Harrell Campaign Opens a Wide Lead in Donations

Supporters of incumbent Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell are widening their campaign cash advantage over backers of challenger Katie Wilson.

The PAC Bruce Harrell for Seattle’s Future has now raised more than $1 million, mostly from some of the region’s deepest political pockets and richest citizens. Katie Wilson for an Affordable Seattle, the PAC backing the progressive challenger, has pulled in just $86,000.

The latest tranche of pro-Harrell cash came from familiar players on the pro-business political scene, including $50,000 from the Washington Association of Realtors, $20,000 from the landlords of the Multifamily Housing Association, and $10,000 from Microsoft President Brad Smith. But two names jumped out at us.

The first is Jon Shirley, who with his wife Kim, gave $20,000. The former Microsoft president is a decent-sized whale in Democratic politics on the national level, with well over $1 million in donations over the past few years, including more than $200,000 to the Biden Victory Fund in 2020. But he’s better known as a landscape-shaping patron of the Seattle Art Museum. Shirley’s money was instrumental in creating the Olympic Sculpture Park on the Seattle waterfront. He has a particular passion for the work of the sculptor Alexander Calder, hence the presence of Calder’s massive “Eagle” as the park’s signature work. The Shirleys actually live not in Seattle itself but across the lake in tony Medina in a $42 million showplace full of Calder’s work.

The second is Seattle Mariners minority owner Chris Larsen, also an early Microsoftie now reclining on a giant pile of money. He’s in for $50,000. (Majority owner John Stanton and his wife were already in for $100,000.) The Mariners just made the playoffs, which likely translates to some extra cash for the ownership group.

Both the Mariners and the museum have significant skin in the game with regards to the city’s responses to homelessness, public drug use, and public-safety concerns.

The pro-Harrell PAC spent about $260,000 through the end of August, so they’re sitting on something around $700,000 for the final push.

The pro-Wilson PAC’s donor base, meanwhile, is both smaller and lower-profile. The biggest check, for the oddly precise amount of $10,416.98, came from William Pitcock, who lists his employer as Edera, which is apparently a bleeding-edge computing security startup.

As a reminder, the PACs aren’t allowed to coordinate with the candidates’ campaigns. Harrell’s campaign has raised about $880,000 compared to Wilson’s roughly $800,000. Both candidates are taking advantage of the city’s democracy voucher system, which comes with spending limits.

In theory, big spending from the pro-Harrell PAC would prompt Seattle Ethics & Elections to release Wilson from those limits, but it’s not clear she would have the money available to exploit that freedom. Expect to see all that money start flying around in the coming weeks. Campaigns and PACs owe a spending disclosure on Oct. 14.

This article also appears in the author’s political blog, The Washington Observer.