Podcasts about policy wonks

Conventional wisdom says that a strong economy helps incumbents, while a weak economy hurts them. But new research from University of Chicago economist Lubos Pastor titled “Political Cycles and Stock Returns” challenges this idea, suggesting that economic downturns actually push voters toward Democrats, while economic booms favor Republicans.If true, this theory could explain decades of presidential elections—and even the stock market's historic tendency to perform better under Democratic administrations. But does the data back it up?

Nevena and John reveal their dark secret, they are both Election Tragics. The post Saturday 11th January, 2025, Nevena's Election Data Addiction: Election Tragics and Policy Wonks. appeared first on Saturday Magazine.

Dr. Bruce Goodwin, a retired Senior Laboratory Fellow in the Center for Global Security Research of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, discusses his publication 'Nuclear Weapons Technology 101 for Policy Wonks' and the importance of understanding nuclear weapons design. He emphasizes the need for technical experts to communicate effectively with policy wonks and non-technical audiences, highlighting the importance of listening and avoiding jargon. Goodwin also discusses the challenges of sustaining a credible stockpile stewardship program and attracting the best and brightest to the nuclear field. He concludes by emphasizing the importance of nuclear deterrence in maintaining peace.From 2013 to 2016, Bruce was the Associate Director for National Security Policy Research in charge of the National Security Office (now the Office of Defense Coordination) and the Center for Global Security Research. From 2001 until 2013, he was the Principal Associate Director of the Nuclear Weapons Program at LLNL. Before that he was a nuclear weapons designer.Socials:Follow on Twitter at @NucleCastFollow on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/company/nuclecastpodcastSubscribe RSS Feed: https://rss.com/podcasts/nuclecast-podcast/Rate: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/nuclecast/id1644921278Email comments and topic/guest suggestions to NucleCast@anwadeter.org

Bess and Denis ARE policy wonks. These are fantastic chats centered (mostly) around the ever-vexing question plaguing us all: why are we still compelled to listen to a show about Alex Jones, whom most people haven't given a turd about for years, AFTER all these years? It's because Knowledge Fight (a podcast about Alex Jones) is the greatest podcast of all time. I would say "besides this one" to be cute, but Broadsheet exists outside of time. Bess is a private citizen who is actually NOT okay with inviting people to be rude to her on the internet just to get a little taste of fake fame. Unlike me, who will do anything for attention. I mean, obviously. No plugs for Bess. Check out Denis Gorman's writing here: https://myfreelancewriting.blogspot.com/?fbclid=IwAR0HGe3cPjnrGFicFjSS24axZzUiv34fKs8Yf6xj7m1FVrsAugT1PMJD7UM Flood souls of sentient beings with healing light, as a rule. And here's my crap: Visit www.hoss.fun for all your Hoss needs™ I have a unique YouTube address now: YouTube.com/hossbossman  Follow Hoss on Twitter and Instagram and Twitch and TikTok @hoss_bossman Twitter: @hoss_bossman  https://twitter.com/hoss_bossman Instagram: @hoss_bossman https://instagram.com/hoss_bossman Twitch: hoss_bossman https://twitch.tv/hoss_bossman TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@hoss_bossman Support Hoss AND get original music at https://hossbossman.bandcamp.com  Visit https://www.hoss.fun for ALL YOUR HOSS NEEDS Check out Hoss's YouTube channel: YouTube.com/hossbossman Go to https://bit.ly/callhoss to leave me a message and I'll probably play it on the show, as long as it isn't racist! ~Other Links~ Email: HossBossman48@gmail.com Follow me on Letterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/hossbossman/ "Like" me on Facebook: https://facebook.com/hossbossmanrules/ Follow me on Tumblr: https://hossbossman.tumblr.com Hear my solo instrumental music on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/hossbossman/oksetgdns/the-boss-of-hosses Find Breadsheet on your podcast app of choice at https://bit.ly/breadsheet Email me w/ questions, comments, appearance/guest/collaboration requests, commissions for original music, or whatever your heart desires at hossbossman48@gmail.com --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/hossbossman/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/hossbossman/support

In this episode of Iran Watch Listen, we sat down with Dr. Bruce Goodwin, an expert on nuclear weapons design and testing. We discussed the steps required to build a nuclear weapon and what is publicly known about Iran's weaponization efforts to date. The conversation took place on May 3 and was hosted by Valerie Lincy, Executive Director at the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, and John Krzyzaniak, a Research Associate at the Wisconsin Project. Expert Bio Bruce Goodwin is a retired senior fellow at the Center for Global Security Research at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Earlier, he was the Principal Associate Director for the nuclear weapons program at Livermore from 2001 until 2013. He has been a key player in the success of the U.S. nuclear weapons program since 1981, first at Los Alamos National Laboratory and since 1985 at Livermore. While at both Labs, he was a design physicist on five nuclear tests. Related Resources “Additive Manufacturing and Nuclear Security: Calibrating Rewards and Risks,” Center for Global Security Research, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, November 2019. “Nuclear Weapons Technology 101 for Policy Wonks,” Center for Global Security Research, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, August 2021.

Prominent policymakers and world leaders met in Washington last week to discuss the economic outlook. In this Viewsroom podcast, Breakingviews columnists explain why US politicians are taking a rosier view of inflation and vulnerabilities in the banking sector than the IMF. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt-out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this Friday show, we present Part 2 of the Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap which was live-streamed on August 9, 2022 with special guests EJ Juárez and Doug Trumm. In Part 2, the panel breaks down primary election results for State Legislature seats in the battleground district of the 47th LD and in Seattle-area Democrat vs Democrat races in the 36th, 37th, and 46th LDs, The historical importance of The Stranger endorsement in the progressive path out of the primary is discussed as well as Doug and EJ's thoughts on other races in the 42nd LD and for Secretary of State. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-hosts, EJ Juárez at @EliseoJJuarez and Doug Trumm at @dmtrumm. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources Hacks & Wonks 2022 Primary Election Recap Livestream | August 9th, 2022: https://www.officialhacksandwonks.com/august-2022-postprimary-recap   Transcript [00:00:00] Bryce Cannatelli: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Bryce from the Hacks & Wonks production team. 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. You're listening to part 2 of our 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap, with special guests EJ Juárez and Doug Trumm, that we live-streamed on August 9th, 2022. If you missed part 1, you can find it as the previous episode of your podcast feed, or you can find the audio and transcript for the full recap on our website, officialhacksandwonks.com. Thank you for listening! [00:00:59] Crystal Fincher: Another very interesting district is the 47th Legislative District, which is half of Kent, Covington, Maple Valley, parts of Auburn - again, a very purple district - one that sees two open seats - an incumbent remaining in Representative Debra Entenman, but an open Senate seat after Mona Das announced that she was leaving and an open House seat after Pat Sullivan retired. And so we had competitive Democratic and Republican primaries going on here with open seats, just a lot of questions about what is going to happen here in the 47th - very hard to predict. But we saw some really interesting results. Again, this is one of the districts that Republicans said was one of their top targets - definitely in the top two or three targets that they felt were there for pickups and turning these seats that were held by Republican [Democratic] incumbents and two of them now open seats into Republican pickups. And what we saw was in the one seat with Debra Entenman, she finished comfortably with 55% against a Republican candidate, Kyle Lyebyedyev. There was another Republican contesting in the race, but Debra made it through fairly comfortably. We had a Senate race with Satwinder Kaur and Claudia Kauffman as Democrats against Bill Boyce, the Republican. Bill Boyce, who is a City Councilmember in the City of Kent, a Republican, also a Black Republican that's running here is - has 45.58%. And then a very, very, very close race between Claudia Kauffman and Satwinder Kaur. Currently, Claudia Kauffman is leading with 27.23% over Satwinder with 27.02%. This is a race that is under a hundred votes separating the two and it looks like Claudia Kauffman is going to squeeze and squeak through here. This is a really interesting race. And again, you look at the combined percentage of the Democratic vote - they're above, they're like 54% there. That's a great result that we see on the Democratic side, but wow, what a really closely contested race. And then in the other seat, we saw two Democrats - Chris Stearns with 33.4% against Shukri Olow, another Democrat, who is making it through - both Democrats making it through the primary - Shukri with 19.6% against three Republicans. One of - again, a party pick for the Republicans - Carmen Goers raised $200,000 in the primary, spent the bulk of it. She actually finished in last place. This was another Black Republican here with two other Republican white male opponents who finished with 15.1% and 17.4%, respectively, with Ted Cooke and Barry Knowles. Very interesting result. I don't know that many people - I certainly did not call that there was gonna be a Democratic shutout in one of these seats in this purple district, or that the other results looked so strong in favor of the other ones. What do you see when you see this 47th Legislative District race, Doug? [00:04:37] Doug Trumm: Yeah. You can't get any bigger with them not even making it to the primary. So having two Democrats in that Position 2 seat - that is going to be an exciting race, but not for the Republicans. But we'll circle back to that, 'cause I do want to talk about that race more, but I suppose we should talk about the other races more a little bit too. Mona Das retiring - I think that certainly led to some nervousness that we're not gonna have the incumbent advantage and that didn't seem to be an issue with the result. And it does look like it'll be Claudia Kauffman, so again - an established name - but someone I think who seemed to do a good job, so someone I'm actually glad to see coming back. I'm not always thrilled when you get people who keep going back for many decades, but I think that one is an exception. But yeah, and going back to the 30th as well - on the Democratic side, I guess over all those years of not having that many Black - and apologies for my cat making all that noise - not having that many Black candidates, I guess assumption was they would do worse than the white candidates that people were putting forward, or just maybe wasn't even a thought. But it's pretty clear that those Black candidates are doing just as good as any of the white candidates, if not better, because we see these results in the 30th and in the 47th and all across really the metro area where we're seeing voters really resonating with these folks. If anything, it appears to be an asset. And yeah, it just clearly is a district that is slipping away from Republicans and they don't seem to be doing very much to fix that. And as you mentioned, Carmen Goers finishing fifth when she had the support of the party at, I think, all levels. And then additionally, she had The Seattle Times endorsement, which didn't appear to be worth the paper it was written on - which I don't know if that's true of every race, but in the 47th that's a really embarrassing finish for the Seattle Times. And as EJ alluded to - a Viking funeral for $200,000 worth of cash - that's gotta be one of the only times that's happened in Washington history - that a candidate has raised $200,000 in a primary and then finished fifth, at least at the state legislator level. [00:07:14] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. What did you see here, EJ? [00:07:19] EJ Juárez: I saw - I think one of the most exciting things for me is that this actually might be the first time where we have two Native people representing the same district in the House in Washington State. And I think that is incredible - the opportunity and the history making moment of those candidates' ascension if they are the victors in November. I really think that is the underreported takeaway of this cycle in that these are two candidates, although one has - both of them are previously elected in other offices - that's a big deal, right? On the other end of that spectrum, it is wildly confusing to me the uneven field game that has occurred in the 47th. We have some candidates who were deeply knocking on doors every weekend, huge volunteer turnout. And then we have some candidates who really focused on media and focused on really traditional electronic - I don't even know if that's the way to put it, "traditional electronic" - they weren't at the doors, they weren't making a ton of phone calls, and they were pretty open about it. So I think there's a lot of questions to be answered in terms of how people got through and the vote share. So when you're looking at Rep Position 2 with Shukri and Chris, Shukri outraised Chris and really produced not very many votes for that. And when you look at the per dollar spend on per vote, it doesn't really - the math doesn't quite work out the way you would expect. Now, a D-on-D race in that is going to be pretty - there will be fireworks, right? Because you have to make up a considerable amount of points and the clock is reset for both of those candidates. So I'm watching them really closely. I'm excited. I think they're both great candidates. I think they're both folks who, as they move towards the general, are going to start to distinguish themselves to voters. I think when you look at that Senate race, I cannot help but think if I was a Republican strategist and fundraiser, I would've wanted to pour a lot more money into that race supporting a Black Republican versus some of the white Republicans, which received much higher proportions of spend from caucus accounts and from PACs associated with Republicans. There's probably some obvious reasons for that on that side that don't need to go too much into depth on, but it is shocking that in a three-way race, the Republican still only musters 45%. [00:10:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think that's all valid. And I even think - actually in this district in the 47th, it has been an interesting one. This is actually - I live near the border of the 47th - the 47th and the 33rd District border. And in the 47th, actually, we've traditionally seen Black candidates, visibly non-Christian candidates - whether it's someone with a hijab or a turban - underperform compared to spend a number of times here. And so it's interesting to see these results come through. I don't know what role that played on the Republican side also, but that's just another dynamic in this race that has been interesting. I do think that this sets up - just for the candidates that are there, that are gonna be in the general - really interesting matchups and comparisons. And I do think that Democrats - all of the Democrats in these races - do need to be out on the doors, do need to work through the general. Certainly a favorable result in the primary, but another one where they can't rest at all and need to continue to push forward. But one where I think - this was an area where people were wondering - Hey, where's the public safety conversation gonna be? And are Republicans gonna be able to land some hits here and are people hyper-worried about inflation? I think, yet again in this district, I think people saw that the conversation on public safety on the ground is a lot more nuanced than it is in the media - I think is safe to say. So many times we hear the conversation between more cops and "Back the Blue" and - hey, we're - no candidates are actually running on this, FYI - but like "Defund Everything." There's not actually a candidate saying that right now, but the perception is out there - that that has been there. And people aren't there - even people who favor more police, who are not bothered by more police - are saying - but what we really need are behavioral health services, are substance use disorder, addiction treatment services, are housing for people. We have to address these root causes. If there's an issue with someone who is going through a crisis, police just don't have the tools to solve that. I think that's pretty universally acknowledged and not a controversial statement. And when polling goes beyond just some very basic questions and probes into those, we repeatedly see the public saying - yeah, of course we need those things. And so it was very interesting to see some of these attacks - whether it's in the 30th, or throughout the state, in the 47th - on those issues and they just fell flat. And even on the inflation issue, people are worried and people are absolutely squeezed, but looking at - okay, so what are you gonna do about it? And I think Democrats told a better story about - okay, here's the plan. This is what we plan to invest in and this is how we plan to help. I think working people felt that Democrats had a plan that was more tailored to their needs from Democrats. So just an interesting result that we saw there. We will pivot a bit to the Seattle races, which are different than all of these battleground races that we've been talking about. And these are in the City of Seattle - Democrat versus Democrat races. We saw a number of open seat races that have happened here. And so we can start with the 36th District, which had a pretty stark and conclusive result, I think, in the open seat race that was there, where there was a contested primary that had five Democratic candidates there - different shades of there, from more progressive to probably on the most moderate end with Waylan Robert. But we saw Julia Reed, who received The Seattle Times and The Stranger endorsement take 55% of the vote, followed by Jeff Manson who is making it through the primary with 13.5% of the vote. And then followed by Nicole Gomez, Waylon Robert, and Elizabeth Tyler Crone. Looks like that is a race that is Julia's for the taking, I think realistically, just looking there. And certainly benefited from both The Times and The Stranger endorsement. There's another race in the 37th in South Seattle where Chipalo Street got both The Stranger and The Times endorsement, but that was a much closer race where we saw Chipalo with 41% of the vote - 41.53% - and Emijah Smith making it through the primary with 35.37% of the vote - a much closer race. We saw in the 46th Legislative District - Darya Farivar make it through in first place, the progressive candidate in the race - she currently has 31.61% of the vote and Lelach Rave finishing in second, making it through the primary at 28.06% of the vote. And then we saw in the 34th Legislative District, in that open seat there, Emily Alvarado with 54% of the vote to Leah Griffin's 31.2%. I'll kick this off, as we discuss these Seattle races at-large. It's been talked about so many times before - how in Seattle, how consequential the Seattle Times and The Stranger endorsements are. On a previous post-primary recap, Michael Charles put it very succinctly - saying there are two political parties in Seattle - The Seattle Times and The Seattle Stranger. And actually went back and looked at the numbers - and for races in the City of Seattle, for legislative districts in Seattle, for candidates on the ballot, for the past decade - candidates endorsed by The Stranger have made it through to the primary a 100% of the time. It actually seems like, particularly for progressive candidates, the path requires going through The Stranger - requires that endorsement to make it on to the general. How consequential is that, and what do you think we saw overall in general in these races, Doug? [00:16:50] Doug Trumm: Yeah, I think that Stranger endorsement - it's really huge, particularly in a primary in Seattle - I think the 46th is where we really saw the test of that. In Seattle the Urbanist Elections Committee, which I'm a member of, is lucky enough to talk to most of the candidates. And when people skip - usually it's a sign that they're either running in that centrist lane, or they just got the race together so late that they didn't really have time or put it together enough to respond. But we agreed with The Stranger and The Seattle Times with Julia Reed - I think there's a unique case where there's just a candidate that was so - just polished - and any other candidates had some promise, but there just weren't really compelling case to say - but why not, Julia Reed. And I think that's a testament to running a really good race and being a good candidate. And hopefully everyone's right about that, 'cause I don't think you see all three of us agree very often. In the 46th, on the other hand, we did end up endorsing Melissa Taylor and really liked what she brought to the table in housing. But we were also - really thought that Darya Farivar was a fantastic candidate as well. And particularly around the issues of transportation - being Policy Director at Disability Rights Washington, which is a great partner of us and a great leader on all these climate and climate justice issues at the state level and the local level. So we were happy with both candidates and great to see Darya go through and being several points ahead of Lelach where - we didn't get a chance to talk to her. And I think she's more in the Sara Nelson lane of the party who endorsed her, if you will. How that race shakes out will have, I think, pretty big bearing on just what is possible on some issues like housing, where it seems like someone like Rave is staking out a very moderate position there and not really being upfront about - Hey, we need to do something about exclusionary zoning, we need to make our zoning more inclusive and be able to fit more people into parts of the city - where Northeast Seattle is so wealthy, so much opportunity, so many good schools and good parks and everything, and it's a part of the city that's pulled up the drawbridge a little bit. Maybe she will change her tune on that position a little bit, but I think - although Darya didn't talk about housing a lot, she's someone who on the questionnaire was pretty clear - she's on that same page around ending exclusionary zoning and promoting missing middle. It's an issue that we track really closely - polling shows that Washington voters are increasingly focused on that. And I think it's because people are smart and you get that the whole world's experiencing inflation - you can't really blame one party for that. You maybe can blame Putin for that a little bit, but no one can control Putin. But what are you gonna do to help people control their costs? And one - the hugest thing is housing. It's just - it's a massive cost in our region. And if you don't have a solution that both gets at promoting affordable housing through investment and also dealing with our zoning and policies that just make it really restrictive to create more housing, you're not really tackling that problem. And I think for some voters that's really starting to hit home, which could give a candidate like Darya the edge. And I will let EJ break down some of the other races, as I've gone on long enough. But it definitely was a reassuring result in that sense. [00:20:45] EJ Juárez: Yeah, so I - one, I appreciate being on a show with Doug because Doug is so smart about so many things. And as he is talking, I'm writing down things - oh, I need to look into some of that. For me, back to the question around endorsements and the power of The Stranger. I think Michael Charles was absolutely right around the two-party system now. I also feel like it is incredibly disingenuous for anybody who works in politics to be surprised if the candidate who gets The Stranger endorsement gets through. I think it shows a lack of context around just how much that means to people, both as a key part of many people's own political maturity within the city, right? The Stranger serves as this thing that people learn about Seattle from, learn how Seattle operates - and discounting the weight of that endorsement is done at one's own peril. I think how we get, how we've gotten to this place - and many of these endorsements and many of the races bear this out - is that there are a couple of things at play. Media consolidation has removed many of the other endorsing organizations that had typically seen - excuse me, typically been seen as nonpartisan, right? We no longer have The Seattle PI, we no longer have many of the regional or neighborhood papers that were also doing this for many years. The lanes of engagement have also changed for people who are coming into elected office. The salaries that we pay people to do public service no longer match the cost of living in many of our cities. So therefore, you are narrowing the field more and more and more as this goes. I think the two remaining factors that I think of when you think about just the power of these - of The Times and The Stranger's endorsements - are the policy hegemony, right? The lane in which we talk about policies is so locked in and narrow in the full spectrum of possibility. So the process of differentiating - if we're looking at the 36th - 7 candidates, is it 2, 4, or 6 candidates who have minor policy differences and may only sell that difference with enthusiasm or gusto differently, but are 99% aligned - is more and more difficult for voters to actually judge on policy versus performance. And I think that gets to the last piece here of - the opposition that is understood in Seattle politics has become more and more clear around - there is the folks that are trying to do good and the folks that are trying to do bad. And the folks that are trying to do bad - when I started working in politics here, that was - you could name 50 different organizations, 50 different people off the top of your head. And now it feels like every campaign has really locked in on - the bad guys are Amazon, the bad guys are the tech bros, the bad guys are X, Y, and Z, but it's really focused on small pockets of opposition. And for many reasons, some of those groups earn that label - I will say that - but in many ways it limits the amount of discourse that happens. And I'm going on a little bit long, but I think it can't be overstated that many of these factors inform how we got to a place where two newspapers informed so much of our political success in the City. [00:24:25] Crystal Fincher: Yeah - to your point - the reason why Hacks & Wonks exists is because of the frustration with how narrow and shallow some of those conversations can be, with so much consolidation and with the thinning of just the amount of people covering these races, the amount of visibility that races and policy have, the lack of accountability that we see with so many of our leaders - not just federally, but in the City of Seattle - we're still wondering what happened to texts that disappeared at a really pivotal time in the City. So it is challenging to work through that and deal with that. And I just think that this is a time where I hope lots of community organizations lean in and engage and try to connect their own memberships, their own spheres of influence to the process. One thing that I found really exciting about these results that I haven't really seen talked about was - there's a lot of public polling available, but the primary is a spectacular, actual public poll. And when we talk about inclusive zoning and making progress on affordable housing, the vast majority of voters in every single district - from the 46th to the 37th - voted in favor of the candidates who said we're taking on exclusive zoning, we're going to make it more inclusive, we're going to vote for that missing middle housing bill, and that spoke strongly in favor of it. That they voted overwhelmingly for candidates who talked about strengthening the social safety net, who talked about addressing behavioral health services, substance use disorder services, supportive housing and wraparound services - and not just focusing on the - well, we just need to lock people up and do what we've been doing that has landed us here today. They're really talking about addressing a lot of these root causes and taking substantive - not incremental, but pretty dynamic - change in many of these areas. And voters were right there, so I think that that was encouraging to see. And I would just wonder and hope that we're going to see that reflected and responded to throughout the general election. Full disclosure - I worked for Melissa Taylor, I've paid close attention to the 46th and a number of these races - and am excited to see a strong progressive get through in that race - and Darya Farivar, especially with a lot of the work that she's done in disability justice, which is critical. And so it's just gonna be really interesting to see as these general election races go by, and I think the 37th Legislative District looks like a very competitive race that could go either way right now, that it's gonna be really interesting to hear in these opportunities where it's not quite a Democrat versus Republican conversation that does get flattened a lot, but hopefully we can get into some of the meatiness of issues. There's a lot of policy space in the Democratic arena, in the progressive arena to really talk through - what are your plans for fixing the issues that are challenging people? How do you plan to make people's lives easier and simpler and what are you going to stand up for? Where are your red lines? What are you gonna lead on? Are really interesting and exciting things to see, that I see there. So I think that the entire media ecosystem from The Urbanist playing a crucial role, the South Seattle Emerald, Real Change - just a lot of community media. Community organizations have a lot of power just because there just aren't many people covering or talking about this - and this is an opportunity for them to talk about what's important to them, their members, people they serve, their community. And we need it now more than ever - as we finish thinking about these Seattle races and just other races across the state, is there anything that you think is flying under the radar that's notable or things that we haven't discussed tonight that you feel we should be paying attention to? And I will start with Doug. [00:29:05] Doug Trumm: Oh, so many things - I think, just to add another thought about the Seattle races is - again, I think what was another case with Chipalo Street, where we endorsed him as well and I think that's another race where Seattle Times and Stranger - we agreed. And I think that may have partially been just an advantage of him having his game plan set when he announced and it seemed like Emijah Smith was a little bit more still trying to catch up - announcing a little bit later, I think. And we didn't get a chance to talk to her, so that was part of our decision - she didn't return a questionnaire. But he was someone who was really good at talking about housing. So again, I think that fits the theme and Emily Alvarado doing better than Leah Griffin, who we endorsed - but we like both candidates, we were very clear that you have two great options there - again, someone with housing chops was doing a little better. I don't know - I might be stretching this theme a little bit much, but it definitely seems like credibility on that issue is a huge asset. And that should be good news. Unfortunately we're gonna have people like Gerry Pollet getting re-elected, but they might look at this and go - maybe I've been doing this a little bit wrong if I really want to continue getting re-elected. But I guess one race we didn't talk a lot about - but we shouldn't shy away from the bad news, which is the 42nd did not go well for Democrats. You had hope of a Senate pickup there and it's still not completely impossible, but Sharon Shewmake, who is an incumbent House representative, getting 47% in that district - that's not a great result against two Republicans. And one of 'em did have kind of that name ID - Simon Sefzik, or however you say that - so that might have helped him, but does look like he'll be the one through. So she'll continue to face that in the primary. And then we have actually - two of those seats are Democratic held, so the people lower on the ticket did a little bit better. But these could be the two seats we lose, but I do think we make that up maybe in LD10 where Greg Gilday, the Republican incumbent, isn't doing well at all - is down like four points. And also in the 26th, as we've talked about a little bit, with having Adison Richards potentially being a pickup there - it might end up coming out in the wash. But I don't know what's going on in the 42nd - I thought that district was drifting a little bit blue, but - and the redistricting is really odd because it's such a huge district - all the changes happened within the sort of Bellingham scope. And I guess they must have just carved out a little bit of Bellingham that was keeping that district where Shewmake was winning. And it's also - I guess, maybe Shewmake wasn't as strong of a candidate as maybe some of - her seatmate Alicia Rule doing a point and change better. I don't know if that's just the money in that race or what, or if it really should have been flip-flopped who tried to grab that Senate seat, but it might have been for naught if that district is just now a +3 or something Republican - you really have to run a really good race maybe to win that. And with Republicans pouring money in there, it's not as favorable terrain - which kind of brings us back to redistricting - it's a weirdly drawn district and I guess we left it that way, but why? Maybe I'll leave it at that for now and let others jump in. [00:32:44] Crystal Fincher: Go ahead, EJ. [00:32:45] EJ Juárez: I think I'll start with the 42nd. I think this is a district that is an opportunity for Democrats to begin with, right? If it were not for the death of conspiracy theorist, COVID-denying Doug Ericksen, who loved to work for dictators - I think we wouldn't even be in this situation. Any Democrat who is putting up numbers right now - it was an uphill battle - and I think that the points are valid around just how hard that was going to be for just about anybody, given the challenges of where the lines are gonna be and all these things. I think in terms of other stuff that is top of mind for me is the real tragedy of Julie Anderson's run for Secretary of State - incredible underperformance, not even carrying her own county of Pierce County, running as an independent against the incumbent Steve Hobbs - is something that I can't, I keep coming back to where I'm like - all right, that does not make sense in my head yet. Given everybody's enthusiasm of keeping Steve Hobbs as far away as possible from actually legislating - that part does. But the lack of challenge to his ascension into the Secretary of State's office seems a bit odd. It is almost certain that the Democrat will hold that seat for the first time in 60 years, and I think that is something that is to celebrate. I think that is a good thing for Washington, even as oddly as we have arrived at that fact. Some of the other quick things on my list is - as long as you're asking for that grab bag - I'll go back to the complete lack of strategy on the Republican side, in terms of how they are planning on taking and building a majority in this state. Still top of mind for me - it is the bright, shiny object of - are they going to produce a strategy at any point in the next decade? I don't know. And then lastly, where Democrats have made long-term investments, they are starting to yield the results and the rewards of that - whether that's Federal Way, whether that's in the 26th out in Gig Harbor - Democrats are getting those rewards for decisions and investments that they made 8-10 years ago. And the multiple cycle layering of those massive multimillion dollar investments in voter turnout, in improving the data on who lives in those areas, and making the case to those voters is making their job easier. And when you look at places that have not enjoyed that investment that are continually looked at as opportunities and pickups, especially when you're looking at the kind of "demographics as destiny" argument that gets made, we don't see perennial investments in places where there are large populations of color that are ascendant to majorities. We haven't seen the multi-layered approach in Yakima. We haven't seen that multi-layered approach in the Tri-Cities. And frankly, the results show - Democrats are not moving forward in many of those primaries and the lack of investment from the party shows. But where they have done it, it has been an incredible reward for them. [00:36:03] Crystal Fincher: Completely agree. And with that, this recap comes to a close. I want to thank our panelists - EJ Juárez, Doug Trumm - for their insight and making this an engaging and informative event. To those watching online, thanks so much for tuning in and for sending in questions. If you missed any of the discussion tonight, you can catch up on the Hacks & Wonks Facebook page or Twitter, where we're @HacksWonks. Special thanks to essential members of the Hacks & Wonks team and coordinators for this evening, Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. If you missed voting in the primary, you still have time to make your voice heard in the general elections coming up on November 8th. If you need to register to vote, update your registration, or find information, you can go to MyVote.wa.gov. And as a reminder, even if you've been previously incarcerated, your right to vote is restored and you can re-register to vote immediately upon your release, even if you are still under community supervision - so that's new this year. You can vote if you are not currently incarcerated - you just need to re-register at MyVote.wa.gov. Be sure to tune into Hacks & Wonks on your favorite podcast app for our midweek interviews and our Friday week in review shows or at officialhacksandwonks.com. I've been your host, Crystal Fincher - see you next time. [00:37:27] Bryce Cannatelli: Thank you for listening to part 2 of our Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap. If you missed part 1, you can find both parts of the livestream in our podcast feed or you can find the video and text transcript for the full recap on our website at officialhacksandwonks.com. Thank you for tuning in - talk to you next time.

