from consideration. (Crone: We mustn't “disrupt the fabric of our neighborhoods.” Yuck.)

Of the remaining candidates, Julia G. Reed, an equity consultant who worked in Durkan’s policy shop (before the war), won out.

Like Nicole Gomez, a Universal Health Care Commissioner who’s lobbied on good health care bills in Olympia, Reed wants to tax the rich, lift the ban on rent control, pass anti-rent-gouging legislation, decriminalize simple possession of all drugs, decriminalize sex work, protect abortion access, and set up a universal health care system yesterday. But Reed sold her support of those policies with more gusto, and we think that skill will (hopefully) help her garner more sponsors in the House.

Unlike Gomez, however, Reed apparently sold herself to the Seattle Times Editorial Board as a legislator who would make “business a part of the solution,” and who wished the Democratic party didn’t beat up on the Catholic church so much, according to her opponents. In a follow-up interview, she assured the SECB that she wanted to include businesses in the solution but also tax them. She added that her defense of the Church did not extend to all the child rape and anti-abortion stuff. That explanation was enough for most of us.

At the end of the day, we need more people in the Legislature like Reed, who is not afraid to draw attention to her own burp at an endorsement meeting. Vote Reed.

Legislative District No. 37
Representative Position No. 2
Chipalo Street

Chipalo Street is a Microsoft tech manager and landlord who drew an endorsement from former seat-warmer Rep. Eric Pettigrew. So, uh, yeah, no one is more surprised about this pick than we are. But during our endorsement meeting, Street wouldn’t stop giving us the best answers to our questions.

Though he’s a landlord, he supports lifting the statewide ban on rent control and passing anti-rent-gouging legislation. One of his properties drew a complaint from the City of Bonney Lake, but when we looked into the issue we ended up blaming the City for its lazy code enforcement. (The City stopped by 1.5 months after Street bought a trashed place and cited him for the previous owner’s shit.) Moreover, the legal fallout from that complaint only revealed to Street the difficulties of adding units to a home, which reaffirmed his stance on increasing density statewide and thus our faith in him.

Though he’s now a tech manager, he says he’s also been a union member who once participated in a work stoppage.

And though he’s not an abolitionist like former Rep. Kirsten Harris-Talley, who held this seat last year, he grounds his support for more police accountability in his experience of getting beaten by the cops in college for not showing them his ID.

The other candidates have lived and learned experience that would serve the Legislature well, too. Andrew Ashiofu is an HIV+ Nigerian immigrant who has experienced homelessness and who now serves as chair of Seattle’s LGBTQ Commission when he’s not working as a flight attendant. Then there’s instructor and consultant Nimco Bulale. She said her mother and eight siblings came to Seattle as refugees and experienced the housing affordability crisis firsthand as disaster gentrification pushed them out of the city to Burien. We also admired King County Equity Now’s Emijah Smith, a longtime advocate for the community who wants to tax the rich.

The fact that we have four good candidates running in this district but have to settle for the Larry Springers of the world elsewhere (see below) makes us feel bad on the inside, but Street edges out the others. Adding another House Democrat who knows how computers work will help that creaky institution function more efficiently. We also expect his experience to add to non-tech policy conversations in meaningful ways. During our discussion, for example, he proposed passing legislation to secure data privacy for users of period-tracking apps.

Vote Street, but if he slips up and starts working in his own class interest, then any of his competitors would be worthy of knocking him out in a couple years.

Legislative District No. 41
Representative Position No. 2
My-Linh T. Thai

You wouldn’t expect a Bellevuer representing Mercer Island to be a lefty, but Rep. My-Linh Thai has given the 41st Legislative District a good name for the past four years.

Since the last time we endorsed her, Thai has been busy becoming the U.S. Supreme Court's worst nightmare. Before the Democrats started begging for our vote by promising to protect and expand abortion access post-Roe, Thai passed a bill requiring student health plans to cover abortion if they already cover maternity care. She also led the charge on the Affirm Washington Abortion Access Act, which extended the right to abortion to people of all genders and incentivized trained, qualified health care workers to offer abortion care. But she’s far from a one-trick pony. Thai also sponsored the Working Families Tax Credit, a law returning between $300 and $1,200 in taxes to very low-income residents. That bill passed after over a decade of hard work from her and her predecessors.

