Renton City Council Candidate Raman Mann Posted "MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN" After Trump Won In 2024

City Council races are non-partisan, but Renton voters should be aware of City Council candidate Raman Mann’s trail of Republican associations. Not only is he endorsed by the King County Republicans in the 11th Legislative District, but he also posted seemingly in support of President Donald Trump and his executive order to end birthright citizenship on Facebook –– Not way back in 2016, but in 2024 and 2025.

Challenging progressive firebrand Carmen Rivera for her District 2 seat, business-backed, Raise-The-Wage-Renton-opposing Mann seemed to be carving a moderate or even politically ambiguous lane for himself, but Mann's social media posts may foil that strategy. He's lost major endorsements from King County Executive candidate Claudia Balducci and Port of Seattle Commissioner Hamdi Mohamed and earned the ire of Democrat groups in South King County.

"We are very disturbed by these statements from Raman Mann," said Chair of Southend Indivisible Josh Castle. "We do not need Trump and MAGA supporters who actively oppose the US Constitution serving on the Renton City Council."

Screenshots show that Mann wrote “TRUMP TRUMP BABY!!MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.” followed by more than a dozen American flag emojis in a November 6, 2024 Facebook post.

Mann told The Burner that these screenshots are an "obvious negative attack" from supporters of his opponents campaign. Mann said that he posted "Make America Great Again" because he lost a bet with his Fantasy Football league. He offered phone numbers of the people who set the penalty, but did not immediately provide written, contemporary evidence of the bet and its odd punishment. UPDATE 1:30PM: Mann sent a screenshot from a group chat dated Jan 30 (no year specified, but he claims 2024), which aligns with about when Fantasy Football season would end. Someone suggested Mann should "publicly embarrass" himself. "We need the bernie bro to go maga."

"As a Bernie Sanders delegate (legislative district level), I would never vote for Donald Trump and would never support his presidency," Mann said.

Given the supportive comments following his post, it does not seem like his Facebook friends read this as a joke or out of character for him.

In January, Mann posted again about Trump, seemingly in support of his executive order to end birthright citizenship.  

“God knows if it’ll hold up in court,” Mann wrote. “[B]ut can’t just have random people flying in to give birth….something needs to change.” 

Mann clarified his position in the comments, saying “legal immigrants are always welcome,” but as an immigrant himself, he “strongly” believes that the U.S. must stop, for example, “multi millionaires from China and other countries” “taking advantage” of the birthright system.

In an email to The Burner, Mann said he has a "nuanced" opinion on birthright citizenship.

"I believe there is some abuse when it comes to birthright citizenship and that is being exploited by the right wing to demonize those of us who are trying to do the right thing on immigration," Mann wrote in an email. "Those were the types of things I was trying to clumsily articulate on that quick social media post."

It appears Mann has since deleted the Facebook posts, but the screenshots indicate he kept them up until at least June of this year.