On this midweek show, we present Part 1 of the Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap which was live-streamed on August 9, 2022 with special guests EJ Juárez and Doug Trumm. In Part 1, the panel breaks down primary election results in the 3rd and 8th Congressional Districts before moving on to battleground districts for State Legislature seats in the 26th and 30th LDs. Stay tuned for Part 2 of the recap releasing this Friday for more primary analysis! As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-hosts, EJ Juárez at @EliseoJJuarez and Doug Trumm at @dmtrumm. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources Hacks & Wonks 2022 Primary Election Recap Livestream | August 9th, 2022: https://www.officialhacksandwonks.com/august-2022-postprimary-recap   Transcript   [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. 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. You're listening to part 1 of our 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap, with special guests EJ Juárez and Doug Trumm, which we live-streamed on August 9th, 2022. You'll get part 2 in your feed this Friday, August 19th, in place of our regular week-in-review episode. You can find the audio and full transcript for this recap on our website, officialhacksandwonks.com. Thank you for listening! Good evening, and welcome to the Hacks & Wonks Post-Primary Election Recap. I'm Crystal Fincher - I'm a political consultant and the host of the Hacks & Wonks podcast. And today I'm thrilled to be joined by three of my favorite Hacks and Wonks to break down what happened in last week's primary election. Before we begin tonight, I'd like to do a land acknowledgement. I'd like to acknowledge that we are on the traditional land of the first people of Seattle, the Coast-Salish peoples, specifically the Duwamish People, past and present. I would like to honor with gratitude the land itself and the Duwamish Tribe. We're excited to be able to live stream this recap on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Additionally, we're recording this recap for broadcast on KODX and KVRU radio, podcast, and it will be available with a full text transcript at officialhacksandwonks.com. We invite our audience to ask questions of our panelists. If you're watching a live stream online, then you can ask questions by commenting on the livestream. You can also text your questions to 206-395-6248. That's 206-395-6248, and that number will scroll at the bottom of the screen. Our esteemed panelists for the evening are EJ Juárez. EJ is a public servant who remains involved in numerous political efforts across Washington. In his day job, he's the Director of Equity and Environmental Justice for the Department of Natural Resources. He leads that agency's work to reduce health and economic disparities through environmental justice practices. He previously served as the first Public Policy Manager for the Group Health Foundation, where he led the work to create that organization's political and legislative portfolio after serving in leadership posts at the Seattle Library and as the Executive Director at Progressive Majority and ColorPAC, organizations dedicated to recruiting, training, and electing progressive champions in Washington and Oregon. Thank you so much - welcome. [00:03:01] EJ Juárez: Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. [00:03:03] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. And next we have Doug Trumm. Doug is the Executive Editor of The Urbanist and serves on The Urbanist Elections Committee, which crafts the organization's endorsements. An Urbanist writer since 2015, he dreams of pedestrianizing streets, blanketing the city in bus lanes, and unleashing an eco-friendly mass timber building spree to end the affordable housing shortage and avert our coming climate catastrophe. He graduated from the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance at the University of Washington. He lives in East Fremont and loves to explore the city by bike, foot, or bus. Welcome, Doug Trumm. Great to have you - so we are having a little bit of technical difficulties with Doug, he will join us back again as soon as he's able, but we'll get started with EJ Juárez. Starting off - I think we can start with the Congressional races, where just yesterday - in the 3rd Congressional District, which is in Southwest Washington - we saw Jaime Herrera Beutler concede. And so Joe Kent, the Republican, is finishing in second place in the primary - proceeding to go to the general election against Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who is the Democrat in that race and finished first. What did you see happening in this? Did you expect Joe Kent to make it through? And what does this mean for what this race is gonna look like in the general election? [00:04:37] EJ Juárez: So I'll be honest and say no - I did not expect Joe Kemp to make it through. I think I had more faith in Southwest Washington, honestly. This is a situation where - I think conventional wisdom had most of the energy focused on Jaime - how were folks going to make the case that Jaime needed to be replaced? And unfortunately for Jaime, that meant everybody was really against her and the results prove that. My big concern moving forward - and I think things that I'm gonna be watching for is - is this a Democratic operation in that district that can pull through and actually deliver a field strategy, that can deliver on the fundraising and the hopes of the strategy of what the national Democrats have been doing - is supporting these Trump conspiracy theorists over more moderate candidates in the hopes that Democrats pull through and take them out in the general. This is one where it's really gonna be - is Nancy Pelosi's strategy gonna play out the way they hope. [00:05:42] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is gonna be really interesting. There was a lot of late money that came in in support of Jaime Herrera Beutler. There was a lot of talk that she wasn't very visible throughout the end of that campaign and so it - that may have had something to do with it. But I think the GOP electorate is pretty fractured. And this is one - we'll talk about several others coming up - but one of a number of races where the party establishment made it known what their preference was, put resources and a big push behind their candidates, and it actually didn't quite land. Their voters said that's actually not our choice and went a different direction and Jaime Herrera Beutler has been known as - it's interesting to say "moderate Republican," but more moderate than her counterparts, I think is fair. She had that reputation, but had been pushed further to the right kind of in response to where the base is this time, but not far enough. Joe Kent is in the race, he's Trump-endorsed, he is a frequent guest on the Sean Hannity program, he thinks that Jim Jordan should take over as leader of the party in place of Kevin McCarthy, he said that he's going to immediately call for Joe Biden's impeachment and investigate the 2020 election, he does not believe in support for Ukraine, defended calling President Zelenskyy a thug - just has a number of beliefs that seem like they aren't in line with where the GOP has traditionally been, certainly different than where the majority of residents in the state are if you look at all available polling. But he cobbled together a coalition that made it through the primary. Do you think that Republicans are going to coalesce behind him, Doug? [00:07:40] Doug Trumm: I think ultimately they will. And I guess it depends how many people are dyed-in-the-wool Republicans in that district, because I think the sort of structural problem maybe that the state GOP is running into is just that the more they make their brand true to that base that elected Joe Kent, the less that they're appealing to the swing independent voters. So I don't know what to make - I think Republicans ultimately might come home, but they might lose a few folks who just - disgusted about the whole thing about her losing her seat. But it seems like there's been an incredible amount of brand loyalty throughout a near coup, so I don't know when to expect a huge exodus, but just a little bit of bleeding in that district would - could end up being costly. [00:08:35] Crystal Fincher: Do you think they're gonna be able to effectively moderate, EJ? [00:08:42] EJ Juárez: I'm gonna go with no. I'm sitting here thinking of what it must be like to be a Republican who shows up to your county Republican meeting in this moment where you have such dissatisfaction - both with your options, your party apparatus and strategy - where literally, there is no consensus. And when we talk about - how are Republicans gonna activate their base, I'm not convinced Republicans know who their base are in this moment. And it shifts in every district based on every candidate and the lack of consistency there - one, makes their money less effective, right? You're not operating in scale and you're not operating with the mass kind of penetration that you can get when you have a consistent messaging strategy that is born out of multiple cycles of races. So I think it's messy, and I think that this race in particular really is a great illustrative moment for what happened in the legislative races and what we're seeing across Washington State right now - where you cannot get Republicans on-brand, which is so wild to me given the past 30 years of rigid brand management. [00:09:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely. It's going to be very interesting to see just how that turns out. And I've certainly been asked recently - well, Joe Kent is a different kind of Republican, not the traditional kind of Republican we've seen elected here in Washington State. Does that mean that Marie Gluesenkamp Perez has a chance to win this race? This is a district where Jaime Herrera Beutler previously won it with 56% of the vote, I believe it was. Donald Trump won it with just under 51% to Joe Biden's around 48%. So this is certainly a district that at least leans Republicans if not more. Does the Democrat have a shot, do you think, Doug? [00:10:42] Doug Trumm: Absolutely. A lot of race still to happen, but I would not be feeling confident if I was just assuming that was going to be a safe R seat. Just the impact of that particular issue - and Jaime Herrera Beutler's been there a long time, so I'm sure there's some loyalists who are a little bit offended that that's how her career ended. So I don't know - it's just, like you said, it's messy. And the brand is just murky right now and so much of it's driven just by anger and backlash - that's a very crude tool to wield. It's effective in motivating people, but you don't know which direction they're gonna go. And if just the conservative media apparatus is just - it completely runs on that type of thing and it's unwieldy. [00:11:40] EJ Juárez: I'll just jump in briefly - I agree with Doug. I think the challenge here is that in any other year, if you were gonna look at the Democrat in that race and say you pulled less than 34%, that's not a good number to build from. And that's a really tough place to find a strategy and a foothold. I think that given the uniqueness of the challenger who's making it through to the general, it throws that playbook out. And we're gonna see over the next month - I think these next 30 days are gonna be really telling over just how much get up and go those local Democrats have in order to make up those percentages. [00:12:20] Crystal Fincher: I agree. And so we'll move to the 8th Congressional District race, which is a bit further north - parts of a few different counties, including King County - that saw Kim Schrier, who is the current incumbent Democrat, finish with a pretty strong result. And had some strong challengers in terms of Republicans who were duking it out - so you had Reagan Dunn, Matt Larkin, and Jesse Jensen all competing on the Republican side, with Matt Larkin making it through. What do you make of this result, EJ? And what do you think it says about where Republicans are at, even in King County? [00:13:03] EJ Juárez: I think it says a lot about Reagan Dunn. I really do. I think that to be perhaps the most high-profile Republican in King County and maybe in that entire district and have that showing really shows - I think it says a lot about both his candidacy and viability for further office, but ultimately his track record and what he's been able to accomplish. Matt Larkin, a relatively unknown Republican coming in, being able to beat a sitting County Councilmember in this contested primary - definitely bad news for establishment Republicans in this moment. [00:13:46] Crystal Fincher: Certainly not what a lot of people predicted. What do you think the general election's gonna look like in this race, Doug? [00:13:53] Doug Trumm: It does have the makings of a squeaker. When I was looking on election night, I was optimistic and I think - if I'm recalling correctly - that Kim Schrier's lead's just eroded a little bit and maybe that's just the rural parts of the district are seeing less of that traditional King County progressive swing at the end. But she still does have, I think, the upper hand and with the higher-profile candidate not making it through again, you have the case of - is the party going to be really excited getting behind Larkin the way they may have for Dunn, as the anointed dynasty son or whatever. And it just goes to show again - they're just having a really hard time picking candidates in the way that they easily used to - anoint the successor and get a candidate through who had all the connections and all the money. Larkin might find that with this sort of being a high-profile race for control of the House, but it certainly isn't what they'd planned. [00:15:02] Crystal Fincher: Does not appear to be what they planned. And it seems like Reagan Dunn and Jesse Jensen were really concerned with going after each other and not really paying attention to Matt Larkin. It seemed, or at least he seemed to duck a lot of the crossfire going back and forth. Do you think that might have contributed to him making it through - just that he wasn't in-between the whole mud slinging battle? [00:15:28] Doug Trumm: Yeah, that seems to be the case. And Reagan Dunn was just doing so much to try to rebrand himself. And maybe that just wasn't a great idea because a lot of the King County Republicans tried to make this moderate brand that they thought would be - and probably that would play - better in the county. But then knowing that he had this primary, suddenly he's taking these votes where he's reaffirming he's anti-abortion, anti-choice and taking these County Council votes where, if he wasn't in that race, you feel like he might have voted differently. And I don't know if voters also just react negatively that kind of like finger-to-the-wind opportunism. Just be yourself sometimes can get you some points that being a little too smart by half might actually cost you. [00:16:24] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think so. I think this was interesting - also the Senate race with Tiffany Smiley and Patty Murray was interesting - in that, especially this 8th Congressional District race, was one that Republicans really thought was - they were going to have, I think certainly a stronger showing than this, that they were expecting Kim Schrier to be a little bit more vulnerable than she turned out to be. And looking at some of these other races where they thought - Hey, these are big opportunities for pickups - and not only did it not turn out very well percentage-wise, but their preferred candidates didn't even make it through. I think both of you alluded to some of the message discipline challenges that they're having. And a lot of times we've talked about - Hey, Democrats' messages are, may have some issues and stuff. They seem to actually be pretty effective that the Democratic results were fairly strong compared to what expectations were going in, and Republicans seemed to struggle. And you just talked about Reagan Dunn having a challenge with talking about where he's at in terms of abortion rights. He before had tried to be a moderate, this time it seemed like he really initially and in the middle there felt like he needed to say - yeah, absolutely I'm pro-life, I personally don't believe in abortion and don't want that. And with the Dobbs decision - Republicans could say that before, certainly more than if you had - I don't think that Washington residents, feeling that they had protections federally plus in the state, really felt like there was a vulnerability and so just let that slide. I don't think that was the case this time. And I heard Reagan Dunn in one interview say - yeah, that happened federally, but here in this state, abortion is settled law - which is literally what we heard Justice Kavanaugh say, what we heard a number of Congresspeople say before that right was eliminated at the federal level. So there just isn't confidence or comfort that that is settled law and it seems like Republicans are a bit flatfooted. And realistically, just not in-step with the 65 or so percent of the public that strongly favors abortion rights. How do you think they handle that issue in the primary? And what does that say for how things will look in the general? [00:18:59] EJ Juárez: I'll jump in first here. I think it feeds into this idea that I think Republicans have been happily beating the drum on of - everything's fine, except for we're gonna oppose everything that might not make it fine - in this divorced-from-reality narrative of - as long as we hold the line, it can't get worse and we're not actively participating in that. And at the same time, 65+%, 78+% of the actual electorate are saying - we are totally on the other side of this issue than you, and you've missed the boat. And it doesn't take much for a voter to look at candidates, frankly like Reagan Dunn, who have that record or others who have public statements like Matt Larkin to say - actually, you've not done that, you've not done anything, you've chosen not to take an action here. And I think Kim Schrier was expertly deploying her messaging on the other end of that by - whether it was her TV ads or her radio spots and her visibility were always spot-on - bringing in the Republican mayors of Wenatchee, the mayors of Issaquah highlighting the fact that she was on the ground being active, not playing into the Republicans' assumption that voters would just be defense-oriented. [00:20:22] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and she's been active throughout her term on the ground and building those relationships and really delivering for the people in all of the areas of her district, which I think a lot of people questioned initially - Hey, is she gonna represent all of us? Is she gonna get out to the various counties? Is she comfortable in this really diverse district that is both urban, suburban, and rural - and that stretches nearly from the coast to the mountains. It is really an interesting district and a microcosm of the state, and she seems to have navigated that very well. So I think we will proceed to a number of the legislative district races. And we'll start with a few - I think overall, it's fair to say that Democrats finished very strongly. Certainly at the beginning of this cycle, there was a lot of excitement from Republicans here in the state, legislatively, and concern from Democrats saying - Hey, this could be a tough year. We have a lot of seats that we may need to be defending. We've got redistricting. We're not knowing how that's gonna turn out. And so is this going to be a year where Democrats potentially lose a number of seats? It's a midterm that a lot of times is challenging for the party in power - just that's the way it's traditionally gone. And these results turned out pretty favorably for Democrats across the board. Thinking about things overall before we get into specific districts, are there thoughts that you have, Doug, on just how things look for Democrats across the board legislatively? [00:22:07] Doug Trumm: I think we can pretty safely say that Democrats are still gonna have control of the State Legislature. There might be a swing of a seat or two in either direction - and that can include Democrats getting more seats, which if you believe all of the coverage - but leading into this election, it was just a lot of reprinted Republican press releases about how there was a wave coming and you better tremble. They might lose a seat or two but given where they're at right now, which is if you haven't been following along - that's 57-41 advantage in the House, it's a large advantage in the House. And then the Senate, there is a 28-21 advantage for Democrats. So they got a little cushion, so if they lose a seat or two - becomes a little bit more of a headache from time to time, as far as whipping the votes. But they're ultimately still setting the agenda, controlling the committees. So at the end of the day, the hope of controlling one of those chambers and stopping all this string of legislation - and, Crystal, I know we've criticized the Democrats here and then for some of the stuff they weren't able to get done, but let's take a moment to acknowledge that there has been a pretty steady stream of major legislation coming from this last few years of having Inslee in the governor's seat and having both chambers controlled that - including a major climate bill and including a major transportation package - neither of them are perfect, but they're definitely a lot better than doing nothing. So anyway I don't know if that's partially a reflection of voters realizing - Hey, this is working out decently for us to let one party with a fairly clear vision and passion for what they're doing lead things. And then on this other side, we have a pretty honestly all-over-the-place message - and other times just really simple to the point of ad nauseam, just hating taxes every time. Well, sometimes we have to pay for stuff. So I think it's a favorable result and it'll be interesting to see some of those close races actually end up coming the Democrats' way. [00:24:26] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. Any thoughts that you have, EJ? [00:24:29] EJ Juárez: I've been thinking a lot about what it must be like to be JT Wilcox right now - the man who's running the Republican House strategy, the guy who's raising all this money in his caucus - for what purpose? And I kept believing that the strategy would become clear, that we were going to get indications of how all that money was going to be used on that side. And ultimately, they might as well just put that in a vault, and set the vault off to the ocean, given it a Viking funeral - because it did not produce. And there is nothing more damning in politics than being able to spend that much money with no results. And so I think the big takeaway for me looking at these legislative races, and I largely agree with Doug, is that Democrats who had controlled both chambers and the governor's office for so long and had really legitimate critique around not delivering on the biggest issues for Washington for many years from all sides - passed some big stuff and started to do big things and voters rewarded them by bucking what was supposed to be a very bad year for them. And so I hope that at least many of those Democrats, especially the incumbents maybe who aren't on the ballot this year, are watching that going - okay, here's the data point, let's keep going, let's do more, and see if this holds if voters will continue to reward us for delivering on the things that we know are important to them. [00:26:09] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I would completely agree with that. And to your point, to both of your points - they have taken some substantive moves, particularly at a time - we're seeing some significant action taken congressionally recently, that they're just making some progress with some major legislation. But even on issues that, federally, congress has been stuck on, our State Legislature has been able to act and move - things like a $35 cap on insulin for families was something that was passed by Democrats this past session. As you just talked about, Doug, record investments in transportation and transit and mobility and helping people be able to safely get through their communities and handle their daily tasks, even if they don't drive. And even areas where - Hey, there's highway expansion - that may be a little bit controversial. They moved on an issue that had been stuck for over a decade and getting through and getting past the I-5 bridge connection between Washington and Oregon. And so it is something where they have done some big things. They do appear to have been rewarded - particularly those that have stood strong. And there was, I think, a question in some of these swing districts that have gone between Democrats and Republicans, that have been repeatedly extremely close, whether Republicans were gonna be able to land some arguments that stuck, whether some of those criticisms from a couple years ago, or four years ago were still valid today. And it seems they fell flat, flatter than they have for a long time. So I think just starting with a few legislative districts - starting with a big focus in the Senate, which I know Republicans were looking at as one of their potential biggest pickups. In the Senate, where the margin is closer than it is in the House, in the 26th Legislative District down on the Kitsap Peninsula with Senator Emily Randall facing a very strong challenge initially from Republican Jesse Young, who is a state representative running for that Senate seat. And Emily has finished - I think stronger than most people anticipated. I think this is one of those races where Republicans - to your point, EJ - invested a ton of money. Jesse Young was one of the biggest fundraisers - outraised, outspent Emily Randall - but Emily finished with over 50% of the vote. She's at 51.5% right now to Jesse Young's 44.3% - certainly not the result that Republicans were looking for and I think frankly, a better result than Democrats were expecting. What happened in this race and why do you think Emily finished so strongly, Doug? [00:29:20] Doug Trumm: I think basically that that part of the state, which is just across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge from Tacoma - it's behaving a lot more like part of the Seattle metropolitan area. And that means it's, I think just generally, it's shifting to the left. And there's a lot of specific things - there was the big thing they were gonna try to hit Emily on - was they wanted to lower the toll on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. And that ended up being a huge football this session, but ultimately Democrats got to a place where they were okay with slightly moderating that toll, but maybe there was some thought that that left them vulnerable. But it appears that if that was gonna be their dark horse issue or whatever, voters went - well, that seemed like the responsible thing to do. You still do have to pay for that bridge and you have to pay for roads in general. You can't just suddenly go - everything's free. As much as we would love that, that means it's coming out of sales tax and other even more regressive sources that are farther from the use case. I guess I just bring that up since I do focus on transportation issues a lot, but I do think that getting around the district is a big one - and they did get a upgrade to the Gorst interchange as well in the transportation bill. And as urbanists, we maybe don't love that widening, but in that district - solving that bottleneck for them might have been something they look at Randall - she's getting stuff done. And certainly we already talked about abortion, but I think in that district it's likely to be a very big issue that's motivating turnout. And with Jesse Young being a pretty extreme right Republican - that's just not a good matchup as they maybe thought it was on paper, just because he has name ID from being a representative and raising a lot of money. At the end of the day, it's just not the right messenger or the right message. So it's not a gimme, by any means - she has 51.5%, I think you said - but that's certainly a good, strong position to be into and barring some sort of real stumble, I think she'll get re-elected and rightfully so. [00:31:44] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and helping a potential seatmate in the Representative open seat currently there - Adison Richards, the Democrat, also finishing with just over 50% against Spencer Hutchins, the Republican candidate. And I think, particularly with Spencer - they tried to paint him as pragmatic, just worried about what people would call kitchen table issues traditionally. I think people talk about a lot at the kitchen table, including issues of values and rights - but really tried to focus on an economic message. They certainly tried to hit Emily Randall when it came to taxes, they were also talking about gas prices. And I think there was a recognition that - one, as they talked about with Biden sometimes, this is a bigger problem than just Washington State or even the United States when it comes to gas prices. There are some other major geopolitical forces at play there that influence that. And I think as you mentioned, Doug, it's not that most people are actually anti-tax - they just want to get their money's worth, I think is the bottom line. And I think with a number of the things that Emily Randall, that Democrats have really talked about being important to invest in, people are feeling that money is being spent in the ways that they feel is valuable and useful and they can see a case to be made for that. What do you see in this district, or what do you think this says about just competitive districts overall, EJ? [00:33:31] EJ Juárez: I'll start by - I think every time we talk about Jesse Young, we also have to talk about the fact that he was barred from talking to his own legislative assistants by the Legislature. This is a man who faced credible and serious allegations of being hostile and intimidating to staff. This is also a man who mixed his professional staff with his campaign staff and was campaigning with state resources on state time, so every opportunity - [00:34:00] Crystal Fincher: Which is illegal, which you cannot do. [00:34:05] EJ Juárez: - had to get that in there 'cause good governance, good - excuse me - good government is important. The second thing is the 26th gives me big 30th LD circa five, six years ago vibes. This is a pattern where we gradually saw Federal Way - that region - transfer to a much more solidly Democrat district, or at least more reliably Democrat district than we have. I think we're watching in real-time, the 26th make a similar transition - probably not apples-to-apples, but it's close enough where we're seeing this trend line of more Democrats consistently showing up. And our candidates, regardless of fundraising ability, doing better and better. That is not to take anything away from Emily because that woman is a rock star, right? She is working really hard. She is in the field and she's actually addressing the least sexy issues of many districts, right? It is the retail politics of where are your sidewalks, let's talk about the farmer's market, let's talk about land use in your neighborhood and the park down the street. And unlike many other legislators, this is something that's popping up again and again on her socials and in her campaign ads and how she is moving through the world. So I think this is a case of an incredibly hard-working Democrat incumbent, who is earning potentially this reputation of somebody who can hold super hard districts and I think raise a bunch of money at the same time. While she may have been outraised, she's pulling in sizable donations and has been a consistent, I think, player in her caucus. [00:35:46] Doug Trumm: Yeah, that's dead on. And I just want to add in quick to that - in addition to her just being clearly a rising star in the party, this district has a fast ferry to Seattle and it's close to Tacoma - this is a place where people are going to escape really high housing prices in Seattle. That is where the working class is moving and that's where your barista lives, maybe. So it's certainly someplace where it's easy to see that trend continuing because Bremerton is building a good amount of housing - they're embracing that to some extent and that's gonna change who's in the district - it's gonna be a younger district for that reason. [00:36:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and to your point - Bremerton has, Gig Harbor has made important strides on zoning housing action, building enough housing to house the people who are moving there, who are living there, and really taking steps to address the housing affordability crisis that we've been seeing - and making progress in those conversations and taking action in ways that I think is surprising sometimes to people in Seattle, and that Seattle is lagging behind areas in Pierce County and in Spokane, when it comes to taking definitive steps to build more housing supply, address the housing crisis, and move there. It's really interesting. I completely agree that this does remind me of the 30th Legislative District around the Federal Way, Auburn area of a few years back, of the early to mid-20 teens that we saw there and that it is progressively coming more blue. And I do think that is because we're seeing a lot more people, displaced really, from Seattle and more expensive areas to those areas, discovering how they are - those areas or are organically growing also. And so we're seeing a number of the Pierce County suburbs shift to be a little bit more blue as well as suburbs in King County. And so it's a really interesting phenomenon that we're seeing - which we might as well move to the 30th Legislative District results. This was another really interesting district, especially with redistricting - a lot of people wondering is this going to be a district that's a challenge? There's been a lot of talk about public safety, there's been a lot of talk about economic issues. And this is another area where Republicans invested a lot of money and tried to attack the Democrats in this district for taking action that was popularly supported by voters in the district before, seems to have been a vindicating vote in that area where Claire Wilson is at 54% ahead of Linda Kochmar, who was a known Republican name in the area. Jamila Taylor finishing above 54% against Casey Jones, who's actually a policeman, an officer in the area. And then with an open seat - the one vacated by Representative, or that's being vacated by Representative Jesse Johnson - Kristine Reeves, who is a former State Representative who left to run for Congress and now is running again for this seat, finished with just shy of 43%. And that was a competitive Democratic primary - so between Kristine Reeves 43% just about, Carey Anderson, the other Democrat in the race, at just about 14% - a really strong Democratic showing in that seat against the Republican who made it through to the general election with 37% of the vote. 55+% is what people would love to see. This used to be a district with Republicans there - very purple, not reddish purple - that has just continued to move solidly blue. I think to that point you have legislators here with Jamila Johnson [Taylor], who's the head of the Black Legislative Caucus, and Senator Wilson who are great retail politicians, great in the community, doing the work on the ground to get this through. What does this result say to you, starting with EJ? [00:40:23] EJ Juárez: At the risk of being a little too snarky, I think what this says is Federal Way and Auburn love a good repeat candidate. We've got Linda Kochmar, who has run how many times now? We've got Kristine Reeves coming back to serve in the House. And by no means is it a single value on any of these also-rans and multiple-time candidates. It is that - one, the bench there is producing the same types of candidates, but the difference is the Democrats are doing better every time, right? These are not radically different candidates than that have been running in the past. What I'm interested in is - you've got Representative Johnson, who had done incredible work on criminal justice reform. Voters clearly were not buying the hype from the media on just how controversial this must have been when it's actually not - that would've been borne out in the vote share - that is a clear correlation, there would've been some level of backlash. I think the other piece here is that turnout was not good in that region. And when you look at King County overall and you look at who's voting specifically in the 30th LD, there is much work to be done. And so while it is impressive that Democrats are putting up 44, or excuse me, 54+% in each of these races, I don't think they can rest. And I think that if they do their - while I don't think it's enough for the GOP to come back and pull one of these seats, it would be a disservice to the nearly decade of massive investments that that caucus and the party has made in that region - that is full of renters that is full of young families, and people that - to Doug's point earlier - escaping housing prices who are sandwiched between Tacoma and Seattle now. So I think it's a fascinating place with lots to watch still. [00:42:18] Crystal Fincher: Very fascinating - a ton to watch. You are absolutely correct - turnout there, in many areas in South King County really, is bad. It's poor. And everyone has to do a much better job of engaging voters where they're at. We have to meet them on the doors. We have to meet them in the community. We have to do the work to make sure that we're reaching out to everyone and listening and hearing what they need, what's concerning to them, what they're saying is needed in their neighborhoods and their communities, and responding and addressing that to make sure that government and their representation is relevant to them. I think there's work to be done there and just the continued communication. So I think this is certainly one where I agree that it probably is not going to flip, but a lot of work just needs to be done in the community. And the more the community is engaged and galvanized, the more they're going to be able to do and lead. This seems like such an opportunity in this district - where sometimes we look at for Democrats, the Seattle districts and say - okay, this is just a safety seat. These people can lead on groundbreaking policy on things that we know are the right thing to do and that just need more proof of concept, more data from implementations on the ground, and people can say - okay, they implemented it there. It wasn't scary. The sky didn't fall. We can expand this. We've seen that with $15 an hour minimum wage. We've seen that with a lot of paid leave legislation. Even renter protections in Federal Way - they were among the leaders in passing a local initiative there that then we saw replicated across the state and legislative action taken on. So it's - I just see this as such a district of opportunity, if they really can engage and connect with the community to be able to do that. Thank you for listening to part 1 of our Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Primary Election Recap. Part 2 will be in your feed this Friday, August 19th. You can find the audio and transcript for the full recap on our website, officialhacksandwonks.com. The Producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler. Our Assistant Producer is Shannon Cheng, and our Post-Production Assistant is Bryce Cannatelli. Our wonderful co-hosts for the recap were EJ Juárez and Doug Trumm – that's two m's at the end. You can find EJ on Twitter at @EliseoJJuarez, and you can find Doug at @dmtrumm. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii and now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on itunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Just type “Hacks and Wonks” into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows, and our mid-week show, delivered right to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com, and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

