Week in Review with Robert Cruickshank - Seattle Elects Progressive Mayor Katie Wilson

Hacks & Wonks 2025 Post-Election Roundtable

"Harrell Concedes to Wilson, Ushering in a New Era in Seattle" by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist 

“Progressive on the edge of a win in Seattle mayor race" by Natalie Fertig from Politico

“Seattle shows it’s a fickle city” by Danny Westneat from The Seattle Times

“The Stranger Should Cover SPS Consistently or Consider NOT Endorsing in Seattle School Board Races” by Albert J. Wong

“The Working Families Party is helping Seattle candidates get elected” by Naomi Ishisaka from The Seattle Times

“Cascadia Forges Ahead on High-Speed Rail Despite Headwinds” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist

Find stories that Crystal is reading here

Listen on your favorite podcast app to all our episodes here

[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 what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it.

If you missed our Tuesday Post-Election Roundtable with Stephen Paolini and Lexi Koren, you can catch it on the Hacks & Wonks YouTube channel or when it gets released as a podcast next week.

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: chair of Sierra Club Seattle, longtime communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank.

[00:00:59] Robert Cruickshank: Thanks for having me on again, Crystal.

[00:01:01] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely - glad to have you here. Before we get started, I just want to give our listeners kind of an update and reminder about our schedule, which has been irregular in terms of releases. Shannon Cheng, our wonderful producer - and just one of the best people walking this earth - is currently battling breast cancer. She always reminds you to get your preventative screenings because that's what caught hers. There were no symptoms, it was just a screening - doing what it was designed to do. So absolutely get all of your preventative screenings. My life has also been lifing lately, so we have had a bit of a modified schedule. We're feeling it out. We'll continue to do so. But just wanted to let you know that is why you don't see us releasing as regularly as we have been.

That said, we have got a lot to catch up on, a lot to talk about. Most of it - just about all of it - related to this November election locally. Starting with the news that we really just got definitively a couple days ago - that Katie Wilson is going to be the next mayor of the city of Seattle. What are your thoughts on this victory? How did she win and how did this come about?

[00:02:21] Robert Cruickshank: I mean, first and foremost, I'm over the moon excited. I've known Katie for about 12 years. She called me up in February saying she was planning to run. And there were a few of us who have known for a while that Harrell was vulnerable. I know that Ron Davis and I were talking about this together about a year ago - that the polling from the Northwest Progressive Institute showed Harrell was underwater, showed Sara Nelson was underwater. It seemed clear that there was a chance, but had no idea who would actually step up and do it.

And then clearly Katie Wilson was thinking along the same lines. And on her own accord - seeing the results, in particular of the Social Housing Initiative, Prop 1A, which passed by a huge margin. And Harrell's preferred alternative Prop 1B failed by a significant margin, with Harrell having been the face of that campaign. That - to Katie Wilson, I think, made it very clear that Harrell was vulnerable and that matched, I think, what she'd been hearing out in the community. That people were unhappy. That sense that Harrell hadn't gotten the job done. That on so many of the issues that the city faces - from affordable housing and affordability more generally, to homelessness, to public safety and beyond - that Harrell just wasn't getting the job done and there was an appetite for change. And to Katie's immense credit, she not only saw that but acted on it. And acted on it at a time when a lot of other people, a lot of other insiders and observers thought she had no chance, thought that Bruce Harrell was a shoo-in for re-election. I heard that phrase all the time in the spring - Oh, Harrell's a shoo-in. He's going to win easily. I'm like - No, he's not. Katie can beat him. And clearly she demonstrated in the primary that she could and she held on and won it in the general election. And we can talk in a moment about exactly how that came about. But I think the main piece of this is Katie seeing that the public was unhappy, understanding why they were unhappy, and understanding that she had answers that would resonate and they did.

[00:04:17] Crystal Fincher: When you talk about - she had answers that would resonate, what was it that resonated with voters? How did she cut through?

[00:04:24] Robert Cruickshank: I mean, she has the experience of being a renter, of trying to raise a family in the city. As someone like me - in our early to mid-40s - trying to have kids and bring them up in the city, it's really hard. It's really expensive. And she could connect with so many voters on that basis. She also had the experience of having delivered policy wins. She had gone around the region and in places like Tukwila, Burien and others - passed higher minimum wage initiatives, had helped get tenant protections passed, including here in Seattle. And of course, she played a major role in getting the JumpStart Tax done here in Seattle, which is the basis of our city's ability to have any budget at all at this point. And she had that combination of the policy experience, the campaign experience, and the lived experience that I think really resonated. I think people were looking for that. People were looking for someone they could believe in, someone they could trust, someone who had a track record of delivering on the things they wanted delivered. And that was a big contrast to Bruce Harrell.

