Week in Review: August 22, 2025 - with Erica Barnett

“Christian Nationalist Rally, Planned for Cal Anderson Park, Will Move to Gas Works Park in Fremont” by Erica C. Barnett from PubliCola

“New Police Chief Shon Barnes Accepted $50,000 Hiring Bonus Created for Rank and File Officers” by Erica C. Barnett from PubliCola

“Trump administration vows to 'come after' sanctuary states and cities, despite court setbacks” by Tim Henderson from Washington State Standard

“Ferguson says he won’t be ‘bullied’ by Trump threats over sanctuary law” by Jim Brunner from The Seattle Times

“WA’s all-mail elections attacked by Trump” by David Gutman from The Seattle Times

“Overturned court ruling clears way for WA to inspect immigrant detention center” by Jake Goldstein-Street from Washington State Standard

Find stories that Crystal is reading here

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[00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work, with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it.

Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows, where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola, and co-host of the Seattle Nice podcast, Erica Barnett. Welcome!

[00:00:49] Erica Barnett: Thank you - great to be here.

[00:00:51] Crystal Fincher: Great to have you back. Well, we got a few things to discuss this week, starting with a return of a Christian nationalist rally to Seattle - this time, initially planned for Cal Anderson Park, but we learned that it's going to be moved to Gas Works Park. What brought this on and what's happening?

[00:01:14] Erica Barnett: Well, as you said, this is a rally that is the second such rally by two different groups in Cal Anderson Park - or planned for Cal Anderson Park - over the last few months. The first recent event was the Mayday rally in Cal Anderson in May - and that went off the rails, with police arresting and pepper spraying counter-protesters. And so, in the hope of avoiding a similar situation with this latest rally - which is being put on by a group headed by Sean Feucht, who is a controversial minister and singer who is doing a "Revive in '25" tour across Canada and the US. He wanted to hold this rally in Cal Anderson, presumably to be provocative. He did not return my calls, but the intent of this tour that they're doing is to go into the sinful cities - I can't remember the exact phrasing they used - but essentially going into the heart of darkness and trying to convert people to Christianity.

So anyway, this is obviously very controversial, very worrying to City leaders. And over the course of really a weekend - last weekend - the Mayor, and especially City Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth, spoke with the group, convinced them to move it to a less transit-accessible area, Gas Works Park, and not in the middle of the historic LGBTQ neighborhood. So they've agreed to move the rally itself. There were plans, and maybe still are plans, to hold a "Jesus March" that starts in Cal Anderson and goes around Capitol Hill. That has been removed from their Facebook page, but who knows if they're still planning to do it.

[00:02:54] Crystal Fincher: Well, yeah, this sounds like a real challenge. Now, you said Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Hollingsworth spoke with the group and convinced them to move it. Was not having this ever an option? Were they talking about that at all? Were there concerns about the safety of having this event at all in the city, given what happened at the first rally?

[00:03:18] Erica Barnett: There absolutely were discussions about how to - I think that the idea of just denying the permit is something that perhaps would be theoretically ideal, right? It would be nice if this event didn't happen here, if there wasn't all this controversy. But, I mean, there's really, very, very little room in the First Amendment to deny people an event. You certainly can't do it on the basis of content. So you can't say we disagree with these people so they can't hold an event in our city and we can deny a permit for that reason. But there are some possibilities that the City considered, including the possibility of denying it for this location because of safety reasons. I think that is somewhat tenuous. Only because the safety that was threatened was people counter-protesting, and the people threatening their safety were mostly cops. And so I don't know how they would sort of finagle that when they inevitably got sued for denying the permit based on safety. But there's just very little wiggle room for - and I think rightly so - for the cities to use content, or the threat of counter-protests because of content to deny permits. There is maybe some wiggle room - and the City considered and rejected this - to say this is an inappropriate location for various reasons. And we'll deny you this permit that you requested, but we'll move your event to another location - which is why I think the City decided to try to actually just talk to the group and talk them into moving it. Which was successful - I mean, again, we'll see about this "Jesus March," because that seems to potentially subvert the whole concept of moving the event. But they did really hard and thankless work behind-the-scenes to get them to move.

[00:05:05] Crystal Fincher: Certainly does seem like a better outcome than having it at Cal Anderson Park. Now, are they still planning and preparing for protests - counter-protests, essentially - at Gas Works?

