The Socialist Take Over Is Underway South Of Seattle

The Democratic establishment is losing its grip — and Democratic Socialists are stepping up to take the reins. In New York, Zohran Mamdani toppled the party machine in his blowout Democratic mayoral primary victory. In Minnesota, the state’s own Democratic Party turned on an incumbent mayor to endorse state Sen. Omar Fateh. And now, that same wave of progressive momentum is barreling toward Washington, where Democratic Socialist candidates are mounting serious bids in Tacoma, Renton, and Tukwila.

Zev Cook

If you live in Tacoma, you’re probably already familiar with Zev Cook and her many years of community organizing. She cut her teeth running mutual aid programs and managing a homeless shelter in Pierce County. Then in 2023, she played a pivotal role in Tacoma DSA’s Tacoma For All campaign, which won Tacoman renters some of the strongest renters rights in the State. More recently, as a DSA member and a rank-and-file grocery worker represented by UFCW 367, Cook laid the groundwork for the Worker’s Bill of Rights initiative, a campaign that recently turned in the required 10,000 signatures to get on the ballot. 

Cook is now running for Tacoma City Council position 5. Her platform is simple: $20.29 minimum wage, build 25,000 units of affordable housing, and tax the rich instead of working people. 

Cook’s got a corporate-backed competitor in incumbent Joe Bushnell. Bushnell is focused on building Tacoma’s business-friendly cred and recruiting more cops. He’s supported by the Mayor of Tacoma, many of his council colleagues, the Washington Hospitality Association, and the Jackson Legacy Fund, which supports centrist, business-aligned candidates. 

In a way, Cook’s already defeated Bushnell once before. Bushnell supported the City of Tacoma’s alternative to Tacoma For All campaign’s renter protections, a deceptive scheme to undermine the popular support for renters' rights that the courts ultimately scrapped. Ultimately, Tacoma For All overcame Bushnell and the City’s trickery plus the hundreds of thousands of dollars the real estate industry spent against the scrappy socialist campaign.

This time, Cook has a leg up. She’s raised $47,000 to Bushnell’s $34,000, according to the PDC. And her average campaign contribution weighs in at less than half the size of Bushnell’s. But that doesn’t mean Cook is taking it easy. She told The Burner she’s hitting doors, making calls, and fighting for that seat up until ballots are due at 8pm August 5. 

Michael Westgaard

Renton residents may have seen Michael Westgaard door-knocking for Raise The Wage Renton, or they may recognize his name from a previous ballot, or maybe they have heard his voice in his admittedly fabulous “Sewer Socialism” campaign ad. But Westgaard’s political journey starts much earlier at Working Washington where he helped pass “Ban The Box” legislation and advocated for home care aid workers’ rights. From there, Westgaard joined DSA where he volunteered on Stephanie Gallardo’s 2022 congressional campaign and then Raise The Wage Renton, which won minimum wage workers a raise from just $16.28 to $20.29 in 2024.

Now Westgaard is running for Renton City Council position 1 to lower the cost of housing and transportation, build up a police alternative, and enforce the new wage hike. That last bit is important — he’s running against incumbent James Alberson Jr.

Alberson used to be the president of the Renton Chamber of Commerce and it shows. To draw the most drastic comparison, while Westgaard was fighting alongside his working class neighbors for the minimum wage increase, Alberson argued, in a public council meeting, that the “minimum wage” should not be a “living wage” — “It sounds like you're trying to lower the bar instead of encouraging them to jump higher,” Alberson said. He suggested “unskilled wage” workers pull themselves up by their boot straps, go to college and then get better paying jobs. 

While any worker with an iota of solidarity would obviously reject Alberson, he’s got friends in high places. According to the PDC, Alberson’s campaign’s funded by the real estate lobby and Amazon. But Westgaard still has him beat on fundraising with a bunch of small donations from individuals. 

Either way, Westgaard says he knows he’ll have to win this campaign on the ground. His campaign is on track to knock more doors than the number of people who voted in the last Renton election. 

Krysteena Mann

Krysteena Mann moved to the Pacific Northwest for a better life — for higher quality healthcare, higher wages, and overall more opportunities. When she wound up in Tukwila, Mann realized there was still work to be done to improve the lives of her community members. Her advocacy became more organized in 2022, when Mann volunteered with Raise The Wage Tukwila and from there, the Transit Riders Union, who led the charge on the campaign. Then she started volunteering on Gallardo’s congressional campaign, which brought her to DSA (Mann’s a member and a self-identified dem soc, but not officially endorsed by the Seattle DSA chapter btw). 

For her Tukwila City Council Position 7 bid, she champions three main priorities: Secure progressive revenue, stand up a South King County social housing developer, and expand public transit. 

Mann is running for an open seat, so she doesn’t face quite the David and Goliath narrative that some of her socialist comrades across the region. But she’s definitely differentiating herself from the competition by running as an open Democratic Socialist. Although, Mann told The Burner that a little DSA rose icon is not exactly a scarlet letter these days. 

“It’s not like the days of the Red Scare,” Mann said. “Voters are seeing that their wages went up because of socialists, they’re protected from eviction because of socialists, and there are socialists in their community advocating to make sure that they’re not just surviving, but they’re thriving.”