[00:05:30] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. So now, another element about Bruce Harrell in this race that wasn't necessarily about his resume or experience was just the controversy and scandals surrounding the Mayor's office, the police department, other departments, the amount of lawsuits that he's facing in the city. What role do you think scandal, and particularly the treatment of women, played in this race?

[00:06:01] Robert Cruickshank: I think it played a substantial role. And it's not something that was mentioned in the ads or the mailers that people got - or if it was, it wasn't frequent down the stretch in the fall. But I think it shaped the public's view of Bruce Harrell for months and years leading into his reelection. One thing I know I heard a lot of people talking about was - It'll be nice that we'll have a mayor who's not going to pull a gun on a pregnant woman in a parking lot. - referencing something Bruce Harrell was alleged to have done in Omaha several decades back. That all the scandals about how he treated women in his office, in the Mayor's office - including his own niece, Monisha Harrell, who had a great article interview with her at KUOW talking about just the awful experience she had. That really eroded public support in Bruce Harrell. I think the public was already unhappy with him for not delivering. But then when they saw what he was really doing in office - running it kind of as an old boys' club and being really sexist to people. And scandal after scandal about how staff are behaving and are being treated - I think that further eroded public confidence in Bruce and left the electorate ready to hear from someone who's going to bring competent, scandal-free management to the Mayor's office. I cannot imagine Katie Wilson getting involved in a scandal. Like she is someone who will make sure to pay her fare when she boards the bus. Like nothing is going to stick to Katie because she's just a normal person who follows the rules, plays by the rules, and wants to help people do well. And I think the public is really hungry for that kind of leadership that's going to be focused on making their lives better rather than being about their own ego as a mayor.

[00:07:35] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Now, this race is happening in the context of several other races in the city of Seattle. We had the City Attorney race, two citywide Council seats, as well as the District 2 Council seat - all swept by significant margins by progressive candidates. We also had a number of legislative races where in Republican versus Democratic races, the Democrats won. In moderate Democrat versus progressive Democrat races, the progressive Democrat won. What does this say about voters in Seattle and more broadly across the state?

[00:08:12] Robert Cruickshank: Well, I think it says a couple things, one of which is they want a progressive Democratic Party. That the electorate now in the state is not just blue, not just default Democrats - they want progressive Democrats. And you mentioned those races - whether it is the Seattle Mayor and City Council or some of these state legislative fights like Edwin Obras and Kevin Schilling just south in the 33rd District. Whether it's Amy Walen, the centrist Democrat trying to take on Vandana Slatter, who got appointed to the State Senate on the Eastside, east of Lake Washington. The progressive Democrat won. And what that shows is that this is becoming a more progressive state, not just a bluer state. That is where the public is. That is becoming the mainstream political resting place of the voter, of the state. And I think there are a lot of Democrats who've been around a while. who don't get that, who don't recognize that. I think Bruce Harrell finally figured that out after the primary, and it was too late for him. He was able to claw his way into contention, obviously. His loss is a narrow one. And I think it's narrow in part because he did try to appeal to that progressive Seattle electorate with things like the sales tax initiative that did pass - that he worked on with Alexis Mercedes Rinck. He tried to make himself sound like he cared about grocery store closures, but it's too little too late - the public had already concluded that he would never deliver on the kind of progressive agenda they wanted.

[00:09:42] Crystal Fincher: Now we talk about the state becoming more progressive. Sometimes that word "progressive" is a stand-in - people have their own ideas. When it comes to policy and what people are favoring specifically - what are they looking for? What does that mean?

[00:09:59] Robert Cruickshank: So I think poll after poll shows this - and you can look at the results, certainly of the initiatives last year in 2024, especially around the capital gains tax, which fended off a repeal by quite a wide margin. Voters want to tax the rich to fund public services. That is conclusive evidence from polling and election outcomes. That is where the clear majority of Washington voters across the state, east or west, urban or rural, big city, small town. There's a clear, stable majority for that. People want it. And they want good services. They want to know that the government's going to fund great schools, that we're going to provide food for people. I mean, we saw such a great outpouring in the community over the last two weeks, when it looked like SNAP benefits might be going away thanks to the shutdown. People rose to the occasion - to dig into their own pockets or try to do what they could to keep people fed. And they want to see the state government do that. They want to see healthcare taken care of. They want to see affordable housing funded and built. These are just common sense things that Washington voters - and in particular Seattle voters, but not exclusively Seattle voters - want. And it used to be the case, you could say 10, 15, 20 years ago, that okay - Well, maybe you liberals in Seattle, you lefties in Seattle want to tax the rich. But outside the state, that doesn't play very well. That was sort of the conventional wisdom for a long time. It's not anymore. The conventional wisdom is now that these core progressive policies of tax the rich to fund great public services is the clear majority across Washington state.

