City of Seattle

John Wilson is running unopposed for re-election for King County Assessor. He was first elected as county assessor in 2015 after spending four years as the county's chief deputy assessor. Wilson considers himself an "activist assessor" and wants to stop young potential homeowners and seniors from being priced out of King County. In August 2019, the assessor's office released a Taxpayer Transparency Tool, a website that provides taxpayers with a breakdown of where their property tax dollars go, as well as the estimated cost of proposed property taxes.

Wilson's years of experience make him a good choice for King County Assessor.

Julie Wise is running for re-election for King County Director of Elections. Wise has worked in King County Elections for more than 15 years and has held almost every job in the department. During her time as director, Wise has worked to reduce barriers for voters, including adding prepaid postage to ballots and increasing the number of ballot drop boxes. Her office also worked to ensure voting materials are available in additional languages and improved election integrity and security for the county. When concerns about VoteWA, the state's new voting system, were raised before the primary, Wise took steps to make sure the election was not impacted.

Wise is being challenged by Mark Greene, a perennial candidate who supports lowering the voting age to 16-years-old but does not support the current system of pre-registration for 16 and 17-year-olds. Greene has expressed distrust in vote tabulation machines and would institute random hand counts.

Wise's experience and strong performance during her first term make her the best choice for King County Director of Elections.

Abigail Doerr is a transportation and environmental advocate who is running to bring new energy to the King County Council. Doerr is a former staff member of the Transportation Choices Coalition who led the successful campaign to expand Sound Transit in 2016 as well as the campaign for a carbon tax in 2018. 

Doerr thinks King County Council members should be more engaged in the community and should provide stronger leadership on progressive issues, especially transportation and homelessness. As such, she has proposed an ambitious 20-year plan to dramatically increase the availability of both low-and-middle-income housing. She also wants to expand the Best Starts For Kids initiative to support young people and end the school-to-prison pipeline. 

Doerr is a great choice if you’re looking for new leadership on the King County Council.

Incumbent Joe McDermott first joined the council in 2010 and in 2016 was chosen to be council chair. He has advocated for civil rights, safe communities, and transportation. In the last few years on the council, he has introduced the King County Gun Safety Action Plan to address the public health crisis of gun violence, supported county efforts to increase shelter capacity and build more affordable housing, and is working to address racial disproportionality in King County’s juvenile justice system.

McDermott is running against Michael Robert Neher, who is not running a viable campaign. McDermott is the clear choice in this race.

Sam Cho, the co-founder of an international export company, is running for Port of Seattle, Commissioner Position 2. He served on Gov. Jay Inslee’s Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs and previously worked on trade issues for a member of Congress. As the son of South Korean immigrants, Cho is running to make the Port of Seattle work better for all people in King County, from reducing congestion at SeaTac Airport to supporting low-income families south of the airport who are impacted by noise and air pollution. He also wants to use the port as an economic engine to create opportunities for the county’s rapidly growing population.

Cho is running against attorney and former Bellevue City Councilmember Grant Degginger. His priorities for the port include balancing investment in clean fuels and carbon reduction with careful growth and ensuring contract equity at the airport for all businesses. As the port expands its construction projects, Degginger states his role as past chair of the Washington Public Disclosure Commission will mean more transparency for voters.

Cho is the best choice in this race because of his strong support from our Progressive Voters Guide partners.

Incumbent Fred Felleman is an environmental consultant and marine biologist. He is running to retain his seat on the Seattle Port Commission to continue fighting climate change and increase the port's green energy jobs. He has been a leader on the commission on protecting orcas, publicly opposing the dangerous Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline, and advocating for well-paying jobs. The port faced criticism following Trump's Muslim ban when some protesters on the light rail were forced to skip the airport station. However, Felleman was among numerous leaders who released a statement condemning the ban and calling for an evaluation of the numerous government agencies’ response at the airport.

Felleman is being challenged by attorney Garth Jacobson. His priorities include pausing cruise line terminal growth until pollution cleanup efforts are further along, finding a way to eliminate the bus shuttles from the car rental facility, and installing availability lights in the airport parking structure. According to The Seattle Times, as of the primary election he has never attended a port commission meeting.

