City of Seattle

Jeff Manson is an administrative law judge who is running for office to boost opportunities for workers and working families and to fund the services we all rely on. He has served as a precinct committee officer, the chair of the 36th District Democrats for eight years, and the board chair of the disability rights group Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE), among other leadership experience.

In our interview with Manson, he described himself as the labor candidate in the race, and mentioned that with the departure of incumbents like Rep. Mike Sells, the House needs more support for working people. However, we were disappointed that Manson stated that he is ready to pour more money into the criminal justice system and militarized police without speaking specifically on how he would ensure we all feel safe, especially for communities of color.

Manson acknowledges that the state is extremely behind on the number of housing units needed for everyone to have a roof over their head and a door that locks, including people experiencing homelessness. To that end, he supports a housing-first approach to homelessness that includes tiny homes and accessory dwelling units. He also supports flipping the state's upside-down tax code, which is the most regressive in the nation, and a reduction of carbon emissions by half by 2030.

Nicole Gomez is running on the motto of creating an economy that works for everyone. She works on the Universal Health Care Commission and is the co-founder of healthcare policy nonprofit Alliance for a Healthy Washington. In addition, she's the executive director of the Institute for a Democratic Future which trains future Democratic policy leaders. Gomez has also served as chair of the 36th District Democrats and is a current precinct committee officer.

In our interview with Gomez, she described how her family became homeless due to the illness of a family member when she was young, which has spurred her to fight for working families. She is supportive of bills like Rep. Bateman's middle housing bill, which if passed would have created opportunities for homes like triplexes and duplexes near transit. For people who need housing and behavioral health, Gomez also supports wraparound services. As a member of the policy committee of the Balance Our Tax Code coalition, she is ready to support policies like a wealth tax on extraordinarily high earners, which would help flip Washington's status as having the most regressive tax code in the nation.

Tyler Crone is the founding director for the ATHENA Network, which aims to promote gender equality and human rights within and beyond the global HIV response. As a public health expert and the mother of a transgender child, Crone wants to make communities safe and welcoming for all, expand child care, protect reproductive freedom, and improve affordability.

Crone wants to see urgent action on the housing crisis, including housing with wraparound services for those who need additional support. If elected, she would work to create more partnerships in the Legislature for immigrant and Indigenous issues, with leadership coming from those communities themselves.

In our interview with Crone, she stated that she was ready to be an ally and follow the lead of experienced legislators on climate, housing, racial justice, and other issues.

Emijah Smith's decades-long record of advocacy shows her commitment to the people of the 37th District. As a deeply rooted community organizer, Smith wants to bring the voices and needs of the community to the forefront through investment in small businesses, trauma-informed health care, and racial justice.

In our interview with Smith, she spoke of how the war on drugs in the Central District inspired her to become an advocate for her community. After years of working with the Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic, she worked at Solid Ground with those experiencing housing and food insecurity and spent 11 years organizing in Olympia as a community engagement manager at the Children’s Alliance.

If elected, Smith wants to prioritize flexible after-school programs, access to addiction services, and truly affordable child care. While Smith and Bulale share an emphasis on public education, Smith has served as PTSA president and vice president of the Seattle Public Schools PTSA. Her experience in advocating for her own children in local district meetings - which led to bigger investments for marginalized students - is unique in this race.

Among the candidates, Smith also had the most to say about combating gentrification by ending predatory real estate development practices. She was also the only candidate to discuss the need to support survivors of domestic violence by unraveling the difficult knot of laws and procedures around getting protection. Smith's notable endorsements include King County Councilmember Girmay Zahilay, Rep. Tarra Simmons, Rep. Jamila Taylor, and former King County Councilmember Larry Gossett, all of whom are outstanding advocates for racial justice and community building.

If you are looking for a candidate with the longest record of work in the community and who centers Black liberation, self-determination, and local knowledge, Smith is a great choice.

Chipalo Street is running to improve education, expand economic opportunities, and close the digital divide. He works in Microsoft's office of the CTO as a senior leader on emerging technology. He also serves on the board of the Institute for Democratic Future, which trains up-and-coming Democratic civic leaders, and is the co-founder of the Teacher Scientist Partnership at Technology Access Foundation Academy, which teaches a computer science curriculum in south Seattle.

In our interview with Street, he was unique among the candidates in his focus on technology education. Street believes that Washington can lead the nation in STEM education and that the Legislature can do more for students by funding free two-year college. He is also a landlord who believes that tenants and owners should work in partnership. He emphasized that during the pandemic he was able to keep all his tenants housed despite a third of them losing work. He supports tenant protections, rental assistance, housing vouchers, and ending exclusionary zoning in transit areas, which would bring more housing options like triplexes and duplexes.