If elected, Thai wants to expand health care access and mental health coverage, address behavioral health problems in school, and help renters afford to live where they want to live. Vote Thai.

Legislative District No. 45
Representative Position No. 2
Larry Springer

Rep. Larry Springer suuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks. Since he first started representing Kirkland in 2004, he has consistently served the interests of corporations and the landed gentry. Remember that time he sponsored a bill to give tax breaks to people selling private planes? We’ll never forget. And we’re still waiting for our invitation to drink at his wine bar, “The Grape Choice.”

During his (understandably) reluctant interview with the SECB, he argued his case for reelection by declaring himself the most bipartisan legislator in the state. Not exactly a winning argument for us, especially when the other partisans want to force pregnancy, watch the acid seas rise, read bad novels constantly, etc.

It’s not like he’s done nothing good in a bipartisan fashion, though. With unanimous ~bipartisan support~ last session, he passed a bill to spend $125 million every two years in perpetuity for wildfire suppression, mitigation, recovery and forest health. That’s good! However, he also told Rep. Jessica Bateman to chill out on her “missing middle” housing bill to avoid causing a “civil war” with critics in rural areas. That’s not good.

If we elect him, he’ll work with Bateman to pass a compromise housing bill, do something about our regressive tax system (he was lukewarm on the wealth tax and gave a firm "no" on raising the estate tax, lol, but he suggested cutting sales taxes in half), and he’ll do something to protect salmon.

Still, he’s SOMEHOW better than his competition. One challenger is a no-name Republican with no funding, and the other is QAnoner Amber Krabach, who received her greatest political honor when Daily Kos named her “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” last July.

Springer said Stranger readers should vote for him because he’s not them. Compelling stuff. Vote Springer.

Legislative District No. 46
State Senator
Javier Valdez

Rep. Javier Valdez is a Democrat with a sunny disposition, an earnest commitment to racial justice, and a love of Ezell’s fried chicken that matches the SECB’s own.

But that’s about all the nice stuff we have to say about him.

The big legislative accomplishments he bragged about took carceral approaches to fighting hate crimes, preventing swatting, banning high capacity magazine production, and attempting to ban assault weapons. While he doesn’t regret backing that legislation, he’s since found religion on restorative justice approaches, and he agrees that increasing jail time for crimes doesn’t do much to deter them. We hope he keeps the faith, but we’ll see.

He’s also wishy-washy on hard decisions he’ll have to make as a senator. He made incomprehensible mouth noises when asked how to address the state’s 200,000-unit affordable housing deficit, and while he was generally amenable to taxing the rich, he deferred all details to work groups.

While he doesn’t want to legalize apartments on all lots statewide “yet,” he would vote for the “missing middle” bill to expand housing options near transit, which is a start.

All that said, Valdez boasts more relevant experience and qualifications for the position than his challenger, Matt Gross, a King County Prosecutor who is singularly focused on housing policy. We agreed with most of Gross’s positions, but his ideas for funding sources were half-baked, he was a little too cautious on anti-rent-gouging legislation, and we didn’t love his Nordic model leanings on sex work decriminalization. Vote Valdez.

Legislative District No. 46
Representative Position No. 2
Darya Farivar

You know that feeling you get when you flip your pillow to the cold side in the middle of the night? That’s how we feel about Darya Farivar. Refreshed. Rejuvenated. Relieved.

The competition in the 46th Legislative District, which covers northeast Seattle, was stiff. The candidates agreed on most issues. But Lelach Rave, a pediatrician who boasts an endorsement from the disaster that is Seattle City Councilmember Sara Nelson, lost us when she started sympathizing with “mom-and-pop landlords” and asking for “more nuance” on legalizing all housing options statewide. On the other end of the spectrum, Melissa Taylor impressed us with her deep knowledge of the issues, especially when it came to addressing the state’s affordable housing deficit. We also liked Nancy Connolly, a doctor who expressed real frustration with the Legislature’s lack of urgency on fixing the very fixable issue of homelessness.

But Farivar, the director of public policy for Disability Rights Washington and the daughter of Iranian immigrants who fled to the US during the revolution, rose above the other candidates when the SECB asked if the state should ban assault weapons. In our previous endorsement meetings, Democrats usually gave an easy “yes,” but Farivar pushed our question further, adding that this type of gun control policy shouldn’t make exceptions for police. We agreed. The other candidates jumped on board with Farivar’s proposal, but her willingness to push milquetoast Democrat policies further spoke to how she would legislate in Olympia. Vote Farivar.

