Tag Archives: d3

Paying $1K fine, Orion settles ethics complaint over Stranger cover ad

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(Image: SEEC)

District 3 challenger Egan Orion has opted to pay a $1,000 fine to settle a Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission complaint over his campaign’s purchase of a controversial $6,300 “wrapper” ad on The Stranger’s October 9th endorsement edition.

The campaign says it is also addressing an issue over campaign finance reporting for its Central District office.

The advertising complaint was sparked by the decision to include “sponsor identification” information inside the Stranger edition — not on the cover as required by the Seattle Elections Code.

The ad sparked controversy by making it appear to some that Orion had won the alternative media outlet’s coveted endorsement. But inside, the paper again endorsed incumbent Kshama Sawant. Continue reading →

Di$trict 3: Orion drops new ad about campaign funding, Sawant has cash ‘EMERGENCY’

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A screenshot from the new Orion TV ad

Meanwhile, some our taking the production of pro-Sawant campaign materials into their own hands (Image: @NoBatteries)

“Who is funding our local elections?”

If you ask D3 city council candidates Egan Orion and incumbent Kshama Sawant, they’ll tell you to look in very different directions for the answer to the question that has become a flashpoint overshadowing other issues in this year’s election.

From the start, Sawant said the election would be a referendum on “who runs Seattle: Amazon and big business, or working people.”

Yesterday, a week after Amazon poured over $1M into the city council election, Orion launched a new ad with a voiceover leveling a de facto response to Sawant’s early rallying cry: ”Who has a voice in City Hall? The Socialist Alternative party or your neighbors right here in Seattle?”

CHS takes a closer look at the ad, plus, give you some campaign war chest updates as well as more insight into what exactly candidates are spending their money on, below.

Orion wants to talk about campaign finance too:  Orion’s new ad, in which he touts his local support, is titled “Who is funding our local elections?”

Some, surely, would respond “Amazon,” but the 30-second clip doesn’t mention the cash the corporate behemoth and others have pumped in local elections via CASE, the political arm of the Chamber of Commerce, which has supported Orion with over $300,000 in independent expenditures.  Continue reading →

With ballots out, here’s where District 3 candidates stand on housing and affordability

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A view from a Pike/Pine crane

Kshama Sawant once again took on corporations and challenger Egan Orion was a no show in a forum on housing and homelessness Monday downtown, posing next month’s election as one between a champion of the working class against a business-backed candidate.

“Amazon, big business, the [Seattle Metropolitan] Chamber of Commerce are engaged in an attempted hostile corporate takeover of this election,” Sawant said. “They want to flip City Hall to the right.”

Sawant has made this pitch at countless forums in the past several months, but this time her opponent wasn’t there to defend himself. Challenger Orion didn’t attend the forum despite being listed as confirmed to attend on the organizer’s website. The Broadway Business Improvement Area head — who has been the beneficiary of more than $163,000 in independent expenditures from the Amazon-funded Chamber’s political action committee in the general election — didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

On housing, Sawant highlighted her controversial push for citywide residential rent control, which she has pushed despite little momentum in Olympia to overturn the statewide ban on the practice.

“It is going to be the most important citywide anti-displacement strategy because people who are homeless now or economically evicted now, today, will be economically evicted next year, next month, even next week,” Sawant said, after also calling for commercial rent control and ending sweeps of homeless encampments.  Continue reading →

Sawant budget proposals: $1M to power Central District community development, free public transit study, and salary cuts for council counterparts and mayor

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The Seattle City Council is getting its plan together for adding to, cutting from, and introducing a twist or two to City Hall’s 2020 budget. Tuesday night will bring a second and final public hearing on the process before the final jockeying begins:

Budget Public Hearing – 5:30 PM
Seattle City Hall | 600 4th Ave, Seattle, WA 98104

Last week, CHS reported on a couple interesting issues for Capitol Hill as the council shakes out its proposals. There’s likely to be an addition of $150,000 for a Capitol Hill “Public Life” study that could someday lead to the creation of a pedestrian and bike only Pike/Pine superblock. And there’s a potentially multimillion decision to be made over the future of the city’s Navigation Team charged with cleaning up homeless encampments. Other debates over the LEAD program and more are coming.

In addition to some of the big decisions, District 3’s representative Kshama Sawant has a few items she is asking her fellow council members to consider. While she takes some heat for not introducing a lot of legislation — she’s sponsored 129 pieces in her time in council chambers — Sawant’s office has come up with a few notable budget proposals over the years.  Continue reading →

Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren weigh in on Amazon cash shaping District 3 race

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Monday, Senator Bernie Sanders weighed in on what has — surprise, surprise —  become the biggest issue in the District 3 race for the Seattle City Council — campaign finance.

“In a city struggling with homelessness, Amazon is dropping an outrageous amount of money to defeat progressive candidates fighting for working people,” Sanders wrote in a social media post sharing a report from The Nation on the company’s targeting of D3 representative Kshama Sawant. “The way Amazon conducts itself in its hometown is a perfect example of the out-of-control corporate greed we are going to end,” Sanders wrote, adding his campaign pitch.

Monday’s message from Sanders followed another over the weekend from Senator Elizabeth Warren sharing the New York Times take on the situation. Continue reading →

Sawant vs. Orion on police accountability: ‘Public safety problems are not because we don’t have enough police, it’s because of inequality’

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It was a busy 24 hours for police accountability in Seattle.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge James Robart issued a ruling clarifying that the city still needs to correct issues in its police accountability system. These problems led Robart to rule earlier this year that the Seattle Police Department had fallen partly out of compliance with a 2012 federal consent decree mandating that the city address allegations of bias in policing and the use of excessive force.

