A few days after he grumpily told The Stranger he hadn’t yet made up his mind, Mayor Ed Murray says he’s backing Hillary Clinton for president.
Murray tells the Seattle Times:
Mayor Ed Murray said he hopes Clinton — who served two terms in the U.S. Senate representing New York state, including New York City — will be the Democratic nominee for president because she’s better equipped to help Seattle.
“I’m endorsing her because she was a U.S. senator who understands big-city issues,” he said. “Whether we’re working the minimum wage, or affordable housing, or homelessness, we’ve got to take this stuff to scale, and we need a partner in the White House who can continue to work with us and who can actually get some things done.”
King County Executive Dow Constantine also endorsed Clinton last week.
Seattle has shown strong support for Clinton’s Democratic rival Bernie Sanders. More than 15,000 people showed up at a Sanders rally over the weekend. Even while endorsing Clinton, Murray told the Times he’d “absolutely be happy supporting either” Sanders or Clinton.
Since becoming mayor, Murray has repeatedly been at odds with Seattle’s far left. He’s a mainstream Democrat opposite socialist city council member Kshama Sawant (who supports Sanders) and he has criticized progressives in Seattle for infighting. In an interview last year, Murray fretted to Ozy.com that, “After everything I’ve accomplished for this city, I’m still ‘the man.’”
Whether he likes it or not, Murray will reinforce that idea tonight when he introduces Clinton at Rainier Beach High School.
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