Legislative District No. 47
State Senator
Claudia Kauffman

Back in 2006, this south King County district elected Claudia Kauffman to serve as the first Native American woman in the state Senate. We want her back in Olympia because she proved herself to be more knowledgeable on the issues than her Democratic competition, Kent City Councilmember Satwinder Kaur.

We also think Kauffman’s positions on those issues will make the 47th a greener, more affordable place to live. Unlike Kaur, Kauffman supported ending new highway construction and lifting the statewide ban on rent control.

Kauffman also managed to refrain from apparently lying to our faces, which was a nice touch!

During an interview, Kaur tried to evade responsibility for voting to put cops back in Kent schools. At first, she twice told us that the Kent City Council did not have any “jurisdiction” over that decision. When a slightly baffled Kauffman pointed out that the council did, in fact, have jurisdiction over the decision, and that they did, in fact, decide to use that power to unanimously approve a contract that would return cops to the classroom, Kaur walked back her statement and confirmed the obvious and widely reported truth.

Kaur added that she wasn’t “100% in support of” cops in schools, but she voted for the contract anyway because “it’s something that parents and families here in the 47th have asked for.” That statement may be true, but more than 1,000 participants—including “parents, students, teachers, district staff and community residents,” according to the Kent Reporter—responded to a school survey asking for input on the matter. Most of the “eight themes that emerged” from that survey supported alternatives to police when dealing with disciplinary action in schools. So some “parents and families” in the 47th asked the district not to spend money cuffing their kids in the lunchroom, too–Kaur just did not want to represent those voices. Which is fine! But there’s no need to suggest those other parents didn't exist.

Now, the contest in this purple district will be tough. Republican Bill Boyce is a compelling candidate. He rose up from segregated schools in North Carolina, and now he works as the first Black man elected to the Kent City Council. He is also very conservative. He loves cops and he hates WA Cares, a first-in-the-nation benefit that helps the elderly afford nursing homes and at-home caregivers. With plenty of money and GOP establishment backing, he’ll likely advance through the primary. To defeat his campaign, the 47th will need a strong challenger who doesn’t mince words. Vote Kauffman.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 1
Debra Jean Entenman

Rep. Debra Entenman said her votes in support of comprehensive sex education and gun safety were “difficult” to take in her arguably swingy district, but she took them anyway because she believed they were right. That’s the kind of courage we want to see walking the halls of the Capitol.

We also want her to finish the work she started on police accountability. After a cop murdered George Floyd, she sponsored the bill to create the state’s Office of Independent Investigations. That agency will deploy independent investigators to check out deadly force incidents, preventing (recent or current) cops from covering for their comrades.

Though constitutionality concerns slowed her roll on a bill to create an independent prosecutor to go after cops who kill, she plans to propose legislation that passes legal muster soon.

While we strongly disagree with Entenman’s support for charter schools, her Republican opponents suck on that score and every other. On his truly demented website, Jessie Ramsey calls Entenman a “Democrat potato.” What? Meanwhile, the Republican establishment is throwing burgeoning perennial candidate Kyle Lyebyedyev at the wall again to see if he sticks. Don’t let him. Vote Entenman.

Legislative District No. 47
Representative Position No. 2
Shukri Olow

Shukri Olow, who runs the Seattle Human Services Department’s youth and family empowerment division, comes out ahead of her major competitor, Auburn City Councilmember Chris Stearns, mostly because of her commitment to a moratorium on climate-killing highway expansions. Though Stearns also impressed us with his green bona fides, we must stop adding highway miles to this state, and Olow promises to stand against that.

But our choice didn't hinge on that threshold question alone. Her emphasis on creating more affordable housing, fully funding public education, and cutting childcare costs are all rooted in personal and professional experience, and the Legislature desperately needs the expertise she’s developed while working on those issues within city and county departments.

Plus, if Democrats want to hold this district, they’ll need to knock on as many doors as possible. Republican banker Carmen Goers currently leads the fundraising in this race by a mile, thanks to major contributions from the state House Republicans, commercial landlords, landlord-landlords, banks, and other groups who profit from the exploitation of the poor. Olow’s current campaign operation outshines Stearns’s, giving us the confidence that she’ll have the stronger campaign going into the general. Vote Olow.