Host, Adam Sommer, has a chat with political consultant and Missouri policy observer, Ian Wroble, about some of the bills moving through the Missouri Legislature in this Spring, 2022 session. https://heartlandpod.com/Twitter: @TheHeartlandPOD

Host, Adam Sommer, has a chat with political consultant and Missouri policy observer, Ian Wroble, about some of the bills moving through the Missouri Legislature in this Spring, 2022 session. https://heartlandpod.com/Twitter: @TheHeartlandPOD"Change The Conversation"

Today former Seattle mayor and Executive Director of America Walks Mike McGinn joins Crystal  to dissect the most recent finance numbers in the mayor's race and break down what they mean, and discuss how Seattle mayoral candidates are seeking to position themselves in this year's race. Then tea is spilled about how Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes doomed the SPD consent decree from the start, how his challenger, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy, looks to be qualifying for Democracy Vouchers sooner than him, and how that race might unfold.  As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii, and find today's co-host, Mike McGinn, at @mayormcginn. More info is available atofficialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “Effort to Expand Hotel Shelters Has Broad Support, Recycled Statements Replace False Endorsement Claims on Compassion Seattle Website” from Publicola:https://publicola.com/2021/06/09/effort-to-expand-hotel-shelters-has-broad-support-recycled-statements-replace-false-endorsement-claims-on-compassion-seattle-website/ “Police Make Mass Arrests at Protest Against Oil Pipeline” by Hiroko Tabuchi, Matt Furber, and Coral Davenport: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/07/climate/line-3-pipeline-protest-native-americans.html Campaign finance reports from the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission: http://web6.seattle.gov/ethics/elections/campaigns.aspx?cycle=2021&type=campaign&IDNum=749&leftmenu=collapsed “Democracy vouchers play crucial role as candidates compete for cash in Seattle mayoral race” by Daniel Beekman and Jim Brunner:https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/democracy-vouchers-play-crucial-role-as-candidates-compete-for-cash-in-seattle-mayoral-race/ “Pete Holmes to seek fourth term as Seattle City Attorney” by David Kroman:https://crosscut.com/politics/2021/02/pete-holmes-seek-fourth-term-seattle-city-attorney “Abolitionist Nicole Thomas-Kenney Announces Last-Minute Run for City Attorney” by Mark Van Streefkerk: https://southseattleemerald.com/2021/06/10/abolitionist-nicole-thomas-kennedy-announces-last-minute-run-for-city-attorney/ “Seattle police funding debate turns to flawed officer behavior system” by David Kroman:https://crosscut.com/news/2021/05/seattle-police-funding-debate-turns-flawed-officer-behavior-system “Can the Seattle Police Department Consent Decree Be Fixed?” by Paul Kiefer:https://publicola.com/2021/06/03/can-the-the-seattle-police-department-consent-decree-be-fixed/ “Court Monitor Bobb Helped Create Seattle's Police Reform Mess” by Doug Trumm:https://www.theurbanist.org/2020/09/14/court-monitor-bobb-helped-create-seattles-police-reform-mess/ “Seattle police had a chance to prove abolitionists wrong. They didn't.” by Shaun Scott:https://crosscut.com/opinion/2021/05/seattle-police-had-chance-prove-abolitionists-wrong-they-didnt   Transcript Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. 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. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes.  Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a cohost. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show, former mayor of Seattle, and today's co-host: activist, community leader, and current Executive Director of America Walks, the excellent Mike McGinn. Mike McGinn: [00:00:57] I always enjoy being here Crystal and I am a subscriber to Hacks & Wonks on the podcast platform of my choice. So go to the podcast platform of your choice and subscribe and support Crystal and KVRU.  Crystal Fincher: [00:01:14] Well, I appreciate that. I appreciate you. And we always get a lot of comments whenever you're on the show, because you kind of bring the heat when it comes to context and history of like - okay, lots of people moved to Seattle in the past 10 years. I mean, we've had a population explosion - so a lot of people listening today and here in the City were actually not here when you were mayor, and don't have the memory of what happened, and are missing the context of a lot of what happened. How did we get into this Consent Decree situation? What initially happened back when Jenny Durkan was a federal prosecutor and Pete Holmes was running for office, and how did we get into the situation we find ourselves in today? You have a lot of that context, so we appreciate it.  Speaking of that context, we have some - a lot of news this week. Looking over - just lots of items have happened this week - Compassion Seattle having to take down its webpage listing false endorsements, we got tax documents on billionaires. Big items this week with - the Olga Park encampment sweep by the City,  Durkan vs. Seattle Public Schools on the encampment in Bitter Lake, hybrid work models coming back with Amazon, the state reinstating around a 100,000 driver's license and halting the practice of revoking licenses for non-payment of traffic fines, three pipeline protests - the Line 3 pipeline protests, Keystone XL pipeline finally dead - which is great and awesome.  But we'll start out with - we just got new fundraising numbers in the mayoral race. Well, in all of the Seattle races, but I guess we can start with the mayoral race and just for the breakdown - where we are currently at. The top six mayoral candidates right now, in terms of contributions - Colleen Echohawk and Andrew Grant Houston are right neck-and-neck at $399,987 and $[399,]978 respectively. There is a $400,000 cap initially on the ability to accept Democracy Vouchers, and so they are at that cap and can't cash in anything beyond that cap. Following that, Bruce Harrell at $308,000, Lorena González at $299,000, Jessyn Farrell $134,000, and Casey Sixkiller at $43,000.  So, you know, Colleen Echohawk and Andrew Grant Houston are just - they're just getting more cash than they know what to do with. And I think both of them - certainly Andrew Grant Houston has reported a significant amount of vouchers, basically in waiting, that he has banked if and when the cap on those expenditures gets raised. So I guess, how are you looking at this? Just on that number - the contributions and what they're doing, Mike. Mike McGinn: [00:04:15] I think it's very, it's really interesting. You know one of - there's a few things that are interesting. One, it is worth noting that there is a $400,000 cap on expenditures for those that are in the Democracy Voucher program, and if an opponent or if an independent expenditure campaign tips the balance over $400,000, then Ethics and Elections can give permission to people to do more. I think what really jumps out at me though, is that the two people in the race that are not office holders seem to have had the most success just collecting vouchers. Now Andrew Grant Houston hired people to do it, and they're out there canvassing and collecting them. And so that's one technique. I think Colleen Echohawk - they've just been coming in.  And it's kind of surprising because you'd expect that the people that had held office before - Jessyn Farrell, Bruce Harrell, Lorena González - they all have, should have substantial mailing lists. They should all have a substantial base of donors who are used to giving them money for their campaigns. They both, all three of them, have run multiple times and - but none of them have maxed out. None of them have hit the cap. Theoretically, they have a more sophisticated campaign operation, including the database and donors, to hit that first. So if these numbers are affirming what some of the polling that we've seen has shown, which is that there's a sentiment out there that the City's on the wrong track - the right track, wrong track numbers are very much leaning towards wrong track from multiple sources. And so that's favoring outsiders. And I - in 2009 when I ran, I was an outsider and it ended up - and I was running against an incumbent, Greg Nickels. There was another outsider in the race, Joe Mallahan - he was a businessman who put in his own money. And everybody always looked at fundraising, and I didn't fundraise that much compared to the others, but I fundraised enough. But the incumbent had the most money. Another candidate in the race was a long-time City Councilmember, Jan Drago, and they both finished out of the - neither of them made the top two out of the primary. So in a lot of ways, honestly, this feels to me like 2009 in that political dynamic of the outsider is going to do better.  I had to wait for the votes to actually show that there was public sentiment for me. The use of the Democracy Vouchers is a measure of public sentiment. And it's kind of fascinating to me 'cause political types, before Democracy Vouchers, just were meticulous at looking at who donated to who, and how much money they had - and they would use that as a metric for success. Now that Democracy Vouchers are out there, they're like, "Ah, money doesn't really matter anymore." Well, hold it. The outsiders are maxing out with regular people handing over the vouchers, and the insiders with all of their political apparatus are struggling to get to the finish line. Something's going on out there - that's what this is telling me.  Crystal Fincher: [00:07:35] Yeah, it is really interesting to see this dynamic. And as you point out, it is not the people who you would think have very established mailing lists and contacts and donor bases from the campaigns that they ran to get elected in the first place. And this may be a measure of insider money versus outsider or regular people who typically aren't intimately involved, particularly early in campaigns and this process. So it is really interesting just to see the effect that Democracy Vouchers have had. And as you point out, it really is a measure of, "Hey, where are regular people at" - that you have to actually interact with the residents, in some form with your campaign, to get these Democracy Vouchers. And my goodness, they have gotten a lot more of them than their opponents at this point in time.  But also, related to this conversation, and you talk about in your campaign - you didn't raise as much money as the other candidates, but you certainly had enough to execute your plan. Yeah, and get your message out. And so having the cash-on-hand in order to do that is important. And so - one, is just looking at the contributions, but really what a lot of people are looking at in politics is, "Okay. But how much money do you have - meaning you try and keep your expenditures on other items down, because the more you can spend directly communicating with residents and voters in the City, the better you are when it comes - to be able to turn out that vote. The cash-on-hand story is actually a very different story. Colleen Echohawk actually has not spent much on the race - she has spent $83,000. Her cash-on-hand is $316,000 - so that's in the bank still able to be spent. Andrew Grant Houston has actually spent the most so far out of the top six candidates in the race. And so even though he's raised $400,000, his cash-on-hand $134,000, which is less than the next two people in terms of fundraising. Bruce Harrell has $220,000 in cash-on-hand. Lorena González has $149,000 in cash-on-hand, then Jessyn Farrell with $58,000, and Casey Sixkiller with $26,000 on-hand. So that's a very different story than just that top line of fundraising, and really impacts how many people you can communicate with outside of free media models like news - in the paper and online - and communicating with people that way. What do you see when you look at that?  Mike McGinn: [00:10:20] Well, you're right.  Obviously cash-on-hand is the metric that matters. And the fundraising from Democracy Vouchers and from donors is some measure both of the degree to which you have support from some base of supporters, as well as the degree to which you have support from people that are used to giving money. So it's a little bit of an indicator as well.  So that's - so what's interesting to me when I look at that and you see the two bottom people - Casey Sixkiller doesn't appear to be a very serious candidate right now. Like if he was a credible challenger from - so I'll back up a little bit - we've spoken about this before. You know, there's generally a right lane and a left lane in Seattle politics. There's an assumption here that Casey is in the right lane - looking for more support from the business communities, a former - he is the deputy mayor to the incumbent. Well, whether it's the business community or the public, it doesn't appear that people think that a current deputy mayor to Jenny Durkan is a really good investment of their Democracy Voucher or their hard-earned dollars, either one. So not looking like he's getting much traction there for people who are - who might be more sophisticated about who to back. I think that Jessyn Farrell is down at this low level - kind of says the same thing. I mean, she's run multiple times in Seattle. She had a mayoral race four years ago, in which she ran a credible race, and she's just not kind of getting the support. And something else jumped out at me - and it was listening to your podcast, Crystal - is that she's a backer of the Compassion Seattle measure, which is starting to become a real indicator of what lane are you in. And when she says that she supports the Compassion Seattle - tells me that she wants to run in the right lane. And actually we spoke about this at length in a podcast a while ago. I said, she's not running in the left lane.  Crystal Fincher: [00:12:27] You called it first.  Mike McGinn: [00:12:28] I called it first - right! She's working the right lane because the Compassion Seattle is very much backed by the business community as their solution. And what we see is that Echohawk and Houston and Lorena are opposed to it and so they're over there in the left lane. And Harrell and Farrell and Sixkiller are for it, so that's the right lane. Well, it just kind of speaks a little bit to the fact that Jessyn can't quite figure out her lane. And I could talk more about this concept too, but that's just really fascinating to me. And I think there's another thing - that's if you'll permit me just to do a little bit of analysis.  Crystal Fincher: [00:13:04] Have at it!  Mike McGinn: [00:13:05] I'll just do a little more analysis here that comes to mind. You know, when I was working within the Sierra Club and endorsing candidates, what really became clear to me was that there was a - there were kind of two sources of candidates as well that don't map exactly with the left lane-right lane, but mostly. And the Chamber of Commerce and the downtown business community was one source of dollars in support for a candidate, and labor as a whole was another source. So in 2001, it was Nickels versus Sidran, and that was a classic business candidate versus a labor candidate. Every other constituency in town kind of has to decide who - where do we go with that? And social services tends to go with labor, and environmentalists go with labor, but sometimes there's a business candidate they like. The neighborhood people - where are they going to go. But all of those other constituencies or communities, and it might be immigrant and refugee communities, or the Black community - they don't necessarily run their own candidates. They tend to have to line up behind the business candidate or the labor candidate. Now when I ran, Greg, at that point - Nickels had been in office for eight years, and he pretty much had both. That's one of the things that an incumbent can do, right? What'll happen is - everybody's getting just enough out of the incumbent that they don't want to take a risk on a challenger. So he had the Chamber of Commerce, which I think was a little shaky on Greg Nickels. He wasn't their guy from the beginning and he had a big chunk of the unions, and I was coming in without either of those. And so was Joe, but then he got business, and I got a little bit of labor in the general.  By the time we got to 2013, we saw a really interesting phenomenon, which was a traditional Democrat in Ed Murray. He had the Chamber support and he had a bunch of labor support. I had some too, but we split labor. And now we, all of a sudden, we saw this business-labor alliance in '13 anoint Ed Murray as the candidate. And this was worked out by the kingmakers and the power elites of the city, right. And I know that sounds a little exaggerated, but trust me - there are specific people who sit down and pick who their candidate is. Same thing happened with Jenny Durkan, who was the named candidate. She picked up the Labor Council endorsement, the Construction Trades - which like highways and other things, backed her. The police officer's union was part of that at the time. So for two cycles in a row, we got these coalitions of labor-business candidates.  And now in this race, all of a sudden, we have a very clear labor candidate in Lorena González and a pretty clear business candidate in Bruce Harrell. And going back to Jessyn, I think she was running as if she could be one of those business-labor hybrid candidates of the last two cycles, but that coalition has broken apart. Now it's a straight business and a straight labor. But what's fascinating is that in the years, the same forces that have now - give us two different candidates, right. But business and labor can't find common ground now - that's too much inequality, too much issues around taxes and homelessness - for them to be able to find a candidate to bridge that. And I, again, I think Jessyn was trying to run as that candidate. They can't do it, but the same forces that produce that dynamic also means that candidates that are outside of those two bases are credible.  So, if you look at the - if you look at the citywide City Council race, we kind of have the same dynamic. We have a business candidate in Sara Nelson, we have the labor candidate in Brianna Thomas, and then you have the neither-of-the-above candidate, Nikkita Oliver, who's coming with a base of support that's completely outside of those two usual centers of gravity and power in the City. So that's kind of the question in this race - is does Colleen Echohawk come from her background as a social services provider, Native American woman? Does Andrew Grant Houston somehow or another slingshot off of the urbanist base. And again, neither of them are going to get very many endorsements from labor, business or a lot of the other traditional players, because everybody's kind of used to - you got to go with one of those. I didn't get any of those in the primary in '09 and I won, right? So it's a very interesting dynamic this year and I think Democracy Vouchers really pushes that even more. And there's no room left for somebody who's trying to be like progressive enough for progressives, but a dealmaker enough for the conservatives. There's no room for that candidate in this cycle - anybody's trying to run that way is like - there's no base for them.  Crystal Fincher: [00:18:30] Well, and as you've mentioned before and mentioned earlier today, what were you polling at before you won the primary, like six weeks out?  Mike McGinn: [00:18:38] Yeah, no, this is really important stuff - like people see the polls, and the fact that what it shows right now - and these are candidate polls, so take it with a grain of salt. But it kind of shows that Bruce and Lorena are doing better than others, but they're also better known than others. About five to six weeks out before the primary, maybe three weeks out before ballots dropped - and I was at 7% in 2009 in the primary, Greg Nickels was at 23% or something like that, Joe Mallahan was at 7%, and a former City Councilwoman Jan Drago - or current City Councilwoman at the time, Jan Drago - was like at 15% or 16% or something like that. But when Election Day came around, Mallahan and I were - I was first, he was second, and Greg was third and he hadn't moved.  And the point is that polls right now - the voters aren't paying attention yet. And all of the materials, all of that money we were talking about - hasn't been spent on campaign communications yet. The messages have not been delivered, right? Like the articles about who should I vote for, the conversations that are just going to start occurring around town of who you're for and why - none of that's really happened yet. And when that happens, that changes those numbers dramatically. And that's why, you can try to crystal ball it and say - no pun intended - but you can try and crystal ball this and say, "Well, here's what I think is going to happen." And we've been doing a little bit of that here saying, "Oh, it's an outsider year, right?" Like that's what the hints are telling us, but it's - this is really an up-in-the-air election, I would say. And having polling at 20% right now, or 15%, if you're a relatively well-known politician in town - that may be your lid. That may be as high as you can go, and your numbers might go lower once they hear about another candidate. Crystal Fincher: [00:20:37] Yeah, and it's an interesting dynamic - you certainly raise a lot of very relevant and helpful issues for context in how to think about this race. When I look at these numbers, I think about what you mentioned earlier in terms of the right track-wrong track polling, and for me, how insufficient it is just to ask that question and make an assumption on that answer. Because right now people ask about the right track-wrong track and the media, I think, has created a popular impression that the City's actions are those of the City Council. But actually when you look at the City Council and Jenny Durkan, both of whom can be characterized as the City - those are two very different viewpoints, two very different philosophies and stances on issues. The City Council has vetoed what Durkan has done, so there's polarization there. And so when someone says things are on the right track, the thing that I see a lot of people doing is concluding - "Well, therefore it means that real people want the issues and the stances that I personally agree with, and this is the proof because people say things are wrong and bad right now."  But looking at - if we're using these fundraising numbers and others, especially with Democracy Vouchers from real people as a - some kind of indicator as to where people are really at. The people, as you talked about, if we're using Compassion Seattle as kind of the most visible proxy for which lanes people are in, those that are not supporting are just dominating in terms of fundraising and Democracy Vouchers. So in terms of the wrong track that the City is taking - is it that some of the inaction and opposition to being able to execute the direction that the City Council has given - is that the frustration? Like, "Hey, at least do something instead of just vetoing stuff and saying stuff is unacceptable, but not doing that much about it." Or is it that people are unhappy with the direction of the Council - looking at the available polling, and to be clear - undecided is the top vote-getter right now in every single poll that's been written, internal and otherwise. So to your point, lots of movement yet to come. But with that, it would suggest that people aren't that unhappy with the Council, as some media narratives suggest, with Lorena making it into the top two, but also not being tied to an insider or wanting to go further to the left if you look at Andrew Grant Houston, or even some of Colleen Echohawk, stances. So it's to be determined where people are at in ultimately deciding what they prefer the direction of the City to be. But I don't think it can be gleaned from a right track-wrong track number. I think that's probably a poor indicator. Mike McGinn: [00:23:40] Yeah.I think that there's a few things in there. One is the - I think for people that are more involved in politics, there's very definitely a Council-versus-the-mayor dynamic that's been going on for the last number of years. And for people who side with the Council in that fight, and for the most part - for the most part, almost everything - I do. That matters in the race. But there's a lot of other people who can't parse that, who don't really feel like they're in a position to figure out who's really right or wrong in that discussion. And I think that's one of the challenges then if you are a current City Councilmember, or even a former one in Bruce's case, right? He was in office in the years in which homelessness went up - and to say, "I'm the person who can come in and fix it." - that's going to be a challenge.  And Lorena will have the same challenge. Having said that, she's probably and is drawing support in particular from labor - unions - for the things that she has delivered for them. Like she has stood up on issues that have led for labor to support her. So it is a mixed bag. I guess I would - speaking from personal experience, I wish that the public had taken a closer look at what was the underlying issues between the City Council and me at the time I was mayor, but I have to say, I know a lot of voters didn't. And a lot of those were just like, "You know what. It seems like the mayor and the Council aren't getting along. We need to get someone new in there." And not only did they - not only did I lose a close race to somebody who said, "I'm going to do everything McGinn did, except I'll do it better." Both of them were false - you'll grant me the opportunity to say that opinion. But, uh - but that was -  Crystal Fincher: [00:25:35] I agree.  Mike McGinn: [00:25:35] - that was his pitch - no ideological issues. "I'm just gonna, I'll just be better at doing it." But they also delivered districts - elections - which was a repudiation of the City Council in the same election. So when the mayor and the Council are fighting, the pox on both your houses thing is real and strong. And so the last point I'll make is - these right track-wrong numbers I've been seeing are really high. They were far higher than they were in 2009 when I ran. And again, an incumbent lost then - and right then the right track-wrong track weren't that far apart then. So these are very - these are historically high right track-wrong track if these polls are accurate. And I think we'll  see more polls that will show it to be that. Which is why I think it's an outsider election, but I also know it's also wide open. And I think the candidates know that too, right now. If you're a mayor watcher, everybody's going to be trying to figure out how do I grab my votes out of that pool of undecided voters? What do I have to do to get some votes? And I think you're going to see candidates working harder to stand out in the next few weeks.  Crystal Fincher: [00:26:47] All right. So we have covered the conversation about the mayor's race in more detail than we thought we were going to get into, but I definitely also want to make sure to talk about the City Attorney race. And so how are you looking at this - with Pete Holmes currently there, but with his challenger, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy, at this point actually qualifying for Democracy Vouchers. Even though she entered the race much later than he did, she's qualifying for Democracy Vouchers before Pete Holmes. Why do you think that is? Mike McGinn: [00:27:22] Well, I think this is really fascinating. I mean, it's pretty clear from her own words that Nicole Thomas-Kennedy got into the race pretty much at the last minute, because she thought it was really important to raise issues, about police reform in particular. And like candidates have discovered before - they get into the race just because they feel they need to carry a conversation, then all of a sudden they discover that maybe there's some momentum behind that. I think that was true with Kshama Sawant against Richard Conlin - I think she got into that race the first time she was elected to the City Council to make sure there was a debate and discovered she had momentum. I think that happened to Bernie Sanders when he entered the race against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic primary and all of a sudden he discovered he had momentum. And I think the same thing has happened to Nicole Thomas-Kennedy.  We were talking about insider or outsider - Pete's been in office for 12 years. And, you know, he, he came in as a progressive reformer on a variety of issues, very much supported by the nightclub industry at the time, because of the way the Nickel's administration was harsh to nightclub establishments. But he came into office - it's been 12 years and it looks like the public is ready for someone different, if the voucher numbers are to be believed. Now I'm not saying that that's how this race is going to turn out, but that there was more support for a challenger than probably Pete anticipated or Nicole Thomas-Kennedy anticipated.  Crystal Fincher: [00:28:54] And a lot of people in the public anticipated. Why do you think there is seemingly this much of an appetite, even an early appetite - looking at early endorsements and meetings and how those are going among insiders. Even those are turning out to be tougher for Pete Holmes than I think a lot of people anticipated. What's going on? Mike McGinn: [00:29:16] Well, you know, I think Pete's found himself in a - well, if you want to try to pin it down - he's been in office 12 years. And I was thinking about this the other day - I think since I signed the Consent Decree in 2012, that there've been 5 mayors, if you count a couple of interims. I think there've been 5 police chiefs, counting interims. Several City Council presidents, we've even had two Monitors - but during that entire 12 years, we've only had one City Attorney and that's Pete Holmes. And he positions himself as a reformer, and essential to reform. In fact, I've heard him say, "You can't ask me to leave now because we have to finish the job of reform." Well, we've been told - we were being told for years by the Monitor and mayors - that reform was on track and Pete was joining that chorus. And what we saw with the protests, and the police behavior, and tear-gassing the public - leading to a federal court order against it. What we see is that reform failed. And Pete says he was at the helm of that, but now he has to be there to help fix it. And I think that from the progressive side, they see that he's not really solving the problems that he says he's for. And I had my own experiences with Pete, obviously, but he has been throughout this entire process, a big supporter - he basically chose the Monitor we ended up with. I wanted a different Monitor. He got 5 members of the City Council to vote for Merrick Bobb - this is the Monitor who brought us this software system, which everybody says costs millions of dollars, and it's completely ineffective, but we have to keep using it - it's useless. In fact, when he proposed that and I objected to it - and Pete supported it in front of the judge. And helped bring it - that was in the monitoring plan. That software - people don't know this - that software was not in the Consent Decree. That software was brought up by the Monitor, put into a monitoring plan, objected to, but Pete said, "No, that's my monitor, and that's his plan and we have to support it." So Pete needs to take responsibility for that waste of money too.  He delayed, for years, the adoption of the accountability legislation, because he had to put his hand in to deal with the Community Police Commission's recommendations. And he never had good relationships with the Community Police Commission.  And here - I'll share news with you that probably no one knows 'cause I don't know that I've ever shared it before. Breaking news. When we mediated - when I mediated the Consent Decree with the Office of Civil Rights, the mediator kept two people out of the mediation. Nobody had to ask her, she just chose to do it. There were two people not allowed in that mediation. One was Jenny Durkan. The other was Pete Holmes.  Crystal Fincher: [00:32:26] Oh what! Okay - Mike McGinn: [00:32:28] Yes. Yes! He signed the agreement, but he did not negotiate the agreement. And it was really interesting because the mediator - I had visited in DC, I'd met with the head of the Office of Civil Rights, Tom Perez. I had to go to DC and meet with him to try to get the negotiations on track because at that time, Jenny Durkan was refusing to negotiate with us. Well -  Crystal Fincher: [00:32:55] As the US attorney at the time.  Mike McGinn: [00:32:56] As the US attorney at the time, while simultaneously sending letters saying that we weren't agreeing to things fast enough. But there wasn't a real give and take. There wasn't a real dialogue about how to settle the case and how to come up with a good productive Consent Decree. So I went to DC, met with Tom Perez, we agreed to re-open negotiations with their office taking more leadership in it. And we ended up with a mediator. The mediator came and visited me and said, "Look, here's the problem. We need the principals in the room. We're going to get the chief litigator from the Office of Civil Rights and you - both need to be in the mediation so that we have the people with the authority to make a deal."  And I said, "Okay, that makes sense. I understand that." I was a lawyer in private practice. And then I said, "What about - hold it, what about Pete Holmes?"  And she said, "Nope, Pete Holmes is not invited. And by the way, neither is Jenny Durkan." So the mediator, from her own decision-making, had already decided how it was going to run. And we had someone from the City Attorney's office there. The mediator would talk to Pete periodically to keep him updated, but the very clear intent was that we needed to keep them - both of them - a little bit away from the negotiation so it could have a chance of success. The two of them were, just honestly, just politicizing the hell out of it at the time. My opinion. And so -  Crystal Fincher: [00:34:21] I agree.  Mike McGinn: [00:34:22] Yeah, no - it was a really challenging environment and we managed to hold a mediation without the leaks to the press about what was being discussed on a daily basis. I'm sure the press would have loved more information about what was going on on a daily basis, but it provided the type of environment in which we could come up with an agreement that everyone could sign. As soon as the agreement was signed, next step was the discussion about who the Monitor would be - critically important decision. And that was the point at which Pete insisted on Merrick Bobb, and did everything in his power to block the people I would have supported, and to get the Council to line up behind Merrick Bobb. I ultimately would have to give way, and we ended up with Merrick Bobb - and Merrick Bobb didn't get along with the Police Commission, wasted money on the software, said everything was going great and it wasn't. And Pete was backing him the whole time. So Pete - you had 12 years to do police reform, maybe it's time to give somebody else a shot. Crystal Fincher: [00:35:22] Well, I think a lot of certainly insiders, at this point as it looks, and the regular public is going to have an opportunity to hear the conversation and to hear that maybe it's time for another choice. So I certainly appreciate all of the background. See, the wonderful thing about having you on is that you come with receipts from way back when, and there certainly is a lot that I remember from, certainly, working with you at the time. But you just have all of the detail and all of the intricacies from what happened.  Mike McGinn: [00:35:57] A lot of years ago, now. The years are adding up, Crystal.  Crystal Fincher: [00:36:00] Well, the years are definitely adding up, but I appreciate the context, and the time, and just being able to go back. Because also - it is so - like now, having a progressive Council to people is normal. It so was not this. It so was - Tim Burgess and Bruce Harrell and Richard Conlin and it was a conservative Council who was mad - who was salty on a daily basis, with the support of the Seattle Times on a daily basis - at this outsider, loony, progressive, McSchwinn mayor. Was coming in and trying to do all these crazy things like trying to do Road Diets, and things that now have been - that are viewed as normal and not controversial. But at the time, when I tell you that, like the whole War on Cars discourse that started for you and during you, that was - it was hyperbolic. It was just - it was extreme. So we're at a very different place today than we were then, but we still have people who were intimately involved and aligned with that conservative Council, like Jenny Durkan, who were very instrumental in setting things up to land exactly where they are right now - which is frustrating for some of us looking at like - this was predictable, that this wasn't the progressive champion that a lot of people thought when they were running. But of course we have the benefit of doing stuff like this for a living and having the time to know when to dive into this. And a lot of people just don't have access to that information.  Mike McGinn: [00:37:43] Well, it's really, and this is a really a good example of that. Like the way in which police reform can be politicized and was politicized. I mentioned the selection of the Monitor. I remember Bruce Harrell like, "Mayor McGinn is anti-police reform because he won't support Merrick Bobb." We had three candidates we supported, that we submitted to the judge, for a monitor. We - I signed a - negotiated a Consent Decree that called for a Monitor, but we were in this place where it was very easy to say who was for and against reform at the time.  And that process of reform - it's so fascinating to watch now a decade later, right? Almost 10 years later - to see that we now have this bizarre situation really where the Council doesn't have authority to change the police budget because the judge wants something different. They don't have the authority to get rid of a software program that doesn't work. Where the Community Police Commission - they warned the Council not to vote for the police contract, and they did vote for the police contract that wiped out the accountability procedures. And all of that was being overseen by the judge. Like the judge is saying, "Who gets to decide what the accountability procedures are? It's me, I'm the judge."  So what started as an attempt to engage the community in a dialogue with the City and the police department about what reform looks like - with the belief that it should be homegrown because it's more likely - let's listen to community - has now turned into this very, very top-down thing, being run by a judge, in which so much of the local control has disappeared. And who's the one person who could go into court on behalf of the City and say to the judge, "No, the Consent Decree called for the Community Police Commission to have power. Not for the judge to have all the power, right? It called for the City Council to be able to pass accountability reforms without having to check with the judge." That is what the - that is basically what the decree provided. But you need a City Attorney who would have the guts to actually go into a federal judge and say, "You don't have all the authority in this instance." And so since there was never any pushback on the judge - now the ability of the community as a whole to influence police reform has been taken away and resides in the judge. And there's really only one place that - there's only one person under the City Charter who had the authority to go in on behalf of the City and say, "Do something different." And that was Pete Holmes. And he never was willing to challenge the Monitor, never willing to challenge the judge, never willing to stand up for the community in that way. So Pete, you've been at this - I go back to - been in there 12 years, said he's necessary to police reform. He has to take some accountability for how he's not gotten it done overall. Crystal Fincher: [00:40:49] And the point that you're making now is a point that he couldn't make enough, 10 years ago, while challenging you with his authority that he was claiming under the Charter - for the Monitor, for taking a different stance than you were in the negotiation. And at that time saying, "Well, you know, it is my duty and responsibility. I have this ability, I'm an independently elected official. I am not just simply operating at the will of the mayor. I am my own entity, and I can and should." So he is claiming this authority, and at that time to challenge you with the support of the conservative Council, and that's why it was so striking to me and I commented a number of times during this past year. During the protests, seeing everything that SPD was doing, all of these challenges that we're having with the judge, all of the challenges that we're having in who can order what between Durkan and the police chief and that, the subpoena-ing of media records and video on behalf of the police. I am just sitting here going - how is Pete Holmes standing silent? This is consent to this - because he made a point of telling everyone he had the power to challenge things like that a decade ago. And now he's just quiet as a little mouse and escaping the accountability that is - that Jenny Durkan was encountering, that the Council, that the police chief - everyone was under the microscope, except Pete Holmes, just quiet in the corner over here. And it's like, if there was one person who could change this, it is Pete Holmes. Just a little frustrating. But, you know, we've talked about that before.  Mike McGinn: [00:42:37] Well, and it is - we have talked about that before - and yeah, something like subpoena-ing records of the media. Like how did that become City policy and how could Pete go and defend that as an action, as if SPD was not a part of the City? And so -  Crystal Fincher: [00:42:53] Yeah. As if the media is just an investigative arm of SPD that they can use at their will - it doesn't work. Democracy doesn't work that way, the City Charter doesn't work that - like, that's not how things work.  Mike McGinn: [00:43:07] And, you know, I think the same issue, honestly, can be raised with respect to homelessness. Now, I'm not saying a City Attorney can solve homelessness alone. It's something that will take the executive branch, the legislative branch, the judicial branch - a lot of the issues for homeless people have to do with dealing with compliance with the laws about being outside, and people ending up being prosecuted, and ending up in Municipal Court. So I don't want to say that Pete can solve homelessness, but a City Attorney is at a really unique and central position on the homelessness issue, because they are standing - 'cause they are in relationship to the City Council, the mayor, the judicial system, and the police department, specifically in a very unique way. And interacting also with the County Prosecutor as well. And to me, it's just noticeable that in 12 years of being at that central point, we really haven't seen - what's the leadership to solving homelessness. He has certainly leaned in on specific things - like I will not prosecute this, or I'll change the penalty for that - and those are oftentimes the right direction to go. But in terms of demonstrating some type of leadership in that space and helping us solve the problems, it's just like you were saying with the other issues - he doesn't want to put himself into that position of being associated with the homeless response. And it's just really hard to do that if you're not going to - it's really hard to have a homelessness response when somebody in that position isn't going to be a really strong collaborator in the solutions.  Crystal Fincher: [00:45:03] Yeah, I agree. I appreciate the time that you've spent with us today. This is probably the longest episode that we've ever had. But like this is - just for people listening - a lot of times there's a conversation before the show, there's a conversation after the show. So this just captures more of some of the types of conversations we have on the sides. And we just decided to keep, to keep rolling.  Mike McGinn: [00:45:28] Just kept rolling, we just kept going. We couldn't help ourselves, Crystal.  Crystal Fincher: [00:45:31] Couldn't help it. And you provide just so much valuable insight and context, so I appreciate it. Well, thanks for taking this time with us today.  Mike McGinn: [00:45:41] Anytime.  Crystal Fincher: [00:45:41] So I appreciate and thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, June 11th, 2021. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones Jr. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our insightful co-host today was activist, former Seattle mayor Mike McGinn. You can find Mike on Twitter - it's a fire Twitter feed, by the way - @MayorMcGinn. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, spelled F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. And now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts, just type "Hacks & Wonks" into the search bar, be sure to subscribe to get full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in. Talk to you next time.