Street's notable endorsements include Port Commissioners Hamdi Mohamed and Sam Cho, King County Councilmember Rod Dembowski, and Tukwila City Councilmember Mohamed Abdi, who all emphasized Street's work in his small business, civic leadership, and values around housing.

If you are looking for a candidate who is pushing for digital inclusion in the 37th Legislative District, Street would be a good choice.

Flight attendant Andrew Ashiofu is running to bring relief to working people who have struggled before, during, and after the pandemic. As a frontline worker, he saw a 60 percent reduction in his income during the pandemic and wants to harness that experience to create more economic opportunities for families in the district and beyond. He serves on the King County HIV Planning Council, the Harborview Madison Clinic Community Advisory Board, and the Washington State Department of Health COVID Vaccine Implementation Council.

Having experienced homelessness in his youth when he came out as gay and lost his job, Ashiofu agrees with his fellow candidates on many housing policies. Specifically, he opposes zoning laws that limit housing to single-family homes and he supports increasing housing choices near transit. He believes that a New Deal-sized housing plan should be the way forward in Washington and that the state should be looking beyond just shelters at this point and creating more homes with wraparound mental health services.

In our interview with Ashiofu, he described how his experience as an HIV-positive patient exposed the flaws in our medical system. He saw the dangers of having health care be tied to our jobs and the limits on when free and reduced services can be accessed. Like other candidates in this race, Ashiofu is determined to invest in better mental health care, as well as health care that can be accessed no matter your race, job status, or what zip code you live in. Notable endorsements for Ashiofu include former King County Councilmember Larry Gossett, Nicole Thomas Kennedy, and the King County Young Democrats.

Ashiofu's focus and experience in healthcare stand out in this race. If you are looking for a candidate with lived experience around healthcare accessibility for intersectional communities and a determination to expand it, Ashiofu would be a good choice.

Adjunct professor Nimco Bulale is running to prioritize affordable housing and make education more inclusive for all students. As a refugee from Somalia and the child of a single mother, Bulale has emphasized the need for schools and social services to work for everyone, no matter what community you come from.

Bulale has previously worked as a program director at the East African Community Services, a consultant for the city of Seattle's Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs, and an education organizer with OneAmerica. She also serves on the executive board of the Southeast Seattle Education Coalition, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, and the King County Immigrant and Refugee Commission.

As an expert in education policy, Bulale is an advocate for inclusive education, including bilingual education at the state level. In our interview, Bulale noted the many ways that overlapping identities affect the district's residents. For many, housing is only affordable in intergenerational households, childcare providers are predominantly immigrant women, and many Black families are being pushed out of the majority of zip codes in major cities due to unaffordability. If elected, Bulale wants to address all this and more with a commitment to increasing green jobs, preventing the exploitation of working people and making communities safer with more laws for gun violence prevention. Her notable endorsements include a sole recommendation from the 37th District Democrats and the Alliance for Gun Responsibility.

If you are looking for a candidate with direct experience advocating for immigrant communities and education policy, Bulale would be a great choice.

Melissa Taylor is running for Position 2 in the 46th Legislative District to work on affordable childcare, equitable education funding, and public safety. She is the treasurer of the King County Democrats and has worked with Persist PAC on a unique policy of contributing to candidates to offset childcare costs associated with campaigning. Taylor has also served on the board of League of Women Voters and the Olympic View and Jane Addams PTA, as well as Indivisible and several other organizations.

Taylor discussed a wide range of progressive policies during our interview. She discussed how as a victim of violent crime, she knows that the best path forward for public safety is not performative punishment but addressing the root causes of crime. Rather than see her story be co-opted as a narrative for more militarized police in our communities, she believes that community investment is the best solution. She believes universal basic income, available and affordable housing, and a public health approach to gun violence would make communities safer and more whole. Taylor also sees climate action, flipping the state's upside-down tax code, and affordable child care as big priorities if elected.

Her years of leadership in Democratic and progressive organizations have earned her many endorsements from elected officials and progressive organizations, notably in labor. Taylor is a good choice if you're looking for a candidate with institutional knowledge and a long track record of progressive activism.

Darya Farivar is running for the 46th Legislative District, Position 2 to bring a keen eye to the intersection of policy and marginalized experiences. She is the public policy director with Disability Rights Washington, an organization that provides free services to people with disabilities and protects and advances the rights of people with disabilities statewide. Farivar has also served as co-chair of the Seattle Women's Commission, policy chair of the State Special Education Advisory Council, and is currently a board member of Peyvand, which supports Iranian students at UW.

