By Erica C. Barnett
In a short but spirited debate that aired on the Seattle Channel Friday, Mayor Bruce Harrell repeatedly attacked his frontrunning opponent, policy nerd and Transit Riders Union leader Katie Wilson, as a know-nothing policy lightweight with zero leadership experience, while explaining away his own missteps, including the ongoing budget deficits that have resulted, in part, from his own proposals to increase city spending, as the result of circumstances beyond his control.
During the debate, Harrell consistently spoke over Wilson, interrupted her, and repeatedly posed his own questions, then wouldn’t let Wilson answer them.
Repeatedly, Harrell took over the role of moderator (to the consternation, no doubt, of actual moderator Brian Callanan) and needled Wilson with rhetorical questions that seemed designed to suggest his challenger—a longtime labor and transit activist who helped craft the JumpStart payroll tax and led several successful minimum wage campaigns— had no business coming anywhere near the mayor’s office. (At one point, Harrell, an attorney, noted that Wilson “has no experience in constitutional law, in arguing in front of courts to be able to protect the people that matter most,” which is not part of the mayor’s job.)
Harrell, who has claimed (unjustifiably) to have created 3,000 new units of housing for homeless Seattle residents, accused Wilson of having “all the platitudes” but “no plan” to build 4,000 new shelter units, as she has vowed to do. “You see the weakness in her platform—it’s just complaints with no solutions,” he said. In comparison, Harrell claimed, his administration successfully referred thousands of people to shelter. (More on why that’s a poor metric for addressing homelessness here.)
Then Harrell accused Wilson of “taking credit for the minimum wage” in Seattle and said businesses were “hemorrhaging money” because of the JumpStart payroll tax she supported.
“There’s been no evidence at all that we haven’t supported” social housing, “we just wanted it paid for differently,” Harrell continued. In fact, Harrell appeared on campaign materials for a proposal to reject social housing and instead use existing funds to pay for traditional affordable housing, something the city already does.
Wilson did get a moment to explain the difference between the social housing measure (which she has said inspired her to jump into the race) and the alternative Harrell supported, which would have deprived social housing of funding. She also corrected Harrell’s false claim about the minimum wage: “I have never taken credit for Seattle minimum wage. What I have rightly taken credit for is leading and coordinating campaigns in the cities of incorporating King County and Burien to raise the minimum wage to the highest in the country.”
Wilson also pointed out that the Jumpstart payroll tax has provided the money to cover gaps in the city budget year after year, even as the mayor and council have piled on new spending that has contributed to a structural budget deficit that now tops $240 million budget. Harrell characterized deficits during his administration as “a very tough hand” he was “dealt,” and changed the subject to accuse Wilson of wanting to eliminate the entire police department.
Instead of responding directly to that claim (Wilson wrote a piece in 2020 about what defunding the police would realistically look like), Wilson accused Harrell of making repeated bad hires that have harmed morale at SPD. “You hired and stood by Adrian Diaz as police chief, and under his reign, SPD lost many high-integrity career officers. Morale tanked,” Wilson said. “It’s weird to be the one saying this in this race, but the police actually have a really important role to play. That’s not happening right now.”
Addressing Callanan, Harrell responded, “It’s pretty rich of her to say that. …. She’s never led anything. Number one, just look at her background. I mean, she’s run a nonprofit. I think one employee.”
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When Wilson also brought up two other disastrous hires: Pedro Gomez, a key staffer who was accused of sexual assault and harassment by several women who met him through his official role at the city, and Darrell Powell, a longtime Harrell friend who spent a brief and tumultuous time as head of the regional homelessness authority—Harrell said he wasn’t to blame. “If you actually had experience of hiring people, which clearly you do not, you’ll realize that sometimes you get it right and sometimes you can make corrections, and you have to be nimble.” Harrell defended Powell, who was accused of referring to an employee as a “retard” and fostering a hostile work environment for LGBTQ staffers, by citing his MBA and CPA degrees.
“When you run an organization of 14,000 employees, you have to make these tough decisions. That’s why the stakes are so high in this particular election, because you are really, literally hiring a person. If you look at her—but she doesn’t talk much about her personal story, by the way. There’s no ability to lead an organization, no budget. What’s the highest budget you’ve ever managed?”
