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Seeing which direction the wind is blowing, the MLK Labor Council, King County’s union of unions, has voted to endorse Katie Wilson, converting its sole endorsement of Bruce Harrell into a dual endorsement.
It’s not a complete abandonment of the Mayor, but it shows that his grip on City Hall is still slipping after his defeat in the August primary.
“Wilson’s campaign has been centered on bold solutions to address affordability, the most pressing issue for union voters in Seattle. Wilson has more than a decade of extensive work with unions on joint campaigns,” the council said in a statement.
“MLK Labor is proud to update our endorsement in the Seattle mayoral race to support both Mayor Bruce Harrell and now, Katie Wilson. A dual endorsement by MLK Labor shows both candidates have earned meaningful support from working people and accurately reflects the views of union members across Seattle,” said Katie Garrow, the council’s Executive Secretary-Treasurer, in a statement.
Wilson sees this as a clear nod to her success in the August primary election. “The results of the primary election are clear: While the incumbent won a majority of votes in Seattle’s wealthiest waterfront neighborhoods, the working people in lower-income neighborhoods across the city overwhelmingly support our campaign,” Wilson told The Stranger. “That’s because they know I will fight for them and fight to make our city a place where you don’t need a six-figure income to feel at home. The unions that represent the hard-working people of our city recognize that, too, and that’s what this endorsement means.”
“Unlike Katie Wilson’s false promises, Bruce has delivered for working people: raising the minimum wage, advancing progressive revenue, expanding housing and childcare, and standing up to Trump,” Harrell’s campaign said in a statement to The Stranger. “We’re positioned to make more gains in a second term, and honored for the support we’ve earned from working people across our city.”
The MLK Labor Council represents more than 150 unions in King County, and almost a quarter of a million workers. The body runs a bit like congress: Each union elects delegates, based on its size, and those delegates vote on its endorsements, among other resolutions.
In May, months before Wilson’s dominant lead in the primary, the council announced its sole endorsement of Harrell. It was perceived as a death knell for any progressive challenger, and a striking turnaround from its 2021 vote when almost 80 percent of the delegates voted to endorse Harrell’s opponent, Lorena González. In its May announcement, the council said that in his first term, he “delivered two strong, pro-worker levies, defended Seattle’s nation-leading worker protection laws, and demonstrated the resolve to stand up to federal overreach when working people’s rights are at stake.” This feeling was not unanimous. A number of unions abstained from the vote.
Harrell did keep someone on staff who was specifically dedicated to labor policies, and built a mountain of goodwill with the city’s unions when he inserted himself into the city’s negotiations with its internal unions, pushing aside its designated labor negotiators and offering a significantly better proposal.
But that sheen didn’t last through election season. In mid-July, PROTEC17, which represents 3,000 city workers, endorsed Wilson over Harrell. And after that, the primary showed that while Harrell was sinking like a lead balloon, Wilson’s ground game was working, even without institutional support. In late August, UFCW 3000, one of Seattle’s largest and most influential unions (with significant sway in MLK Labor), endorsed her as well.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include comment from Bruce Harrell’s campaign.
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Hannah Murphy Winter
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