Is Rinck's win scaring Seattle city council centrists?

[00:00:10] Hello, Seattle Nice listeners. I'm David Hyde here in Donald Trump's America with Erica C. Barnett of Publicola. Hi, Erica.

[00:00:19] Hi, David.

[00:00:20] You sound chipper.

[00:00:22] I know, I sound so chipper compared to you.

[00:00:24] Yeah, and political consultant Sandeep Kaushik, who, you know, if Donald Trump's secret police are already listening, is MAGA for Seattle.

[00:00:33] There you go. MAGA forever, man. MAGA.

[00:00:36] I just want to peek behind the curtain here and to say that we were all chipper two seconds ago.

[00:00:43] And I'm just not as good an actor as David, you know.

[00:00:46] Not because we're happy about living in Donald Trump's America, but because we're, I think, giving in to nihilism.

[00:00:54] Somberness.

[00:00:55] Yeah, there you go.

[00:00:56] All right, if you like this podcast, I just want to wake one pitch. If you want us to continue doing it because you think that local journalism that you can just turn on when you're driving or whatever.

[00:01:07] I mean, you can read Erica on Publicola, but you get a little bit more here.

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[00:01:23] And we're here to talk about position eight.

[00:01:25] We talked about it last week.

[00:01:26] And the question is, well, we know who won.

[00:01:30] I mean, Alexis Mercedes.

[00:01:31] Yeah, was Sandeep wrong?

[00:01:32] Yes.

[00:01:33] How wrong was Sandeep Cash?

[00:01:35] We might as well get that out of the way.

[00:01:37] Sandeep, do you want to start with that?

[00:01:39] How wrong were you?

[00:01:40] Well, I was wrong.

[00:01:42] You know, I'm going to take my medicine here, eat my porridge.

[00:01:46] So, I mean, I was wrong.

[00:01:48] As I think I can safely say, I was not predicting a rink win.

[00:01:54] However, I did think that race would be closer than it has turned out to be.

[00:01:59] I thought it was going to be kind of a 54-46 kind of race and sort of, you know, eight, nine points.

[00:02:04] And it is right now, I don't even know what it is.

[00:02:07] It's like 17 points or something.

[00:02:09] So, it is in blowout territory.

[00:02:10] It's a big, big win for Alexis.

[00:02:12] So, yes, I was wrong.

[00:02:13] And could get bigger.

[00:02:14] It probably will get bigger.

[00:02:16] It will get a little bit bigger.

[00:02:16] Yeah.

[00:02:17] Yeah, it will get a little bit bigger with the later counts for sure.

[00:02:20] Sandeep, why were you so wrong?

[00:02:21] I just want to listen to you talk about this for the rest of the podcast, please.

[00:02:26] Well, look, when you're in the political strategy game and you kind of make assumptions about elections and you make certain bets on strategies, no one gets that.

[00:02:38] No one bets 1,000 in my world, right?

[00:02:41] So, as I'm looking back on what happened here, I am wondering whether the fact that this was a presidential year election with a much, much bigger electorate does mean that that electorate is certainly in this situation skewed more progressive, right?

[00:03:00] More to the left lane.

[00:03:02] Which is what, which is what, sorry to interrupt, but that is what David and I were saying.

[00:03:06] And certainly, at least I was saying, maybe, David, you don't want to own that.

[00:03:09] But that was my argument all along.

[00:03:11] That, yeah, of course it's going to skew more progressive.

[00:03:13] Yeah, I actually said even your elections are likely to favor progressives, maybe, sort of.

[00:03:20] But I also have this weird idea that in this existential year with MAGA on the ballot, people are just like left, left, left in cities like Seattle.

[00:03:28] And they're just less receptive to these kind of law and order messages that resonate a little bit Trumpy in a year like this.

[00:03:37] And things are less local, you know, but that's not a very nuanced argument.

[00:03:41] I'm sure, Sandeep, you've got much more to say.

[00:03:42] I do have a couple of things to say about it.

[00:03:45] I mean, one, in the national context, obviously what we saw nationally is almost the entire country shifting right.

