Archie McPhee Owner Didn't Mean To Fund Anti-Trans Initiative — Just To Protect The Interests Of The Ultra Wealthy

Seattle internet enjoyers proclaimed over the weekend they would find a new quirky

establishment from which to buy their rubber chickens when several viral posts exposed that the owner of novelty shop Archie McPhee, Mark Pahlow, gave $10,000 to Let’s Go Washington (LGW), a right-wing campaign promoting anti-LGBTQ+ initiatives and a social-services-starving repeal to Washington's Millionaires Tax.

Pahlow publicly apologized, claiming he somehow missed all the anti-queer garbo LGW has been spewing for months and he really just wanted to protect the interest of the ultra wealthy. He claimed he got his LGW donation refunded and kicked it to the No Hate In Washington State campaign to oppose the anti-LGBTQ+ measures. The campaign confirmed this donation in an email to The Burner.

It's unclear how many permanent or meaningful enemies this made for Archie McPhee, but as the latest in a string of businesses under fire for their LGW donations, any association with LGW is becoming more and more toxic, which could be a promising sign for Washingtonians who oppose genital inspection and our ass-backward tax code. 

Millionaire hedge fund CEO Brian Heywood launched LGW to run a slate of right-wing initiatives in 2023 and they’ve been on their bullshit ever since. For this upcoming election, LGW is promoting I-001, a so–called parental rights measure that could in practice hand sensitive information to abusers, I-638, which capitalizes the outsized outrage against trans athletes to creep in Washingtonian school girls’ underwear, and finally I-645 to repeal the Millionaires Tax in a political climate where taxing the rich to pay for social services could not be a more popular sentiment. 

Last week, a redditor posted that Pahlow gave LGW $10,000 in early July. The issue got even more attention when popular lefty Instagrammer EvanYellsAtClouds made a reel calling Pahlow out on Saturday. 

“Do you want to see public schools closed and kids packed into classrooms? Do you think Washington State needs to do more to exclude trans kids? Do you want to see mandatory genital inspections for everyone who wants to play girls' sports to prove that they were assigned female at birth?” EvanYellsAtClouds asked in his reel. “Then come on down to Archie McPhee, where you can buy wacky doodads knowing your money helps fund hate and greed!” 

Seattle’s corner of the internet was not thrilled. 

“[N]ot a man who runs a store full of whimsy backing the anti-whimsy party 🥀 what the fuck,” one redditor wrote. 

“Where can I get a sticker for my Groucho glasses that says 'I bought this before I knew Mark Pahlow supported anti-trans political activism'," another wrote. 

And many commenters vowed to boycott: “Ok, so does anybody know where else I can take my kids to buy their fart whistles and whoopie cushions? I can live without the cricket lick-its, but kids need whoopie cushions,” a redditor said. 

Within hours, Pahlow posted an apology (no comments allowed) on Instagram.

Pahlow explained that he wanted to support the repeal of the millionaire’s tax, a repeal that would endanger public education, the upcoming universal school breakfast and lunch program, the expansion to the Working Families Tax credit, sales tax relief, and, ironically for the owner of Archie McPhee, tax breaks for small businesses. 

Pahlow said when he learned about the anti-LGBTQ+ initiatives, he asked for and received a refund from LGW. “To mitigate the harm” he caused, Pahlow donated that $10,000 to No Hate In Washington State, the campaign fighting to stop the initiatives he called “appalling.” 

Pahlow’s not the only small business owner to see consequences for support LGW. Last month, multiple wholesale buyers announced a boycott of E9 Brewing after an Instagram reel exposed the owners’ contributions to LGW, the Tacoma News Tribune reported.  Similarly, E9 Brewing owners claimed ignorance about LGW anti-LGBTQ+ agenda and donated $5,000 to Rainbow Center and another $5,000 to the Oasis Youth Center to support Tacoma’s queer community. 

But these business owners aren’t fully off the hook by insisting they only meant to support the ultra wealthy. In a state with the second most regressive tax code in the nation, meaning the poorest are the most tax burdened, advocacy group Tech4Housing still called Pahlow’s contribution “immoral” in a social media comment. 

And if the moral argument isn’t compelling, these small business owners should at least run the numbers to see if repealing the Millionaires Tax is actually in their best financial interest. The Millionaires Tax levies a 9.9% tax on household earnings over $1 million, which represents just the .5% highest earners in the State. 

It’s actually possible the Millionaires Tax will save some of these grumbling business owners some money. Defend Washington, a coalition opposing LGW’s three MAGA initiatives, noted in an email to press that repealing the Millionaires Tax will hurt almost every small businesses owner in the state because the tax funds breaks for small businesses. 

Zooming out, this episode seems like a good sign for No Hate In Washington State. Behind the scenes, Democrat operatives didn’t seem to have much faith that they would overcome LGW’s anti-LGBTQ+ initiatives, particularly in the early days of the campaign. But this weekend, Seattlites spoke loud and clear that trans exclusion won’t win customers for even the most charming of doodads shops. Perhaps that means a substantially less endearing right wing campaign won’t win too many votes either!