A focus on disability rights runs through Farivar's campaign, from her priorities in housing, criminal justice reform, health care, and more. In our interview, Farivar stated that she wants to build up diversion programs and ensure accessible housing units for people experiencing homelessness, noting that 40 percent of homeless people report having a disability. Farivar also makes the interesting point that disabilities cut across partisan lines and she would be willing to work across the aisle to move forward legislation that works for everyone. She wants to see investments in robust mass transit, including infrastructure to get people to the district's three light rail stops, and would be very supportive of transit-centered housing.

Farivar is also one of two candidates of color in the race, and if elected states that she would be the first Middle Eastern woman serving in Olympia. As the daughter of refugees, she wants to establish a commission for Middle Eastern affairs to help the Legislature work in unison with Middle Eastern communities.

If you're looking for a candidate whose experience would center underrepresented voices and ensure truly accessible services and housing for all, Farivar would be a good choice.

Pediatrician Dr. Lelach Rave is running for office to bring mental health, youth and family health, and education to the forefront of the Legislature's agenda. She is the legislative chair for the Washington Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics and has spent years in Olympia advocating for policies like paid family leave, feeding kids through Breakfast After the Bell, and creating the Washington Vaccine Association.

Rave is one of two physicians running for Legislature this year alongside fellow 46th District candidate Nancy Connolly. Her approach to a physician joining the House is a bit different from Connolly's. Because of her pediatric focus, Rave highlighted the need to support both kids and parents in this burgeoning mental health crisis. She noted that we can accelerate hiring much-needed mental health staff statewide by lowering the administrative burden on health care workers, especially lower-paid staff. She was also the only candidate in our interviews to discuss the importance of special education, noting that the state is behind by millions of dollars in funding special education, and that special needs kids fell even further behind than neurotypical kids in the pandemic.

Outside of her health-related policies, Rave wants to see additional investments in the Housing Trust Fund, more low- and middle-income housing, reduction of fossil fuels, and more.

Rave emphasized that with the retirement of Eileen Cody, there are no physicians in the Legislature. Rave is a good choice if you are looking for a candidate with the experience and drive to advocate for community health care for children and families. 

Dr. Nancy Connolly is running to prioritize the district and state's need for better mental health care access, housing-first solutions to homelessness, and more affordable housing. Connolly has worked as a primary care physician for 20 years and has the unique experience of providing care for people experiencing homelessness in downtown Seattle, Renton, and Shoreline. She also serves on the board of Seattle King County Coalition on Homelessness and on the policy committee of Healthcare is a Human Right - Washington.

Connolly notes that the retirement of Rep. Dave Frockt means the House needs more mental health advocates. Like Farivar, Connolly says that there is a great need for point-of-engagement services; providers need to meet people where they're at or offer more distributed sites rather than only centralized ones. Connolly wants to see more investment in peer navigators and care managers.

Connolly says that there should be no detention without rehabilitation services. However, we have some concerns about her emphasis on pouring more money into a law enforcement system she herself describes as "egregiously inequitable and extremely ineffective." While most of the other candidates articulated specific ways that law enforcement needs to be accountable, Connolly offered less specific paths forward on this critical issue. Connolly joined her peers in pledging to support any reasonable legislation that would finally balance our state's upside-down tax code and would support bold action to address climate change.

Connolly is a good choice if you're looking for a candidate new to politics with medical expertise and direct experience with people experiencing homelessness.

Nina Martinez is running to leverage her experience in building safe and equitable communities for the benefit of all. She is the board chair of the Latino Civic Alliance, an organization that supports equity for Latinos through opportunities in career paths, livable wages, and education. Martinez has spent over a decade working with legislators and in the community to pass legislation like I-940, which requires law enforcement to receive violence de-escalation, first aid, and mental health training. Martinez has also served on several of Gov. Inslee's task forces, including Independent Investigations of Police Use of Force, Hate Crime Advisory Working Group, and Agricultural Labor Rights.

In our interview with Martinez, she was the most outspoken about community safety from gun violence. Like fellow candidate Rave, Martinez mentioned the need to support parents and noted that when dealing with gun violence, parents need social services and programs to work effectively with their kids. She said the Legislature also needs more creative workforce programs, like apprenticeships, as well as a nuanced approach to housing that reflects the needs of everyone, whether they're evicted, not able to sustain their income, or any other situation. Martinez was surprisingly critical of some incumbent Democrats when it came to workers' rights, despite significant legislation moving forward in recent years.

As one of two women of color in the race, Martinez wants to ensure that the voices of the Latinx community, especially farmworkers, are heard in Olympia. Martinez would be a good choice if you are looking for an activist voice who has worked to support police accountability and would prioritize apprenticeships in Olympia.