[00:05:18] Erica Barnett: I have not independently reported on those efforts, but they have to be. I mean, there's going to be counter-protests. There's already discussion of counter-protests. And when it was going to be at Cal Anderson, the Lavender Rights Project was working on counter-programming to counteract the effect of this giant event in the park. So I think the counter-protests are going to be inevitable, or counter-programming - everything is not necessarily a protest. So, yeah, there's going to be people at Gas Works Park. I think that the permit for the group is for 350 people, so it might be a smaller event than the Mayday rally in Cal Anderson - we don't know. But I think certainly the City is going to be planning for that. But I think they're pretty relieved that it's not in Cal Anderson, particularly emergency managers, who are having to coordinate the City's efforts to respond to counter-protests. So hopefully there'll be less violence from police. And I think that is the volatile element in all of these things is - not the counter-protesters, and not even really the event organizers, but the way that the City responds to it. Whether with sort of flooding the zone with police, or just letting the counter-protesters be and letting the event go on.

[00:06:36] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, this is scheduled to take place on August 30th at Gas Works, currently scheduled from 9 to 9, I believe - 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.

[00:06:48] Erica Barnett: Oh, that's the permit. I think it's actually going to happen at 5p. But the permit is for 9 to 9.

[00:06:53] Crystal Fincher: Okay. So we will continue to follow this story and certainly will be following Erica's reporting at PubliCola, who has been on top of this the entire time.

Also want to talk about the new police chief, Shon Barnes, accepting a hiring bonus that seemed like it was created for rank and file officers. What happened here and how was he eligible for this?

[00:07:20] Erica Barnett: That's a great question. And it's not just Shon Barnes. It's also his Deputy Chief - he brought on a second Deputy Chief, Andre Sayles, and a new Assistant Chief, Nicole Powell. They're all getting this $50,000 bonus that was absolutely and explicitly meant for rank and file officers when it was passed in 2022 and then expanded in 2024. And the City says he's eligible. I don't see, under the language of the legislation, how he is eligible. He's not a police officer. He is the Police Chief. And there's all kinds of language in the legislation itself. And then, of course, like, we covered it at the time - it's not that long ago. The whole point was to address a purported hiring crisis at SPD and get more cops on the streets. That was the entire point. And this lateral hiring bonus - which is the bigger one, the $50,000 one - is meant for police officers coming over either from other departments or people who have left SPD and return. And they get more money as a bonus because they are fully trained and can deploy right away, so the idea - and it's explicit in the legislation - was to get people on patrol and investigations. And that is not what the Police Chief does, or the Deputy Chief, or the Assistant Chief. And I spoke to the sponsors of the 2022 legislation and the 2024 expansion, and they both said that the intent was for this to recruit officers, which I think is obvious. And the discussion is not so old that it's been memory holed at this point - I mean, we're talking about last year. That was the whole point of this. So I would question the eligibility. Now, of course, if Bruce Harrell, the Mayor, approved this, which is what SPD appears to be telling me, then I don't know that there's anything that can be done. I think it is certainly a little unseemly looking.

[00:09:17] Crystal Fincher: I think that is a challenge, and we're having conversations about a massive deficit that the City finds itself in, once again. Conversations in other departments and with other programs about their levels of staffing and funding. Challenges we're having there - everything from people on the frontlines helping with homelessness and contacting people in need through the city to the planning department and the resources that they have there. So to see these bonuses kind of result in additional compensation to the Police Chief, to Assistant Chiefs, and not to the rank and file officers that - as you point out, do seem to be explicitly named in the legislation - does seem like it's not quite meeting the intent. And the money spent is not being tracked as closely, is not really being invested in the ways that it was anticipated to get the return that they were trying to get. Now, has the Police Chief commented on this at all so far? Have you heard from them? Or on the idea of any signing bonuses for any non-police type positions or departments?

[00:10:34] Erica Barnett: Well, to answer the second question first, there is no discussion of that. There's no discussion, typically, of doing anything to recruit all these other folks that are desperately needed, like social workers for the CARE team, like people who work in human services, like nonprofit employees - which is how we run our homelessness system, the City funds nonprofits. And to answer the first question - no, it's been like pulling teeth to get information out of SPD. So not only did it take weeks to get them to answer my questions, they kind of dribbled the information out in a way that I think was not particularly strategic - because this could have been one or two stories, but it's now at least three on PubliCola, with new information coming out every few days. They have not been forthcoming with information particularly, and I have heard and reported that there is an investigation into who is "leaking" information to media internally at the police department. They deny this, but I have it on pretty good authority that that's going on, which I would just say that - in any organization, once you have turned your focus to searching for the mole, you have lost the game. 'Cause the fact is, stuff like this, stuff like giving giant bonuses to people who are already making - the Police Chief makes $360,000, the Deputy Chief makes over $300,000. And they are giving them $50,000 bonuses, which is more than a minimum wage worker makes in the city of Seattle. I think that people in the rank and file at SPD often find stuff like this pretty outrageous. And frankly, I will say, everybody I've talked to internally at the City who has not gone on the record about this is pretty outraged. Not just because it's a giant bonus, but also because it is contrary to the intent of the legislation. And so I think this is pretty demoralizing if you are in the city and if you're a rank and file officer at SPD. It could be pretty demoralizing to hear that the person who makes one of the highest salaries in the entire city is getting a very large bonus on top of that just for being hired.

