‘I hope she gets in’: John Curley endorses Katie Wilson for Seattle mayor, calls it a socialist ‘experiment’

Katie Wilson, the co-founder and executive director of the Transit Riders Union (TRU), earned more than 50% of the Aug. 5 primary vote to be Seattle’s next mayor, leading incumbent Bruce Harrell, who captured less than 42% of the vote.

Political consultant Crystal Fincher told Axios it’s “so rare” for a candidate to lose an election after capturing more than 50% of the primary vote. Reading the tea leaves regarding Seattle’s political future, KIRO host John Curley used his show, “The John Curley Show,” to officially endorse Wilson.

“I don’t normally weigh in on local elections, because I live in Cle Elum … but we had a chance to talk to Katie Wilson, and she’s well-versed on the issue. She has a particular point of view,” Curley said. “I didn’t push her too hard on certain things. I just asked a few probing questions, and she did a pretty good job of handling, although she wasn’t quite sure what I meant by who pays corporate taxes. So I thought I would endorse her.”

Why John Curley is endorsing Katie Wilson

Curley called his endorsement of Wilson, a candidate highlighted by progressive policies including raising the minimum wage and establishing stronger renter protections, “an experiment.”

“In my endorsement, I would like to see a socialist in the new definition, which is a very generous welfare society supported by a great deal of taxes to be paid to the city so that they can distribute all the goodies to everybody, whether it’s housing or free this or free that,” Curley said. “Basically, a Swedish or Danish style of living. Now, this would be in a city experiment, and I would like to see it because … it won’t work. It fails everywhere it is tried, but I would like to see it go full blast.

“The reason I want to see this, if they were to do the experiment, is so that people would eventually go, ‘OK, we tried it and it doesn’t work. We tried it and, apparently, you can’t squeeze the dickens out of the golden goose without the golden goose either flying away or just dying right there in your arms.'”

Harrell and his team remain confident he will get reelected despite the primary results. In 2021, Harrell received just 3,862 more votes than Lorena Gonzalez in the primary before winning by more than 46,000 votes in the general election.

“Maybe people would start to have a different view of how the U.S. and how the government needs to provide just the services without incentivizing, without over taxing, and maybe it adjusts back in the City of Seattle, moving away from this sort of progressive utopian dream,” Curley said. “I hope Katie Wilson gets in. I hope she gets the support to go full blast and see if it works. And as history has proven over and over and over again, it doesn’t. And maybe then people would wake up.”

Listen to the full conversation here.

Listen to John Curley weekday afternoons from 3 – 7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.

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