Show Notes On this week in review, Heather Weiner joins Crystal to analyze progressive revenue being passed in the state legislature, developments in fundraising in the Seattle mayoral race, and more on the “compassionate” charter amendment seeking to make encampment sweeps in Seattle more prevalent. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Heather Weiner, at @hlweiner. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources Learn more about the Working Families Tax Credit here: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/washington-lawmakers-passed-a-tax-credit-for-working-families-in-2008-is-this-the-year-they-finally-fund-it/  Track several of the bills mentioned in this show, including capital gains tax, here: https://crosscut.com/politics/2021/03/bills-were-tracking-2021-washington-state-legislature#taxes  Learn more about the background of the capital gains tax here: https://southseattleemerald.com/2021/03/29/democrats-include-capital-gains-tax-in-state-budget-proposals/  Read the Hugh Spitzer article mentioned by Heather in the show here: https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/whatever-your-opinion-about-a-state-capital-gains-tax-its-constitutional/  Get to know more about candidates in the Seattle mayor's race here: https://southseattleemerald.com/tag/2021-seattle-mayoral-race/  Learn more about the proposed chart amendment meant to address the homelessness crisis here: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/seattle-begins-to-digest-proposal-that-would-change-city-charter-to-address-homelessness/    Transcript Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] 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 through the lens of those doing the work with behind the scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a cohost. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show, and today's co-host, local political consultant, Heather Weiner. Heather Weiner: [00:00:44] Hi, Crystal. Crystal Fincher: [00:00:45] Hey. Heather Weiner: [00:00:46] Hey. Crystal Fincher: [00:00:47] So happy to have you back. Heather Weiner: [00:00:48] I'm so glad to be here. We have so much to talk about as usual. Crystal Fincher: [00:00:53] So much to talk about. And I guess the first thing that I'd love to talk about is... You know what? We're about to get some progressive revenue, it looks like. Capital gains in the legislature ... Heather Weiner: [00:01:03] Yeah - just minutes ago! Crystal Fincher: [00:01:04] ... is moving to the floor in the House. Heather Weiner: [00:01:07] Oh gosh, there's two really exciting things happening right now. So the first one is the legislature has finally included the Working Family Tax Credit in the budget process, which means that thousands and thousands of families in Washington state will get a cash infusion starting soon, coming from the state. And that'll be every year, not just during the pandemic. So that is great news. The second thing that's great news is we are taking a second step in balancing our regressive tax system and have just passed, out of the House committee - just minutes before this recording, hot off the presses - a capital gains tax. So that just passed out of committee 11-6, out of the House Finance Committee. That's Chair Noel Frame's committee. Go, Noel. Crystal Fincher: [00:01:59] Go, Noel. Heather Weiner: [00:01:59] And with Vice-chair April Berg, they have passed, really, a historic bill that will tax the extraordinary profits made by exceptionally rich people on the stock market. So this does not affect retirement accounts, it does not affect sales of small businesses, or any real estate at all. It's just people who are getting passive income from selling their stocks and bonds. And you would think, $250,000, wow. Who's selling $250,000 worth of stock? That are making $250,000 off of stock sales at a time. And the answer is not that many people, actually. It's really just the 0.02 per top 2%. Wait, 0.2 top percent. Am I saying that correctly? Crystal Fincher: [00:02:53] Yeah, not even 2 - 0.02 percent. Heather Weiner: [00:02:55] Yeah, right? So that's 2 out of 1,000 people who will be paying this tax. And it's just 7% of everything that they make over $250,000. Doesn't sound like that much, but we have enough billionaires in this state that that will raise $500 million for childcare and early learning every year from now going forward. And that's amazing. So Crystal, here's how the process works. The bill passed out of the Senate, came to the House, just passed with some amendments out of the House committee. The full House has to vote on it. It then goes back to the Senate and the Senate's got to decide if they're going to vote on the House version or not. It's all got to happen in 10 days. Only geeks like us - think this is exciting. Crystal Fincher: [00:03:44] We think it's super exciting. I think that there's a lot of people even beyond geeks. I mean, only the geeks are following along to every step in this process of the legislation moving, certainly, but my goodness, this is going to help a lot of people. And just thinking about, in this entire conversation about taxation, which is actually pretty popular - polls very well now, people are understanding, now more than they ever have, about just how wide the gap is between those who are regular working class. Whether it's lower, middle-class even upper middle class - completely different conversation, completely different universe, than the ultra wealthy, than the billionaires. And we have our fair share of billionaires here in Washington state because they have gotten off scot-free for so long. This is a great place, has been a great place for billionaires to live and to hoard wealth, and that they make so much money that just taxing 2 out of every 1,000 people can change lives of thousands of families in this state. That's what the stakes are in this conversation. Heather Weiner: [00:05:02] Right now, I'm looking at this spreadsheet with the Department of Revenue data. Okay. Okay. We will not spend the entire half an hour talking about this. [laughter, crosstalk] Nothing more sexy than talking about a spreadsheet you can't see. That's hot. But let me just tell you, look, according to the Department of Revenue, there are over 3.7 million households that file taxes every year. And of those 3.7 million, I'm going to tell you exactly how many people out of those 3.7 million are going to actually have to pay this. Are you ready? 8,000. Crystal Fincher: [00:05:43] Jeez. Heather Weiner: [00:05:44] 8,000. And you know how much money those folks make or have every year - just that's taxable? Crystal Fincher: [00:05:53] How much? Heather Weiner: [00:05:54] No, wait. $9.8 billion, just for those 8,000 people. Crystal Fincher: [00:06:04] Of taxable income? Annually? Heather Weiner: [00:06:08] Taxable capital gain income. [crosstalk] That's not money that they're making by selling gadgets or gidgets, right? Crystal Fincher: [00:06:19] Just money from capital gains. Okay. Heather Weiner: [00:06:20] It's just money from capital gains that they put into the stock market, where rich people trade money back and forth with each other. And then they take it off the top, right? It's basically gambling money, because when you're putting that much money into the stock market, what you're essentially doing is playing poker. And so, you're putting it in, you're trying to see if that bet works, and then you win off of that gambling money. So this is money that is [crosstalk] basically gambling winnings that we should be taxing. Crystal Fincher: [00:06:46] Every year, almost $10 billion of taxable capital gains income. Okay. Heather Weiner: [00:06:52] Okay. All right. All right. Let's not talk about this the whole time. Crystal Fincher: [00:06:55] That was a bigger number than I was prepared for. That was - I knew it was big. I did not know it was that big. That is obscenely huge. Heather Weiner: [00:07:03] Yeah, obscenely huge. Just off the stock market. Crystal Fincher: [00:07:08] Tax it, tax it. Tax it long and tax it hard. Tax it, Tax it. Heather Weiner: [00:07:12] Oh, you're saying the words to me that make me so excited. Let's tax it. Nearly every other state in the country, including our next door neighbors - Idaho, Oregon, California - all tax capital gains. It's time for us to do the same thing. And don't give me that BS argument about how it's an income tax. It's not an income tax. Income is something that you earn. This is from the sale of something. This is essentially a sales tax on the sale that you just did of your stocks. So it is an excise tax. It's a sales tax. There was a great op-ed written by Spitzer Hugh. Spitzer's a renowned constitutional lawyer here in the State of Washington, who said, "Not only is this going to pass a constitutional test, this is actually going to help a whole bunch of other issues." Now, here's what I think is going to happen next, Crystal. I think this is going to pass the House, going to pass the Senate, the governor's going to sign it. And then, conservatives - who want to protect the interests of these super wealthy, uber rich people - are going to try to do a referendum to repeal it. Just like what we saw with sex ed last year. So I think we may be in for a referendum fight. We'll see what happens. Crystal Fincher: [00:08:28] Bring it on. Heather Weiner: [00:08:29] Yeah. Bring it on. You tell people who are still struggling. You tell people who are still unemployed. You tell people who don't have childcare, whose children are being set back by the last year of not getting education, that you don't want to tax 8,000 super rich people in the State of Washington. Crystal Fincher: [00:08:49] Yeah. I think conservatives are - we saw it in last year's elections, I think, where for years and years and years, the kind of knee-jerk reaction to any revenue is - Taxes, taxes are bad. Say taxes, and it's scary, and people are going to run in the other direction. And that actually worked, but it worked too well for too long. And taxes actually fund things that collectively we need and have decided are valuable and necessary and beneficial to our entire society. And we robbed cities and states and localities of tax revenue for so long and created a situation where income is so unequal that we are seeing the effects of that and people have put together that, "Hey, this is actually what happens when not everyone is paying their fair share." When we ask people at the bottom to shoulder the burden for everyone, and then the work and all of the benefits just skyrocket to the people at the top and leave everyone else behind. People are not in the mood for it anymore. Public polling shows that's the case. Last year's elections show that that is the case. People are no longer afraid of the word tax. That's an old, tired boogeyman that does not play anymore. So - Heather Weiner: [00:10:04] No, and in fact, nationally, when now we are talking about Biden administration investing billions and billions of dollars into infrastructure, roads, broadband, repairing our bridges, trains, buses, transit, everything. People really support it. And then the support increases when you tell them the money is coming from big corporations and the super rich. So I think when it comes to childcare and early learning, I think that you say you want to cut funding for people to get childcare because you don't want to tax these 8,000 people? Bring it on. All right. So that's just one hot thing that's moving right now, Crystal. What else do you want to talk about? Crystal Fincher: [00:10:44] One hot thing. Well, look, let's talk about the Seattle mayor's race. Let's talk about what's going on in the realm of spending and fundraising. Heather Weiner: [00:10:54] Oh boy. Are you paying much attention to the Seattle mayor's race or you've got other things going on in your life? Crystal Fincher: [00:11:00] I am not working on anything in the mayor's race. I'm happily not working with anyone or on anything in the Seattle mayor's race. I'm just a bystander. I'm just watching, and looking, and learning, and listening, and doing all of that. I'm just over here in my corner, watching everyone. Heather Weiner: [00:11:19] Well, I'm excited to hear your take on these things, then, as an outsider. Because I am in it deep. I just can't quit Lorena González, I'm sorry. I just think she's fabulous. So full disclosure, I am doing a little bit of work for Lorena González who's running for mayor. So take everything that I say as the extremely biased point of view that it is. Nevertheless, I'll try to be still professional and honest when I say fundraising is very interesting right now. So if you'd just look at the plain SEC data and what's been filed - and filings just came in a couple of days ago - Colleen Echohawk is kicking ass. She's really out-fundraising everybody else right now. And she's doing that mostly through democracy vouchers, which is the way it was intended to work. As someone who helped pass democracy vouchers, I'm thrilled to see how many people are using it. Excuse me. Echohawk's numbers currently say that she is close to $300,000 and remember the cap for people taking democracy vouchers is $400,000 for the primaries. So she's about to max out. I think González - Lorena - is not that far behind her. She started a little bit about a month after Echohawk did. So, Echohawk got a little bit of a month lead there, going and picking up vouchers first - smart of her and González is not far behind her. Then there's Andrew Grant Houston, who has raised $137,000. And this is phenomenal - really great activist, architect, housing activist, homelessness activist, and also 100% behind defunding the police. And so, he's really captured people's attention on that. He's raised $137,000. Although if you look at his spending, he spent about half of it on fundraising, or half of it already. And really, when you're in a race where you have a cap like this of a very low amount, the race isn't so much who can raise the most, because everybody will get there. The race really is about who can spend the least until the moment when they're ready to start talking to voters. So I think it's interesting that Houston has already spent half of his, half of his funds. Crystal Fincher: [00:13:34] Just a pause in that, when you say, until the moment they're ready to talk to the voters, people are like, "Well, aren't they talking to voters right now?" And early on in campaigns, a lot of it is trying to fundraise, trying to get endorsements, establish credibility. And so, early on, there's a lot of talking to insiders, talking to people who are involved in the political process, are involved in organizations in one form or another. There are hundreds of thousands of voters that need to be talked to. And usually, that happens later on in a campaign as you get closer to the primary. So throughout June and July, as we get closer to the August primary, that's when campaigns are really focused, almost exclusively, on just making sure voters know who they are and understand their message. So that happens later. It's really expensive. And you need a lot of resources, a lot of money, to do it. Heather Weiner: [00:14:33] Yep. That's absolutely right. Direct voter contact is really what candidates should be spending the majority of their money on, not on fundraising and not on consultants like me, to be honest with you. Crystal Fincher: [00:14:43] Not on consultants. Yep. Heather Weiner: [00:14:45] Don't spend it on me, spend it on voter contact. Crystal Fincher: [00:14:48] Spend a little, but don't spend much. Heather Weiner: [00:14:50] No, don't even spend that much. Because I'm going to give you a lot of advice, but when it really comes down to it, what you want to be spending your money on is mail, you want to be spending it on advertising, you want to be spending it on people knocking on doors, on materials, on events. You want to be spending it on things where you can reach the biggest number of likely voters who are likely going to vote for you. And that's what we talk about when we say, "Get out the vote." So in this race, because it's going to be capped at $400,000, I am very interested to see who's going to be spending money on advertising, who's going to be spending it on mail, and who's just going to be spending it on grassroots door knocking during a pandemic. It's going to be really interesting to see what happens there. Now, you're going to ask, Crystal, because I am Crystal's crystal ball. You're going to say, "Well, is anybody going to do an independent expenditure?" And under the Seattle rules, if somebody comes in - if everybody is using the voucher system, which is what's happening right now. Bruce Harrell's using it, everybody's using it. If an independent group comes in and starts spending money for one candidate or against a candidate, the Ethics and Elections Commission will then lift that $400,000 cap and allow people to continue to raise more money, to keep up with the influence of that independent expenditure. So I'm very interested to see who might be spending money in this. Crystal Fincher: [00:16:11] Also very interested to see who might be spending money in this. And one entity who has announced that they won't be involved in the race, as we've seen them be involved before, is the Seattle Chamber of Commerce. That was an interesting announcement. What was your read on that? Heather Weiner: [00:16:30] As I said to the reporter, Daniel Beekman, about the... No, it was Paul Roberts in the Seattle Times, who wrote - they had this headline, Seattle Chamber Executive Director Rachel Smith Calls for a Truce. I was like, "I think it's more of a surrender." Because you don't call a truce after you've lost over and over and over again. And they really had a big misstep under the leadership of Marilyn Strickland when they raised millions of dollars, spent it to try to defeat a progressive slate of candidates, and the voters had a big backlash against that. So I don't think it's really... Crystal Fincher: [00:17:11] [inaudible] . Heather Weiner: [00:17:11] What did you say? Crystal Fincher: [00:17:12] Soundly and thoroughly rejected them after they spent a ton of money. Heather Weiner: [00:17:17] A ton of money. So, I also don't believe it. I mean, I think that we're not going to see money being spent directly from CASE, the Chamber's PAC. But I do think we're going to see it coming through some of those other groups, again, like Moms for Seattle. And I think the charter amendment is a proxy for that. Because - Crystal Fincher: [00:17:37] It's 100% of proxy for that. Heather Weiner: [00:17:38] Do you think so too? Crystal Fincher: [00:17:39] Oh my gosh. That's absolutely what it is. And to your point, the spending isn't going away. The title above the spending is going to change, and it's going to be just funneled through other groups and other means. So it's not going to come through through the Chamber's PAC but it's going to come through others. Heather Weiner: [00:17:59] Yeah. I mean, we're already seeing it in terms of the money that is currently going into the new PAC that's going to try to pass this charter amendment. So for your listeners who don't know - Crystal Fincher: [00:18:10] Compassionate Seattle, Heather ... It's compassion. Heather Weiner: [00:18:12] Yeah, okay. Compassionate Seattle. So for your listeners who don't know - Tim Burgess, bless his heart, is a nice guy. But served as the president of the Seattle Chamber, not Seattle Chamber, of the Seattle Council. And nevertheless, despite the fact that he was on the Council, now thinks that the Council is horrible, and blames the Council for everything that's going wrong. Really what he means when he says that is Kshama Sawant. So what he is doing, because he knows he can't run people directly against the Council, is he's trying to attack the Council by running a charter amendment. And the charter amendment, for your listeners who don't know about this yet, it's called Compassionate Seattle. And it claims to address the homelessness emergency that we have had - well, it's been declared for more than five years now, but it doesn't have any source of funding. So it sets a whole bunch of lofty goals - most of which are already in place and are being implemented with some success, some without success, by the current mayor. Have been authorized by the current City Council. And this, I think really, brilliantly - in a bad way, brilliantly - turns the table on the City Council by blaming the City Council and then saying, "We're going to make a charter amendment that requires the City and the City Council to do X, Y and Z." X, Y and Z, the City Council's already doing. And then it says, "But we're not going to give you any money to do it. You've got to take money from other programs." And I don't know what the voters are going to think about that. Crystal Fincher: [00:19:49] Well, it's interesting. So we've talked about this the last couple of weeks on the show and have certainly talked about how, from its title to how they're trying to spin this charter amendment change, it is wrapped in the language of compassion, wrapped in compassionate language. There's very much - that is the rhetoric direction that they've decided to take. Because although it's a lot of the same people who last year were talking - and frankly offensive, just very blatantly offensive and incorrect terms about people who are unhoused - equating them with crime, and everyone just wants to be, and they're refusing to get help, and they should be swept, and just get them off of the sidewalk. And viewing the problem with people being unhoused as one that the people who are looking at them - who have homes and warm places to be, and food, and are comfortable - they're the ones who are being inconvenienced by having to look at people and encounter people who do not have homes. Very much from that group. And so, they were defeated soundly, decisively. Seattle voters just wholesale rejected that. So now, that group is back, with prettier language this time, saying, "No, this is compassion. And what we're going to do is we're going to make sure that there are 2,000 new units built, that there's some money available. And then we're going to sweep everyone and have the police get them off sidewalks and confiscate the few belongings that they do have, and so on and so forth." Except that one, the amount of housing that they've identified does not come anywhere even close to what the actual need is. It is largely planned for already, from both the mayor and Council. There is no disagreement that there needs to be a lot more housing than they have planned. But what they have planned looks like what is proposed here. There is nothing substantively new or innovative. And in the timelines that they propose - as we've seen with this Durkan administration and the Council - you can appropriate money to be spent and the mayor can choose not to spend it and they can not act on it. It can take a long time to actually have policies that are approved and funded actually implemented. Certainly the case with housing. So yeah, we can say, "Hey, we've authorized the building of new units of housing." But those new units of housing may not materialize for years, as we have continued to see. Meanwhile, today, you're going to say, "Well, there is new housing appropriated. I know that you have nowhere to go, and that doesn't help you, or change this conversation in any way, but you need to get out of here and go somewhere else, mysteriously, just not here in this area, even though you have nowhere else to go." Heather Weiner: [00:22:58] Yeah, I think it's interesting to see what the positions are of the mayoral candidates. So Colleen Echohawk, who, of course, comes from a homelessness advocacy background, is in favor of it. And interestingly, a lot of the organizations, including the Chief Seattle Club that she is Executive Director of have been listed as endorsers of it. So that's really interesting. Jessyn Farrell has said, "It really depends on the next mayor." Kind of implicitly saying, a lot of the problems are this current mayor who has not been implementing or spending the money that the Seattle Council has authorized. Lorena González has said, "Great first step, but we need to go a lot bigger than this. We need to actually have a big source of funding in terms of progressive revenue. We need to make these goals much bigger so that we are able to keep up with the rising needs of people who need housing." That's not going to go away, particularly with the ending of eviction bans. And she's also said, "We need to deal with the lack of affordable housing and the way that the City is zoned." That such a large percentage of private property is zoned single family housing. And there's very little way for us to build multi-family and affordable housing. Bruce Harrell has said that he's in favor and Houston has said, "Absolutely not. 100% against it." So I think, again, it is going to be an interesting litmus test for mayoral candidates, and it is a proxy for attacking the City Council, which is going to also be very interesting to watch. Crystal Fincher: [00:24:45] It is going to be interesting to watch. I'm definitely very curious to see how the candidates for both the mayor and City Council talk about this charter amendment moving forward. You mentioned that there are some groups that have been helpful in areas, and who have been helpful in providing services for unhoused folks - who have signed on, notably Lisa Daugaard and the Public Defenders Association have been supportive of this bill. We had a conversation with Erica Barnett, who has been covering this at PubliCola for quite some time. And she brought up an excellent point - was that service providers, who actually stand to benefit from this in terms of revenue and contracts - we've seen service providers, some of them, come out in favor of it. But people who aren't - we haven't seen much of that from that community. Certainly, advocates, we've seen a lot of opposition. And there seems to not be communication or input that was gathered from people with lived experience. And from a lot of other very valuable, very knowledgeable expert resources on not just the issue of homelessness. But specifically in Seattle, and what we're dealing with in terms of the service and provider ecosystem, in relation to the need and how that's all playing together. So it certainly seems like there are a lot of voices missing from this conversation that should have been included and that should continue to be included. It will be interesting to see how people talk about, and account for, and respond to that. And how organizations who stand to profit from this, frankly - receive a lot of revenue from this and certainly, that helps the security of the folks in those organizations. No one wants people to wind up on the street or struggling themselves financially because of this. And even people who oppose this amendment don't want that. But how do you talk about that and account for that? And is that a motivator? That, if that were not a factor, may have impacted whether or not they chose to support this charter amendment. And certainly with the voices that have been left out of the conversation, and with some of the inadequacies of its - part of its stated intent - which I think people question is genuine or not. But it certainly seems like there's a lot more work that needs to be done on the housing and shelter end of this, for that conversation to be taken seriously. Heather Weiner: [00:27:35] So look for ads about the Compassionate Seattle charter amendment, as it's moving forward, that say things where the bad guy in this case is pictures of the City Council, and particularly people who are currently running, right? So Teresa Mosqueda, who's running for re-election, Lorena, who's running for governor - mayor, sorry, I skipped a step. Running for mayor. And Brianna Thomas, who is also running for City Council, who currently is Chief of Staff for Lorena. So that is who this charter amendment is going to be targeting as the bad guys, all women of color. Instead of really naming what's really happening here, which is that we have a massive wealth inequality. And going back to my first topic, no revenue to pay for all of the things that need to happen. And that happened 10 years ago during the great recession of 2008 and 2009, when our state cut funding resources for mental health, housing, and a whole bunch of other services. And that is why we are now seeing a homelessness epidemic in the state. Thank you so much, by the way, giving me a big soap box because this is - I think everything and every problem that the state is currently facing comes down to wealth inequality, and that we do not tax the rich enough. And I think we have a great solution in front of us right now, and I'm really excited about it. Can you tell, Crystal? I'm such a geek. Crystal Fincher: [00:29:04] I can tell and I'm absolutely excited about it. I think that this is a reflection of - I think, obviously, we work in politics. Conversations in politics have been different. They are different today than they were 10 years ago, 15 and 20 years ago. I think a lot of people are still hesitant to really acknowledge the reality that has been made apparent from - whichever type of data point you want to look at, whether it's polling or just general public sentiment, whether it's who's being elected, whether it's who the most vocal people are. No matter how you slice it, people are infuriated about the issues that are driven by income inequality. They know that is the cause and they are upset that people are not doing more to fix it. They are demanding action and showing up and holding people accountable who are not taking action. And so, this is long overdue and I'm happy to see that it is finally here with this one issue. And hopefully, this is the beginning of a conversation and not the end of it, when it comes to more fair and progressive taxation. Heather Weiner: [00:30:32] Well, we did not talk about the recent horrific shootings and murders of people by police, the horrific shootings by lone gunmen across the country. I mean, we've got a lot more to talk about. So are we going to stay on for an extra hour? No, we got to go. Don't we? Crystal Fincher: [00:30:51] We do have to go. Certainly that is being talked about in a lot of arenas. I'm very online. You can see my thoughts on Twitter about most things. Heather Weiner: [00:31:03] [crosstalk] Why don't you remind us of your Twitter account? Crystal Fincher: [00:31:09] Wait, what'd you say? Heather Weiner: [00:31:10] Remind us of what your Twitter account is. Crystal Fincher: [00:31:12] Oh, it's @finchfrii, F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. But, I mean, it's been a tough week, and when you have to ask, which police shooting? Which police shooting of a child? Which mass shooting? Which - we can't even keep them straight, they're coming so frequently, they're coming so relentlessly, and they're just so blatant and obvious and egregious. And the accounts that differ. Yeah. I won't get into all of that. That's - that's a lot. And - Heather Weiner: [00:31:50] Well, thank goodness for the people who we have elected to our State Senate and our State House who are changing the laws so that juries can hold police accountable for murders, which has been almost impossible for juries to do because of the way that the law has been written. So thank goodness we have elected those fantastic people, and I'm really looking forward to seeing what happens there. Crystal Fincher: [00:32:16] Absolutely. And as you mentioned, that is our time. So I do want to thank you for listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, April 16th, 2021. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our wonderful cohost today was Seattle political consultant, Heather Weiner. You can find Heather on Twitter @hlweiner, W-E-I-N-E-R. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, that's F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. Now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our mid-week show delivered to your podcast feed. And you know what? Reviews actually make a really big difference in the discovery of podcasts. If you like the show or whatever your thoughts are, please feel free to share a review on iTunes or wherever else you are listening. And if you would like to get a full transcript of the episode, it's available as well as links to the resources referenced on the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. So thanks for tuning in, and we'll talk to you next time.