[00:12:45] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, certainly not a feel-good story, not great to see happening. I think there's a lot of people who share the sentiment of the folks who you talk to within the City. So we'll also continue to follow this and see if they have anything more to say about this, if this will continue to be a practice that is followed in the City now - which seems like, again, just was not the original intent of the legislation, or gets us closer to the goals that were set when this money was allocated.

Now, I want to talk about a story coming from federally, with the Trump administration vowing to come after sanctuary states and cities, including the city of Seattle and State of Washington. What is the administration saying here? And how exactly do they plan to go after sanctuary states and cities?

[00:13:46] Erica Barnett: Yeah, this was in the news this week. Attorney General Pam Bondi sent letters out to sanctuary states and cities and counties, saying that they have to abide by federal policies and cooperate with federal law enforcement when it comes to ICE enforcement - deporting immigrants, putting immigrants in detention, and so forth. Seattle is a sanctuary city, King County is a sanctuary county, and Washington is a sanctuary state. And we have a law that says essentially that jurisdictions are not to cooperate with ICE agents, with federal law enforcement coming in and trying to detain and deport immigrants. And so, as far as how they're going to enforce this, I think that is a little vague. So far, there are sort of vague threats and bullying tactics that are going on that the State of Washington has said, through Attorney General Nick Brown and also Governor Bob Ferguson, that we're not going to be intimidated by. And it's not something that they've said specifically how they're going to enforce yet, but I think it's just a first shot across the bow to let cities like Seattle and states like Washington know that the federal government is watching us and doesn't agree with our policies of protecting immigrants.

[00:15:04] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. And we certainly have seen - while the threats are vague, we have heard and seen some of their intention before - threats to withhold funding, withhold support. And everything from funding for natural disaster response has been talked about and threatened before, in some cases attempted to be withheld, to current federal funding for programs, for infrastructure, things across the board. We have seen them be free with their promises to use any tool that they can think of at their disposal that they have access to. And the way our system is set up, the state does get a lot of funding from the federal government. Taxes are paid to the federal government and there's an expectation, and Congress has approved returning that money in several ways to the states who pay it. We'll see what this turns out to be.

But we've also seen some court injunctions with actions like this against these actions by the Trump administration. There is one case in July last month where a federal judge dismissed a case against Chicago, Illinois and Cook County - that was a big loss for the Trump administration so far. Certainly going to be appealed and looking at working its way through the courts in cases like this. But it is really illuminating to see the states that are on this list. The 12 states, in addition to the District of Columbia, are California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington state. The list also includes some counties and cities as well in Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New Mexico. So we can see from this list that it looks like they're predominantly going after blue states, blue cities and counties - just a further provocation, further overreach into local governance and affairs. Things that are typically left up to states' rights - kind of makes plain how hollow the actual claim of states' rights was. It was more about wanting to do the things that they at that time weren't allowed to do by the federal government. This very much seems to be an issue, an ideologically driven pursuit. We'll continue to see what this is.

[00:17:53] Erica Barnett: Yeah, and I just wanted to say, too, it is pretty clear that - and, you know, in Washington state, as I said, I mean, Nick Brown is fighting this. Bob Ferguson is saying that the state will fight it, which I think is a good policy. Because negotiating with the Trump administration - I mean, if you just look at the way universities negotiated with the Trump administration and how badly they lost - I mean, there is really no point in Washington state capitulating or figuring out ways around or trying to get to a point of agreement with the Trump administration on things like this. Because they are coming after us. We are not going to be saved by being wishy-washy. I don't think that the Trump administration is going to be cowed in its pursuit of blue states and blue cities by those states saying - Oh, yes, sir, we'll do what you want - and sort of trying to trick the Trump administration into believing that we're doing what he wants. I think that the best tactic is fighting in court and fighting in the streets. And making it clear that - yes, we are a sanctuary jurisdiction, and we're not backing down from that. Because doing otherwise - it's not only capitulation, I just don't think it'll work. I don't think that we are going to be saved in terms of losing funding for Medicaid, from HUD, from the Department of Transportation - just all of the federal money that we get and rely on. I think that the trouble is coming and we're just going to have to face it head on.