[00:11:32] Crystal Fincher: Now there are people who are questioning - if voters are really saying this in Seattle, the Mayor's race was really close in a way that the Council and City Attorney's race wasn't. What does that mean in terms of what kind of a mandate Katie Wilson has and how to move forward?

[00:11:52] Robert Cruickshank: Well, I think there are questions, certainly - why was it so close? It didn't look close in the primary, some people think. I would actually argue that it is consistent. Katie Wilson got around 51% of the vote in the primary. She's going to end up with 50.5% here in the general. She's been stable. Bruce Harrell was down by 8 points after the primary votes were counted. He's now going to be down by less than a percentage point. What he was able to do was close that gap - I think, by two things. One, having a series of attacks against Katie Wilson. His campaign was almost entirely attacks on Katie Wilson. That will leave an impact, especially on someone who is new to the electorate, or the electorate does not know well. Katie Wilson has been around Seattle politics a long time. Those of us who have done the work in City Hall and elsewhere know her really well. She's a fixture. She's experienced. But the public didn't know her. And so that made it possible for Harrell to try to define her and take advantage of that inexperience.

Harrell also did, as we said, try to position himself as more progressive than some of the other citywide candidates - more progressive than Sara Nelson, more progressive than Ann Davison. But I think ultimately there's just such a huge level of scrutiny applied to the mayor. You and I know this - we've worked in a Mayor's office. That office is under a microscope in a way that no other elected office in this state is, including the governor, I would say. The Mayor of Seattle gets so much more scrutiny. And that will make it hard for anyone, especially a progressive, to win. We've only had this century, two progressive mayors. And both of them, Mike McGinn and Katie Wilson, won their elections by the skin of their teeth. So that shows that this is hard. Voters seem to hold the mayor to a different, maybe a little more conservative standard. But Katie was able to overcome that. And I think people will be very happy with what they see from her in office. They're going to see someone who's really pragmatic, but has the right values, is going to get stuff done. But getting in there is certainly a challenge - which she met.

[00:13:42] Crystal Fincher: Now let's look forward. Now we are about to set on the transition. What can we expect from that? How does Katie prepare to take office? And what can she expect through this process?

[00:13:56] Robert Cruickshank: Well, I mean, Katie's been preparing for this for a while. And not just in the sense of she's done the work. She's also been thinking about what her administration would look like, certainly after the primary. And she had a big win in the primary - over 50% - became very clear that she could be the next mayor very well and started thinking about this. And there are a lot of great people - really progressive people - who've done great policy work inside City Hall, outside City Hall that she can draw upon to do the work. And filling those important roles, whether it's budget director, chief of staff, deputy mayors, staffing the departments - so I think people are going to find that there's a really deep bench of talent out there that she will call upon to help her in office. And she's going to be surrounded by some really sharp, smart people. I think she's also going to have to prepare for incoming attacks. There are a lot of sharks out there on the water who want to come after her, and they will be relentless. And I think she's going to be prepared for that. She knows that. She's no fool. But I think she'll be ready to handle that as it comes.

[00:14:58] Crystal Fincher: Now, when you say there are sharks in the water and they're going to be relentless. Certainly both of us have some context for this, as people who were around for the McGinn days and in fact worked in the administration and on the campaigns. But what does that look like? What should people be on the lookout for?

[00:15:16] Robert Cruickshank: I think there are several sharks in the water. One is The Seattle Times, especially the editorial side. They will try to make her look bad in ways that are often unfair. One thing that stood out to me when I joined McGinn's administration in early 2011 - there was a story written that I had been hired to be McGinn's image advisor, and that I was responsible for him wearing suits and losing weight. Now, if anyone actually has met me - I'm not a schlub, but I'm no one's image advisor, certainly not my own. And that was, to me, a sign like - Oh, The Times doesn't know what they're talking about. And that just got reinforced over and over again. Now, I think they have better reporters now. People like David Kroman are really good at what they do. I think they're going to be more fair. But the editorial side in particular is going to come at her. The Chamber is another shark in the water. They desperately are going to want to get her out. They're going to want to stop her, frustrate her agenda. So I think they will be a shark.