[00:03:52] In 48 out of the 50 states, Trump did better in 2024 than he did in 2020.

[00:03:57] The only outliers are Utah, where Trump doesn't play well with Mormons, and in Washington state.

[00:04:05] So I do think there was actually, when you look at the statewide races and the initiatives, there's a legislative race.

[00:04:12] There was a blue shift in Washington this year while the rest of the country was going red.

[00:04:15] So there's something about – so maybe there's something about that, about Trump being on the ballot.

[00:04:20] I do think, though, in terms of the electorate being more progressive in a presidential year turnout, it's not – it's a little bit more – the story is a little bit more complicated, right?

[00:04:29] There is a huge contingent of voters in a presidential year that never vote in municipal elections.

[00:04:35] And in this race, they did vote.

[00:04:38] They broke really hard to the left, right, to the progressive side of the equation.

[00:04:43] But they're kind of – they're low-information voters, and therefore they're somewhat blank slates, as I said last week.

[00:04:51] They broke left in this case, but that doesn't necessarily mean they will in every case.

[00:04:55] And I can kind of explain a little more.

[00:04:57] Yeah.

[00:04:57] Okay.

[00:04:58] So to jump in, finally, I mean, I do think – even though I said I wanted to hear your mea culpa for the rest of the podcast, I mean, you can't really have it both ways, Sandeep.

[00:05:08] You can't have it that they're low-information blank slate idiots who don't know anything.

[00:05:12] I didn't say they're idiots.

[00:05:13] Okay.

[00:05:13] But you've been calling them low-information blank slate voters.

[00:05:16] They don't track municipal races, right?

[00:05:17] They don't vote.

[00:05:18] They suffer from false – they suffer from false consciousness.

[00:05:20] Yeah.

[00:05:20] Okay, guys.

[00:05:21] But let me talk.

[00:05:21] I've been reading my Susan Faludi.

[00:05:23] Let me talk.

[00:05:24] So, you know, you can't have it both ways.

[00:05:26] You can't say that they're low-information voters who don't know anything about municipal races and say they broke left.

[00:05:32] How did they know who they were voting for?

[00:05:34] I mean, the idea that, you know, people are just coming into this with no information and saying, oh, I don't know, I guess rank because I'm a lefty,

[00:05:42] just seems really contradictory with the idea that they just don't know what's going on.

[00:05:46] I think what happened is that people sort of have looked at this council and, you know, and maybe have looked at Tanya Wu in particular because she has not led on any legislation.

[00:05:58] And her campaign, once again, like her losing campaign in 2023, was all about the work that she did as a volunteer in Chinatown, sort of claiming that she's a job creator, an affordable housing creator because of some businesses and an apartment building her family owns.

[00:06:16] And I think that just people weren't convinced by that.

[00:06:19] I mean, people do not like to see someone lose an election as Tanya Wu did and then get appointed to the council.

[00:06:24] And unless she has been just an outstanding council member in those interceding 10 months, I don't think they like to elect that person.

[00:06:32] And, you know, and then last point very quickly.

[00:06:34] I mean, I also think this is a repudiation to some degree of the council's current more conservative politics.

[00:06:41] I think it's, you know, a vibe check 10 months in on this council.

[00:06:45] And I don't think people are impressed.

[00:06:47] So the first part of what you were saying, you know, was there some public unhappiness with the fact that Wu, who had just lost a race, you know, then got the appointment immediately afterwards?

[00:06:57] I think that probably is a factor in this race.

[00:07:03] You know, is it a vibe check?

[00:07:05] Probably to some extent it is, though I think that that's easy to start overreading.

[00:07:10] I mean, look, if you...

[00:07:11] By vibe check, you mean vibe check on this council's policies on crime, homelessness, addiction?

[00:07:19] Sort of, sort of, sort of.

[00:07:20] So what I mean by vibe check is people are looking at what this council has done publicly and seeing that, you know, Rob Saka is out there saying his top budget priority is setting aside $2 million to get rid of a traffic barrier he finds annoying.

[00:07:38] You know, Bob Kettle today was out there.

[00:07:40] Do nothing council.

