Letâs get the easy one out of the way first. In citywide Position 9, incumbent Lorena GonzĂĄlez had a comfortable 61 percent of the vote last night. Her closest challenger, neighborhood/Seattle Times candidate Pat Murakami won about 20 percent. GonzĂĄlezâs percentage is down slightly from the 65 percent she won in the primary in 2015, but still a mandate. GonzĂĄlez isnât going anywhere.
Now, the open seat. Incumbent Tim Burgess is retiring from citywide Position 8, which leaves a wide open field. With last nightâs first drop of results, labor leader Teresa Mosqueda was in a clear first place. After a crowd of supporters chanted âTe-re-sa!â at her election night party, Mosqueda said she was confident her lead would hold.
But second placeâwhich will determine who Mosqueda takes on in Novemberâwas a closer call. Tenant advocate Jon Grant looks likely to make it out of the primary and on to the general, setting up an ugly left-on-left fight between now and November. Sara Nelson, the owner of Fremont Brewing backed by the Chamber of Commerce, was very close behind Grant.
Mosqueda won about 31 percent, Grant won about 24 percent, and Nelson about 23 percent. But later voters tend to lean left, so it would take a change to historic trends to push Nelson past Grant. Not impossible, but not likely. Supporters from both camps will be watching the next ballot drops closely.
If it is, as it looks now, Mosqueda vs. Grant, itâll be a months-long fight for Seattleâs left. Mosqueda has backing from just about every corner of Seattleâs Democratic sceneâlabor unions, a majority of the city council, Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal. Sheâs young, sheâs a renter, and her labor cred mostly saves her from the âpro-businessâ label. (It also brings in large amounts of cash.) Grant, on the other hand, has support from two of the councilâs farthest left members, Kshama Sawant and Lisa Herbold, plus Socialist Alternative and the Democratic Socialists of America. Heâs questioning politiciansâ dependence on market solutions for addressing housing affordability. This race will quickly become a local proxy battle over the future of the left and Grant will face a significant uphill battle.
At Grantâs election night party, one of his supporters, Nickelsville resident Sean Smith, said heâs backing Grant because of his housing policies. Smith cited a recent city survey of people experiencing homelessness, which found that the majority of them were already living here when they became homeless.
âTheyâve been priced out, theyâve lost a job, or their rent has gone up,â Smith said. âIf we could make labor understand thatâs going to happen to them and they need a candidate whoâs going to answer to that, then I think we have a real chance.â