Mayor Bruce Harrell was elected in 2021 by a city still reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic.
It was a change election (or backlash election, depending on who you ask), with more conservative-leaning candidates beating out a progressive slate. Harrell won over then-Council President Lorena Gonzalez by more than 17% of the vote.
Much of Harrell’s first term has been about post-pandemic recovery, with a focus on things like police hiring, Downtown revitalization and homeless encampment clearance.
He now faces seven opponents in his bid for reelection. If Harrell succeeds, he’ll be the first Seattle mayor to serve a second term since Greg Nickels left office in 2009.
Bruce Harrell
Prior to his time in elected office, Harrell worked as a telecommunications lawyer for US West (now Lumen Technologies). He was elected to the Seattle City Council in 2007 and reelected twice. He did not run for reelection to the Council in 2019.
On his campaign website, Harrell touts progress on public safety. Harrell and the Council have invested significantly in hiring bonuses and officer salaries to offset years of officers quitting faster than new recruits could be hired. Harrell launched the CARE Department, an alternative response model that sends mental health professionals instead of police to intervene in public mental health crises.
Harrell also highlights his work on affordable housing, including the passage of a record $970 million housing levy; his Downtown Activation Plan to help the city core recover from the pandemic; and work on transportation through the $1.5 billion transportation levy.
Ry Armstrong
Ry Armstrong is an actor, co-executive director of Sustainable Seattle and a National Council member for Actors Equity, the actors’ labor union. They ran in the 2023 primary for Seattle Council’s District 3 seat.
Armstrong’s priorities include affordable housing, public safety, workers’ rights and childcare.
Armstrong wants to see more construction of permanently affordable subsidized housing, including social housing, and wants more protections against displacement for renters and homeowners. To improve public safety, they want to see more community-based interventions and more investment in first responders equipped to deal with mental health crises.
Armstrong said they will fight for policies that protect wages and working conditions, and want to expand affordable child care options in Seattle.
Clinton Bliss
Clinton Bliss is a primary care doctor in Seattle. On his campaign website he said he is running for mayor to “end the tearing down of our country and our system of governance and begin a new paradigm of positive change.”
Bliss’s top priorities are to restore public safety and civility, use public funds to benefit all and end economic favoritism in government.
He wants to implement a system of peer review for police officers like the one used in the health care profession, arrest criminals, stop graffiti and end the war on drugs. He supports mixed-use density, but wants more protection for trees. Bliss wants the city to build more shelter space so anyone experiencing homelessness has somewhere to go.
Joe Mallahan
Joe Mallahan is a former executive at T-Mobile who narrowly lost to Mike McGinn in the 2009 Seattle mayoral election. On his campaign website, Mallahan said he’s running for mayor because “big, progressive cities like ours don’t have to choose between bold values and real results.”
If elected, Mallahan wants to shift the police department’s culture to a community policing model, improve officer oversight, invest in alternative responses and bring down 911 call times.
On housing, Mallahan wants to increase the supply of emergency and supportive shelter to get people off the street, build more subsidized affordable housing and cut red tape for market-rate housing development.
Joe Molloy
Seattle’s homelessness crisis is central to just about every political campaign. Joe Molloy has firsthand experience. They were evicted from their apartment last summer while dealing with health issues and have been homeless ever since.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Molloy’s top priority if elected would be to address homelessness in the city. They want to improve and expand Seattle’s supply of short-term and emergency shelter. For longer-term affordable housing, they support the new Seattle Social Housing Developer.
Molloy wants to create a “nonviolent emergency crisis response network” to send caseworkers, encampment outreach specialists and street medics to engage with people living on the street to help them move to shelter and housing. They also want to create a universal basic-income pilot program to support Seattle’s most underserved and vulnerable communities.
Katie Wilson
Katie Wilson is a longtime organizer and general secretary of the Seattle Transit Riders Union (TRU), a left-wing political organization that has successfully advocated for a variety of issues including transit access, minimum-wage increases and renter protections in Seattle and south King County.
Wilson’s priorities for city leadership include housing and homelessness, climate and transportation, workers’ rights and economic development, progressive revenue and “Trump Proofing” Seattle.
It’s very early in campaign season, but Wilson is currently the front-runner against Harrell, having raised $191,000 to Harrell’s $376,000, so far. Armstrong has raised the third-most, $16,000.
Thaddeus Whelan
Thaddeus Whelan grew up in rural Texas and joined the Army as a young man, which eventually brought him to Washington’s Joint Base Lewis McChord. He now works as a project management analyst for the Federal Aviation Administration.
Whelan’s priorities include housing, homelessness, police reform, transportation and bringing back the Supersonics.
To improve housing affordability, he wants to end single-family zoning, tax vacant and unutilized buildings and land and build much more housing. To help homeless residents, Whelan wants more low-barrier shelters and permanent supportive housing. Whelan sees the Seattle Police Officers Guild as a barrier to reform and wants to limit its power as part of an effort to change the department.
Isaiah Willoughby
Isaiah Willoughby is an apartment leasing agent who graduated from North Seattle College with a degree in real estate, experience he said will help him tackle one of Seattle’s greatest challenges: housing. Willoughby was sentenced to two years in prison for starting a fire outside the Seattle Police East Precinct during the 2020 protests.
In his voter guide statement, Willoughby said he is running for mayor “to bring justice to our city, to uplift those who feel unheard, and to walk in humility and strength as a light in challenging times.” He said he wants to make government more accountable, accessible and responsive to everyday Seattleites.
If elected, Willoughby wants to champion housing affordability, public safety that’s “rooted in community trust” and creating a city economy that uplifts working families and small businesses.
This article has been updated with information about candidate Isaiah Willoughby.