[00:07:40] The do nothing council.

[00:07:41] Bob Kettle was out there today saying that he, you know, really wanted to prioritize what matters most now, and it's getting rid of coyotes on Upper Queen Anne.

[00:07:51] That was his newsletter the day we're recording this on Thursday.

[00:07:54] I mean, I think there is a vibe that the council, yeah, hasn't really done anything and is focused on some kind of weird priorities that aren't the priorities of most of the city.

[00:08:04] They're weird.

[00:08:05] They're weird.

[00:08:06] I like this.

[00:08:06] This is resonating now.

[00:08:08] The Tim Walls.

[00:08:09] Right.

[00:08:09] I just don't think most voters in Seattle, even in an odd year, much less a presidential year where we're going to hit 80% turnout, like, know anything about what Bob Kettle thinks about coyotes on Queen Anne.

[00:08:26] No, that's why I'm saying it's a vibe.

[00:08:28] I mean, it's an overall vibe.

[00:08:30] And I think, like, I think, Sandeep, if you talk to people outside of the, you know, the world of people who are working for these candidates, you'll find that people do find them kind of weird.

[00:08:40] I do think there was a vibe here that pushed voters in a progressive direction in this election.

[00:08:47] I don't know whether I 100% agree with you about what the sort of, you know, locus or driving force behind that vibe was.

[00:08:54] But clearly so.

[00:08:56] What about the actual, let me just get, so what about the actual issues in this race, Sandeep and then Erica, like, you know, or issues in city government here in Seattle, again, like homelessness, public safety, addiction, taxes.

[00:09:10] What about all those things?

[00:09:11] I mean, I haven't heard either of you really say much about those things.

[00:09:14] Do you think those weren't driving forces in this election?

[00:09:17] Was it a repudiation of this city council's approach on those issues in part?

[00:09:23] Well, let me let me weigh in because I think you're asking a really important point.

[00:09:28] And this is where I don't think the progressive left in Seattle gets to have it both ways.

[00:09:31] Right.

[00:09:32] Alexis ran a smart campaign.

[00:09:35] And one of the smartest things she did was she ran on a much more moderate sounding, less ideological message.

[00:09:41] Right.

[00:09:41] She didn't lean in on if the left sees this as some kind of endorsement of sort of no sweeps or, you know, let's cut more police positions or we shouldn't have laws against public drug use.

[00:09:53] I don't think that's what it was at all.

[00:09:54] Right.

[00:09:55] Alexis ran on a kind of, you know, City Hall.

[00:09:59] It's too divisive right now at City Hall.

[00:10:01] Let's get past the bickering and the fighting and let's get to work.

[00:10:04] I'm going to bring people together.

[00:10:06] You know, which is a great message, but it's exactly the kind of message that Bruce Harrell or Jenny Durkin or Ed Murray before them ran on in a moderate lane in the mayor's race.

[00:10:15] And she didn't lean in on some of the more, you know, kind of kind of less popular, more controversial positions that the left has taken on issues like homelessness and encampments and drug use and stuff like and policing.

[00:10:30] On the other hand, on the other hand, one point where and then Erica jump in after this.

[00:10:35] But on the other hand, I do think where the left does best in Seattle, where they where they have the most success with voters are on economic issues and stuff related.

[00:10:47] I do think there's some suspicion of big business in Seattle.

[00:10:52] So to the extent that the IE on the other side messaged that Tanya Wu is a tool of, you know, corporate and big business interests, I do think that has some resonance.

[00:11:03] And to the extent that this council came out of the gate, not on public safety issues, but on, you know, issues like the delivery earnings standard that I worked on or talking about the Seattle's minimum wage law.

[00:11:15] I don't think that played to their benefit.

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[00:12:01] So if I can respond to Sandeep's, I guess, the middle of a few points there about these sort of these left lane issues as you describe them.

[00:12:18] I mean, I think that you and others on the political centrist to right side of things are sort of created those issues as and put them in people's laps and claimed that they were, you know, that they were taking these radical positions.

[00:12:32] You know, let's not fund any police.

[00:12:35] Let's get rid of all funding for police.

[00:12:36] Let's let homeless encampments, you know, proliferate everywhere.

[00:13:10] I think people probably looked at that and said, huh, this seems familiar.

[00:13:14] And also, huh, it's been a year almost for these council members.

[00:13:18] And the stuff that I thought I was voting in the min for has not changed materially.

[00:13:23] And so maybe this message is just not resonating as much with voters now.

[00:13:28] But I don't think it's entirely fair to say that Alexis is particularly different than someone like, oh, let's say, Lisa Herbold, a council member who did not run again and who supported Alexis this year.

[00:13:40] But who got smeared with some of these same, you know, absolutely outrageous allegations by IEs like the one that attacked Alexis.

[00:13:49] And again, Sandeep, last week you were saying that you thought their message was good and that it wasn't dishonest.

[00:13:54] I also wonder if crime is resonating less as an issue now than it was in, you know, the last few elections that we've had.

[00:14:04] It's just there maybe because people think there's less crime or whatever.

[00:14:08] I'm not quite sure, but like I just kind of wonder if it's a less resonant issue now.

[00:14:12] And the other thing is, I mean, you know, in our debate, you said yourself that there was pretty clear contrast between the candidates, even if you're saying she moderated compared to, I don't know what, you know, some sort of more radical candidate.

[00:14:28] The ghost of Shama Sawant or whoever else or NTK, whoever else Sandeep is obsessed with.

[00:14:34] Is that a question for me?

[00:14:35] What I'm saying is that I think there is a real difference between the message Alexis ran on, which was an effective message that appealed to more moderate sounding kind of, you know, center left progressive leaning, but less, you know, not not fully kind of left ideological kind of voters.

[00:14:55] And the positions that if you press her, if you press Alexis on the positions that she has on on some of those key issues that we've been talking about, right?

[00:15:06] Right. When she came out of the gate, she endorsed a complete winter moratorium on encampment cleanups.

[00:15:12] She said she opposed the public drug use law that got passed last year.

[00:15:17] She's going to be voting mostly as an ally of Tammy Morales on the council.

[00:15:21] I mean, that's what we all pretty much expect, right?

[00:15:23] There might be some daylight there, but but they're going to be the progressive left of this new council.

[00:15:28] Right, Erica?

[00:15:29] Absolutely.

[00:15:29] But I do think that, Sandeep, you are being you're sort of relying on on listeners not remembering 2021 very well in 2023, in particular, when all these council candidates got, you know, got elected or a lot of them did.

[00:15:42] The people they were running against were not exactly this radical leftist regime that you're talking about.

[00:15:50] I mean, there were certainly a couple of candidates who were far to the left of others.

[00:15:53] But are you saying that you think Andrew Lewis ran a radical left campaign and that's why Bob Kettle got elected or, you know, Maren Costa in District 1 where Rob Saka got elected?

[00:16:04] I mean, there were a lot of candidates that don't fit into this mold that you're talking about where, you know, you're saying that the Seattle voters just rejected this radical leftist regime and that Alexis pivoted to sort of sound less like a radical leftist.

[00:16:18] Although I think you have expressed that you think her positions are radical leftist since, again, you said that it was not dishonest to say that she wants to defund the police and end all encampment removals.

[00:16:28] Yeah, I don't think it is dishonest to make that argument.

[00:16:32] So you want to talk about those previous candidates.

[00:16:36] Maren Costa lost in large part because she said the council was right to put a marker down in 2020 to say that they were going to defund the police by 50 percent.

[00:16:46] Andrew Lewis shot his campaign in the head when he on the dais flipped and voted against the public drug use law.

[00:16:55] I think prior to that, I would have bet he would have probably won that race.

[00:16:59] Right.

[00:17:00] And I think if you ask him, I think if you ask him, you're shifting sands that you're standing on, Sandeep.

[00:17:04] You were saying you were making a point about Alexis.

[00:17:07] And I just don't think the point really applies as much to 2023 as you think.

[00:17:11] 2024.

[00:17:12] Yeah.

[00:17:13] 20 or no.

[00:17:14] In 2023.

[00:17:15] Yeah, I just don't think I don't think I don't think that that is the valence of this campaign.

[00:17:20] And I do think I do think, too, people are looking at like, you know, these these new policies that the council is proposing, you know, bringing back soap laws, bringing back these banishment areas, bringing back, you know, prostitution loitering, putting CCTV cameras monitored by live police officers, you know, 24 hours a day in neighborhoods around Seattle.

[00:17:39] I do think those policies are alarming to people in Seattle and particularly, you know, the CCTV cameras.

[00:17:45] We are very privacy oriented city.

[00:17:48] And, you know, and I do think that there is a sense that perhaps this council is going too far towards, you know, a police state.

[00:17:58] And maybe I'm wrong.

[00:18:00] You know, again, it's a vibe check.

[00:18:01] We will see.

[00:18:02] But bringing back laws that were like that were overturned because they were widely viewed as discriminatory, like the soap and soda laws.

[00:18:10] I just I don't think that if you pull on that, it's particularly popular.

[00:18:13] Could be wrong.

[00:18:14] I'm sure you're right.

[00:18:15] I'm sure you're right.

[00:18:16] But I don't.

[00:18:17] This is where I guess I do agree with Sandeep.

[00:18:18] There are low information voters that turn out in years like this one.

[00:18:22] And they have no idea what the city council is doing for the most part.

[00:18:25] You know, I think the question we're kind of hinting at here is would Bob Kettle have won in 2024 versus Andrew Lewis with the same campaign?

[00:18:34] And I think neither none of us know the answer to that.

[00:18:37] Oh, I think absolutely not.

[00:18:38] In 2024 with this electorate, of course not.

[00:18:41] Same electorate, same campaign, same everything.

[00:18:43] Would would Bob Kettle be elected today?

[00:18:46] I don't I don't know.

[00:18:47] I think the answer is more.

[00:18:49] Look, the answer the answer to that question might not.

[00:18:51] The answer to that.

[00:18:52] Well, look, the answer to that question is complicated.

[00:18:55] I do think the public drug use law is is popular.

[00:19:00] There's a contingent of voters that don't like it in Seattle on the left.

[00:19:03] But but but majorities in Seattle support that majorities in Seattle support the mayor's current policies on encampment cleanup.

[00:19:12] I don't think those things have shifted in some really significant ways in the since the last couple of election cycles.

[00:19:19] On the other hand, Erica, you said I'm not arguing that they did.

[00:19:23] I'm arguing this council has gone far beyond that.

[00:19:26] Right.

[00:19:26] I actually think that soda and soap laws are probably quite popular and have majority support.

[00:19:30] Right.

[00:19:31] But and and, you know, we haven't tested that yet in a really direct way.

[00:19:37] But that that is my sense of it.

[00:19:39] On the other hand, Erica, you sent me you sent the both of us an article the other day that I thought was really interesting about the San Francisco mayoral race.

[00:19:48] Right. Which happened this year in a presidential year with a big electorate.

[00:19:52] And what's happening down there is that the self-funding candidate, this millionaire scion of the Levi Strauss family, who's put it poured millions of dollars into his own campaign, is the one.

[00:20:06] They have rank choice voting.

[00:20:07] So the outcome's not determined yet.

[00:20:09] But it looks like he's going to win that race.

[00:20:11] Right. And what this article was pointing out is that in a presidential year with a huge electorate that it's very expensive to communicate with and with all the noise, which is the bigger thing of the presidential and other races to actually connect with voters on a municipal race costs enormous sums of money.

[00:20:30] Right. And so it really starts to disproportionately advantage the side that really spends citywide race in a city.

[00:20:39] And we have districts for the council elections that we had last year.

[00:20:43] Yeah. Yeah. But next year, we've got the mayor's race.

[00:20:44] We've got the, you know, the two citywide races again.

[00:20:47] You know, Alexis will be on the ballot again.

[00:20:49] And we've got that city attorney's race at citywide races.

[00:20:53] And neither side in this race, there were IEs on both sides in the Woo rink race, but neither of them spent money that's even equivalent to what got spent last year.

[00:21:03] Right. In the in an off year.

[00:21:06] So if somebody had come in and thrown seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars into a race, you know, going after Alexis on the kinds of messages that I talked about, I think they probably could have reshaped.

[00:21:23] You know, I don't know whether.

[00:21:25] Do you not think.

[00:21:26] I mean, what you're saying is very cynical because it suggests that the candidate doesn't matter at all.

[00:21:31] And it doesn't matter.

[00:21:33] You are. You're saying that if they have thrown a bunch of support behind either that or you think that Tanya Wu was actually an amazing candidate and should have won.

[00:21:40] But if you don't think that and you have indicated in the past, you don't think she was the greatest candidate in the world.

[00:21:46] You're saying that it doesn't really matter because you can just throw messages, which, again, I believe the messages that were thrown at Alexis Mercedes rink very late in the campaign were incredibly dishonest.

[00:21:56] But that you can throw these kind of, you know, these messages out there.

[00:22:00] And it doesn't really matter if it's Tanya Wu or if it's, you know, Joe Biden.

[00:22:04] I mean, it's just going to be effective at defeating a popular candidate who was popular for reasons that go beyond the fact that out of the two, she, you know, pulled a little more lefty voters.

[00:22:16] I just I think that's I think that's incredibly cynical.

[00:22:19] No, I first of all, I you're mischaracterizing what I'm saying, because I agree with you.

[00:22:23] I agree with you that candidate quality matters in these races.

[00:22:27] And I think Alexis was a strong candidate who ran a who ran a smart campaign with a strong message.

[00:22:34] As I've said before, I think she she she made a pitch to that that appealed outside of the kind of more ideological left and the more more kind of center lane voters.

[00:22:45] And that's why she's running up the kind of margin she's running up.

[00:22:48] So all of that is true.

[00:22:50] On the other hand, I'm also saying that voters haven't fundamentally shifted their positions on the issues that have dominated recent election cycles around encampments, addiction and public drug use and policing and public safety.

[00:23:06] OK, so, Erica, like one of the things that I wonder about is from my point of view, I look at all sides in Seattle politics and see essentially machine politicians for better or worse.

[00:23:16] Right. And so on sort of the Sunday Chamber of Commerce, Tanya Wu side, we have folks who will never, ever, you know, practically say that they're willing to raise taxes on big business on on Amazon, which is something we've talked about before, which I think could be really, really popular in Seattle, except for we don't have progressive candidates in office right now to really do that.

[00:23:37] But similarly, you wouldn't have a candidate who would talk about raising taxes and who would also take a more centrist position on something like public drug use, where, you know, for better or worse, that's something that might be popular with a broader swath of the public.

[00:23:53] And so I'm curious, what do you think about that?

[00:23:56] I think that the candidate that you're talking about doesn't necessarily exist because a centrist point of view, like let's just talk about drug use, a centrist point of view is to increase police and arrest drug users for using drugs, which is a law they passed last year.

[00:24:13] And a progressive point of view is harm reduction and social services.

[00:24:19] So when you're talking about attacks, you got to do one of those, let's say.

[00:24:23] So who is the person who's going to be in favor of progressive taxation but to fund cops?

[00:24:28] I just I'm not convinced that exists.

[00:24:30] And without being as specific, you know, sort of digging into the details of this, somebody who is really progressive on taxation, but slightly more to the center than, let's say, you know, Alexis Mercedes Rink or Tamir Morales.

[00:24:44] I think a candidate like that would do really well in Seattle, but neither side would back them.

[00:24:49] On the progressive side, forget it.

[00:24:52] You know, you're not taking our positions on these issues.

[00:24:54] We don't care if you want to raise taxes.

[00:24:56] And on the more centrist side, well, we're basically being brought to this party by big business and big business PACs.

[00:25:02] And so we can't, you know, go along with that, even even if privately either side even somewhat agreed with that those types of candidates couldn't win.

[00:25:10] And they would get shut out even with democracy vouchers.

[00:25:13] A candidate like that would get completely shut out because Seattle is run by two machines.

[00:25:19] You represent one side, Sandeep represents the other.

[00:25:21] I'm in the middle, people.

[00:25:22] I want some funding for my machine.

[00:25:24] I want independent thinkers who take eclectic positions that give the finger to all sides.

[00:25:30] Let me just say something about-

[00:25:31] And pragmatic politics, pragmatic politics that actually works as opposed to this politics that we have now, which is, you know, people can't get out of their boxes.

[00:25:42] Oh my God, David, you're being Sunday.

[00:25:42] And that's really what we mean.

[00:25:43] Can I just say-

[00:25:44] No, I'm not.

[00:25:45] Sandeep is on the big business side.

[00:25:46] No, I mean, you're not letting me speak.

[00:25:48] I got my point out.

[00:25:49] So let me just say on the issue of taxation, since that's the one that you're bringing up, it is actually quite popular to tax big businesses.

[00:25:58] The Jumpstart tax passed 7-2.

[00:26:00] And so it is not actually, you know, a Seattle quote unquote partisan issue.

[00:26:04] It is something that, you know, the city of Seattle is now relying on to backfill its entire general fund budget gap.

[00:26:12] And so I think that progressive taxes actually can pass in Seattle, whether you have a more centrist council or not.

[00:26:18] This council is not going to raise taxes on big business.

[00:26:21] And they are not the ones, as you've pointed out many times, who levied the original Jumpstart tax.

[00:26:26] And they never would have.

[00:26:26] That's true.

[00:26:27] I mean, we do have-

[00:26:28] But I would say that this council is not so much centrist as centrist too conservative, particularly on fiscal stuff.

[00:26:35] But I mean, I, but again, I mean, I just go back to like, I don't think that your independent thinking candidate who loves taxes and cops or loves taxes and homeless sweeps exists.

[00:26:46] And I don't think that voter necessarily exists either.

[00:26:48] That's where we differ.

[00:26:49] I think that's exactly where a majority of Seattle voters are, slightly to the center from where the progressive left of 2019 and maybe even 2021 was.

[00:27:02] But certainly to the left of this council when it comes to progressive taxes and a whole host of issues, probably.

[00:27:08] So I really do think there is space in the middle for a candidate, but no one can occupy that space because they'll get shut out.

[00:27:14] It's like a, you know, a defensive move in soccer where you're trying to score the goal and you're getting shut out by defenders on both sides.

[00:27:22] Okay, well, I'm not-

[00:27:23] Ahistorical or counterfactual?

[00:27:24] I don't engage in sports metaphors.

[00:27:28] Fair enough.

[00:27:29] No, I think you are being ahistorical because there have been many people on the Seattle City Council in the past that have been, you know, I mean, Nick Licata, Lisa Herbold.

[00:27:39] I mean, that have been, for example, Nick Licata was one of the most pro-police people on the council and was constantly trying to get more funding for them.

[00:27:47] So I think the idea that, like, that we can't have some combination of things is also untrue.

[00:27:53] And I think what's happening now, you know, potentially, and we'll see next year, is more of a course correction from sort of oversteering in the more conservative direction.

[00:28:03] And I think we will see more candidates that are not the quote-unquote progressive left and are not the sort of law and order, crack down everybody, create banishment zones folks that we have on the council now.

[00:28:15] I mean, I could be wrong. I'm often wrong. But it just feels like this has been oversteering in that direction and, you know, and also in the direction of people with kind of no government experience but a lot of confidence.

[00:28:28] I think you definitely could be right about that.

[00:28:30] And anybody, you know, including Sandeep, who sort of denies that this election, you know, doesn't bode well for the Sarah Nelson camp next year is, I don't know, in la-la land.

[00:28:42] I mean, I think these numbers are pretty resoundingly bad for her camp and about to get worse.

[00:28:50] So let's leave it there. That's it for another edition of Seattle Nice.

[00:28:54] I'm David Hyde here with Erica C. Barnett, Sandeep Kaushik, and our editor is Quinn Waller.

[00:29:00] Thank you so much for listening and suffering through 2024 with us, except for here in Seattle, where, depending on your perspective, it's been awesome.