This week on the show Crystal is joined by co-host Erica Barnett, editor of Publicola. They get in to Mayor Durkan's floundering attempts to address homelessness, developments of the convention center bailout, and grocery store workers being granted a $4.00 and hour hazard pay increase. A full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Erica Barnett, at @ericacbarnett. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Articles Referenced: Mayor's Office Defends Hotel Shelter Plan as Council Pushes for Tiny Houses by Erica C. Barnett, Publicola https://publicola.com/2021/01/28/mayors-office-defends-low-budget-for-hotel-shelters-as-council-pushes-for-tiny-houses/ Seattle, state look to join King County in multimillion dollar Washington State Convention Center bailout by David Gutman, The Seattle Times https://publicola.com/2021/01/28/mayors-office-defends-low-budget-for-hotel-shelters-as-council-pushes-for-tiny-houses/ The convention business is cratering, and cities are getting stuck with the bill by Mike McGinn and Joe Cortright, The City Observatory https://cityobservatory.org/the-convention-business-is-cratering-and-cities-are-getting-stuck-with-the-bill/ Seattle City Council approves $4 per hour mandatory pay boost for grocery workers during COVID-19 pandemic by David Gutman, The Seattle Times https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/seattle-city-council-approves-4-per-hour-mandatory-pay-boost-for-grocery-workers-during-covid-19-pandemic/ Seattle ‘hazard pay' bonus for grocery workers likely to begin next week by Ben Adlin, South Seattle Emerald https://southseattleemerald.com/2021/01/29/seattle-hazard-pay-bonus-for-grocery-workers-likely-to-begin-next-week/   Transcript: Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and 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 through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host, Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola and author of Quitter: A Memoir of Drinking, Relapse and Recovery, Erica Barnett. Erica Barnett: [00:00:49] Hi, Crystal. Great to be here.  Crystal Fincher: [00:00:51] Great to have you on again. Well there's a lot going on this week and I think we want to start out talking about Mayor Jenny Durkan's shelter surge plan that seems to be in trouble. What is the plan and what is happening with it?  Erica Barnett: [00:01:08] Well, the original plan was announced last year in October-ish. And it's to add a bunch of new shelters, mostly in hotels. The idea being that people will be taken off the street by outreach workers, put into hotels, and just sort of stabilize there - and move quickly to either permanent supportive housing which is a very kind of service-intensive, expensive kind of housing for people who can't live independently , or rapid rehousing using vouchers, essentially, that they can spend on the private market for a short period of time. And the idea is that they would then be able to pay market rate rent within a year or so. What's happening with it this week and as we reported exclusively at publiCola is that the plan is sort of or at least a large component of the plan - one of the big hotels - has fallen apart. And , and the city is scrambling to find somebody to provide those rooms. The issue is that the mayor's office and the city budget office have capped the amount that can be spent on these rooms at a rate that providers are saying is way too low for them to provide the kind of services that would actually make people ready to move into this market rate housing. And the difference, the money difference, is pretty significant. And so that - that larger of two hotels that they're planning, which is a 155-room hotel , has fallen through. And now they're scrambling to find a new provider. It was going to be the Public Defender Association, but - but no more. Crystal Fincher: [00:02:35] So they're at the point where they're saying they are getting ready to roll this out, and now they're down a provider. And the feedback that they've gotten from the providers that they're looking at moving forward with is that the money may be too low to actually provide the services and, and provide the outcomes that the program was supposed to provide? Erica Barnett: [00:02:59] Yeah, so the Public Defender Association does a program called JustCare, which got a lot of positive press. It's down in Pioneer Square in the Chinatown International District. And basically they - they cleared out a bunch of encampments there and moved people into hotels. And it's - it's an expensive program because you're talking about people who have really high needs, so they're providing behavioral health care, mental health care, addiction services. And and so the idea was to basically expand - at least the PDA's idea - was to basically expand that program. They're going to move it into the Executive Pacific hotel downtown. And this is all according to our reporting - the city has not actually said any of this publicly, but we've talked to the PDA. And they're saying we can't do this for $17,000 a bed, which is what the city is essentially willing to provide. You know, it costs - it costs about $28,000 - we need more money. And, and that's kind of where the impasse is - are we going to do this service-rich program that gets people ready to move into housing or are we going to do a low-budget program that, you know, we're just going to put people in hotels and move them on and hope for the best. I mean, I'm not saying that the whatever lower budget program they end up with, assuming this moves forward, is going to be a bad program, but it's going to not have all of the services that they were originally intending to provide when they started talking about this. Crystal Fincher: [00:04:21] One, and originally intending to provide - and that seemed to be necessary to successfully transition people out of homelessness into stable housing. You know, the, the goal of this, certainly, we want to get everyone off of, off of the streets , out of unsafe and unsheltered situations, and to have shelter first and foremost critically, but, but it is also important to provide people with the assistance that they need to transition into stable housing. And I guess the question is, as you referenced, there are different populations within the unhoused population. There are people who are recently homeless, who oftentimes just need some financial assistance to get back into a stable situation. Then there are people who have more , you know, intricate needs and more service needs, whether it's mental health issues, substance abuse issues, that, that really need those programs and support. So is there information on who our existing population is and, and does this solution work for them? Erica Barnett: [00:05:33] Well, I mean, what the - what the Public Defender Association has told me is that the JustCare clients that they've worked with have had very high needs. And, and I think you're - you hit on exactly the point. I mean, there is no one population of people who are unsheltered. But a lot of times when you're going into encampments and people who have been chronically homeless for a very long time and you know, are, are not going into the traditional shelters that are on offer, you're talking about people who do have high needs. And, and I think with anybody in the current housing market - I mean, yes, rents have gone down a little bit in Seattle, but anyone going into the current housing market with a rapid rehousing subsidy is going to need that subsidy for a really long time. And ordinarily, those are capped at three to six months. Now the city is saying they're willing to pay for more like a year, but - but then what happens when that year runs out? I mean, at that point as I've also reported, you know, you are expected to pay the full market rent for whatever apartment you've found and it's considered successful if you're paying 60% of your income on rent, which is very, very rent burdened. So there's just - there's just a lot of problems with the current sort of two tracks that we have, which are permanent supportive housing - very high needs, you're always going to have a subsidy for the rest of your life, or rapid rehousing - you know, 12 months and you better be on your feet and earning a high enough income to pay for that apartment. And there's not a whole lot for people who fall in between those two tracks.  Crystal Fincher: [00:07:03] But, you know, this seems to me - Jenny Durkan has certainly experienced criticism for not following through on the details or paying close attention to the implementation of her plans, and them not panning out as they were originally sold. This seems like it's heading in that same direction. What are the options that are available moving forward? Are they just trying to force it through as-is?  Erica Barnett: [00:07:30] Well, I think what they're doing is scrambling right now, as we're speaking, to find - to find another provider for that second hotel. And , and to - to maybe find a - there's actually supposed to be a third hotel. And so to maybe find a provider for that third hotel that'll, you know, altogether make up the 300 rooms that the mayor promised. But I want to pivot, if I can, to the tiny house village proposal that's on the table now, because you talked about Durkan making promises. She said in her campaign and, and during her first year, that in her first year, she would build a thousand new, tiny houses in villages around the city. So far, the city has less than 300 total and most of those aren't new. So Andrew Lewis on the council has proposed sort of on a totally separate track to build a 480 new tiny houses in 12 new villages around the city over a couple of years. And so that is another shelter option that's moving forward kind of without, without the, I mean, you know, with the mayor's cooperation, certainly, but the deputy mayor was talking at the council meeting the other day. And you know, he seemed to - just he was describing this as happening on a completely different track and, you know, and speculating about how it would work with the mayor's plans, which, you know, just really haven't gone anywhere as far as tiny house villages are concerned. Crystal Fincher: [00:08:53] Well, and, and Councilmember Lewis' plan is interesting and it looks like it is relying on a mix of city money, taxpayer money, and privately funded money - is that correct?  Erica Barnett: [00:09:05] Yeah, it would be city money for operations and private money for actually just the physical construction, you know - here's the land, money to build these these tiny house huts that people live in, and then, yeah - and then the city would pay for ongoing operations.  Crystal Fincher: [00:09:21] Okay. Well, I mean, it seems, at least it's - kind of the, the general conversation that has needed to move forward into more effective housing solutions. Even with the mayor's plan and where she originally started - it seems like that - and with the tiny houses, we are acknowledging that people need private spaces with shelter. That the big, huge congregate shelter settings are certainly not ideal and that hinder progress and the ability to get in a position where you can transition into more stable housing. Has that been an intentional focus? And are they looking at moving away from group shelters even more in the future? Erica Barnett: [00:10:03] Well, I think that that's a Council-Mayor difference in some ways. I mean, and there's - there's good and bad things about both approaches, right? I mean, on the one hand, everybody would prefer, I mean, pretty much universally - if you offer people tiny houses or hotels, they say yes, whereas if you offer people a bed in a shelter - and we are mostly doing enhanced 24/7 shelters now, so it's not so much the mat on the floor model and get out at 7 in the morning anymore - but people don't like those as much, for what I think are very obvious reasons. Which is that, you know, you have privacy, you have some dignity, you have a door that closes . On the flip side, I will say, that when you have - when you invest really heavily in these programs, you're investing in a program where people don't move out into housing very quickly. They tend to stay in tiny house villages for a really, really, really long time. And so there's not a lot of what they call throughput. And so, so the question is, you know, in my mind, is are we building, essentially, a, you know, an inferior form of semi-permanent housing by putting tiny house villages all over the city and sort of avoiding the larger issue, which is that people actually need permanent housing. I mean this isn't to demonize tiny house villages in any way, because I think they are obviously really desirable to people. But I think that one of the reasons they're desirable is they're kind of a quasi-form of housing. And you know, I don't know - I don't know that we want to be a city and you know, I'm gonna get in trouble for saying this, but where it's just Hoovervilles everywhere and no housing. Like there needs to be housing to move people into.  Crystal Fincher: [00:11:35] Well, there does and I guess that - that brings up the question you talked about - the city money being used for services. Are those services the types that have shown to be effective for transitioning people into permanent housing? Erica Barnett: [00:11:47] Are you talking about the hotel - the services in the hotels? Crystal Fincher: [00:11:50] The services for the, the tiny house villages. Are there going to be services provided there or is it just, Hey, here's a tiny house and, and we will leave. Erica Barnett: [00:11:59] Oh, absolutely. No - there's case management and they, and they certainly provide services. I mean, this is also the case with JustCares, which is hotel rooms. That's another option that people stay in for, for a long time. And I think it's not - the problem is not so much that the services aren't there and that - because people do stabilize in these situations where they have some privacy and they have some dignity. People get better in, you know, in their lives. But the main - the, you know, the overriding condition of homelessness, I mean, you're just never gonna address that unless you create permanent housing solutions. And I don't mean permanent supportive housing for everybody. I mean, things like long-term subsidies. I mean, there's a lot of people in this city, as we've seen with, you know, the eviction moratorium. There's a lot of people who just can't pay that last $500 a month. You know, or $200 a month or whatever it is, that's keeping them from, from, you know, from staying in their places and that's making them subject to eviction. You know, I don't know why this is something that the city has been so reluctant to do. I think it's 'cause rapid rehousing is just in vogue right now because it feels like a market-based solution. But when you're throwing people under the market, there's no safety net really if , if they fail.  Crystal Fincher: [00:13:06] That's definitely true. Well, I think that - well, I think your coverage on this, on publicola.com has been excellent. And I encourage people to continue to follow along with where this process is going and provide feedback to the council and to the mayor about how you feel about how this plan is proceeding. Are there any conversations about increasing the amount that's available per room, or is the mayor just saying, That's it, - you gotta make it work.  Erica Barnett: [00:13:36] Well, this is all - this is all happening, I should say, sort of internally right now at the city. The mayor's office will probably be willing to give a little bit. But the other day - there's this really interesting moment in the council meeting where Deputy Mayor Casey Sixkiller was saying that the - the DESC in Renton, Downtown Emergency Service Center - which has a hotel in Renton that they have - that they're using as a shelter is able to do it for super cheap so that's the baseline for what should happen in Seattle. And there's just - there's so many things wrong with that, with that line of thinking. I mean, one is that he's not comparing apples to apples in terms of what that money is paying for in Renton. The other is that Seattle is more expensive. And the other is that DESC actually put forward its own plan - and its own plan for this hotel in Seattle was much, much more expensive and very much in line with all the other plans that everybody else submitted for , for these hotels. So I think the providers are saying, Look, this actually does cost more money than you are saying that we can spend. And the mayor's office, the city budget office is saying, You know, sorry, but we need that money for rapid rehousing because the rapid rehousing component of the hotel shelter plan is about twice as much as , as the services component. So they're, they're spending pretty lavishly on rapid rehousing to kind of get people into apartments fast, but the sort of step zero of, you know, helping people with their behavioral health issues, helping people with , you know, all kinds of barriers to housing that people have , is just, is, is being kind of not invested in Crystal Fincher: [00:15:12] Just a reminder that you're  listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher, and today we have a guest co-host, Seattle political reporter, Erica Barnett. Part of the other issue with the DESC benchmarking it off of that was, was also - we want to pay people living wages. Seems like the focus is on just, Well, we just need to get people in - I'm sure the promise that she made is weighing heavily on her and the ability to say, All right, fine - there's more - we did it. I'm delivering what I said I would - is a motivating factor.  Well, we will continue to keep our eye on that and we'll transition to talking about the bailout of the convention center. Dow Constantine - I feel like it was about six weeks ago -  you know, somewhere around then, announced that he, from the County perspective, had put together a plan for a massive bailout of the convention center that is ailing and struggling. Obviously in this pandemic, there are not companies coming from across the country and internationally - to fly all their people in and have big conventions together. So they are struggling and the question is - looking forward, are they going to bounce back and be able to make good on these on, on basically this, this loan? And furthermore, does it even make sense to continue to invest in the convention center? Are we going to see a long-term shift in the way that, that these types of conventions have been? What's going on with that right now?  Erica Barnett: [00:16:51] Well, the the city, I mean, you've, you've basically laid out what the situation is. I mean, the city and state have both said that they are open to providing loans to , to bail out the convention center even further. The boosters of convention centers say that they are critical for the region's economy and they're where, you know, tourism comes from, and people could, you know, they can cite however many, you know, people come in here. I mean, it feels a lot like , like the way that boosters sell arenas - that they make their money back in the overall benefit to the economy from people coming into the city, et cetera, et cetera. I am not aware of a lot of research that backs that up. Admittedly, I'm not an expert on convention centers, but I think that by and large, the reason that people come to a city like Seattle is not to - what - to sit in, you know, a windowless meeting room. And that a lot of that stuff is being done online now and I think will continue to be done online. I mean, if you're talking about a large meeting of a you know, of the business affiliation group, for example, or a large meeting of a company - I think there are a lot of lessons that we've learned during the pandemic that are going to continue and persist after the pandemic. And one is that we don't need these large, you know, giant gatherings. And I think the city really should be promoting tourism in a way that is about what is good about Seattle, not, you know, this is a great place to have your convention because of this and such tax breaks or hotel breaks or whatever it may be. But this is a great city because of the outdoors, because of Pike Place Market, you know, et cetera, et cetera. There's lots of, there's lots of reasons to come visit Seattle. I don't think that giant conventions are by and large gonna continue to be among those in the future.  Crystal Fincher: [00:18:37] Beyond that, we are in a recession, which you know, doesn't have prospects of getting better anytime soon without any stimulus activity . Started at the federal level, which is looking bleak beyond the little $2,000 amount that they are talking about as a one-time thing. And so even, even companies' ability, even if they wanted to continue to do that, has been hampered. The convention center is in need of - they're saying a $315 million loan in order to be bailed out. The County started and said, Hey, we'll, we'll be in for a $100 million from its investment pool. And they're hoping to be paid back through hotel tax revenues from another industry that is definitely struggling. Erica Barnett: [00:19:26] I think that , you know, even if you look beyond - I mean, because I do think that it's important to look beyond, you know, current recessions and look at , you know, just kind of the, the ongoing, you know, up and down of the economy and, and assume that we will come back at some point. But even then, I mean, I would really like to know and I, and I haven't seen this, this analysis done - what would be the impact if we stopped? If we just - if we stopped building it . The argument for - from labor, for the convention center, you know, has been that it will create a lot of jobs in the short-term. And okay. So let's, let's count up what the impact of that is and then what will be the ongoing long-term impact? You can even make it the worst case scenario, you know, take it from the point of view of the convention center itself and, and, and just figure out what, what if we stop ? Because I think there is this tendency with huge projects to just keep going with the forward momentum. Because you know, we've already invested so much money, so we have to keep going, we have to keep going no matter what. Just pour, pour, pour more money into it. And and I, and I do think that the stop option is not one that we even consider because it just feels impossible. And, and I think that, you know, I, I think that the region should just take a breath and consider whether we need to keep pouring sort of infinite buckets of money into this one project in downtown Seattle that that so many people have staked so much so much on sort of mentally, emotionally , financially . You know, and maybe the answer would be, No, we absolutely have to keep going because we're almost there and it just needs this little push, but, but let's, let's find that out and let's just take a pause instead of sort of all these panicked infusions of money, which is what it feels like. And these are, these are loans, but you know, it is not unprecedented for loans not to be paid back. I mean, if, if the convention center fails you know, that is, that is a possibility. And so when the city, state, and county say, Well, these are all repayable loans and we'll, we'll make interest on them. You know, I think we need to consider that that is not a sure thing. Crystal Fincher: [00:21:28] It's definitely not a sure thing. And, and part of the, the consideration of spending, especially, you know, providing public loans is - is what is the benefit and what is you know, will it, what activity does it stimulate? How much money can we generate from this loan? And you want that to be moving in a positive direction and to have multiplier effects. And that we'll wind up further ahead in the long-term if we provide this loan right now. And it just doesn't appear that that is a solid calculation with this. But we will see - again, encourage people to continue to stay engaged with this. As always, we'll be putting links to articles and information about these in our show notes that accompany the podcast. So you will be able to get more information there. But it's certainly a challenge. But speaking of helping workers, there is a - in my view - was a very positive step taken this week. And that was by providing grocery workers with hazard pay. What ended up happening and what did the council approve?  Erica Barnett: [00:22:37] From what I understand - and I apologize, I did not cover this specific , this specific initiative because I was sort of deep in in homelessness land this week. But the upshot, as I understand it, is that grocery stores, which are defined as, you know, stores over a certain size that are, that sell groceries. Or stores over another certain size that sell, you know, 30% or something like that, of their , of what they sell, is groceries. So, so big grocery stores have to pay $4 more an hour to their workers because of evidence that, you know, well, first of all, they're essential workers. They are providing food that people, you know, obviously rely on - the grocery stores are necessary and these workers are putting themselves in harm's way. They get COVID at a higher rate. And so so this is, this, this is, you know, as, as the legislation says, it's hazard.  Crystal Fincher: [00:23:24] Yeah, absolutely. And, and it is Seattle grocery businesses with 500 or more total employees that qualify for this. So most of the grocery stores - and as we continue to learn, as, as we get further in the pandemic, just being indoors is a risk factor. And as customers, we can, you know, go in and go out. But, but they're forced to be indoors for, you know, hours and hours at a time. And so this is a recognition that they are facing an increased risk and they do deserve increased pay because of that.  Erica Barnett: [00:24:00] I totally agree. And, and slash, but I would say, you know, it does , it does feel like when we see these kind of one-off pieces of legislation that pick one category of worker , one category of essential worker ,to receive hazard pay or to receive benefits that absolutely makes sense and that are absolutely rightful. I don't know where grocery workers come from specifically as opposed to hardware store workers or other retail or garden store workers. You know, other retail workers who are also, you know, inside all day, coming into contact with people all day in the same conditions as grocery workers. And so it's , it's a little frustrating to me watching legislation being made in this way, because if the, if the conditions are the issue, let's make it across the board for every large business over a certain amount of employees, say , and that has employees that are in X condition, you know, standing at a checkout counter all day or in the indoors all day, you know, with a certain number of customers coming through. It seems to me that it is, it is very strange that I can go down the street to my QFC and the grocery workers there are rightfully getting $4 an hour more, and then I can go to Lowe's across the street and those workers aren't because they don't sell groceries there. So I just, I think if the issue is the condition - let's address the condition. If the issue is , is that people are being exposed to COVID let's, let's let's address that. Otherwise it feels a little bit like you know, like legislation being made at the behest of a particular, a particularly effective lobbying effort. And, you know, and I, I just, I don't, I don't want to see legislation being made based on lobbying. I want to see it being made based on, on, on science and fairness. Crystal Fincher: [00:25:54] Any person working in a retail or customer-facing environment that has to be indoors in that shared space should be receiving hazard pay. You know, the delivery drivers who are, who are interacting with us, bringing food and groceries and, and, you know, delivering packages and goods - in my view, deserve hazard pay. You know, this is a time when, when many people are fortunate enough to not have to have higher exposure to the virus. And we are counting on people to do that in our place in order to, you know, continue our quality of life, really. And so I think that's a very valid point. I do know that there has been data cited specifically for grocery workers. Now, whether that data is also a function of you know, industry supported research that others may not have access to is a very valid question.  Thank you for listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, January 29th, 2021. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones, Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our wonderful co-host today was Seattle political reporter and founder of PubliCola, Erica Barnett. You can find Erica on Twitter @ericabarnett and on publicola.com. And you can buy her book Quitter: a Memoir of Drinking, Relapse, and Recovery at wherever your favorite bookstore sells books. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, and now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts, just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our mid-week show delivered to your podcast feed. And as always, full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time. .