I think there will be other councilmembers, who will be gunning for her job in 2029. We know that when McGinn was mayor - Tim Burgess, who was Council President at the time, became deputy mayor under Bruce Harrell. Did the Mitch McConnell strategy. Mitch McConnell, of course, decided to die wins to Barack Obama. Tim Burgess did the same thing to Mike McGinn. The Council would be hostile and conflictual with McGinn rather than going along to get along. Councilmembers may try that. I think they're going to find that to be a very bad strategy. The councilmembers who are up for re-election in 2027 need to look at what happened to the councilmembers this year and see that if they're not progressive, if they're not trying to help Katie succeed, I think they're going to struggle for re-election in 2027. A couple other sharks we should mention. Right-wing influencers Brandi Kruse, Jonathan Choe are going to be trying to smear her. SPD, whether it's the command staff or SPOG, are going to be some of the most dangerous sharks out there trying to undermine her, especially on public safety. We're probably in a recession. That's going to be a real problem for anyone. And finally, there's the great orange shark in D.C., Donald Trump, who is going to be a thorn in anyone's side who's an elected official. in a blue city. I think he's going to try to test Katie Wilson. He's going to find that Katie Wilson is made of more steel than he thinks.

[00:17:28] Crystal Fincher: I think that's a fair assessment. Now, I want to talk about an article written this week in The Seattle Times - a column by Danny Westneat - where essentially he's saying Seattle is a fickle city. Look at these voting results. They're progressive, they're moderate and conservative, they don't know what they want, they keep voting mayors out - even though I would mention this mayor thing keeps on being mentioned, and Seattle didn't vote out four mayors in a row. Two of them actually - one of them resigned in disgrace, another decided not to run for re-election. So it's not quite the situation and scenario that people try to make it seem. But what do you make of this contention that Seattle voters are fickle?

[00:18:15] Robert Cruickshank: I don't think they're fickle. I think there are two things going on here. One is that our election cycles are disjointed. We elect a mayor, a city attorney, and two citywide councilmembers in 2025. But we elect the rest of the City Council from the districts two years later. So it makes it difficult for anyone to come in and have a real head of steam. This is one of the biggest challenges Katie Wilson is going to face is - she'll have at least three allies on the Council, but you need five votes to get something done. So when, for example, progressives did really well in the 2019 City Council elections, they were frustrated by a Mayor Jenny Durkan, who systematically undermined everything they were trying to do. Then you get to 2021 - Harrell wins, and he and the Council are not in alignment. And so that makes it hard for either the progressive wing or the more centrist business wing to really govern because they don't really have both the Mayor's office and control the Council at the same time. Now, after 2023 they did. And voters very clearly rendered their judgment on that. They were not happy.

I think that the other thing to keep in mind about what Westneat's writing about is - Seattle voters are truly progressive, genuinely. But what that means to them - I think - I think it means Scandinavia. I think they want to be Stockholm or Copenhagen. And part of what that includes are clean, safe cities. And they want a progressivism that gets people out of tents and into shelter, that gets people off the streets and into treatment. And I think that earlier this decade, for a moment there, a crucial moment, I think some progressives lost sight of that, but they've adjusted. And you can see in Alexis Mercedes Rinck's huge victory - she has gotten more votes for a Seattle city office than anybody in history and has done it twice. You can see the huge victories for Dionne Foster over Sara Nelson, the big win for Eddie Lin. These are really great, sharp people. They're all pragmatic progressives who understand that we have to make progress on public safety and homelessness in ways that are compassionate and truly progressive, but that also aren't just leaving problems alone to fester. And I think that's the key insight. And I don't think voters are fickle about that. They just haven't had a city government that is fully aligned with where the electorate is. And I think we're getting closer there than ever before.