Felleman is the best choice for Port of Seattle, Commissioner Position 5.

John H. Chun is running to retain Judge Position 1 on the Court of Appeals, Division 1, District 1. He was appointed to this seat in 2018 by Governor Inslee and was previously a King County Superior Court Judge as well as a private practice attorney and federal law clerk. Chun specializes in criminal, complex civil, and family law cases. He is endorsed by all of the Washington State Supreme Court Justices and many other judges around Washington. Chun is running unopposed and deserves your vote for the Court of Appeals, Division 1, District 1, Judge Position 1.

Judge Lori K. Smith is running to retain Position 2 on the Court of Appeals, Division 1, District 1. She was appointed to this seat by Governor Inslee in 2018 and previously served on the King County Superior Court as a Family Law Court Commissioner and as a Deputy Prosecuting Attorney. Smith serves on the Minority and Justice Commission and co-chairs the Tribal and State Court Consortium. She often mentors young people and over her career has worked to increase access to justice and eliminate bias in the judicial system. Smith is running unopposed and deserves your vote for the Court of Appeals, Division 1, District 1, Position 2.

Incumbent Lisa Herbold was first elected to the Seattle City Council in 2015 on a platform of affordable housing, paid sick leave, and raising the minimum wage. While on the council, Herbold has passed a slate of reforms, including an anti-discrimination law to protect tenants and a police observer's bill of rights. In the face of a recent spike of hate crimes, Herbold has introduced legislation to increase the penalties for people who commit hate crimes. If re-elected, Herbold will continue working to expand community access to healthy food, support a wage transparency law for companies that have public works contracts with the city, and expand affordable housing.

Herbold is running against video game company co-founder Phil Tavel, who has served as a public defender and judge pro tem. He has served as the vice president of the Morgan Community Association and on the board of Allied Arts. He'd like to see more police hired to deal with property crime but hasn't articulated a detailed plan for increasing affordable housing and reducing homelessness. Tavel has the backing of CASE, the electoral arm of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, as part of their unprecedented $2 million campaign to flip the Seattle City Council and push their conservative corporate agenda.

Herbold is the best choice for Seattle City Council in District 1 because of her strong track record and broad support from progressive advocates and elected officials.

Tammy Morales is a longtime community organizer who is running for Seattle City Council in District 2. Morales narrowly lost her 2015 race against Councilmember Bruce Harrell, who is stepping down this year. Morales works at the Rainier Beach Action Coalition mentoring young people and fighting displacement. She supports a housing-first approach to homelessness that provides permanent supportive housing to those most in need. She also wants to do more for the "missing middle" that earn 30 to 60 percent of the median income and are struggling to afford rent. Morales supports a tax on real estate speculation and some form of a payroll tax on large corporations to fund the investments in affordable housing that District 2 and the city of Seattle need.

Morales is running against Mark Solomon, a Crime Prevention Coordinator for the Seattle Police Department and an Air Force veteran. If elected, Solomon's priorities include hiring more police officers, convening a District 2 Mandatory Housing Affordability Evaluation Committee, and marketing District 2 to attract more businesses. Solomon has the backing of CASE, the electoral arm of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, as part of their unprecedented $2 million campaign to flip the Seattle City Council and push their conservative corporate agenda.

Morales is the clear progressive choice for Seattle City Council in District 2.

Kshama Sawant is a former economics professor and member of Socialist Alternative running for re-election to the Seattle City Council in District 3. Sawant has played a valuable role in an impressive number of progressive victories on the city council, from the historic $15 minimum wage to blocking rent increases for public low-income housing. Her campaign platform takes aim squarely at Amazon and she pledges to tax large corporations to fund a large investment in social housing and a Green New Deal for Seattle. She has also been an advocate for city-wide rent control and believes the city council must have the courage to pass bold policies at the scale necessary to address our city’s challenges. She has been a consistent voice for low-income families in Seattle who are struggling to get by.