[00:19:17] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And that seems to be the conclusion that Governor Bob Ferguson came to in a press conference on Tuesday, where he stood with a number of legislators. He essentially said, well, he said - Let me be very clear. Washington state will not be bullied or intimidated by threats and legally baseless accusations. Pretty strong statement. Seems like a pretty unequivocal statement that Bob Ferguson does not plan to just try and go along and get along, or duck his head into the sand and hope this passes by.

In addition, in 2019, Washington passed the Keep Washington Working Act, which limits the role that law enforcement agencies can play in aiding the federal government in arresting or deporting undocumented immigrants. Jim Brunner covered this in The Seattle Times this week. A number of folks covered this as well. It was pretty major news. But Washington has protections against cooperation with immigration authorities at the federal level, against cooperation - turning over a lot of information there - that flies directly in the face, notwithstanding any sanctuary policies that are cited, that really prevents us from doing this at the local level. So what's next in this? Moving forward, what does it look like is coming, and what might we see?

[00:20:52] Erica Barnett: I don't have a lot of insight into what the state is working on specifically. But I think in general, like you said, I think it's going to be a battle in the courts and a battle to get rulings against the Trump administration, which other jurisdictions have certainly gotten. I think that we have a good team here in Washington that is pretty committed to that. I will say Governor Ferguson did cut the Attorney General's budget right after he left the Attorney General's office. So that is not great, but I think that they will focus their resources on this. And I think the city of Seattle, which I cover a little bit more frequently, has been, I would say, a bit quiet on that front. We have a City Attorney who is a Republican who has joined some lawsuits, but has not been particularly proactive in protecting our own local sanctuary city status. And Bruce Harrell, the Mayor, has been similarly kind of tepid. I mean, he's made some public statements. But he's also made contradictory public statements about trying to work with the Trump administration in the past. So I think that Harrell would agree with the proposition that they don't have the right to come in here and round people up and that the city is not going to cooperate. But we just had a primary election - Katie Wilson, Harrell's challenger, is ahead, and I think she would be a lot more proactive on that front than the Mayor has been.

[00:22:17] Crystal Fincher: Well, we'll continue to follow that, certainly. Huge issues at both the state and the local level, particularly for the city of Seattle.

Now, we had other news where President Trump is coming after policies here in Washington state. The other that made quite a bit of news was Trump going after all-mail elections. This was kind of odd in that it came after a meeting with Putin. And he essentially said he was warned about fraud from Putin and all-mail voting being suspect and vulnerable. And so Trump has renewed, seemingly, his opposition to all-mail elections and trying to go after those. What was he saying? What's he talking about now, Erica?

[00:23:09] Erica Barnett: Well, what he's talking about is the fact that he wants to suppress the vote from Democrats. And the best - he's not being explicit about that, of course, although I'm kind of surprised because Trump has diarrhea of the mouth - but he is basically saying that these votes allowing people to vote by mail, results in vote fraud. All the same claims that we hear different variations of every time when Trump gets angry that Democrats are allowed to vote, essentially. And so voting by mail is a way of enfranchising more people. And generally, when you enfranchise people, you are producing more votes for Democrats. The people whose votes are suppressed historically in this country are Black and Brown people, people with lower incomes, people who work jobs during the day and can't necessarily get to the polls during the day. And going back to a system of all in-person voting would suppress those votes, and it would make Republicans more likely to win. So that's why he's against it. I don't know if in his heart he believes there's actual fraud going on, but vote by mail is incredibly secure. And it's obviously what we have in Washington state - primarily vote by mail and also dropping votes off at ballot boxes. And there has been no credible evidence of fraud or abuse of this system whatsoever on any kind of a mass scale. So this is purely about Democratic voter suppression, just like redistricting in Congress has been the issue that made the Texas Democrats leave the state last week.

[00:24:43] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. This has been examined as a concern several times. And over and over again, from investigations to people from both parties - variety of political leanings - directly observing the processes in election centers throughout the day to verify and validate that what is happening is secure, it's valid, it is proceeding as it should be. And repeatedly, there have been no findings of fraud, no findings of abuse. The allegations that have surfaced predominantly in far-right spaces as conspiracy theories that have stoked concern from people - sometimes well-meaning people - have been debunked and disproven. Our election process is transparent, open to the public in terms of being able to monitor many election centers through webcam, having observers there from various parties. It is such a secure and valid system that we're fortunate to have. We were one of the first states to move to all-mail balloting. Several followed suit, particularly through the pandemic and changing policies there. And really makes it so much more convenient for a lot of people to be able to vote. So it's a process that's near and dear to us here in Washington, that once again is under national pressure. Now, what remains very unclear - because elections are administered at the local level in our country by states and counties - are what power, what authority the president has to meddle or impact these local elections at all. Some of it, I suspect, once again, are threats of withholding funding - however unrelated they may be to the issue at hand - and just trying to punish people who don't go along with what he wants at the moment in whatever way he can. But this is not going to happen without a fight here in Washington, certainly, and I think in most of the other states that are using all-mail voting. What do you see moving forward here?