[00:20:33] Crystal Fincher: I agree with that. I think one thing that people do miss - exactly what you said - essentially, you have to deliver. You can't be all talk. I think most progressives are not. Katie Wilson certainly is not. But sometimes in the discussions and punditry, they talk about what policy positions are, but don't really connect that to - and are you delivering for residents in the city? Do they see an improvement in the areas that you're talking about? I think Stephen Paolini the other night when we had our live stream made an excellent point, in that - one, something that Bruce talked about, that some others have talked about was sometimes just talking about how much they invest in stuff. We invested a ton of money in affordable housing - more than anyone has before. And are people feeling that on the ground? It doesn't seem like it. They're feeling that their rent is higher than it's ever been before. Childcare is more than it's ever been before. More people are out on the street. People are wrestling with housing costs in a way that frankly we have not seen. And so, you can kind of wax poetic about - Hey, we have this accomplishment and that accomplishment. But what does it really mean if people don't feel it, if they don't see at least some progress? That's going to matter a lot, as well as the ability to just effectively and competently manage. The City is a large enterprise that requires sound and effective management. I think that's an area where Bruce Harrell struggled very visibly. I think that's something that McGinn did particularly well when he was in office. And that often goes unnoticed and under-discussed, but I think that's major. What else would you say is key to Katie having a successful first year and first term?

[00:22:29] Robert Cruickshank: I think having a clear vision of what she's trying to accomplish overall for the city. And how each piece fits into that vision. And not biting off more than she can chew. And this is where I think Katie's fundamental pragmatism comes in. I don't think she's going to come in and try to do everything all at once immediately. I think she's going to come in and have in mind - all right, here's what I think I can accomplish in 2026, given the reality of the economy, the City Council, and what's happening in the State Legislature. And she's going to try to do stuff that is attainable, but also actually makes a difference for people. I think she also understands very clearly that she has to show that she can deliver. We all are living amid the rubble of the failure of the Biden administration to communicate its victories effectively. And we could talk about whether they did enough, won enough things. Maybe they didn't. But the Biden administration totally failed to communicate what they were doing. And I think the Wilson administration - to succeed - is going to have to show and explain and constantly talk about all of the things they're doing and how it fits into the bigger picture and how they are delivering. I think Katie really fundamentally gets that and is going to be surrounded by a group of people who want to do that.

[00:23:43] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, a lot was made about Katie's experience. And one thing that I think a lot of people missed, that we actually discussed with Katie before on this program - we've talked to her here on Hacks & Wonks before she ran - is, man, she excels at that. She excels at communicating across coalitions, keeping people focused and all pointed in one direction, unified towards a big goal. With people across - with varied ideologies, different interests kind of overall or specialties. But the way to distill what people on the ground need to policy and putting together a coalition of people and organizations that can turn it into reality has really been a strength of hers and I think is a really important trait for an executive to have that really went underappreciated - and really, frankly, disrespected in this campaign.

[00:24:39] Robert Cruickshank: I think that's right. I think a lot of people that knock on Katie - Oh, she doesn't have experience running a big organization or managing a big budget. It fundamentally misunderstands what the role of the mayor is. And fundamentally misunderstands what the job of the mayor is. The mayor is not buried in a spreadsheet all the time. The mayor is not day-to-day managing 11,000 staff. If they are, they're going to fail. And in fact, one of the biggest knocks on Jenny Durkan from City staff is that she meddled too much and as a result things didn't get done. You need a mayor who understands those details, who can be familiar with those details and intervene when needed, but has a budget director who knows the details, who has department directors who are running their shops efficiently so that Katie can be the one to bring them together, along with people outside City Hall and the public - you can't get anything done without that - united around a vision to implement key policy. The mayor is a decider, they are a convener, they are a communicator. Good mayors know this and exceed at that and all those things - deciding, communicating, convening - Katie Wilson excels at all three.

[00:25:44] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Now I want to talk about the role of endorsements in these races in the city of Seattle, including in the school board races, which we haven't talked much about yet. How do you think the endorsements impacted the races that we saw and some differences between them?