As Wilson began to respond, Harrell interrupted her. “What I’m trying to impress upon everyone that’s listening is that an executive has to have executive experience. Even before this, I was elected to the City Council, as president twice. [I was] a managing partner at a law firm. I know how to manage people. … These are tough decisions. Katie, and if you’ve never managed any employees, you should at least tell them. Maybe they’d accept that—'[it’s] the city of Seattle, I’m hoping to be the mayor of an $8 billion organization, and I’ve never managed any employees,'” Harrell said.
On the topic of police surveillance, Harrell accused Wilson of claiming to speak “on behalf of minorities” while “ignoring” the opinions of Seattle Councilmembers Joy Hollingsworth and Debora Juarez, two women of color who voted to expand camera surveillance earlier this week. (No mention of another woman of color on the council, Alexis Mercedes Rinck, who opposed the bill.)
“How rich is it for this person to talk about protecting my community?” Harrell said. “We ran into the same same arguments when I proposed body cameras [for police]. Body cameras are put for the protection of communities of color. Now this surveillance will be used smartly and not to the detriment of the very same people that my opponent seems to want to speak on their behalf.”
The law the council passed expanding surveillance, Harrell continued, has plenty of “safeguards” to ensure the footage can’t be used to prosecute immigrants and people seeking abortions or gender-affirming care.
Not even the most ardent surveillance supporters on the city council were so bold as to make this claim when they passed the legislation earlier this week; instead, they added an amendment saying the city can shut down the cameras for 60 days if the feds come after SPD’s footage, as the many civil-rights groups that opposed the legislation believe they will.
Harrell concluded by calling Wilson’s plan for creating new shelter beds “ridiculous,” calling Wilson herself “a person that gives platitudes, that will not answer a question,” and accusing her of being “hypocritical” by “talk[ing] about the need for public safety.”
Bruce is clearly desperate, and did not learn anything from his disastrous interview with The Stranger who noted his over-the-top “Trump-like” aggressive demeanor which is completely unsuitable for a mayor of Seattle. Seattle does not need or want a pit-bull as its mayor who dominates everyone, we want a thoughtful, reflective, respectful mayor who is able to take responsibility for what goes right and what goes wrong in the city. Bruce keeps harping on Katie’s experience, not realizing this is the same right-wing, Republican attack used against Obama’s community organizer creds, and he turned out to be one of the best presidents this country has ever seen. No, Seattle does not want to become a police-state desired by Trump, it wants to be a shining example of how to reduce crime through smart social services and community policing, which features restorative justice and empathy training for offenders so that they feel the pain of their victims as though it is happening to them. THAT is what reduces crime and recidivism even further, not the “tough on (visible) crime” and police buildup of the 90s that resulted in the warehousing of mostly black and brown men, and the poor. Police abuse of power and excessive force, devastating black and brown families by creating single-earner “baby mama” households, and criminalizing poverty and mental illness was one of the worst outcomes of those tough on crime policies, and Seattle, like most progressive cities, was embarrassed to be a part of that.
Interesting perspective. I can understand why some like Herold and Joy Hollingsworth feel irritated that this entitled white woman is trying to tell them what it is like to live like a second class citizen in the US. That she is going to protect them? She is no Obama. They have worked and fought their way up all of their lives to have the chance to improve their city. Herold was the one council person who fought and worked to get oversight on the police after the killing of the wood carver and other incidrnts many years ago. It was Harold and his group that slowly created the joint citizen police oversight committee beginning in 2010/11 to establish rules of conduct to discipline poor police behavioir. A structure to attempt to address the horrible behavior ofvthe police during the BLM times. Police behavior was totally our of control. Voters need to do their homework about who he is and has done. Harold is not Trump. There is no quick fix to complex societal problems. In this election voters seem have a short memory or no memory of the slow deliberate work that has the possibility of making things better.
Who is Harold?
Thanks for the note and message David
Apologies for the repeated typo
Harrell not Harold
Andy
Bruce is not connecting the dots between lavish salaries and bonuses for recruiting out-of-state police who are not part of the community in a dramatic police expansion in Seattle and the NEXT George Floyd, Rodney King, wood carver incident. When you throw a lot of money at the police and put too many of them on our streets, they get bored and start seeking ‘action’, which is often at the expense of black and brown people, and the poor. Concerning ‘entitlement’, it is Bruce that keeps telling us he is ‘entitled’ to another term because he is “from here” and all of Seattle’s problems are not his fault. I am from here too, and have very deep roots in the Seattle black community, but that does not ‘entitle’ me to be mayor. We need a “can do” mayor who is able to confront Seattle’s problems head on and not deflect and shift blame to others. The buck stops with the mayor, and if you don’t believe that you have no business running for that office.