Today Crystal is joined by a new co-host for our weekly show, the inimitable Marcus Green! Crystal and Marcus get in to the inauguration, how we need to continue to be involved in policy after the election, the Seattle Police Department's response to officers who attended the Capitol Hill insurrection, and the refusal of some police officers to wear masks – even when at a hospital. A full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii, and follow Marcus Harrison Green at @mhgreen3000. Learn more about Hacks & Wonks at www.officialhacksandwonks.com. References: Hear how to pronounce Vice President Kamala Harris' name here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYkZkpLQUS0 Learn about why it's important to pronounce names correctly here: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20210108-the-signals-we-send-when-we-get-names-wrong Read Seattle Times coverage about the SPD officer's refusal to wear a mask here: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/spd-reaffirms-mask-guidelines-after-hospital-incident-that-blew-up-on-twitter/ Check out The South Seattle Emerald's continuing coverage of the upcoming Seattle mayoral race here: https://southseattleemerald.com/tag/seattle-mayoral-race/ Read guest Marcus Harrison Green's Seattle Times column here: https://www.seattletimes.com/author/marcus-green/ Transcript: Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and Wonks. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher. On this show, we talk with Political Hacks and Policy Wonks to gather insight into state and local politics and policy through the lens of those doing the work and provide behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a guest cohost. Welcome to the program today's co-host and publisher of the excellent South Seattle Emerald and columnist with the Seattle Times, Marcus Harrison Green. Welcome Marcus!  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:00:31] It is such a pleasure to be here, Crystal. Thank you so much for having me. This has been a long time coming and I'm glad that I'm here. Crystal Fincher: [00:00:39] Absolutely a long time coming. I'm such a fan of your work of the South Seattle Emerald. I have just followed you for so long - your writing, your columns, everything that you're doing. And now the South Seattle Emerald is a resource that I and so many people refer to every day for critical information about our community. So I am just thrilled that you are here. And so what happened this week? Just a couple things, right? Not too much. Pretty low-key, I guess. So starting off, what, what kind of everyone was paying attention to for so long - the culmination of the 2020 election. This week we had the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. So there was a lot surrounding that - I guess, your thoughts on the events of the day? You know, we were kind of holding our breath to see if there was going to be any violence that day. Lots of people have feelings about, Okay, so what does this actually mean in terms of changes of policy moving forward? As you are absorbing this, I guess, what did you take from the inauguration and what are your views on what lies ahead? Marcus Harrison Green: [00:01:51] Yeah, I mean, I, it's a small thing, but it was - I was like, I was hoping that the Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who swore in Kamala Harris, would have gotten her name correct.  Crystal Fincher: [00:02:04] It's not a small thing, and it is a significant thing and - Marcus Harrison Green: [00:02:08] It is a very, very significant thing. You're watching it and you're like, Ooh, 'cause you're seeing it in her eyes. It's just like, but you know, but other than that, right, the rest of the day in terms of the inauguration day seemed to go off pretty much without a hitch relative to what many people were expecting. Like, I'll say this. I mean, I certainly was on alert for any violence that was going to take place, but it, you know, it's really was a fairly low-key day in the sense that it was somewhat normative, right? And, and I think that was - I think that was the main message that they were trying to convey, right? I mean, as much as I've been critical over our past presidents and heck, this one, that we are newly - our new president as well. If there was sort of something about - and look, all inaugurations are propaganda, let's be honest. But there was something about, right - seeing all the past presidents there together. You know, obviously it's a photo-op, but sort of this message of, Okay, we've gotten through sort of this one bout of chaos, most likely to go through another bout of chaos, but at the very least it was like, we can be calm and assured and breathe at least a sigh of relief for 24 hours. And I think that's really kind of what the nation needed regardless of, you know, what, where you fall along the spectrum.  Crystal Fincher: [00:03:42] Yeah, I agree. I mean, one of the, just kind of huge picture hallmarks of democracy is the peaceful transfer of power. And this has not been a completely peaceful transfer of power, but there is something to just the, the ceremony of handing off power. This is not something that - I think we've seen - we can take for granted. So now that we've been able to move on, I mean, I certainly saw a lot of conversations from people going, You know, there, there are some problematic histories and issues that we have with, you know, Joe and Kamala. This isn't going to be any different and why is this worthy of celebration? And I think that we can hold space for multiple things at one time when we look at this inauguration. Certainly, people may have issues - and justified issues - with some of Kla Harris's policies and Joe Biden's policies. I am one of them.  And , but I do think that there is space and it is okay and, and shoot - with all we've had to endure, it is okay to, to take a moment of joy and celebration and commemoration to mark us seeing a, you know for me, certainly - a Black woman , an Indian woman being inaugurated as the Vice President of the United States of America. This is something we have never seen before and, and little boys and girls growing up now can say, Oh, this is something that, that is normal. This is in my realm of possibility. I see someone there and can put into context that they belong there. It does not seem foreign anymore and, and, you know, certainly they're going to be facing a lot of obstacles and, and everything that is the challenge of running federal government and trying to move policy. But I do think that - and also celebrate that - Wow, one, we just got rid of a nightmare and you know, at least we are not going to be continuing to head full speed down that road. Now we're gonna, you know, push in the right direction as hard and as fast as we need to? To be determined. But for that day, I am, am with everyone else and saying, let's pause and celebrate. Let's feel this joy. Marcus Harrison Green: [00:06:08] Right. It's more of a - it's almost like a holiday of catharsis, right? In the sense of, No, it's going to take a much more than, right, an hour and a half inauguration to heal true. But at the very least, it's sort of a, Hey, we can stop. And we can just pause, and we can reflect, and we can - I mean, I hate to admit this - but like I found myself singing with the Garth Brooks, you know, during the Amazing Grace rendition. And I'm just , you know, I had to almost catch myself. I'm like, You know what? Whatever, right? I mean, I mean, this is a time to invite a level - yes, of healing. But let's be honest though - a level also of accountability, you know, in our country. Right. And you can't have healing without accountability.  Crystal Fincher: [00:06:59] Right.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:06:59] And you know one of the things and look - I think, quite frankly, the, you know, Biden's speech - it was a little overblown with some of the praise and, and the lauding of it - I think Chris Wallace called it "the best he had ever heard." I'm like, come on.  Crystal Fincher: [00:07:12] Oh my gosh.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:07:14] But I mean, it was, it was definitely better than his predecessor's. Crystal Fincher: [00:07:17] Yes. Marcus Harrison Green: [00:07:18] But , right - exactly.  Crystal Fincher: [00:07:20] And I think that's - that's an example of moving forward - like, okay, we have to recalibrate the bar that we have. The previous bar from the previous president was, you know, underground. And so, you know, yes, it is better than that, but, but how can you not be? And so it's kind of this recalibration of, of the standards that we hold people to. And, and also, yes, it is better, but that doesn't mean it's where we need it to be. And we do need to continue to advocate and push and be involved to stay engaged and hold this administration accountable. Just because someone has the D next to their name and you voted for them does not mean that, that they are above all criticism and critique, they don't need to be called in or called out - they absolutely do. And that's how we actually get progressive policy - that I'm a fan of, obviously - progressive policy. But that's how we get policy passed - is by continuing to hold people accountable and making sure they hear our voices. Marcus Harrison Green: [00:08:24] Well and I think, yeah. And I, and I think to your point in what a lot of criticism has been lobbed already, right, at Biden and Harris for some of their past policy misdeeds - you know, everything from, you know, helping shepherd the crime deal to when Harris was the AG over there in, in California, essentially wanting to jail folks for - for parents, for truancy, if you will. I think that at the end of the day it's also like, look, politicians aren't static, right? They're reactionaries. And so the thing - the thing that they react to, right, is their constituency and their base and to movements, right? And so at the end of the day, it's up to us to hold folks accountable who are supposedly on our side, right? I mean, that wasn't that of the prior administration. That is at least ostensibly this administration. And so I think it has to be pushed, right? It's that old apocryphal story of FDR - he's talking to somebody , you know, from a, I want to say it's a labor union - and he says, you know what? I agree with everything that you said, but you gotta go make me do it. You gotta make me do it, right? And so I think, you know, we're in this position right now with Biden-Harris - we gotta go make them do the things that we think are the best possible things in terms of, you know, progressive legislation and moving this country in a direction that , you know, is equitable for everyone. Crystal Fincher: [00:09:41] Completely agreed. And, and, you know, on that same vein of staying engaged, it's not just on the federal level - the local level counts too. And, and a lot of the changes that people are really pushing for across the board, and certainly that protests are focused around, and that will bring equity in all of the areas that we need to - require action at the local level. And, and the City of Seattle is a perfect example. And we have a police department in Seattle that refuses to take a seat, really , and continues to stay making headlines for all of the wrong reasons. And, and the community being engaged is the reason why - why we're also able to, to have these issues and items surfaced and why we're one of the only cities in the country-  like one of three, I think it is - who actually reduced the funding of the police department. But I mean, this week we saw - you know, more officers were in DC during the "Stop the Steal" rally, which just the premise of the event is so problematic. Marcus Harrison Green: [00:10:51] Yeah, we thought it was only two. And now it's five. It's yeah.  Crystal Fincher: [00:10:54] Now it's five that we know of so far. And so, you know, this is a continuing challenge. More officers were there. You have a police guild chief - head - who is, you know, Mike Solan, who just was called on to resign by several members of the community and the City Council because of his false and inflammatory statements about an insurrection , an anti-democratic attempted coup. So, so do we trust this mindset with policing? I mean, the structure of the department is something that we can certainly spend a lot of time, and have before, talking about. But my goodness, just on a daily basis -  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:11:39] Yeah that is like an absolute, no - I mean, it's been that way forever. I'm a lifelong Seattleite. I mean, it's been that way since I've lived here - so, which has been all my life. Goodness. I - where to begin - I think the press conference that interim Police Chief Diaz held earlier in the week where he said you know, that he would fire any police officers that were, that were proven to have been involved in the actual insurrection, in riots. And then he sort of goes on to say, But you know, if they were just there to protest and, you know, and had the belief that the election was stolen, then, you know, that's, that's a different thing. I'm thinking like - these are public servants who are tasked, right - they are public servants tasked with protecting people. I would want to say, could they at least have some, like, I don't know, relation to reality? I mean, that, that bothers me - that bothers me that they would think that this - the election is stolen. I mean, that, that, that shows their character and that shows right, also their thought process. I don't want somebody like that with the license to kill. I'm just sorry.  Crystal Fincher: [00:12:50] A hundred percent. And, and to be clear, not just stolen, but stolen by Black people fraudulently voting - and in a mass conspiracy across the country to upend an election. Like that - and so all of the Black people's and Black areas' votes should be invalidated. That is where they're at. And so I don't feel comfortable with that as yet another thing that we are contending with and, and I think we have to address - we absolutely have to address this culture. We can't act like that has nothing to do with how they would be performing their job. It has everything to do with how they would be performing their job. And they are taking this direction from someone who has said "it's okay to rough them up a bit," who has encouraged police violence, who has excused murder from white people and from police officers, and has advocated for the death of Black people who are innocent and just existing. So it absolutely has to do with how they police and, and the attitude that they take. And this is on the heels of other news this week, that as we've all seen numerous times - Seattle police officers , several of them, many of them, refuse to wear masks when this is required, when they are interacting with several members of the public in vulnerable places. And there was a tweet that a nurse made who was at a local hospital who recounted the experience from a night prior saying that, Hey, there was a Seattle Police Department officer in here who was not wearing a mask. This was near COVID patients. This was in a hospital. Obviously these are people who are ill or with compromised immune systems and every precaution needs to be taken - there at the very top of the list of places where we need to be careful. And when asked to put on a mask, got an attitude, refused to, and so you're looking at an officer of the law who can detain whoever he wants, who really has the authority in that situation to - to violate people's rights and put people's health in jeopardy and like, this is a real threat - you're in a hospital, you might be killing people. You might be giving people an infection that will kill them. And, and to do that with impunity and to have that attitude, that that is okay, is just so far beyond unacceptable. And I don't understand how, how this has been able to linger for so long - watching so many police without masks on.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:15:27] It's - it just goes back to, right, I mean, the whole thing with power corrupting. And police officers for too long in our society have been too powerful, quite frankly. And that - you can't tell me that that mentality, right, doesn't start to become a part of you, where it's like, I - I can enforce and lay down the law, but I don't need to be subject to it myself. And I mean, it's just the whole not-wearing-a-mask thing - it's just ultimately, right, a microcosm, an epitome - of the whole fact that police officers largely do not want to be held accountable for their actions. You know, this whole mask situation is just, you know, the microcosm of that. And the fact is when you also ask them to be accountable, then it's all of a sudden it's, Well, we can't do our jobs, or we're being attacked, or this and that. And it's like, at the end of the day, nobody is drafted to be a police officer. You are - you voluntarily entered into this, and so that you should have guard rails to what you can and can't do, especially if you are given such an outsize, I don't wanna say, you've been given sort of an outsize presence within our society. So you should also have an outsize responsibility. Unfortunately doesn't seem like too many people want to buy into that.  Crystal Fincher: [00:16:35] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know, we have the saying, "With great power comes great responsibility," for a reason. And it's true. We are not advocating that they go home injured. We're not advocating anything. We just don't want our rights to be violated. And given that they have the power to - to violate them - that they can detain people, that they can , you know, strip people of their freedom , interrogate people - they have the ability and the authority to go so far beyond what every other citizen, resident can, that - that they should be held to a higher standard. This is something so simple and obvious that we have to continue to push back on the idea that, that, no, we shouldn't question anything. We should just let them do whatever they're doing and whatever request they make, whether it's legal or not, whatever mood they're in, whatever whim , you know, they feel, we just need to capitulate and obey and, and do whatever they say at whatever time. That's not how this works. It's certainly not how it should work. And, and if that is happening, it should be completely , you know, overhauled and fixed. And so there's so much work to be done.  You know, it was very revealing to see the support for the [King County] charter amendments in the November election, especially one having to do with reforming and bringing more accountability to the Sheriff's office. Because a lot of people are under the impression that, Oh, only, only Black people care about this. Only these young, you know, radicals and left-wing progressives and Antifa, as if that's an organized thing, only cares about that. And, you know, to see a super-majority of cities in King County come out strongly in support, in favor of reforming - it just really underscores that this behavior has persisted and has been so visible that - no, we're actually in agreement as a society, whether in the suburbs or not, whether you're in high income or low income areas - people understand this needs to change and have voted to change it. And in the City of Seattle, the numbers are, are huge - astronomical in support. So, you know, this idea that, Oh, people just want law enforcement officers to keep doing what they're doing and they support them. You know, I think people want to, you know, say, Hey, let's all work together to keep each other safe, but, but that means that we have to keep each other safe. And if there are members of our community that are not feeling safe, we have to do something about it. So I'm definitely gratified to see that people are willing to vote for change at the ballot box. And I hope, especially as we have city council elections, the mayor election coming up this year in 2021, that we - that they see that the residents across the board in Seattle are demanding change and willing to vote for it. And, and to take that also as a caution - that if they're acting against that, then that is a problem for them at the ballot box also. This is something that the residents of Seattle want and the most important poll that could possibly be taken - the one that actually happens when people vote - supports it. So we'll have to see what happens.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:20:06] I'm cautiously optimistic, Crystal.  Crystal Fincher: [00:20:09] I am cautiously optimistic too. And by the way, you at the South Seattle Emerald are running an excellent series - so people should stay tuned to the South Seattle Emerald because you have interviews with people who have declared that they are running for mayor so far and will continue doing that. So people should definitely know that that is a resource for finding out where people stand right now. I know that, you know, as I was reading - certainly went into more detail with one candidate in particular than I had seen anywhere else. So I appreciate how thorough you're being in examining who these candidates are and the issues that they support .  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:20:51] Appreciate that, Crystal. And you have - I have to say it, especially because it's your show - you have definitely helped with sourcing of, of some questions. So you are the mayoral whisperer is what I'm going to start calling you. Crystal Fincher: [00:21:04] I don't know about that. I've just been around long enough to to have absorbed that over time. I think that's it. And I'm just approaching dinosaur status, pretty much. So I wanted to talk about, just a little bit, about the candidates that have announced so far. I guess, looking at the City of Seattle elections - what is on-deck, I guess, for the next few months at least? We're going to see more people announcing their candidacies - what types of issues, I guess, are immediately on the docket for them right now? I anticipate, certainly, dealing with COVID - getting the vaccinations out. What are we looking at there?  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:21:45] I mean, obviously COVID - we're still in the midst of a pandemic and then the same crisis that we've had - that have yet to be fully satisfactorily addressed. And I'm talking about homelessness, obviously - affordable housing, income inequality here in the city. How do you balance companies paying their fair share, but also I think things that keeps some companies here for quote, unquote, create jobs and so forth. So it's not going to be an easy task. I mean, I think, you know, love or hate our current mayor - I think her tenure has definitely shown that it is a extremely hard job in a city that is changing, evolving, and has multiple interests that quite frankly, don't always align. So it is going to be tough. I don't know if there can be a unifying force, if you will, in terms of the mayoral candidates who have already declared and some who I've heard are considering running. That being said, I don't know if we necessarily even need a unifying force, right? I think we need strong leadership in this city. And it's yet to be determined who can provide that type of leadership.  Crystal Fincher: [00:22:46] Yeah. I, I definitely agree with that. I think that we have seen , certainly, with Jenny Durkan , before her, with Ed Murray, that there seem to be a desire to not make people unhappy. And wanting to please everyone. And as we all know, especially when it comes to being the head of a major city, that doesn't work. And that's just going to get everyone mad at you. And it's a recipe for paralysis. And when there are pressing urgent problems that you're dealing with, you know, that usually winds up moving you backwards. And, and we have seen, throughout the 10 years of both of them, moving backwards on the issue of homelessness, income inequality, housing instability, so many factors. And so I certainly am hoping for someone who is willing to be a strong leader and who is not going to be kind of that same, well, let's, let's try and find a consensus and let's try and, you know, take a uniform approach. And I've commissioned four task forces to take a look at that. And you know, I'm not going to implement any of their recommendations, but treat their report as like a win. We cannot afford - literally, residents can't afford to have that happen anymore. People are, are trying to avoid COVID, trying to stay in their homes with the highest unemployment rate. So certainly a challenge moving forward. And we'll just have to see how it unfolds.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:24:19] Crystal, I do want to ask you this - I mean, you talked about the, our last two mayors. Like I could not tell you who their base actually was, right? I mean, you know, like who, who are these people's base, right? Like, I can't tell you who Jenny Durkan's base is right now. Might be one of the reasons she's not running for reelection.  Crystal Fincher: [00:24:37] Aside from the Chamber?  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:24:41] Right. Right. But obviously, Chamber support isn't enough, in and of itself, to, to, to gain you friends. And, you know, enduring influence in the city - and endearing, I should say - well, endearing and enduring influence in the city. So how do you, I mean, how do you - how would you suggest - if you were giving free advice, if you will, to our next leader, whoever whomever that might be, what would you tell them? Crystal Fincher: [00:25:13] I mean, so I guess I should say this. Obviously coming , having worked on Seattle mayoral campaigns before, having you know - knowing people who worked within several campaigns, probably had a little bit more visibility into the coming together of, of policy. You hit the nail on the head and that you actually have to have a base of residents who vote in the city. And, and that's a challenge. And, and so my advice would be to be who you are and lead according to your values - that's really all you can rely on. And, and that actually builds trust with voters. I think people underestimate that, that - if you give voters a clear understanding of, of what your values are, and the lens through which you process information and policy - that even when you disagree, even, even when they don't see eye-to-eye, that if you're able to explain to them - this is how I came to this decision. This is how I come to these decisions and the same way that, you know, this policy that you supported. There's a reason why I did that. And, and this is the reason why I did this and to be transparent. And certainly that's not going to please everyone, but people would be surprised. Many politicians would be surprised that that does carry weight with a number of voters. And that they feel that if you are straight with them and that you actually care about helping them - that's really what they're looking for. Not, well, if I do this, I'm going to make this person unhappy. And gosh, my re-elect is going to need an endorsement and financial support from that organization. And, Oh, these, you know, this trade organization that's, you know, headed by people who don't even live in the city - that becomes so problematic. And so I think you just have to be where you are and, and that has to match where the voters are. And really if that doesn't match, then you aren't right for the moment anyway. You're going to have to make your case. And, and if they decide to go in a different direction, that's what happens. But, but the way that you actually build power and build political capital is by saying - you know what, I'm going to lead in this direction and then leading in that direction and, and bringing the coalition with you that comes. Your mandate comes from being elected and people need to understand that. And operate accordingly.  Marcus Harrison Green: [00:27:36] Crystal's mic drop.  Crystal Fincher: [00:27:39] Well, I thank you so much for joining us today. You know, this has been a wonderful conversation. Again, I encourage people to continue to read the South Seattle Emerald and support the South Seattle Emerald financially because it's such a necessary media platform here in the city. And thank you to everyone for listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, January 22nd, 2021. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones, Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our wonderful co-host today was South Seattle Emerald publisher and Seattle Times columnist, Marcus Harrison Green. You can find Marcus on Twitter @mhgreen3000. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii. And now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type Hacks and Wonks into the search bar and you will get our almost-live show and our midweek show sent directly to your podcast stream. And of course we will have a full audio transcript available for people there and the links to articles and information that we referenced in the show. So thanks for joining us and talk to you next time.

Today Crystal and Ashley Archibald, local reporter and friend of the show, get in to what is going on with Covid-19 vaccine distribution, the local ramifications of the white supremacist insurrection in Washington, D.C., and the Seattle Police Officer's Guild president cosigning their actions. A full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Ashley Archibald, at @AshleyA_RC. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Articles Referenced: Vaccine reserve was exhausted when Trump administration vowed to release it, dashing hopes of expanded access by Isaac Stanley-Becker and Lena H. Sun, The Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/01/15/trump-vaccine-reserve-used-up City Council members call for Seattle police union president to resign after Capitol remarks by David Gutman, The Seattle Times https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/pressure-mounts-on-seattle-police-union-president-mike-solan-following-capitol-siege-remarks-city-council-members-call-for-resignation/ SPD confirms two officers at U.S. Capitol riot, CPC seeks documents, and calls increase for SPOG president to resign by Paul Faruq Kiefer and Andrew Engelson, The South Seattle Emerald https://southseattleemerald.com/2021/01/11/spd-confirms-two-officers-at-u-s-capitol-riot-cpc-seeks-documents-and-calls-increase-for-spog-president-to-resign/   Transcript: Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and Wonks. I'm your host Crystal Fincher. On this show, we talk with Political Hacks and Policy Wonks to gather insight into state and local politics and policy through the lens of those doing the work and provide behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a guest co-host. Welcome back to the program today's guest, local journalist, Ashley Archibald.  Ashley Archibald: [00:00:25] Hi, thank you for having me.  Crystal Fincher: [00:00:27] Well, there certainly has been a lot that's transpired since the last time we have spoken . You know, so much has gone on - we had the insurrection and attempted coup at the Capitol, we have ongoing talks of violence, Joe Biden is supposed to be sworn in next week and Trump heading out. There is a lot going on locally still - Session just started - there's just so much happening - in the middle of a pandemic. So I guess the first place that we should probably start is just talking about where we stand with COVID and vaccinations. And when thinking about this show earlier in the week - thought, well, you know, we'll talk about how the vaccination - how vaccinations are running under the capacity that we have and we're having a hard time in this state and nationally, kind of across the board, getting all of the vaccine into people's arms. But actually this morning, there was a new dimension and wrench thrown into this story. Do you want to talk about that Ashley?  Ashley Archibald: [00:01:34] Sure. So the Washington Post came out with a story, and if somebody else got it first, my apologies, I saw it in WaPo. The Washington Post came out with a story that basically said that the reserves that we thought we had at the federal level of this vaccine that was supposed to make sure that people who got their first dose would also get their second doesn't exist. So earlier in the week, when the federal government said that they would be releasing all of the vaccine that was available and expanded the ability of people to get it to basically anybody over 65 from the previously a bit more constricted criteria, that was just impossible because they don't have additional doses of this vaccine, which is a little bit mind-blowing. Crystal Fincher: [00:02:19] It's absolutely mind-blowing. And just as a reminder, these vaccines are not a one shot deal. What was studied and what these vaccines are designed for is - two shots, around a month apart , and really designed - for the full efficacy, for the full effectiveness, you need both shots. That's what gets you to the 95% number that they achieved and observed in their clinical trials. So the thought was, Hey, America is starting out with 40 million doses. The federal government, from their own mouth, said, Hey, we're going to hold back 20 million of them, understanding that people need to get the second dose. So we'll get out the 20 million - get the first dose, get them scheduled for the second - but we know that we'll have 20 million people vaccinated with two doses. We're holding it back to make sure that everyone can get their second dose. States made plans based on that information. People have proceeded according to that. In the interim, some conversation did start - because we're in a pandemic that is spreading so rapidly, and this new strain is spreading so rapidly, and reports today say that they expect the new strain to be the predominant one in America by as early as March. And they said, Okay, well, you know, we're going to hold these back. And a lot of people said, Well, maybe just give everyone one and to help speed up the effort, we're gonna reduce the requirements and just anyone over 65 is now what the administration is recommending. And the CDC recommended just to give it to everyone over 65. States are in process, Washington is in process of developing high-volume vaccination sites, mobile vaccination sites, thinking that there is another 20 million doses being distributed throughout the country - we're going to double our supply. Only to hear this morning that, Hey, never mind. There is no more vaccine coming. You actually already have almost all of it. So this vaccination effort is so far behind and now half the small scope that we thought it was going to be. And for just the average person who is not a frontline health worker or first responder, I mean, we may not get the vaccine for, until late this year. What, what does this mean for the overall effort? Ashley Archibald: [00:04:51] Well, it's not good. It's not great, Crystal. I mean, we were already behind, we were already deploying these shots very slowly. There's a writer with The Atlantic whose name is, I believe, Zeynep Tufekci, and she's been very critical of the rollout of the vaccine, not specifically in Washington state, but in general, because people have been fairly precious about how they're releasing this. And it varies so much state by state, but the overall vaccination rate has been quite slow in general. And I understand why they were doing that - because they do want to prioritize people who are most at risk, like healthcare workers, frontline workers, essential workers, people in nursing homes, that sort of thing. And that does make good sense, but sometimes the perfect has been the enemy of the good here and we need people to be getting these shots in the arms. Because at the end of the day, it really doesn't matter if we have the extra 20 million doses of vaccine if we're not actually putting it in needles and injecting it. Crystal Fincher: [00:05:58] Right. And that has been a huge problem - here in Washington state, less than a quarter, less than 25% of the vaccine that we currently possess has been administered to people, has gotten into people's arms. And so, as this is raging, and as businesses are closed, and everything is on pause as we try to get this under control, it's pretty important to try and get this on track as soon as possible. And certainly , localities have been underfunded. They've requested a significant amount of funding from the administration to build out the necessary infrastructure to get this virus, to get the vaccine into people's arms , and have been denied that funding - it's been delayed. There's some that was part of this most recent package passed that is going to start to help the states, but that's just coming now. And so there's still a lot of infrastructure that is in process of being built, but now it looks like we may be - you know, we need to get the existing vaccine out and kind of do a surge with that, but at the same time, we seem to be building infrastructure that there is no vaccine left to use it for. So this just continues to be a mess and depressing and people's lives continue to be affected. People continue to get sick and die. You know, this has major consequences and will cost lives. And certainly a lot of wheels have been spinning - trying to get the infrastructure in place to deliver 40 million doses. And now we have half of that. It's just frustrating to be just a regular person and just to see this spiraling downhill and think, When is it going to stop? Even the light at the end of the tunnel seems to be getting further away again.  While we're dealing with this pandemic, we're also dealing with a wave of very violent and insurrectionist white supremacists that are roving the country. And we are not exempt from this locally , here in the Seattle area, and as a matter of fact, members of our own local police departments made their way to DC to try and overthrow the government. And on top of that, the head of the Seattle Police Guild made horribly false, demonstrably false, unprovable and inflammatory allegations - somehow in his logic, blaming Black Lives Matter for the Trump supporter insurrection at the Capitol. And sticking by it - doubling down on it. So, many people have called for his resignation, including the Seattle City Council, people who've been sympathetic to him in the past. He has been radicalized and his rhetoric continues to prove it. How do you see this week and what is happening within the police department and SPOG in regards to this insurrection and what it says about the state of law enforcement? Ashley Archibald: [00:09:11] It is - I mean, first of all, yes, it is demonstrably false that the insurrection on January 6 at the Capitol building where, you know, the Capitol was taken over and lawmakers were threatened , was a result of Black Lives Matter activists. And we are, we can - even us, who have no special knowledge, I feel, can feel very comfortable saying that - because I've read the articles. I have seen some of the quoted chats - this was planned in some part out in the open, it was encouraged by the President of the United States. You know, this is not, this is not a false flag operation by any stretch of the imagination. There's no evidence to suggest that - it's a little bit wild. At the same time, I think that it was also interesting to watch that information about the participation of SPD officers drop at like 9:30 on a Friday night. The Friday night news dump usually doesn't - usually doesn't mean like Friday, middle-of-the-night news dump, so that, that was unexpected but certainly noted by people who are interested in this information. And I think that, we will see what SPD does with that. It seems from the statement released by interim Chief, Adrian Diaz, that if people were simply there exercising their First Amendment rights in the places where it was legal to do so - they probably will not see consequences for that. It would be more of the actual, you know, storming of the Capitol that people need to have avoided. I think that is - that's basically what he said, right?  Crystal Fincher: [00:10:49] Yeah. That is what I recall him saying. Saying if they were part of the storming of the Capitol, they would definitely be fired, but that would have to be proven. If they weren't part of that activity that - he commented on being fired. I don't know if he commented on there being no disciplinary action, but certainly drew a distinction that just being in DC was not going to be the determining factor. And as I look at this, there are two issues - clearly , you know, someone that was involved in the storming of the Capitol - not only should they be fired, but you know, charges would be appropriately brought as they're being brought in the other cases. I mean, this was done with the explicit intent and, you know, planned intent, as we see with so many of their videos and social media posts leading up to this event. They planned to interrupt the process of certification. They planned, as federal  prosecutors have detailed and reiterated this morning, they planned to violently overtake and physically detain legislators and people working in the Capitol. This was a coup attempt. You know, no - no two bones about it. Not technically - this was literally a coup attempt. So it was literally an interruption and a direct attack on the peaceful transfer of power. And, you know, fortunately employees there had the foresight to take out the elector ballots so they could be counted later on - otherwise we could be in a humongous, constitutional crisis right now. So one, they may not be charged, but certainly the event was billed as Stop the Steal. The only reason to go was if you felt so strongly that there was widespread voter fraud, despite 60 lost elections, and hearing all of the rhetoric blaming massive voter fraud, committed by - coincidentally, conveniently - Black people. And the attempt at invalidating predominantly Black and Latino votes in key states - is scary to think about that mindset, that conspiracy theory taking hold so deeply, that they aren't just spouting that in their conversations here. They're flying to DC to be part of a group whose explicit purpose was to Stop the Steal, allegedly, of the election. This attitude is terrifying - and the Seattle Police Department, and we're finding out that several off-duty cops from several departments across the country, were police. And Capitol police talking about how many of the people in the mob were flashing their police badges at them - that they were off-duty, but they were law enforcement taking part in the activities to interrupt the election on the 6th. To me, we have the information that we need to understand further, Wow, how toxic is that? How toxic is that belief? And if someone believes all the things that are being said - to lead them to fly to DC, because they're so upset at the things that they've heard from Trump mouths and the mouths of other white supremacists, to stand side-by-side with people with Confederate flags and Camp Auschwitz T-shirts - open, proud white supremacists. Law enforcement has been infiltrated. The SPD has been infiltrated. This is not surprising, not shocking. I mean, we've seen this, we've seen them protect people with these beliefs in protests downtown. But it just continues to show how broken these processes are and how urgent it is that there be accountability tied and massive culture changes.  Ashley Archibald: [00:15:07] We exist in a society where people are engaged in two completely different realities. And I don't know what you do to overcome that. I don't think everybody in that crowd genuinely believed that the election was stolen. I don't know that - that's just, I find it difficult to believe - how about that? But some people are true believers. Some people truly believe that the election was stolen, that Trump is here to save us from a cabal of like, Well, I mean, we don't even need to get into the QAnon stuff - that's just a whole other thing. But it's - people live in bifurcated realities and I don't know what to do. I don't know what the answer is - to bring people back to what I consider to be evident on its face, which is Trump lost this election. And what we saw on January 6th can be described in no other ways than trying to overturn a certified election in what we like to call, but I would argue isn't really, the world's oldest democracy. Like it's just - it's maddening.  Crystal Fincher: [00:16:21] Yeah, it is - it is maddening. And I actually want to underscore something and to not minimize it. I mean, to be clear, this was a publicly pre-planned event. You know, this is something that Trump and his cronies organized and paid for. Trump spoke at the event. This was a planned event with the title of Stop the Steal, with the  explicit pre-stated purpose of - come to stop the stealing of the election by Joe Biden. So for anyone traveling to DC for this event, it seems to be a necessary prerequisite that they think that this - that they have fully bought in to the conspiracy that there was widespread voter fraud, widespread enough that it would have changed the election. And it should have been a landslide in favor of Trump, which we know has been rejected, in every legal and serious forum we have in the country. But as you stated, that doesn't prevent people from falling prey to the conspiracy and the depth of disinformation. And of people who are completely separated from the reality as we see it and do genuinely believe that this election is being unfairly stolen from Trump and the QAnon stuff - it is, it sounds almost laughably ridiculous, right? But there are tens of millions of people who believe it.  Ashley Archibald: [00:18:01] And rejected by Republicans - rejected by Republican Secretaries of State - who, I mean, I'm not trying to lionize some of them - they have participated in what I consider to be voter suppression, hands down - especially, you know, look at Georgia. But for their own self-interest they're saying - minimally, you could say, I ran this election. This election was run correctly and you lost. And those people have been, for their  trouble, been given death  threats and told that they're the enemy and that sort of, I mean, it's just, it's amazing. It's a cult of personality that I don't - I don't fully understand.  Crystal Fincher: [00:18:44] Right. And it's hard - it's hard to understand because it is such an extreme view that seems so detached from reality. That it is - that it seems like it should be literally unbelievable, but we have watched, we have witnessed, the increased radicalization of people here. And it's concerning. And the problem we now find ourselves with is that these people are able to remain separated from the reality as we see it - they have an entire media ecosystem. They have an entire social media ecosystem - that was somewhat disrupted this week by the purging of so many QAnon, alt-right white supremacists , Trump conspiracy, election conspiracy  websites. And Twitter, Facebook , Amazon has stopped hosting people, so there has been some de-platforming of some of the most visible people. But this is the Republican party. There are a small percentage of Republicans who have publicly said, This is actually not theft. But the very telling thing is that there are more Republicans who have refused to say, Hey, that's not true - it's a conspiracy. Or they've just flat out promoted the conspiracy themselves and far worse. We have congresspeople and state representatives who are QAnon believers. They were elected really recently. And they're sharing this information openly. We have lawmakers at the federal level who are refusing to go through metal detectors and disobeying orders of police , of the Capitol police, daily. They just do not feel that they are subject to the same laws and rules that we are, and they are operating with the encouragement of supporters, a base that they have cultivated, that cheers this lawless activity on. So they continue.  Ashley Archibald: [00:20:58] Going back to what you mentioned on the social media front - of those accounts being taken down. Obviously, Parler was basically got rid of when Amazon stopped hosting it. But it was one of the funnier things when you saw personalities complaining about how they'd lost tens of thousands of followers. And I'm like, Guys, why are you telling on yourselves? Like, is that really, is that really what you want to broadcast right now? Just shhhh - it's okay. You don't have to say it. Crystal Fincher: [00:21:25] Yes - to see how many open racists and insurrectionists are in your network - and it is wide and vast. But I think that's - that's what we need to contend with - is that these are not people - there were many comments and I've heard a lot of punditry - trying to suggest that these people were downtrodden, economically anxious, didn't really know what they were saying, didn't really know that - didn't plan violence. Who was to see and to know that something like this could happen and subsequently, a ton of video footage, a ton of posts, where they are explicitly, frequently, broadly - planning, explicitly planning, violence . You know, they had blueprints and plans. And we're talking about locations that they needed to get to. They were talking about who they needed to detain. They beat savagely, viciously, several police officers who were there. This was a violent mob and, and yes, and killed an officer. This is a violent mob that was explicit about their violent intentions and that continues to be explicit about their continued violent intentions. And I still feel like so many people just do not take threats of violence from white men, in particular, seriously. Oftentimes because they don't feel like they're a direct threat. And I think the action that we saw was because this was a situation where, Hey, actually, a number of the people who can pass laws and institute consequences for this were directly threatened. They had to shelter and they were in immediate danger of physical harm. I just think that they're detached from understanding that there's a lot of people in this position today, and these people are among us. The people at the Capitol were not downtrodden, poor - the picture of, They're just turning to this because they're struggling and, you know, they're just having a really challenging time. These were CEOs, there were several legislators. These are former military, former and current police officers. This was an upper middle-class  crowd, actually , by and large. And so we need to contend that these are the people that we are interacting with every day. And to somehow act as if this can't permeate your communities, and you don't have a responsibility to say something when someone pops up with a conspiracy theory - to say, You know, actually, no, we're not going to normalize that. We're not going to act like that's rational. It is not and it's dangerous to continue this line of thought. That this has to be confronted and called out. And we can't allow beliefs like this to go on unchallenged because they have for too long and this is the result.  Ashley Archibald: [00:24:25] That being said, I'm kind of circling back to what you had mentioned at the top of this topic. You know, I very much doubt - unless interim Chief Diaz actually takes action, I really don't see the SPOG chief, the SPOG union head going anywhere. I mean the City Council and the Mayor's office and people who are otherwise, I would classify as pro-law enforcement, asking him to step down is one thing. But Mike Solan was elected by  70% of the SPOG membership, if I recall correctly . You know, people have - people seem fine with this kind of rhetoric coming from the head of the union.  Crystal Fincher: [00:25:03] Well, definitely - certainly a number of the police officers, the ones who elect the SPOG head -certainly are okay with it. Unfortunately, SPOG, you know, Solan is paid for by our tax dollars. He is on the public payroll and so there should be some public accountability for what he says. And certainly, he's poisoning the waters for the negotiations that are upcoming. He has continued to take belligerent , violent, mocking stances and using that kind of rhetoric. He has defended  what has been objectively viewed and legally ruled to have been abusive, civil rights violating behavior - has made inappropriate jokes about violence committed by officers. And when you are in a position with so much power, there is a higher standard of accountability that should be instituted. We've talked about this, you know, broadly - just in the overall police accountability conversation, but my goodness, how much more clear and obvious do you need to make it? That there is a dangerous mindset that has taken hold with too many officers within SPD. And to see that these beliefs are being supported by so many officers, that this attitude and stance is not found to be objectionable, and that there have been officers that went to DC to be part of the Stop the Steal activities that Trump called for - we need massive changes.  And we saw with the [King County] Charter Amendment [6] vote that people, not just in Seattle but in a super-majority of cities in the county , want substantive reform. The unique thing is that even when you listen to police talk - they talk about calls that they don't feel that they are the appropriate response for. They talk frequently about not wanting to be social workers and that not being an effective place and way for them to intervene. Why don't we listen to that? But we do need to talk about what the structure and purpose is - what we actually want our officers doing. And if they're in a place where they are indoctrinated with a demonstrably false conspiracy theory that Trump won this election and are taking action, significant action, based on that - how is that influencing the communities that are also being blamed for the stealing? What kind of resentment are they harboring? That that is not only what they believe , but what they are so dedicated to, that they would invest their own resources. And how are they enacting and carrying that belief through their actions and interactions with everyday people. I don't like the implications of that. I think we've seen numerous examples of what happens, and we've seen the continuum of attitude and behavior that leads to people's civil rights being violated and the over policing, over-incarceration of poor communities and communities of color.  So thank you for listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, January 15th, 2020. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones, Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our wonderful co-host today was local journalist and friend of the show, Ashley Archibald. You can find Ashley on Twitter @AshleyA_RC. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii. And now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Just type Hacks and Wonks into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live show and our mid-week show sent directly to your podcast stream. Thanks for tuning in. Talk to you next time.