[00:26:04] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, I think that clearly The Stranger, I think, won every single race in which they endorsed. I don't think there's a single one they lost. The Times was more mixed. And that, I think, reflects generally, again, the progressive lean of the Seattle electorate and the fact that the people The Stranger endorsed were generally sensible, reasonable, pragmatic progressives. The Stranger took a lot of knocks earlier this decade for endorsing people who were seen by some as more extremist and unelectable. I'm not saying that that's what I think they were, but that's a common criticism that was levied. I think The Stranger has, in the last few years, tried to address that. But it's clear that The Stranger's endorsement is the most influential, particularly in school board, for example. Albert Wong, who's a researcher and a parent advocate, wrote earlier this week that since 2005 - over the last 20 years - only two people have gotten elected to the school board without a Stranger endorsement, and nobody has done it since 2011. So if you get that Stranger endorsement, you are a shoo-in for the school board, which, this year they got three of the four right in my mind. But I thought they really got the Sarah Clark race wrong. And as a result, nothing's going to change on the school board or in the school district. You have essentially continued the status quo. But it's really, I think, interesting and potentially problematic that one institution has so much influence and so much power, especially one that isn't accountable. Like, a lot of us like The Stranger. I like their writers. They do good work. At the same time - man, if you look at an organization that has that much power and no accountability, that's hard. If you don't like the endorsements that your local Democratic Party organization makes, you can change them. You can go change the people making the endorsements or you can vote for the endorsements yourself. And in fact, that's happened in almost every local Democratic Party organization in Seattle over the last 10 years. Progressives have ousted the more centrist establishment types from leadership roles. And those endorsements now from your local Democratic Party org in Seattle are very fundamentally progressive. But that's a built-in accountability mechanism that you don't have with The Stranger. And so we're in this weird situation where - yeah, we love their endorsements, they're influential, they help us win elections. But man, if things go sideways, what recourse do we have? So it's a really tricky place to be.

[00:28:21] Crystal Fincher: Now, you mentioned a little bit - like the legislative district endorsements for Democrats now pretty consistently favoring more progressive candidates. What are the other publications, endorsers that progressives particularly should be looking towards, in addition to The Stranger?

[00:28:40] Robert Cruickshank: Well, Naomi Ishisaka at The Seattle Times this week had a really interesting article on the Washington Working Families Party. And full disclosure, I've been part of this effort early on. I remember early in the 2010s, Steve Williamson, who's Pramila Jayapal's husband, and I and a few other people kept saying - Gosh, we wish we had a Working Families Party in Washington state. Well, we did it. We worked with a few other folks and launched one in 2017. And early in this decade, in the 2020s, we tried to expand it out and thought about - Well, how do we endorse? And how do we endorse in a way that is really transparent and inclusive? You know, you could have people on a board make the decisions, but that just felt gross because it's just a bunch of insiders doing insider things. And so what we came up with - and this is an idea I helped create, but I'm not saying it to toot my horn, I'm saying it for full disclosure - Working Families Party came up with a really interesting model where people who want their endorsement have to go to a public meeting, whether in-person or on Zoom, and be grilled by Working Families Party members and activists. And by members, it's either someone who donated money, or someone who took an action, or has been active with the organization. So there are a lot of people who maybe can't afford regular dues - they should be included too because they're active. And then those people, after they grill the candidates - they vote. And their endorsements are pretty progressive. And I think that that's a really interesting model for people who are out there doing the work to be the ones doing the endorsing and holding people accountable. I really like that approach, and I've seen it work. I've seen it grow. I'm less involved in WFP these days because I've got so many other things going on, but also it's just taken off. The National Working Families Party pays now for a full-time organizer to be here, and it's just taking off in a really fun way. I think that's a great model of bottom-up grassroots endorsements and accountability that I think potentially helps address the questions of who's making the decisions and why.

[00:30:36] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, we've seen the Working Families Party be very effective and influential in major races across the country - in New York, in Los Angeles, and certainly building a larger footprint here in Washington. I think we can expect to see more from them as we move forward and moving more in this direction.

Now, I'm wondering about the school board races more specifically. What did voters say they preferred with who they elected on the school board and what can we expect to see as we move forward, particularly as they navigate the budget challenges that they're experiencing because of a lack of funding from the state?

[00:31:20] Robert Cruickshank: So voters, I think, sent mixed messages about the school board. They didn't elect a clear slate. They went with what The Stranger endorsed. The Stranger's endorsements were not super coherent in terms of policy and outcome. They elected Joe Mizrahi and Vivian Song, who had both been on the board. Mizrahi was appointed in spring 2024, and now he gets a full term. Vivian Song coming back after resigning last year - elected herself now to another full term. And they were very active and loud against the school closure efforts. And obviously, I was a strong supporter of and helped the campaigns of Mizrahi and Song and Sarah Clark, who we'll talk about in a bit. In South Seattle, Jen LaVallee got elected - I've known her for a few years. She was one of the parents who organized against school closures. She is open to closing some schools depending on the circumstance and conditions, but that was fundamentally different from what was proposed last year.