The consensus in the comments makes it unnecessary to watch this mess…I can’t vote anyway so I just have to hope the rest of y’all get it right.
Once a bully, always a bully! Grow up Harrell on your own time,. Not my vote
Harrell is basically mini MAGA in a “liberal” city. I’m surprised he and Nelson and Kettle and all these clowns don’t just call themselves the “Make Seattle Great Again” coalition.
Can we be done with those idiots please? I’m so sick of being gaslit by both the national MAGA Nazis and these “centrist” Seattle politicians who seem to think installing anti crime measures that have been proven time and again NOT to work will somehow work this time.
What’s that definition about insanity being doing the same thing over and over again with the same bad results?
Wilson says she wants to build 4000 additional shelter beds, and Harrell says he has “successfully” referred thousands to shelter. So, to evaluate this, let’s look at the current system: In round numbers there are 16,000 homeless individuals in King Co (Jan 2024 count) and 5000 shelter beds, which are always almost all full. Referrals to shelter is a useless metric. If the Hope team (or UCT or whatever they are this week) comes to a sweep and has 2 beds in Renton, and offers them to 15 people, without takers, and then they sweep out 30 folks a few blocks down the street, is that counted as 15 or 30 “referrals”? This, in fact, is what typically happens, though I haven’t been to a sweep since … oh, last week at Shilshole & 15th in Ballard. No one got into shelter.
A link to the Seattle Channel debate: https://www.seattlechannel.org/CityInsideOut?videoid=x179740
I watched the debate. Harold was not at all inspiring, but he does a good pitbull, so maybe he should try out for the prosecutor’s job. He would definately win against Wilson in arm wrestling :D.
As your writeup indicates, Harrell is a bully and a compulsive liar. The council president is not a position of authority or a recognition of superior performance. It is where the council puts members who are a nuisance to get them out of the way. They did the same for Nelson.
The people who seek surveillance footage, which is all available through a document request, are usually parties to some civil litigation, usually a divorce case. When one spouse claims they were at such and such a location at such a time on such a date, the request goes out for the video covering that location. and that is why Seattle got rid of surveillance cameras in the first place, because they infringed on the personal privacy of ordinary citizens, typically minority persons. Its obvious that cameras dont prevent crime. No city that has installed cameras has seen crime reduced on account of the cameras. What they have seen is the need to hire more clerks to respond to requests for the tapes in divorce cases or other civil litigation. And since the cameras are often installed in locations frequented by people or color, youths, etc thats who gets filmed. Occasionally they can help solve a crime, but they would not be acceptable as evidence without corroborating evidence, because they are so easily manipulated (especially now with AI).
It is really important Katie finds a way to stand up to Harrell, in a way that works for her. I hope she wins, and if she does, she will face people who are far more disrespectful, abusive, bullying, dishonest, and loud than Harrell, if that’s possible. And its worth noting that just because a person has a particular skin tone does not make them a representative spokesperson for an ethnic or racial community. None of the current slurry of right wing councilors ran as representatives of ethnic or racial communities, because they aren’t.
Harrell gets a pass on being 1st City council in America to vote to exempt low level drug pusher from Jail
Is there any format where one might watch the debate to get a first hand ✋️ look at it. I was busy working and missed it?
the Seattle Channel.
Seattle Channel debate: https://www.seattlechannel.org/CityInsideOut?videoid=x179740
Thank you for the link. It was helpful to watch it myself. I am trying to better understand who can best lead us forward. I thought they both attacked each other in many moments and interrupted at times but also gave each other space. There seems to be a gender bias that when a woman openly attacks it is fine vs when a man does that the man is mean and a bull dog. Tough times and I will watch more debates and try to do some fact checking ✔️ to better understand who to vote for. Thanks all
Great reporting [Erica]
What. An. Asshole. [Harrell]
What nothing about his niece Monisha who ran his election campaign and resigned due to mysoginistic toxicity? Speaks volumes – am concerned about Wilson’s lack of government experience but that debates shows the real Bruce – not a good look – note, at east Wilson had the xhops to take him on, when others allegedly more qualified didn’t –
Perhaps he can get a refund from Sinderman for lousy debate prep. Sigh.