[00:27:14] Erica Barnett: Yeah, I imagine Washington has also challenged, or did challenge a previous executive order that said that people have to provide documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote. And to move back the date that ballots can be accepted so that they have to be received by election offices by Election Day through the mail, rather than postmarked by - which, again, is nonsensical. And the only reason it is even a concern of the Trump administration is because later ballots do, as we see in Seattle, tend to go to Democrats and more progressive candidates. So Washington challenged that previous order. The federal judge did block it. And so this executive order, I believe, has not come out yet. But when it does, I would expect that Washington state and other states that use mail-in ballots will challenge it as well.

[00:28:06] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, certainly more news to come there and we will be following it. The last thing I want to talk about today was a pretty important overturning of a court ruling here in Washington that clears the way for inspection of the immigrant detention center in Tacoma. What happened here?

[00:28:29] Erica Barnett: Yeah, there's a federal decision now that says that a 2023 state law can go into effect, that provides more oversight of conditions at the Tacoma ICE facility and allows the state to go in and actually inspect inside and see what's going on there. So there's been a lot of allegations of abuse in this facility - and it's run by a private company. And those allegations have included cases of tuberculosis, cases of abuse of prisoners - or detainees, rather - and neglect. And so now state officials will presumably be able to go inside and at least see what's going on there in this very large and obviously controversial facility.

[00:29:12] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and it has been a very controversial facility. Over the years, the city of Tacoma has expressed that they do not want an ICE facility in the city. They have not been able to essentially legislate that out of the city previously. Numerous people, including some Congressional members, have attempted to view and inspect the facility - particularly after deaths happen there that were either late in being reported, were not fully explained, don't have what feel like satisfactory answers about what exactly happened in those cases. And being denied entry even to members of Congress. There essentially just seems to be a black site - completely unaccountable facility - where, who knows what is happening inside. And the views that we do get in, the little that we do hear, is alarming and horrifying. Based on the treatment, inconsistent with what we view to be standards and laws here. And even those standards and laws need a lot of work. So it is just very concerning to see how insistent that facility has been in denying access and denying oversight. So hopefully this court ruling overturning the previous ruling that in effect invalidated that state law - was overturned, the state law is now valid, and hopefully we can start to get some answers about what conditions and practices are like and what is actually happening inside that facility. And hopefully putting the people inside at less risk for having to report this themselves and sometimes experiencing retaliation for doing so. So a lot has been alleged that has happened. Hopefully we get some concrete answers now. But really a challenge to see what has been happening throughout the country in immigration facilities. And certainly a lot of concern remains about this one.

[00:31:36] Erica Barnett: Yeah, I said "prison" initially when I was describing this and then corrected myself that it's a detention facility. There shouldn't be any difference, but I think there is a legal difference. Not between the legally required conditions - I don't know exactly what all those are - but between a detention facility where you're talking about people who are just being detained on suspicion of violating laws, some of which are very much in dispute - about our immigration regulations. And people who have been convicted of crimes. I think that, obviously, both types of facilities and other kinds of involuntary detention facilities should be held to high standards of humanity and not mistreating people who are detained. But I do think it's worth noting that these are detention facilities, not prisons. And we're talking about people that haven't necessarily been convicted of any crime at all and are being held under - often extremely unjust circumstances and interpretations of federal immigration law. So it's just stuff like this is obviously - I mean, maybe not obviously - outrageous. That people can't go in and members of Congress, you said, can't go in and see what the federal government is paying private contractors to do with our tax dollars. So I was glad to see this ruling. It seems like a very important step - very small, but very important step in addressing some of the outrages that are happening right now under the Trump administration.

[00:33:02] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, completely agree. And with that, I thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, August 22nd, 2025. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today was Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola, and co-host of the Seattle Nice podcast, Erica Barnett. You can find Erica on Bluesky at @ericacbarnett and on PubliCola.com. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else, you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review and our Tuesday topical shows delivered to your podcast feed - understanding that we may have a slightly modified schedule moving forward as Shannon works through her treatment. But please, if you like the show, leave us a review wherever you listen. You can also get full transcripts of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com.

Thanks for tuning in - we'll talk to you next time.