And then I think the real race that decides the sort of direction of the school district was the one for the Northwest Seattle seat between Sarah Clark, who had also been appointed in 2024 alongside Joe Mizrahi, and her challenger Kathleen Smith. And again, it's another race where I did a lot of work for Sarah. And that's the one that was the most contrast between the two candidates, but I don't think the public ever really saw that. Where Smith was hedging on whether she would support closing schools, hedging on what sort of reforms she'd make to school governance - Clark was very clear about both of these things. And I think that's why that race was so much closer. You can see that both Vivian Song and Joe Mizrahi are winning with nearly 80% of the vote. Jen LaVallee, who also got a Stranger endorsement, is about 60% of the vote. But the Kathleen Smith-Sarah Clark race is pretty close, 53% to 47% or so. And I think that that was a sign that voters were not totally sold with what The Stranger was saying - their endorsements of Smith were more criticisms of Clark than saying why Smith was better. But Smith is now the one on the board for another two years to fill out that term. So we'll see where it goes, but as I look at it, I don't know that anything fundamentally changes at Seattle Public Schools on the board level.

Now they are hiring a new superintendent, a guy named Ben Shuldiner, who is currently superintendent of schools in Lansing, Michigan. He has experience in New York. He had been appointed by Mayor Bill de Blasio to be on the New York City Schools board in the 2010s. He ran a school out there as a principal. So he's going to be really interesting in what he brings to Seattle, and it's unclear exactly where he's going to go on some of these policy questions. But I think with the school district, we are in a moment of change, but nobody's really sure what the change is. And status quo is a real possibility that that continues for another two years.

[00:34:05] Crystal Fincher: What does status quo mean when they're facing a budget deficit and the prospect of closing schools is on the table and they have to do something - one would think?

[00:34:17] Robert Cruickshank: They have to, and it's unclear what that is. I mean, the argument against closing schools is that it doesn't actually save any money. Rahm Emanuel closed 50 schools in Chicago in 2013, and it didn't make a dent in Chicago Public Schools' deficit. In fact, it made it worse because families saw that and thought - Oh, I'm leaving this district. And it harms student learning. There's studies that show that students whose schools are closed do more poorly in the school that they then attend later on. And it's sort of dropping a bomb in the middle of a community. All of a sudden your community asset where people gather, they play on the playground, they have community meetings, it's all gone now. So that has real impact. But the problem is we haven't seen out of this district lately a real effort to partner with the public or even elected officials and other places on this. There was a meeting last week at Rainier Beach High School where the new superintendent Ben Shuldiner met with some community members and some elected officials. And one of the elected officials talking his ear off was State Senate Majority Leader Jamie Pedersen, who is a Democrat representing Capitol Hill, the 43rd District. He's got kids in Seattle public schools. He's married to a teacher. And Pedersen - very interested in what is going to happen at Seattle Public Schools. I think a lot of us are. In terms of - but do we pull away from the status quo of like trying to close schools and shut down programs and have a standardized educational model? Or do we go somewhere different that actually tries to grow enrollment, treat kids not as widgets but as individuals, move away from test scores towards a holistic curriculum? That is all really up in the air. And I think we're going to find out in the next few months where that goes.

[00:35:55] Crystal Fincher: We will certainly be paying attention and appreciate your insight and expertise there. Now I want to talk about the region, where we saw - outside of the city of Seattle, kind of all across the state - councils, cities, a number of them moving in a more progressive direction. We saw the Burien Council kind of kick out their moderate majority to bring in a progressive majority, particularly after their mayor, Kevin Schilling, had been kind of on the forefront of anti-homeless, really hostile and expensive policies there. We saw Bellevue moving in a more progressive direction. Tacoma choosing a more progressive mayor over one that was viewed by people as more moderate. The city of Spokane having a liberal progressive majority on their council now to go along with their Democratic mayor. What do you think this is saying about suburbs, about outlying places, more rural, on the east side, on the west side, north and south - about where the state is heading? And does this say anything about what we should be looking for in the upcoming legislative session?

[00:37:11] Robert Cruickshank: Oh, I think so, for sure. I think that, as we said earlier in the episode, we are seeing Washington become not just more Democratic, but more progressive. And these election results really confirm that. There have been, for the last 10, 15 years, really pitched battles throughout the King County suburbs between MAGA Republicans and more progressive Democrats. You mentioned Bellevue, for example. Naren Briar, a young Kurdish-American woman, very progressive, defeated Conrad Lee, a longtime fixture on that Bellevue City Council. He donated $50,000 to Trump's inauguration. This guy is fundamentally MAGA. And Naren beat him. And I think that is a real sign, along with Vandana Slatter's victory over Amy Walen in a legislative district that covers a large part of Bellevue, another sign of where the region is headed. You mentioned Spokane. Spokane will now have a very progressive city council. Burien will. A number of progressive Democrats won in their races in Bothell, in Kirkland, in Redmond, in Newcastle. So around, in the metropolitan parts of the state where the population lives, it's becoming more progressive, not just Democratic. In the rural, rural areas, I think it's still maybe a bit more up for grabs. But those voters do clearly want that progressive economic agenda. They want to tax the Puget Sound billionaires so that they can get good schools in their own communities - that's popular as well.