In this episode, Crystal brings on her colleague Shannon Cheng, ACLU People Power activist and all around wonderful person, to talk about what's next for policing in 2021, what action on policing we can we can expect from the upcoming legislative session, and follow Shannon's path into activism. A full text transcript of the show is available below, and on the Hacks & Wonks blog at www.officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   References: Learn more about ACLU People Power: https://www.wethepeoplepower.org/kcca Learn more about bills during this legislative session: https://leg.wa.gov/ Find your state representatives here: https://app.leg.wa.gov/districtfinder/ The NAACP Legal Defense Fund's Police Union Contract Toolkit: https://www.naacpldf.org/wp-content/uploads/LDF_07242020_PoliceContractToolKit-12c.pdf   Full Transcript: Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and Wonks. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher. On this show, we talk to Political Hacks and Policy Wonks to gather insight into local politics and policy through the lens of those doing the work, and provide behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, joining us is Shannon Cheng, who in addition to being a colleague of mine at Fincher Consulting, is an activist with ACLU People Power. Thanks for joining us, Shannon.  Shannon Cheng: [00:00:56] Thanks Crystal! Excited to be here.  Crystal Fincher: [00:00:58] Thank you! Excited to have you - so why don't you tell us a little bit about who People Power is. Shannon Cheng: [00:01:04] Yeah, so People Power is a grassroots project of the ACLU. What they do is, sometimes they will provide blueprints of campaigns to further civil liberties for all, but it's up to volunteer organizers to choose tactics and put them into motion. So it's truly grassroots and it was pretty exciting for me to get involved. I was not really a politically active person, but like many other people in early 2017, I was feeling pretty adrift and powerless after the election of Trump and was looking for something to do to change something.  Crystal Fincher: [00:01:38] That completely makes sense, so what did you do? Shannon Cheng: [00:01:41] So, yeah, there was a call to action by the national ACLU on - this first campaign was called Freedom Cities, which involved meeting with local law enforcement agencies to ensure that people's constitutional rights weren't being violated through cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. And yeah, kind of at the same time, our local affiliate, the ACLU of Washington, approached our group about supporting local police accountability reform. So as part of that work, we helped advocate for passage of some local ordinances. One was at the King County level and expanded the authorities of the County's Office of Law Enforcement Oversight. And then there was also the City of Seattle's Police Accountability Ordinance that, in response to the work on the consent decree, enshrined a three-body system to allow for community input and civilian oversight.  Crystal Fincher: [00:02:31] In your work on that and starting out, how did that affect you or what ended up happening at that time?  Shannon Cheng: [00:02:38] I hope that people listening to this can feel inspired about starting their own journey as an activist, because I really knew absolutely nothing when I started. And have just been learning along the way and just having my eyes opened to how the world works. And so what happened was both of these ordinances we were asked to help - they passed and there was much joy and excitement. We got to celebrate alongside everybody in community who had fought for those reforms for way longer than we had been there. And it's really kind of humbling to just get to be there at the finish line. But I think a lesson that I've gradually learned through activism is the work doesn't stop at wins like these . Actual follow through is key and in this case, accountability for a robust accountability system needed to happen. And so though we had that victory in May 2017 when Seattle City Council unanimously passed our landmark accountability law, we had a huge setback in November 2018, when that same City Council voted to ratify the SPOG, or Seattle Police Officer's Guild contract, which contained provisions that watered down that accountability ordinance. And I think for me that City Council meeting where that happened was a huge turning point for me, where I naively entered thinking, Oh, well, you know, the last time we were here this passed. And gradually at the meeting, hearing community member after community member come up to testify about how collective bargaining and police accountability aren't mutually exclusive, and then to see the writing on the wall as councilmembers made speeches and ended up supporting the contract anyway.  A core group of us stayed engaged after that, trying to monitor the city's progress on the consent decree and the new police contract negotiations that are now upcoming. And honestly, earlier this year it was feeling a bit hopeless. Despite being court-ordered in 2019 specifically to address accountability, the City had been stalling on that front and in early May of this year filed a motion to end independent monitoring of Seattle Police Department's use of excessive force and racial bias in policing. And meanwhile, the pandemic was in full force and community groups were focused on trying to take care of their communities. So it just felt like they were trying to slip something through when people weren't able to pay attention. And I think this felt alarming - that community was just going to be ignored.  Crystal Fincher: [00:05:08] Which had been the case in the past, and I share your feeling with the approval of the 2018 SPOG contract and seeing accountability measures rolled back and watered down, and feeling like we just took a big step back and wondering where do we go from here? And also that it's a really complicated process. Once we start talking about the Guild contract and some of the really inside process, it's hard for the average person who hasn't been engaged in this process to follow the process through. And certainly looked like maybe this was going to happen again and we were going to take another step back. And then - George Floyd was murdered. After so many other Black people have been murdered and assaulted and civil rights being violated at the hands of police - and it was just a breaking point - the straw that broke the camel's back and protests broke out nationwide, including in Seattle, and brought a huge focus directly onto police accountability. How did that impact your group?  Shannon Cheng: [00:06:21] Yeah - that moment was a real tipping point. Our core group had been trying to understand the systems - where were the levers of power - speaking to our City Council members, trying to affect change, and testifying at meetings to try to make the next contract negotiations go in a better way. And like I said, it was feeling hopeless, but then after that event and all the protests breaking out, immediately there was this spotlight on all these issues that had always been there but just been able to be ignored by the broad public. And within a week, I think, after protests broke out, the City of Seattle withdrew that motion - trying to get out from being monitored. And it was kind of funny because it felt like, Okay, our goal is now done. But as I said before, the work doesn't end there. And so what ended up happening is our somewhat sleepy little group suddenly had a giant uptick of interest and people coming from all over, wanting to work with us. And we were a little overwhelmed, because we had been so focused on a particular goal, that at that point had been met. And so it was about trying to regroup and re-understand and listen to what the protestors and community members were saying. And try to understand - where do we go from there?  So we ended up helping support - locally here in Seattle, we had months of budget talks - this deep questioning of what the role of police is in the City of Seattle, and what we would want that to look like, and what kind of accountability measures could come from that. In addition, with the large outpouring of new support - we had people reaching out to us who wanted to help, who didn't specifically live in the City of Seattle - so we ended up wanting to broaden our focus and we found an opportunity at the King County level to help out, as in this past election in November, there were four charter amendments on the ballot that specifically were about police reform. And so we worked on a campaign to help support and pass those, which they all did successfully. And then, we're also looking at the upcoming state Legislative Session where a lot of policy and bills are being introduced - that some of them are foundational to being able to get a lot more of this work done at all the other levels.  Crystal Fincher: [00:08:51] You talked about action in the City, action in the County, action at the legislative level - talking about police accountability, reform, transformation - is not just a one-jurisdiction job. It touches so many. How do you manage that?  Shannon Cheng: [00:09:11] It's a little dizzying. Trying to wrap one's head around all the different layers - there's your local jurisdiction's police department, there's the local police guilds, there's just the local government - in Seattle, we have the Mayor and the City Council - just trying to understand how all those fit together and who actually has power to make some of the changes - that is something that we've tried to look at. At the City, we kept running up into walls - when we would have meetings with City Councilmembers asking about reforms, they would point to us to the State and say, Well, this is under state law and for that to happen, we would need state law to change. So basically, we agree with you, but this is not under our purview. So kind of pointing us elsewhere - and part of it as an activist is trying to understand what they're telling you - and one, doing your fact checking and make sure, making sure that's correct - that they're not just diverting you and passing you off to somebody else, but then understanding, Okay, the next step of this process - maybe it is to go to the State.  And then for Seattle, a lot of what got us involved in the King County process is understanding that when an officer-involved shooting happens anywhere in King County, whether that's through the King County Sheriff's Office, the Seattle Police Department, or any other city that has their own departments, such as Bellevue, Auburn, Kent - all those go through inquests that are under the King County level. And that was what one of the charter amendments was about - was about reforming that inquest process. So, you start down a path and it just quickly turns into this rabbit hole of all these interconnected laws and policies between these different levels. And it is hard to keep track of.  Crystal Fincher: [00:11:08] And looking at how - all right, we want cities to make a change and we want you to reduce funding, we want these officers to be held accountable - but understanding especially institutional power usually doesn't just rely on one method or one lever to maintain power and control. Usually institutional power is like tentacles - the entrenchment of our current policing system is not held actually within the police department. It happens quite frequently that an officer can be found to have violated policy and/or the law, and then can appeal it - go through arbitration - appeal that discipline. A Chief can fire them and then that decision can be overruled and the police officer can wind back up on the force. So it looks like police chiefs are ultimately powerless when it comes to establishing a culture and setting discipline - certainly rots the culture of a department - is completely demoralizing to people who feel like they are doing their jobs in the right way, but it leaves them powerless. How do you get around that issue? Does that lie in the Guild contract? Does that lie in other laws? How does that get fixed? Shannon Cheng: [00:12:31] This problem is really huge and I think in some ways, it lies everywhere. We, as community members, need to be engaged and continuing to pressure our elected officials who have different levers of power - that this is important. The police guild definitely has a huge role in it. They, under state law, get to collectively bargain in what way discipline and accountability happens when there's officer misconduct. Even though the City can pass an ordinance, as Seattle did in 2017, it doesn't actually become law unless it's accepted into the police contract, which are done through these closed-door negotiations, and that there's very little public insight into what actually happens there. At the same time, city government does have the power that City Council could reject a police contract, if it comes out from behind those closed doors, that is not acceptable - but the police are very entrenched, as you said, and it has just been the pattern of accepting that what comes out is what we have to take, even though that may not technically be the case. Then there is this question - at the state level - that they could help empower local communities to be able to be better -  to implement these accountability systems that have been proposed by taking it out of the collective bargaining process and making that something that is truly public - that everybody and anybody can see what's happening and understand what trade-offs are being made - and making sure that that is something that we all want. I hear a lot about people talking about needing to restore trust in law enforcement and sometimes I wonder if law enforcement trusts us - why are they so concerned and fighting tooth and nail against any attempts to put any amount of accountability process into place for them? Crystal Fincher: [00:14:54] Just a reminder that you're listening to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher. And today our guest is Shannon Cheng, grassroots  activist with People Power. Valid question. A lot of the conversation right now is philosophically on the front end. There's a lot that deals with accountability - after something potentially bad has happened - but there is a call for, Okay, let's actually not just focus on tinkering around the edges, as it appears to some people, or focusing on things that only deal with something after the fact. How do we prevent these things from happening in the first place? Hence, calls to reduce the amount of patrol officers on the street, reducing funding, demilitarizing organizations, and re-imagining what policing is and divesting from armed enforcement to community-based solutions. How do you navigate that?  Shannon Cheng: [00:15:59] Policing is very reactive. You call the police when there's a problem that is already happening or happened. And oftentimes, I think the experience of a lot of people is, when the police show up, they aren't actually helping or addressing the root cause of what the problem was that brought them to that place. To me, it makes sense to try to be more proactive and try to address those. And I think as we've been delving deeper into what city and police budgets look like, it appears that we're spending a lot on being reactive rather than being proactive. And so this is this issue of thinking about, Okay, are we going to just continue to reform a system that has not worked for many of us in the past, or currently? Or do we want to figure out how to transform it and society into something that better serves all of us, not just a few of us. And I guess that's, to me, like in my own life - if I think about problems - it's better to get to the root of things, but it's harder. And I think it's also - it's harder for people to quantify whether something has worked. And that is the issue and why, I think, we go back to being knee-jerk reactors to problems.  Crystal Fincher: [00:17:30] So as you're looking at what you're supporting, or what is on the table coming up in this legislative session in the near term - in local, regional and state government. What is that landscape? What is being talked about? What are the things that are going to be in front of bodies that have the power to change process and change the law?  Shannon Cheng: [00:17:55] So there's going to be a lot of bills related to policing coming up at the state level in January. Some of them are addressing police standards - so trying to change at the police level what happens - things that will ban chokeholds and neck restraints, no-knock warrants, unleashed police dogs. There are bills that are looking to demilitarize the police. There are bills that are looking at setting a statewide standard for use of force and when that's appropriate. There's also talk about having a standard where officers have to report misconduct of their peers. So that is looking at trying to change upstream what happens throughout an officer's daily day-to-day.  Then there's a lot of bills that are going to look at different avenues of accountability that are available. So when an officer misconduct situation does happen, what opportunities do community or jurisdictions have to hold those officers accountable. And so I think there's three different levels of accountability. There's the criminal accountability , which currently there's a lot of talk about trying to have truly independent investigations, where you're not having police departments investigate other police departments. They are looking to set up a statewide oversight entity to oversee that and potentially, also have an independent prosecutor for deadly force incidents. There's also talk about - at the civil liability level - making it possible for both police officers and departments to be held civilly liable for misconduct. Part of that is going to be removing the restriction of qualified immunity at the Washington state level. Then administratively - so allowing police departments or chiefs to actually follow through on the standards that we're setting and hold officers accountable when they don't live up to them - there is talk about trying to reform collective bargaining such that we do empower local jurisdictions to be able to hold officers accountable.  And then in support of a lot of these are talks about de-certification - having the ability statewide to de-certify officers from being able to get jobs at other police departments. There's also a push to have more transparency - so setting up databases that would track misconduct and disclose police activity. And then there's also talk about trying to empower the setup of local community advocacy boards across the State. Crystal Fincher: [00:20:53] Okay, so that is a lot. And also, probably not enough. So if this is going to be introduced in the session, which starts on January 11th, how can people advocate for these? What do they need to do? And how do you recommend people getting involved and making sure that legislators know that they're paying attention and that they want this at the local level?  Shannon Cheng: [00:21:19] Thanks for asking that, Crystal . People absolutely need to be engaged and involved for any of this change to happen. We can't just leave it to lawmakers to make it happen. So what we need to do is show them that there is community public support for these reforms that are being talked about. So one of the best ways to do that is to look up who your legislators are, and write them an email, or call them, or even set up a meeting with them to talk about - if you have a personal story about how you've been affected, that is a huge boon for legislators to hear from you. And there's also opportunity - a lot of these bills will be going through committees that are dealing with Law and Justice or Public Safety, so you can look up on leg.wa.gov when the bill you're interested in is going to be in committee. You can - I think everything's going to be virtual this year, so in some ways it's going to be a lot easier for grassroots activists to take part. You don't have to drive yourself down to Olympia to be present and you can testify or just sign in and show support. I think it's about making noise that these issues matter to the public - and keeping up that noise - and continuing to put pressure on our lawmakers to live up to the vision that the community has for what policing could look like.  Crystal Fincher: [00:23:00] You mentioned getting bill detail and finding out who legislators are - we will include in the show notes for this podcast and the website - the links in order to be able to do that and to be able to track each piece of legislation that's proposed, the bill name attached to it, and a synopsis of what happens. There is a lot of good information that can be tracked down with those. So we'll include those in the show notes, but if someone wants to get involved with People Power, Shannon, how should they do that?  Shannon Cheng: [00:23:35] So we have a new website that we set up this last year and it is wethepeoplepower.org. And if you go there, there's a summary of what all we're working on and you can sign up - there's a sign up link at the bottom of the homepage, or if you do Get Involved -> Join Us that also takes you there. We will also likely be having action alerts on our webpage once Legislative Session starts, so check back for updates.  Crystal Fincher: [00:24:07] I want to touch with you, in about the five minutes that we have left, talking about collective bargaining reform that you talked about. Why is it important to be paying attention to what is happening with renegotiation of the SPOG contract and other police guild contracts for other city police departments, county police departments? Why is that so important in the overall conversation of reform and accountability?  Shannon Cheng: [00:24:41] To me, it's important because it empowers the local jurisdictions and police departments to have a say in what their police department looks like. A lot of reforms are being proposed, but if there isn't mechanisms in place where accountability for those reforms can happen, then passing all those reforms is kind of pointless. So what we need to do to strengthen the overall reform effort is prevent accountability being able to be watered down, contract after contract, in local jurisdictions. Crystal Fincher: [00:25:23] So ultimately local jurisdictions don't have the final authority or the final say on what happens in terms of discipline for officers. And that's something that lives within the police guild contracts?  Shannon Cheng: [00:25:40] Practically speaking, that's how it's played out. As I said, City Council could refuse to ratify a contract, but I think what is more concerning is that the public is calling for wanting accountability, and understanding, and having transparency into how that accountability is happening. And by having the process by which that is set up happen in closed-door negotiations, the public doesn't have any ability to trust that their interests are being met. I think it's dangerous - because without this transparency, it sets up this assumption that we have a robust accountability system in place when we really don't. And so when something does happen that the public wants to call out, they are often going to agencies or officials who don't actually have the power to solve the problem. It just continues to degrade the trust that the public can have in the process.  Crystal Fincher: [00:26:57] The challenge that we are hearing from pretty much every legislator involved in this process and many community members - is this rule is unionwide, across the big spectrum of unions that represent workers. And I am certainly a strong proponent of unions, as most of us, especially in this region are. And so not wanting to tear down any union protections for general workers, but recognizing that police officers do have a unique role because they can impact people's civil rights with every contact that they have with the public - and do have the power and authority to use lethal force. And so it seems like that responsibility is far and above most other positions that are involved, and so the accountability that should be tied to it should be greater than most other positions involved. But the details and how to segregate police from others, in terms of the contract, and treat them independently as their role would indicate as appropriate, is a challenging thing. Do you see any other complications in that process?  Shannon Cheng: [00:28:26] It is complicated. I mean, we respect the rights of workers to collectively bargain fair pay, benefits, working conditions. I think - it's just police unions and guilds have been masterful at muddling up that push for workers' rights with their ability to avoid being held accountable. As you said, police officers have state-sanctioned responsibilities that other union employees do not have. And so it makes sense that they should be held to a higher standard for those. They have the ability to get in the way of civilians' life and liberty - and that is a serious matter - and shouldn't be left up to being weighed against how much they get for overtime, or how much vacation they get. It's a serious enough matter that it should be brought out into the public. We don't want to bring everything out - we want just this piece that is specific and special to law enforcement.  Crystal Fincher: [00:29:44] Right. And to that end, it seems like that is a conversation that is certainly occurring within the labor community. Here in King County where we're located, the King County Labor Council, or the overarching organization representing all unions in this region, in this County - actually expelled the Seattle Police Officers Guild, particularly after seeing their staunch resistance to any kind of accountability or oversight, and seeming defense of violations and violence perpetrated by some officers during protests. We have had the opportunity to talk about a lot in this conversation, but I think overall is just that - you started from just someone who felt like - I need to get involved and make a difference to someone who's involved in a number of advocacy, reform, re-imagining, and accountability efforts at all levels in government. And that other people can follow that same path and impact these decisions that are being made. And that they do need to be involved if we are going to push our elected officials to pass the reforms that are so necessary. So thank you so much for spending time with us today, Shannon.  Shannon Cheng: [00:31:07] Thanks Crystal! We all have our own skills and I like to call them activism superpowers. I think, for a lot of us, it's just trying to figure out what that is, and just go out there and make change. Crystal Fincher: [00:31:27] Thank you for listening to Hacks and Wonks. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones, Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii and now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type in Hacks and Wonks into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our mid-week show delivered to your podcast feed. You can also get a full text transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced during the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in. Talk to you next time.