Robart also ruled Tuesday that, in finding ways to mend flaws in the SPD’s internal investigations of officer misconduct, Seattle may consult outside advisers.

And on Wednesday, an internal SPD inquiry found that an officer acted reasonably when he shot and killed a man armed with a handgun after a traffic stop last year, a shooting that has drawn deep scrutiny.

So Wednesday’s night’s police accountability forum at Centilia Cultural Center in Beacon Hill with candidates from many of the Seattle City Council races, was timely to say the least. And this time, both Kshama Sawant and Egan Orion were there. Continue reading →

Di$trict 3: Amazon pumps over $1M into Seattle elections — What it means for District 3

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Sphere of influence (Image: Amazon)

Remember that time when we reported that independent spending from Political Action Committees had soared to unprecedented heights? That was a week ago.

Campaign finance has become even more, um, unprecedented this week with the announcement Tuesday that Amazon is pouring an additional $1.05 million into CASE, the political arm of the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, right when ballots are sent to voters this week.

That brings the local corporation’s spending on this year’s local elections to $1.45 million, more than any other union or Political Action Committee.

With $241,257 already spent on his behalf by CASE (mostly on mail and canvassing), D3 candidate Egan Orion is its largest beneficiary.

To give you a sense of the magnitude of this week’s contribution: Amazon’s total contribution to the PAC now adds up to more than the combined $1.27 million City Council candidates opposed by the PAC have raised. That group includes incumbent Kshama Sawant in D3, who has raised the most of any council candidate — $387,730.

“The money CASE has raised is from local companies who care about the future of this city,” Markham McIntyre, executive director of CASE, said in a statement. “The status quo isn’t working: we have a dysfunctional, toxic environment at City Council, and employers, including our city’s largest private employer, want a return to good government.”

The contribution brings CASE’s total spending power for this election up to $2.68 million, of which it has spent $1.3 million.

In a statement, Orion called the influx of PAC money in city politics this year “completely out of scale with the grassroots campaign myself and many others are trying to run and is proving to be a distraction from the real issues.”  Continue reading →

D3 candidates to square off on police accountability

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Last week, how the candidates for District 3’s seat on the Seattle City Council look at policing and accountability was put on stage in front of the police officer union. One candidate participated and said he wanted to “stabilize” the city’s police force and address concerns of reduced ranks and sinking morale. The other boycotted the event, saying she would stand with activists in the fight for accountability.

This week, in a forum hosted by a wide array of Seattle community organizations including Seattle’s Vietnamese Community Leadership Institute, El Centro de la Raza, and the GSBA, both Egan Orion and Kshama Sawant are expected to attend and have their say on legislating policing in the city in a Wednesday night forum: Continue reading →

43rd District Democrats make move to Capitol Hill

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Fresh off making “history” with the group’s endorsement choice in the Seattle District 3 race for City Council, the 43rd District Democrats are bringing their monthly meetings to Capitol Hill:

We’re MOVING! Our next general meeting will be on Tuesday, October 15 at 7pm at Seattle Central College.

Enter through the main doors of the college, go to the left, and we’re just down the hall — room BE 1110.

Be sure to RSVP going on our facebook event page! https://www.facebook.com/events/274492786568352/

In recent years, the influential political group has gathered in the University District for its meetings and endorsement sessions. Tuesday’s meeting will include two new resolutions — one a “Rent Control Resolution” and another “End Sex Work Arrests Resolution.”

The group meets every third Tuesday.

The 43rd was also busy in the neighborhood over the weekend canvassing for D3 Socialist Alternative incumbent Kshama Sawant in her race against challenger Egan Orion.

It’s not every election year you’ll find the Democratic-focused group working to get out the vote for someone outside the party.

In September, the 43rd voted to endorse Sawant, the first ever endorsement of a non-Democrat by the 43rd District group.

Ballots are slated to be mailed out Wednesday for the November 5th General Election. Thursday, the drop boxes open. You can find all of CHS’s Election 2019 coverage here.

 
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At public safety candidates forum, Orion makes call to ‘stabilize’ force, Sawant makes statement by passing on Seattle Police Officer Guild event

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(Image: @brandikruse)

In mid-May, just six weeks after announcing his bid for the Seattle City Council, Egan Orion moderated a panel on summer safety for the now-defunct Capitol Hill Chamber of Commerce. A big topic of discussion that day was the understaffing of the Seattle Police Department.

SPD East Precinct commander Capt. Bryan Grenon noted at the meeting that the department was down several officers on all watches and that in his 28 years on the force, they’ve never had officers to spare.

So Orion came into Wednesday’s candidate forum hosted by the Seattle Police Officers Guild to prove his mettle on one of the biggest issues plaguing the city and the district. And what was the first issue he brought up in his opening statement?

“We’re losing police officers faster than we can hire them on the SPD,” Orion said. “Public safety is an essential part of our every day lives, of course.”

Kshama Sawant, Orion’s competitor and the most vocal Seattle Police critic on the current council, chose to make her statement by not attending Wednesday’s forum that included at least one candidate from all seven council seats up for election next month.

“Far too often, the conversation on police accountability has had to start at the grassroots level in the wake of tragic events, with the political establishment rushing to catch up, and the SPOG standing in opposition,” Sawant said in a statement. “I stand with the Movement for Black Lives, which has called for independently elected community oversight boards with full powers over police departments.” Continue reading →