Sawant is also a controversial and polarizing figure. Her uncompromising positions and disregard for collaboration have not made her popular with her peers at City Hall and have reduced her effectiveness as a council member. In addition, Sawant is one of the few candidates who has opted-out of the Democracy Voucher system. She has stated that she needs to raise as much money as possible to fend off campaign attacks from corporate interests. 

The electoral arm of the Seattle Chamber is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars against Sawant and in support of her opponent, Egan Orion. This is part of their unprecedented $2 million campaign to flip the Seattle City Council and push their conservative corporate agenda. We believe Sawant is the best choice to maintain a strong progressive majority on the Seattle City Council.

Egan Orion

Sawant is facing a challenge from Egan Orion, a moderate small business owner and former director of the Capitol Hill Chamber of Commerce and the Broadway Business Improvement area. Orion is a prominent member of Seattle’s LGBTQ community who is best known for taking over Seattle’s struggling PrideFest in 2007 and building it into one of the largest and most popular pride celebrations in the country.  

Orion is running a centrist campaign that promises to bring a collaborative approach to the council, in contrast to what he sees as Sawant’s hard-line approach. He has earned the endorsement of Teamsters Local 117 and several other unions. In our interview, he did not take a position on the increased Seattle Police emphasis patrols this summer and is a “maybe” on allowing safe injection sites. While Egan is a moderate Democrat who is an advocate on social issues like LGBTQ rights, it’s unclear if he’s willing to fight to balance our upside tax code by making Seattle’s most successful businesses to pay their share in taxes.

While we have concerns about both candidates, we think it’s important not to let conservative business groups gain undue influence over the council's policymaking. We believe Sawant is the best choice for Seattle City Council in District 3.

Incumbent city council member and attorney Debora Juarez is running for re-election in District 5 on her record of engagement with her district's needs. The first native council member in Seattle, she chairs the Civic Development, Public Assets, and Native Communities Committee, one of the nation's first formalized municipal legislative voices for Native governments and leaders. In her time of the council, she helped secure $16 million in funding for the Lake City Community Center and pushed to get the NE 130th Street Light Rail Station, as well as have the station open 7 years early in 2024 instead of in 2031. She also points to $20,000 she secured for the local food bank, as well as her support for funding Clement Place, a 100-unit low-income housing project. If re-elected, Juarez would push for a public development authority that could directly build affordable housing in the city.

Juarez is being challenged by conservative Ann Davidson Sattler, a former Seattle Sonics employee. Unfortunately, Sattler favors a law-enforcement heavy approach to homelessness that ignores the underlying causes of homelessness in our community.

Juarez is the best choice for Seattle City Council in District 5.

Andrew Lewis is a progressive assistant city attorney running for Seattle City Council in District 7. He served on the Seattle Human Rights Commission and managed the 2009 campaign for former City Councilmember Nick Licata. As an assistant city attorney, Lewis has focused on diversion programs, especially the Choose 180 program, which keeps youth out of the criminal justice system. As a candidate, Lewis’s top campaign priority is to build more affordable homes and increase support for tenants struggling to stay in their homes. He’s fully committed to reforming our upside-down tax code that has driven up the cost of living for low-and-middle-income Seattleites. He also supports replacing the Magnolia bridge and pairing it with increased transit service connected to urban villages.

Lewis is facing Jim Pugel, a former assistant chief and interim chief with the Seattle Police Department, as well as a Chief Deputy at the King County Sheriff’s Office. He was also the executive sponsor for the establishment of the LEAD program, which diverts low-level, nonviolent offenders and sex workers away from jail and into other services. Pugel supports a statewide capital gains tax, which would fund needed programs in the city. He has a four pillars approach to addressing homelessness, which is "prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and enforcement." Pugel has the backing of CASE, the electoral arm of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, as part of their unprecedented $2 million campaign to flip the Seattle City Council and push their conservative corporate agenda.

We believe Lewis is the best choice in this race because of his progressive values, commitment to public service, and detailed policy platform for how to address the challenges facing our city.