Today Crystal is joined by political consultant and friend of the show, Heather Weiner, to discuss the news of the week, including:  Jay Inslee's new capital gains tax proposal and its prospects this legislative session. Deb Haaland, the first indigenous person to be appointed to run the Department of the Interior. Jenny Durkan's renewed focus on clearing out homeless encampments, against public health advice. A full text transcript of the show is available below, and on the Hacks & Wonks blog at https://www.officialhacksandwonks.com/post/week-in-review-december-18-2020. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and Heather Weiner at @hlweiner. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com. Articles Referenced: Inslee unveils Washington budget proposal with taxes on capital gains and health insurers to fund COVID-19 recovery by Joseph O'Sullivan, The Seattle Times https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/inslee-unveils-washington-budget-proposal-with-taxes-on-capital-gains-and-health-insurers-to-fund-covid-19-recovery/ History Walks With Deb Haaland to the Department of the Interior by Charles P. Pierce, Esquire https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a35013654/deb-haaland-interior-department-joe-biden/ Interim Guidance on People Experiencing Unsheltered Homelessness from the Center for Disease Control https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/homeless-shelters/unsheltered-homelessness.html Full Transcript: Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and 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 through the lens of those doing the work, with behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes.  Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live 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: local political consultant extraordinaire Heather Weiner.  Heather Weiner: [00:00:46] Hi Crystal! So nice to be here.  Crystal Fincher: [00:00:49] So excited to have you back on! And we have a lot to dive into and we will start with Governor Inslee's budget - and he is proposing new revenue - he's ready to tax the rich. Is everyone else ready? What are your thoughts on this development?  Heather Weiner: [00:01:06] Oh boy, I have so many thoughts on this development. So first of all, Governor Inslee is now in his third term. It does not look like he is going to be leaving to join the Biden administration, which some had been speculating on. The positions - and we'll talk about that a little bit more - about who is being picked for some key spots. So Jay is here, and Jay is the Honey Badger of Governors right now. He is out there - he just rolled out a four days - exhausting everyone, including the press - as he, without any apparent fatigue, started just rolling out his plan for racial equity, his plans to combat climate change, his plans to help small business owners, and his plans to pay for it by taxing the rich ... finally. Crystal, you know - I don't know if your listeners do - that Washington is the worst in the country. We are #51, including DC. We are the worst in the country when it comes to taxing the poor and not taxing the rich. In other words, if you are a low-income person, 17% of your income likely goes to taxes. If you're a high-income person - and by high-income, I mean millionaire - likely somewhere around 3% of your income goes to state taxes. It's time we fix that. And Jay Inslee has proposed something that will help take us from worst to best.  Crystal Fincher: [00:02:29] Literally it will bring us to the best.  Heather Weiner: [00:02:35] Well, not single-handedly, but it's a plan to get there.  Crystal Fincher: [00:02:38] Gotcha. So what is he proposing?  Heather Weiner: [00:02:42] So Jay - I'm sorry, we're not on a first name basis - he doesn't ever call me up and say, Heather! So let me just say ... I wish he would though - call me anytime, Jay! So Governor Inslee has proposed something he's proposed in previous budgets - and that is to tax capital gains. Capital gains from the sales - large sales, windfalls - from the sales of stocks, bonds, other intangible type passive wealth - wealth that people make off of doing nothing other than just letting their money continue to sit there. This is not a tax on the sale of your house, the sale of your small business, anything like that - it doesn't apply to retirement funds. Just if you were a gazillionaire, like, I'm not going to name names, Jeff Bezos, and you are making millions and millions of dollars every day. You will then have to pay about 9% of your profit to the state to help pay for small business support, helping struggling families, and public health. And I think that's a great first step.  Crystal Fincher: [00:03:47] It seems like an excellent first step and something that, as you said, had been proposed before, but didn't progress through the session or have much of a strong push. This seems like the case is different this year. Do you think there's a chance in the legislature? Heather Weiner: [00:04:04] Yeah, I do. I do. I think there's a big chance. And I'm going to tell you - I'm going to tell you why Crystal. Number one - we are in a huge economic hole right now in the state of Washington. You know, we still have a quarter of a million people laid off without work, small businesses - we've had 2,000 restaurants alone - just restaurants - close permanently here in Washington state. We're in tough shape right now and it doesn't look like it's going to get better in 2021, honestly, even with the vaccine. So we've got to do something and we've got to do something now. And so I think the pandemic is really lighting a fire underneath the shoes of our legislators. The second thing that's happened is the elections. Although the makeup of the House and Senate haven't changed dramatically in Olympia, we are seeing a lot of new people coming in - freshmen who very much support progressive revenue - T'wina Nobles, one of your former clients, to name one - who are going to be out there advocating for it and a lot of the older legislators who've retired were still kind of stuck in the nineties. So I'm hopeful that that will work. This is - listen, capital gains is the very least that we can do - it is passive wealth. It only applies to the very, very wealthiest people here in Washington state. It is the least that we can do. There's a whole bunch of other things we can do - taxes on big corporations that have been making so many big profits off of, and during the pandemic, not to name any names, Amazon - and all different kinds of loopholes that we have been overlooking for the rich and the very wealthy for years at the expense of the health of our state. I'm psyched. I'm ready. I'm like, Go Jay, go.  Crystal Fincher: [00:05:49] I am ready also, especially on the heels of, as you referenced, so many loopholes and tax giveaways to some of the wealthiest corporations in the state with absolutely no accountability tied to it. We saw a record-breaking hundreds of billions of dollars given to Boeing with no jobs guarantee attached, and they just started laying people off and then announced that they're leaving town. If we can have no problems shoveling money to those with resources, how in this pandemic and emergency that we have, do we not show ourselves as eager to make sure that we're taking care of people - by taxing and just asking people to pay their fair share as they do to a greater degree in every other state. It just seems fairly basic, particularly in light of the fact that we're hearing that the congressional stimulus relief package is really disappointing, lackluster - probably does not include any bailout or help to local and state governments. So help that people even thought was coming in the midst of this emergency is not, and it really is up to us to provide for our own residents. And the only way we can do that is if everyone pays their fair share, and we don't continue asking those with the least to bear the greatest burden. So I'm excited. The House is saying that they believe they have the votes to pass this, which is really exciting. There's a number of new members in the House - I think they have a lot of new energy. I think that a lot of the new members on Finance are excited to push this through. And so it really looks like it's going to be a question about, is there the political will to do this in the Senate? I know a lot of people have that will - is it going to be enough? And I think that paying attention to where all of our Senators stand is going to be really important.  Heather Weiner: [00:08:02] Yeah. Agreed. For example, let's talk - well, last time I was here, we talked about Senator Mark Mullet and he is once again, a key vote out in Issaquah. This is the guy who last time has held up all kinds of things by sitting on these Senate committees and voting with Republicans. So I am hopeful that Senator Mullet is going to be changing his tune a little bit, or that the rest of the Senate Democratic leadership is going to be willing to override him and move forward. We'll see what happens. Again, this is a great first step I think Jay is doing - I'm sorry, Governor Inslee - is doing the right thing. Now it's up to the legislature to really find a progressive revenue package that again, takes Washington state from being worst in the nation to eventually - I think we should be the best. We've been the best on minimum wage, we've been the best on LGBTQ rights. We should be the best when it comes to revenue. Crystal Fincher: [00:08:56] We should be the best and on so many other issues in other areas, we're leading the country in terms of policy and we're setting the standard with, as you said, minimum wage, with paid sick leave, with so many different things - and to be this behind on the revenue that funds everything else and makes those things more possible for more people, I would think that we would be more excited to get this going. So hopefully this is the year and hopefully people look around at the need, which is only going to increase in 2021, and they get on board. And I guess, kicking this off, obviously session is going to be starting in January - on January 11th. Is there anything else that you're keeping your eye on that looks like it's going to be a topic and going to have legislation moving forward in this session?  Heather Weiner: [00:09:49] So it's super interesting because the legislature is going to be doing a lot of their deliberation by Zoom online. I think the whole apple cart is going to be turned over. The first thing we're going to see is a lot of legislators wanting to do a lot more grandstanding because there's going to be a lot more people watching them, a lot more constituents who have the time and the access online to comment and to see what they're doing. At the same time, leaders have said that they want to limit their legislative work to focus on the pandemic and dealing with our budget crisis. So I think there's going to be some really interesting things happening. We see a little bit about police reform, a lot about racial equity work, a lot about the environment, moving forward. I don't know - I think a lot of those small bills, the little gifts to lobbyists that we often see, may not get through this year. So I don't know - we'll see what happens. I'm really excited, though, about the access for the public to watch the sausage being made and to hold their legislators accountable. And I think our legislators who are more social media savvy, like Joe Nguyen, for example, are just gonna, mmm, they are just gonna rock it. I think it's going to be a real fun time to watch. And since I'm not as excited about the Seahawks this year, unfortunately, this is my new sport that I'm going to be just yelling at the TV about.  Crystal Fincher: [00:11:08] Well, I will out myself as a 49ers fan - I'm a huge 49ers fan. I have been a 49ers fan for my entire life. So, you know, that's just too bad. We'll see what happens with the Seahawks - Russ looks a little challenged right now. I don't know what's going on with that, but I also will not talk about what's going on with the 49ers.  Heather Weiner: [00:11:30] Right, all right, right, right, right, I know. Someday Crystal, we're going to have a long podcast where we're just going to talk about women's basketball. Someday I'm going to suck you away from the NBA and into the WNBA where the basketball is just amazing. But we'll talk about that some other time.  Crystal Fincher: [00:11:44] I am on board. We can talk about that another time - I'm down to talk about the Storm - anytime, anywhere we go. But you know, I share your enthusiasm and excitement about this session, and the possibility for the public to engage to a greater degree than they have before, to participate without a lot of the barriers that we've seen before - because of the pandemic - the opportunity to be able to offer testimony remotely and to really standardize having all of this available, not just on TVW when you have to happen to tune in, but available via Zoom where the public can participate - where the legislators can see how many people are paying attention, and who is paying attention, and they know that eyes are on them in a way that they were not able to see or feel before. And I think, especially in light of the protests that started in the wake of George Floyd, and here locally, Manuel Ellis, and that have continued to now and continue still, there is a greater degree of interest and attention still being paid that I think is going to be fairly unprecedented. And that excites me. Heather Weiner: [00:13:03] Yeah, it's fantastic - and as I've said to a couple of legislators, I hope that you keep the Zoom and public testimony, electronic public testimony, available. It certainly increases democracy and we've seen that with the Seattle City Council this year, where so many more people are able to testify when they weren't able to physically come down, both for income issues, work issues, and physical ability. So this is - I think it really improves democracy, I think it's great. Of course, I say that 'cause I usually agree with the people who are testifying - if it was a whole bunch of people that I disagreed with, I would say shut it down. Crystal Fincher: [00:13:41] Well, I think what we see is - most of the public is representative of the people who don't set aside time and have the privilege and ability to do nothing but pay attention to those meetings and attend those meetings. And usually the people who do - have more resources, are members of majority populations and communities, and certainly do not face some of the same barriers and challenges that people who have been marginalized and who don't have the resources that they do. So that is most of us. And so when more of us - just regular people - and, you know, obviously I work in politics, I'm not really that regular, I'm a little weird - but for just the average person, they're more represented when we expand access. And that's really what we need to continue to do - I think being forced to do this through the pandemic has just really brought on so many accommodations and changes in process that should have happened a long time ago, and that we need to continue to explore - how we can expand this access and make it even more accessible to people. With that, we can look at the Biden administration planning, and they're in the process of their transition. Certainly, Trump is still trying his little - literally coup - to defy the will of the people, and despite losing over 30 court battles, being turned away from courts at every level and the Supreme Court - thoroughly, handily, completely, he has lost the election and the electors have now voted. Biden is the President-elect. So he's moving forward, despite all the noise from everyone else. And he's moving forward with some particular picks for his cabinet that have a lot of people excited. You want to talk about that?  Heather Weiner: [00:15:53] Yeah - I'm so excited about the Department of Interior pick, which is Deb Haaland. Deb is a Native American woman from New Mexico. She was just elected in 2018, first Native American woman from that district to come in, and she has already just hit historic levels by being tapped to be the new Secretary of Interior.  Now I used to be a lobbyist in Washington, D.C. for 10 years. My job was to lobby the Department of Interior specifically on environmental issues. And it always shocked me that they had a very large bureau that went almost unmonitored, called the Bureau of Indian Affairs. And the Bureau of Indian Affairs has wreaked havoc on Native American families and tribal governments for over a century. And here, finally, is a badass Native American woman, who is coming in to take over not just the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but the entire Department of Interior - and that includes Bureau of Land Management, US Fish and Wildlife Service - it's just going to be - and the National Park Service. It's just going to be an amazing shift, both in representation and leadership, but also in the policy and direction for the Department of Interior. Go Deb Haaland - what an amazing feat - and kudos to Joe Biden for picking her. We had heard that Governor Jay Inslee - my beau, my boo - was considered for that appointment. Of course I was a little bit disappointed that he wasn't picked, but Deb Haaland, I'm going to give it 10 - 10 stars on that one. Great, great pick.  Crystal Fincher: [00:17:38] Great pick. And Biden is being universally lauded for that pick - a number of people have been lobbying for Haaland's appointment to that position for quite some time. And across the spectrum of Democratic leanings, she has been extraordinarily qualified. She has already set the course - one of her tweets on Thursday was, Hey, in four years, Trump failed Indian country and only broke more promises. It was exacerbated by the administration's failure to take this pandemic seriously - looking forward to turning the page on this dark chapter. So we are going to see a radical change from certainly this past administration, but also our past period. And hopefully this can start to right some of the wrongs, mend some of the broken trust, and really get to work on really moving forward - considering everybody's needs, and living up to the promises and the potential that we have when we all respect each other and move forward together. Heather Weiner: [00:18:46] And, you know, when people say that elections don't matter, this is a great example of where elections do matter. That by having President-elect Biden in leadership - he is able to pick amazing people like Deb Haaland to dramatically change the on-the-ground daily lives of other human beings. And I think that that right there makes it worth, makes it worth the votes. You know, I'm not as thrilled with some of the other picks or I'm a little befuddled, shall we say, by some of the other picks, but this one's pretty good.  Crystal Fincher: [00:19:22] That one's pretty good. Also, another pick - Biden's pick to head the EPA, Michael Regan - from North Carolina, African-American man, who comes with a long history of accomplishments. But certainly, in terms of the environmental movement and policy and priorities, this pick has been involved in environmental justice movement, has been involved in the EPA for over a decade - really understands that this isn't just a niche concern as it had been viewed by some in the past, but this really impacts us all. Climate change is not affecting us in the future - our environmental priorities - air pollution, water pollution - is something that is impacting communities today. And that, especially, is impacting communities of color, low-income communities, to a greater degree than others. And understanding that that is as much a health issue, as it is a racial equity issue and a social justice issue, is something that he certainly understands and a lot of people are excited about that pick. Again, similarly, some thought that this could be a place where Jay Inslee could fit into this administration and were considering that. But if the pick isn't Governor Jay Inslee, then this certainly is a great alternative.  Heather Weiner: [00:20:54] And I do have to say that as much as you and I would have loved a little bit of the drama that would have come from Jay leaving, because then, of course, we would have the cascade of - then Bob Ferguson runs for Governor and then who runs for AG, and so on. Despite the fact that we're not going to have that tea to drink, we are going to, at least, have some stability and really focused leadership out of our executive branch. So I'm very excited about that.  Crystal Fincher: [00:21:21] Very excited about that too. And he's putting forward a budget that here, on the state level, I am digging, and I want to see passed and want to see him continue to push this forward. And he certainly has been a strong and steady hand in leading throughout the pandemic. You know, from the very beginning - and charting the course and putting Washington on more stable footing than most other states in the country, so we're still happy to have Jay here, and look forward to his leadership throughout this pandemic and meeting the needs of the people who need it most. So speaking of leaders, that brings us to Mayor Durkan, who isn't viewed quite as magnanimously or positively as Governor Inslee. And so this week - we know that last week, Mayor Durkan announced that she will not be seeking re-election. And I don't know if she feels like that frees her up to do more of what she was trying to do before with no apologies. But this week she decided to proceed with evicting people who have no homes from Cal Anderson Park, even though there are no homes for them to go to. What do you think about that, Heather?  Heather Weiner: [00:22:46] I am heartbroken this morning - 10 people have been arrested already today - protesting the eviction of people who were living in tents in Cal Anderson. Look, I agree with everybody - it's not the thing I want to see in the middle of my park - is people - I don't like to see human suffering. I like to turn away and not look. But as human beings, we have to witness that this is what has happened with our massive wealth, inequality and housing crisis in Seattle. And here we have actual human beings who are living out in the cold, in the rain. They have nowhere to put their trash. They have nowhere to cook and they have chosen a safe place, which is a park in the middle of a very busy district next to a community college, next to Seattle U, next to a lot of businesses. So businesses started complaining about there being people living in the park there and today , SPU and then the Seattle Police Department went in and started clearing people out. And they were met with protesters, and the protesters were doing their thing and 10 of them have been arrested so far. Look, I mean, City Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda pointed out in an email today, and a statement today, that there is no housing - safe, COVID-safe housing available. No COVID-safe shelters, even - not even just talking about housing, but just daily shelters. There's no COVID-safe daily shelters available. Where are people supposed to go? And so they're just going to continue moving their stuff from place to place and in misery - why are we doing this? Why are we spending taxpayer money doing this? It boggles my mind and also boggles my mind that Durkan's not being held accountable for this. The story that the news media are talking about right now are blaming the protestors and blaming the people living in tents, instead of blaming this administration for not coming up with a solution - that means renting hotel rooms, opening up unused City buildings to make sure that there are places where people can safely get out of the rain and the cold.  Crystal Fincher: [00:24:59] It is infuriating. It's infuriating for a number of reasons. First and foremost, we need to acknowledge and understand that these sweeps are specifically recommended against by the CDC and by public health authorities, including King County Public Health, because in a pandemic, this increases the chance and exposure of people to COVID-19. And this is a population that is also specifically vulnerable, more vulnerable than average. They're an at-risk population for COVID-19 and now you're increasing the likelihood of them being exposed, and everyone involved in this effort - it is so deeply irresponsible from a public health perspective and flies in the face of guidance. So at a time when she's saying she wants people to do what's necessary to keep each other safe, it would be nice if she did that herself, and didn't defy the CDC in order to push out people from a place where, at least they have a stable place that they can call their own and they can sleep right now in the pandemic, and not push them out because some people get their feelings hurt and get riled up by having to see them, as if that is the offense and not that someone doesn't have a home - when, as you said, there are many, so many hotel rooms available. There are so many vacant spaces available. And in a time when we have the hospitality industry, in particular, asking us to help them because they're struggling - rooms aren't being rented - wow, this does seem like it makes sense - that this can meet a number of needs if we were to partner or procure those rooms for people who did not have a place to live. And this is also happening in the face of State Supreme Court ruling that says that you can't kick someone, you can't remove someone who does not have a home, from public property if there is nowhere for them to go. And that's what we're talking about here and what infuriates me about Durkan - one of the things that infuriates me about Durkan - is that her and her administration seemed to put so much effort into acting like they were solving the problem, and a public relations effort with a Navigation Team who wasn't obligated to offer real services, and who was actually working in tandem with police officers to sweep instead of spending that money and effort and time on actually just providing people with housing. And it's so frustrating and it's so upsetting and angering, that the focus is on people who are upset by visible poverty - as if just the threat to their idyllic vision that other people - "those people" - shouldn't be around here and I shouldn't be subjected to them is just maddening and against everything that we should be standing for. It's offensive - protestors were out there for the same reason - they're out there for other items that are unjust. This was an unjust, unwise, and unhealthy action, and I hope we see the end of these when Durkan leaves.  Heather Weiner: [00:28:40] Yeah. Well, let's see if people are gonna run, if somebody's gonna run on fixing homelessness, like she ran on in 2017 - that was her major issue. And in fact, I remember the Chamber of Commerce ads in support of her, specifically showed tents in parks and said if her opponent, Cary Moon, was going to win, there would be more tents in parks. Guess what? Durkan won. We see tents in every single park - and it's not because she's not being tough enough. It's because there is nowhere else for people to go. And when you tell people to go get a job, to get themselves "cleaned up", to deal with substance use disorder or other mental health issues - suddenly, we are in a chicken and egg scenario because there is no way for someone to get a job or to deal with mental health or substance use issues when they are just trying to survive in a cold wet tent. Crystal Fincher: [00:29:41] Absolutely. So I - we will certainly be hearing more about this. There is certainly a lot of resistance to this effort and obviously, one of the reasons why Durkan is choosing not to run again is it looks unlikely that she would have been elected again, because she and her leadership and policies are unpopular with the majority of Seattle residents. So we'll continue to stay tuned.  I thank you for tuning in to Hacks and Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM this Friday, December 18th, 2020. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones, Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. And our wonderful co-host today was Seattle political consultant, Heather Weiner. Thanks for joining us, Heather.  Heather Weiner: [00:30:30] Oh, so nice to chat with you and I'm happy to come back on again soon.  Crystal Fincher: [00:30:35] Thank you. You can find Heather on Twitter at @hlweiner. And you can find me on Twitter at @finchfrii. And now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, and wherever else you get your podcasts - just type Hacks and Wonks into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe, to get our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in. We'll talk to you next time.

Amy Mecozzi Cho, MD Do hospital-based physicians benefit from being out-of-network? Are policy wonks who attack “surprise billing” fully aware of the relevant factors? In this second episode on this topic, Dr. Koka leads a conversation with our guest, Dr. Amy Cho, an emergency physician from Minnesota. Dr. Cho graduated from the University of Michigan with a joint MD/MBA and completed her residency in Emergency Medicine at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Chicago. Prior to medical school, she worked as a management consultant with Bain & Co. and as a product manager with Convio, a venture-funded software company. GUEST: Amy Mecozzi Cho, MD: Twitter LINKS: High Yield Script (website) RELATED EPISODE: Ep. 94. The Trojan Horse of Surprise Billing Legislation (with guest Daniel E. Choi, MD) SUPPORT THE SHOW: Make a small donation on our Patreon page and join our discussion group or receive a free book. Support this podcast

A new book from journalist Binyamin Appelbaum shows how economists evolved from overlooked number-crunchers to powerful influencers who reshaped American policy. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A new book from journalist Binyamin Appelbaum shows how economists evolved from overlooked number-crunchers to powerful influencers who reshaped American policy.

A new book from journalist Binyamin Appelbaum shows how economists evolved from overlooked number-crunchers to powerful influencers who reshaped American policy.

This week we will look at espionage. It is spies and spooks, coups and active measures. It is a shadowy world. All cloak-and-dagger. Carried out by those we will never know. Of the things that are supposed to stay secret. Aiding with the reconnaissance on this episode of Idyllic Music are Karmacoda, Hector Zarate, Frank Dorittke, Tommy Ptolemy, DTR, and the Policy Wonks.

It's Sunday so of course we're checking in on Game of Thrones. The season 6 writers are back with Choose-Your-Own-Adventure dick and grammar jokes, Kelsey Has A Gripe, Li'l Finger and his Li'l Finger pew pew pew their way through the Li'l Finger News Bulletin, Cersai scored at Mac on Free Lipstick Day, we have our first point in our Fantasy Draft, and Policy Wonks win the episode in both Dragonstone and Winterfell. Cross over universes this week included the Grand Designs tour of Dany's Bespoke Dragonstone Throne, Bran Potter and the Goblet of Winterfell, House of (Ice and Fire) Cards, and The Office. Sorry, there were no funny puns for that one. We also jumped aboard the #noconfederate bandwagon.

Hop aboard! In this episode, the crew dissects the recently released report of the National Defense Strategy Commission. Melanie, Chris, and Bryan weigh in on the report’s strengths and weaknesses. Also, Chris and Melanie reveal themselves to be Scrooges by expressing disdain for Hallmark Christmas dramas.   Links Eric Edelman and Gary Roughead, Providing for the Common Defense: The Assessment and Recommendations of the National Defense Strategy Commission (United States Institute of Peace, 2018). CNBC, “Deadly California Wildfire Now 100% Contained After Scorching 154,000 Acres,” Nov. 25, 2018 Joseph Archer, "Beijing to Assign ‘Personal Trustworthiness Points’ For All Citizens by 2021," Telegraph, Nov. 20, 2018 Greg Jaffe, “John Collins, Army Colonel Who Launched Influential Online Warlord Loop, Dies at 97,” Washington Post, Nov. 23, 2018 “Pentagon Fails Audit and Nobody in Washington is Surprised,” Taxpayers for Common Sense, Nov. 16, 2018 Lara Seligman, “How the Generals are Routing the Policy Wonks at the Pentagon,” Foreign Policy, Nov. 15, 2018 “Anti Vaccine Community Behind North Carolina Chickenpox Outbreak,” BBC, Nov. 19, 2018 Morgan Gstalter, “Disney Screenwriter Says Term ‘Anti-Vax’ is Equivalent to ‘N-Word,’” The Hill, Nov. 24, 2018 Dennis Romboy, “Trump Backs Criminal Justice Reform Legislation that Sen. Mike Lee Helped Write,” Desert News, Nov.15, 2018 Jack Crowe, “Mike Lee Accuses Tom Cotton of Spreading 'Fake News' on Criminal Justice Reform Bill,” National Review, Nov. 19, 2018   Music and Production by Tre Hester

Erin, Radha, and Loren invited Dr. Lindsay Cohn of the U.S. Naval War College to join their posse and explain America's history of employing the military for domestic purposes.  In Keeping Up Foreign Relations, UK Prime Minister Theresa May is still negotiating the terms of her break up with the EU, and new revelations on the tragic killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi are giving us a collective heart attack.  A new entrant to White House mayhem, First Lady Melania Trump, flexes her muscle to oust the fifth Deputy National Security Advisor of the Trump administration, and we assess the assessment of the National Defense Strategy commission.  Finally, come what may, we commit to developing a holiday shopping list for you festive needs this season.   UPCOMING EVENT: The American Public and the War on Terror https://my.theworldwar.org/2307 (Tue, 4 Dec, Kansas City) Border Deployment Alice Hunt Friend, "5 reasons to be concerned about deploying U.S. troops along the southern border," Washington Post Lindsey P. Cohn, "The Precarious State of Civil-Military Relations in the Age of Trump," War on the Rocks Keeping up Foreign Relations Alex Hunt and Brian Wheeler, "Brexit: All you need to know about the UK leaving the EU," BBC Frank Langfitt, "Here's What You Need To Know About Brexit After A Tumultuous Week In The U.K.," NPR Jasmine Andersson, "What is the customs union, and how is it different to the single market," iNews John Cassidy, "The Brexit Fantasy Goes Down in Tears," New Yorker Saudi Arabia Alex Ward, "Trump doesn't want to punish Saudi Arabia over Khashoggi. His new sanctions prove it." Vox Shane Harris, Greg Miller, and Josh Dawsey, "CIA concludes Saudi crown prince ordered Jamal Khashoggi's assassination," Washington Post White House Mayhem Abigail Tracy, "'I don't know how you recover from that': The cruel, unusual fate of Mira Ricardel," Vanity Fair Aaron Mehta, "A 'crisis of national security': New report to Congress sounds alarm," Defense News Eric Edelman, et al., "Providing for the Common Defense: The Assessment and Recommendations of the National Defense Strategy Commission," USIP Lara Seligman, "How the Generals Are Routing the Policy Wonks at the Pentagon," Foreign Policy Pop Culture Roger Cormier, "15 Things You Might Not Know About Moulin Rouge!," Mental Floss Alan Sepinwall, "'The Little Drummer Girl' Review: Ignore the Plot, Admire the Beauty of Le Carre Thriller," Rolling Stone Katy Waldman, "HBO's 'My Brilliant Friend' Understands Its Source Material, But Its Diligence Feels Misspent," New Yorker Ryan McPhee, "Moulin Rouge! Musical Sets Broadway Dates Theatre; Aaron Tveit and Karen Olivo to Star," Playbill

Erin, Radha, and Loren invited Dr. Lindsay Cohn of the U.S. Naval War College to join their posse and explain America's history of employing the military for domestic purposes.  In Keeping Up Foreign Relations, UK Prime Minister Theresa May is still negotiating the terms of her break up with the EU, and new revelations on the tragic killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi are giving us a collective heart attack.  A new entrant to White House mayhem, First Lady Melania Trump, flexes her muscle to oust the fifth Deputy National Security Advisor of the Trump administration, and we assess the assessment of the National Defense Strategy commission.  Finally, come what may, we commit to developing a holiday shopping list for you festive needs this season.   UPCOMING EVENT: The American Public and the War on Terror https://my.theworldwar.org/2307 (Tue, 4 Dec, Kansas City) Border Deployment Alice Hunt Friend, "5 reasons to be concerned about deploying U.S. troops along the southern border," Washington Post Lindsey P. Cohn, "The Precarious State of Civil-Military Relations in the Age of Trump," War on the Rocks Keeping up Foreign Relations Alex Hunt and Brian Wheeler, "Brexit: All you need to know about the UK leaving the EU," BBC Frank Langfitt, "Here's What You Need To Know About Brexit After A Tumultuous Week In The U.K.," NPR Jasmine Andersson, "What is the customs union, and how is it different to the single market," iNews John Cassidy, "The Brexit Fantasy Goes Down in Tears," New Yorker Saudi Arabia Alex Ward, "Trump doesn't want to punish Saudi Arabia over Khashoggi. His new sanctions prove it." Vox Shane Harris, Greg Miller, and Josh Dawsey, "CIA concludes Saudi crown prince ordered Jamal Khashoggi's assassination," Washington Post White House Mayhem Abigail Tracy, "'I don't know how you recover from that': The cruel, unusual fate of Mira Ricardel," Vanity Fair Aaron Mehta, "A 'crisis of national security': New report to Congress sounds alarm," Defense News Eric Edelman, et al., "Providing for the Common Defense: The Assessment and Recommendations of the National Defense Strategy Commission," USIP Lara Seligman, "How the Generals Are Routing the Policy Wonks at the Pentagon," Foreign Policy Pop Culture Roger Cormier, "15 Things You Might Not Know About Moulin Rouge!," Mental Floss Alan Sepinwall, "'The Little Drummer Girl' Review: Ignore the Plot, Admire the Beauty of Le Carre Thriller," Rolling Stone Katy Waldman, "HBO's 'My Brilliant Friend' Understands Its Source Material, But Its Diligence Feels Misspent," New Yorker Ryan McPhee, "Moulin Rouge! Musical Sets Broadway Dates Theatre; Aaron Tveit and Karen Olivo to Star," Playbill

It's Sunday so of course we're checking in on Game of Thrones. The season 6 writers are back with Choose-Your-Own-Adventure dick and grammar jokes, Kelsey Has A Gripe, Li'l Finger and his Li'l Finger pew pew pew their way through the Li'l Finger News Bulletin, Cersai scored at Mac on Free Lipstick Day, we have our first point in our Fantasy Draft, and Policy Wonks win the episode in both Dragonstone and Winterfell. Cross over universes this week included the Grand Designs tour of Dany's Bespoke Dragonstone Throne, Bran Potter and the Goblet of Winterfell, House of (Ice and Fire) Cards, and The Office. Sorry, there were no funny puns for that one. We also jumped aboard the #noconfederate bandwagon. We're off the next two weeks for vacation, but join us again for Episode 6 later in August! Regular episodes will continue on Tuesdays.

We live in a confusing time, bombarded every day with news stories from around the world that can be hard to follow, or fully understand. Let Worldly be your guide. Every Thursday, senior writer Zack Beauchamp, senior foreign editor Jennifer Williams, and staff defense writer Alex Ward give you the history and context you need to make sense of the moment and navigate the world around you.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices