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August 2026 Primary Election Endorsements

Summary

This year, we reached out to most candidates contesting most elections that touch King County. We issued endorsements based on responses to our endorsement survey as well as public track records of supporting mass transit. Most races where we received no responses are simply not listed.

We hope to make single endorsements in more contests for the general election.

Seattle City Council

District 5: No Endorsement

King County Assessor

King County Assessor: Rob Foxcurran and Christopher Roberts

U.S. House

WA-1: Catherine Hildebrand
WA-7: Pramila Jayapal
WA-9: No Endorsement

Long Version (For select contests)

Metropolitan King County Council District 2

Finding daylight between the stated positions of State Senator Rebecca Saldana and Port Commissioner Toshiko Hasegawa is nearly impossible.  They must have been sitting at the same laptop to respond to our endorsement survey.  But both of them are solid progressive voices, with elected experience, who understand the importance of a reliable and accountable mass transit system.  We hope to make a single endorsement for the general election, but in the primary, just pick either one and don’t overthink it.

King County Assessor

Most people don’t get out of bed and wonder who the King County Assessor is, but make no mistake: assessing property values is crucial for financing Sound Transit’s plans, so having someone dedicated to fairly measuring property values and to the mission of equitable transit access for the county is important. We’re endorsing both Rob Foxcurran and Christopher Roberts during the primary; Rob and Christopher are ideologically similar, and share our urgency for building ST3 and beyond.

Legislative District 1 Representative Pos. 2

During her ten-year tenure, incumbent Shelley Kloba has not impressed us. And she didn’t return our endorsement survey. Her challenger, Jenne Alderks, did — and we weren’t impressed. While Alderks tries to claim urbanist credentials, she went out of her way to note that she would use project delays to “solve” Sound Transit’s delivery challenges. That’s in opposition to our widely publicized goal of speeding project delivery.

Legislative District 32 Representative Pos. 1

Keith Scully’s questionnaire responses stood out for their sophistication. We liked Scully pointing to a track record delivering non-motorized infrastructure in Shoreline. While other candidates leaned on general talk of traffic reduction or fare enforcement, Scully lays out a clear vision for a multi-tiered transit network: fast regional rail, paired with local jurisdictions aggressively funding frequent neighborhood connections in place of infrequent all-bus service. He also offers sharp critiques of the state’s grant restrictions on Sound Transit, and he backs a directly elected, full-time Sound Transit board to keep the agency accountable and focused on delivering its $100+ billion capital program. Vote Scully.

Legislative District 32 Representative Pos. 2

For LD-32 Pos. 2, only Imraan Siddiqi returned our endorsement survey. We like that self-identified transit rider Imraan Siddiqi’s responses focus on ways that he can help through the legislature: expanding progressive revenue streams and reforming the Sound Transit board structure. His sole opponent, incumbent Rep. Lauren Davis, did not fill out our survey, and has no readily available policy positions on Seattle-area transit. Vote Siddiqi.

Legislative District 32 Senator

We really wanted to be able to make an endorsement in this race.  However, incumbent Jesse Salomon — who has a generally pro-urbanist record in the state Senate — declined to return our survey.  Challenger Cindy Ryu did return our survey, and although she is eager for Sound Transit governance reform, her apparent confusion about how our state funds transportation prevents us from endorsing her.

Legislative District 34 Representative Pos. 2

House Majority Leader Joe Fitzgibbon’s work on rapid transit in our region since 2010 has been extraordinary. Seattle’s Democrats hold key leadership positions, which benefits rapid transit—most recently, the successful passage of permitting reform for Sound Transit projects, which Fitzgibbon prime-sponsored in the House, is a great step. Fitzgibbon is one of our state’s smartest, most talented Representatives, and like Seattle’s other legislative leaders, he has the power to help fix Sound Transit’s underlying problems: chiefly, that its federated, part-time Board keeps learning after the fact about billions in cost overruns, and the agency still lacks the in-house technical expertise to deliver billions in capital projects–instead relying on expensive consultants. We think the current federated, part-time board is a big part of the problem. Yet questionnaire responses suggest senior legislators aren’t interested in governance reform—at this rate, the federated, part-time Sound Transit Board may be stuck in budget “realignment” forever. Representative Fitzgibbon isn’t so sure, but we’re eager to hear his ideas for fixing an agency that must deliver not just ST3, but ST4 to Burien and beyond.

Fitzgibbon’s opponent answered our questionnaire too, and while their tone seemed supportive, their responses didn’t meet the high bar that would be needed to gain our support. Vote Fitzgibbon.

Legislative District 41 Representative Pos. 1

Incumbent Janice Zahn technically has two opponents in this race: a Republican, and perennial nutjob Alex Tsimmerman.  So we especially appreciate that she took the time to provide substantive responses to our survey.  However, based on her responses we aren’t endorsing her at this time. But we look forward to working with her.

Legislative District 43 Senator

Senate Majority Leader Jamie Pedersen received our Subway Rider of the Year award in 2022 for creating a funding mechanism allowing the Sound Transit Board to expand rapid transit in individual cities (like Seattle) without a region-wide vote. What we didn’t fully realize then is that Sound Transit’s real problem is governance—the very Board he empowered keeps learning after the fact about billions in cost overruns, and the agency still hasn’t brought needed technical expertise in-house, let alone used the additional funding authority he secured for it. Our oversimplified take: Pedersen’s skill at compromise dampens excitement for him. We hope he recognizes that part of the problem is the current board structure—a part-time, federated board without enough in-house expertise to deliver. He has the power to fix Sound Transit’s governance problems, but his questionnaire responses showed disinterest. Pedersen is a powerful advocate when he chooses to be, has shown he can deliver progress for rapid transit, and he wants to give Sound Transit the funding mechanisms needed to complete ST3.

Hannah Sabio-Howell is a progressive organizer whose affordability agenda we strongly share–it’s exactly why we want a complete rapid transit network throughout our region. We’re excited about the energy she brings to this race. Her vision includes tax increment financing flowing back into transit itself, and progressive revenue options for rapid transit that don’t rely on regressive sales taxes. Sabio-Howell’s fresh energy to realize the full promise of ST3–and beyond–is exactly what we’re looking for in the 43rd District. Her openness to thinking about how to empower Sound Transit for future success is exactly what we need from our state legislators from Seattle, if we’re going to get all of the rapid transit we so desperately need. 

We hope to make a single endorsement for the general election, but in the primary, just pick either one and don’t overthink it. The real decision will come in November.

Legislative District 46 Representative Pos. 2

Incumbent Rep. Darya Farivar’s responses to our endorsement survey note how intersectional public transit is with other important progressive priorities and she supports Sound Transit Board reform (noting in her response that she co-sponsored a similar bill for an Amtrak Cascades oversight board). We wholeheartedly endorse her over independent Rodney Thornely. Vote Farivar

State Senator, Legislative District 47

Claudia Kauffman is our choice, she should be yours too. We look forward to working with her on board reform, and expanding her views to being a champion for the entirety of ST3. Vote Kauffman.

Legislative District 48 Representative Pos. 2

Jessica Forsythe is a current Redmond City Councilmember, challenging the incumbent in this seat, and wow are we excited about her candidacy. She is committed to actually delivering the ST3 package voters approved, and is open to all conversations about how we do better. Her opponent did not return our survey. Vote Forsythe. 

U.S. House WA-1

While Catherine Hildebrand has not actually raised any money this election cycle, her responses to our endorsement survey reflect strong support for public transit expansion. We especially like that she calls out the inequity and inefficiency of our at-grade rail segments. Incumbent Suzan DelBene declined to fill the survey out, but while her stated policy positions are nominally pro-transit, they either lack specificity or focus on low-impact improvements like bus electrification. Rep. DelBene has won her primaries by increasing margins since first elected in 2012, so it’s very unlikely that she loses the primary. You can vote guilt-free for Hildebrand.

U.S. House WA-9

Washington’s 9th Congressional District (in the US House of Representatives) deserves better.  No candidate in this race returned our endorsement survey, but we feel a need to express just how disappointed we are in this year’s selection.

Useless war hawk DINO Adam Smith has held the seat for THIRTY YEARS.  In that time, the district has morphed from spanning rural King, Pierce, and Thurston counties to covering mostly-urban areas around southeast Seattle, so we’re long overdue for someone who represents the district’s current form.

This year, second-time challenger Melissa Chaudhry is joined by Socialist Jacob Perasso who seems to not actually be campaigning; “Independent” Socialist Kshama Sawant, who represented District 3 on Seattle’s City Council for a decade; and wacko Republican Doug Basler who displays his weird obsession with Sawant on an entire section of his website dedicated to an AI-generated caricature of “the evils of socialism.”

We could go on at length about why we dislike each of these candidates, but what really matters to us is that none of them is going to be the transit champion we need in our nation’s capital.

If you can stomach a vote for her, Sawant would make the most interesting challenge to Smith (who, again, really really sucks) in the general election.  Otherwise, write-in your dog.  We’re confident your dog cares more about building trains than any of the registered candidates — even if you don’t have one.