It's really unclear, though, whether the Legislature gets this. And right before the election, there was an article in the Washington State Standard where State Senator June Robinson, who chairs the Ways and Means Committee there - represents Everett - basically told legislators, Don't ask me for any new spending. We're not going to be able to do it. And I saw that and I just thought - wow, that's out of touch with where the public is. At a time where, like we said, the public is really mobilizing around SNAP benefits, really wants to fight for healthcare protections, you could go to the ballot or even just pass it in the Legislature next session, a wealth tax or some other tax on the rich to fund these things and be hailed as heroes. The public will love it. In fact, this year, Microsoft - their CEO Brad Smith and their corporate allies spent a lot of money to try to defeat those progressive Democrats. They spent a lot of money to try to elect Michelle Caldier over Deb Krishnadasan in the 26th District State Senate race down in Gig Harbor, Bremerton. Failed. Every single race they spent money on failed, lost. So there is a clear mandate for Olympia to pass progressive tax and spending policy. If they don't do it, I think they're going to have an electorate that is pretty deeply unhappy with them.

[00:39:50] Crystal Fincher: Is Bob Ferguson going to allow that?

[00:39:52] Robert Cruickshank: I mean, this is, I think, the big question. So another thing that came out last week, and it was The Urbanist that reported this. In an article about high-speed rail conference for the Cascadia Corridor, Bob Ferguson gets up there and talks about Christine Gregoire, who's been very active in this. And he touts how close he is to Gregoire - that if you want to get to Ferguson, you can call up Christine Gregoire, that they talk regularly. Now Gregoire - for those who weren't here or are not familiar with her, who are listening to this episode - she was governor of Washington state from 2004 to 2012. A very centrist, corporate-friendly Democrat who in her second term in office, 2008 to 2012, imposed quite a lot of austerity on the state. Huge budget cuts to healthcare, to human services, to education. This was deeply unpopular. Jay Inslee came in in 2012 and marked a shift towards a more progressive direction. And the dude won three terms in office, growing Democratic majorities the entire time. So if you're Bob Ferguson and you're the governor of the state and you want to succeed and get reelected in 2028, you would probably look towards Inslee's model rather than Gregoire's model. But I don't think he is. He seems to be very consciously positioning himself in the Gregoire model. And I don't think that's where the electorate is. And I think there could be a conflict coming up between the electorate and Democrats in Olympia. It feels like it's starting to bubble and boil. That may be a big story of 2026.

[00:41:25] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, we could certainly talk about election results for hours on end. I think we'll leave it here. I really appreciate your expertise, your insight into what we saw this election and what we can expect. Is there anything else that you're looking for, or that you would tell people to keep their eye on as we move forward?

[00:41:49] Robert Cruickshank: I really think the upcoming legislative session is going to be important. I think that the budget deficit the state is facing is growing. We're probably entering a recession, even though Trump won't allow joblessness numbers to be published anymore - I think that is a reason for that. And I think that the budget cuts that have happened in Congress and in D.C. are going to hit. So I think there's going to be a real fight brewing in the Legislature. Even though Democratic leaders there don't expect or want it, it's coming for them one way or another. And I think all of us who want Washington state to be a beacon in the dark years of Trump's presidency - who want to help people get a place to live, get food to eat, get shelter, get a good job, get healthcare, get education for their kids - we're going to have to be willing to shove the Legislature pretty hard, I think, in the next few months to step up and do it because the public is ready for it and wants it.

[00:42:48] Crystal Fincher: Well, thank you for your insight. And thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, November 14th, 2025. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today was chair of Sierra Club Seattle, longtime communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank. You can find Robert on Bluesky at @robertcruickshank.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Bluesky at @HacksAndWonks. And you can find me at @finchfrii with two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe and please leave a review wherever you listen. It helps us tremendously. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at OfficialHacksandWonks.com.

Thank you for tuning in - talk to you next time.