The Post’s Ukraine reporter Lizzie Johnson wrote on X, quote, “I was just laid off by The Washington Post in the middle of a war zone,” she wrote from Ukraine.

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/2/6/karen_altiah_washington_post_layoffs_journalists

Original article: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/bruce-harrell-says-his-loss-didnt-cause-reflection-or-at-least-wont-show-it/

Text:

Bruce Harrell says his loss didn’t cause reflection, or at least won’t show it

Jan. 28, 2026 at 6:00 am | Updated Jan. 28, 2026 at 6:00 am

By

David Kroman

Seattle Times staff reporter

In the weeks since he left office, former Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell hasn’t done a lot of retrospection. Reflection was woven into his single term as mayor, he says, leaving no need to worry on his time in office now that he’s left.

“Many people can look back retrospectively and think about, ‘I really, really did this well, I did this ineffectively, I could have taken a right turn instead of a left turn,’ ” he said, sitting in slippers and an untucked shirt in the living room of his South Seattle home. “I suppose that’s one method by which a leader can look back at an organization. That is not my style.”

To the extent Seattle has institutional political figures, Harrell is one. His 16 years in City Hall is more than the experience of the current mayor, city attorney and Seattle City Council combined — minus interim Councilmember Debora Juarez’s years.

His tenure as a council member began the year before Barack Obama was elected president, when Amazon’s workforce still fit inside the Pacific Tower on Beacon Hill and the median rent for a studio was $600. By the time he lost reelection as mayor, his time spanned the housing collapse, killing of Osama bin Laden, legalization of marijuana and same-sex marriage and the election, defeat and reelection of Donald Trump.

And now it’s over.

Harrell sought to use his years as a strength during his campaign for a second term as mayor. With so much uncertainty about the direction of Seattle postpandemic against a hostile federal government, the city should want someone who knows his way around the halls of power, he argued.

In fact, for just enough voters, his experience turned out to be a liability and he lost the closest race in a hundred years. Why homelessness has not improved faster, why rent is more than $2,000 for a one-bedroom apartment or why the waitlist for day care extends to before some parents have even conceived were all questions that ultimately fell to him, fair or not, as a person who oversaw the rise of Seattle’s frustrating realities from a position of power.

But Harrell is comfortable in his administration’s response and his legacy, while also glib about the broader state of politics and their ability to deliver solutions.

On one hand, he is bluntly confident about his mayoralty. Resistant to grappling with possible shortcomings, Harrell said his office pulled every lever it could on homelessness, public safety and affordability.

“The fact is, I was an effective leader and was an effective mayor,” he said.

Where there are failures, particularly on issues of affordability, Harrell argued they are broad, the result of a political environment either unwilling or unable to move together. On homelessness, in particular, which was declared an emergency while he was on the council and continued to rise through his time as mayor, “those problems cannot be solved by a mayor or a City Council or city attorney.”

“No one’s delivering,” he said. “Whether it’s centrist, conservatives or progressive, the system is not delivering.”

Asked if that was an indictment of all politics, he answered, “I suppose.”

Simultaneously, Harrell is frustrated he was not given more credit for dropping crime rates.

“When all of those numbers go in the wrong direction, all of the politicians are blamed, particularly the mayor, but when they trend in the right direction, it just happened organically,” he said. “And that’s not true.”

When Harrell first left office at the end of 2019, he saw it as his retirement from public office. But with former Mayor Jenny Durkan opting against a reelection campaign and the city still reeling from the pandemic and protests of 2020, he felt his style would be “conducive to right the ship, so to speak.”

“It’s obvious I don’t need a job,” he said, motioning to his more than 6,000-square-foot South Seattle, water-view home. “I’ve worked very hard and I’ve been a successful attorney. I had effectively retired from the city in 2019 so it was truly a calling to serve more than anything else.”

In Harrell’s eyes, the power of being mayor came from what tone and image he set for the city. How he presented himself to both his staff and the public was central to his style of management, a view of the position of mayor rooted in formal leadership training and study, akin to a CEO or head coach. For Harrell, it was important that the public and the people around him never see him sweat.

“I’ve always been the kind of leader that will walk in the office and I try to make things look easy,” he said. “I don’t want people to get stressed out.”

Harrell’s backslapping personality sometimes led to questions about whether he had the policy chops to back up his public face. Harrell said he heard those criticisms, but rejected them.

“Often critics can advance a theory that someone is all show and no substance,” he said, “and make no mistake about that, there are even racial overtones associated with that.”

“You become the face of the city,” he said, “and then based on that vision and that image of the city, then you develop policies and commence actions to drive that imagery to make it a reality.”

As for why he lost, Harrell answers: “I didn’t get enough votes.”

He insists he’s not bitter about its result, calling his strength his positive attitude. But if he felt otherwise, he’d likely not want anyone to see him sweat.

Snip this clip at 33:38 for future amusement:

Reporter: You said you envision the WA National Guard would be deployed, if necessary, to protect public spaces - sort of a buffer between the federal agents and maybe public protests?

Gov Ferguson: That’s a fair way to put it, yeah.

Reporter: And then secondly, on the accountability question, can, in your opinion, local law enforcement and state patrol detain a federal law enforcement officer they see doing something that violates state law? In the moment?

AG Brown: It’s obviously incredibly complicated when you’re talking about the division of authority between state law enforcement, local and the federal government. What I would say is, as a general matter, state and local law enforcement do not have to simply watch or look away if the law is being violated. If they see somebody being assaulted unlawfully or attacked unlawfully or otherwise having their legal rights violated, we do not expect state and local law enforcement officers to simply watch or do nothing.

It is important that each of those jurisdictions talk to their lawyers and legal teams to understand where those lines are drawn, and after an incident, the lines of investigative authority or prosecutorial authority can be very challenging to navigate.

But I think the WA public expects their local sheriff or local police chief or officers that work for either to not simply watch if somebody in their community is having their rights violated. We hope we’re not ever in that circumstance in WA state, but I think as a general matter that is the expectation, if not the duty, that we would anticipate our local forces having.

So the WA National Guard can be deployed to protect “public spaces” while ICE terrorizes and murders WA residents. And we can totally rely on local cops to make sure the feds aren’t breaking the law.

Have these two obtuse clowns ever met a cop before?

Let me introduce y’all to Pierce County Sheriff Keith Swank. Here he is, commenting before the state Law & Justice committee on the upcoming law prohibiting cops from wearing face coverings, threatening to command a mob to surround the state building in Tacoma if they ever try to remove him from office (Jan 15 2026, 12:08 PM, at 1:16:58 in the video):

https://tvw.org/video/senate-law-justice-2026011149/?eventID=2026011149

This video was from 10 days ago.

Proposal document from architect GGLO: https://www.seattle.gov/documents/Departments/Neighborhoods/HistoricPreservation/Landmarks/2026/LPB011626SeattleBrewMaltBP.pdf

Original article link: https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2026/01/14/rainier-brewing-malt-house-georgetown-apartments.html

Original article (if the archive link doesn’t work for you):

Original Rainier Brewery complex targeted for residential development

By Rob Smith – Contributing writer

Jan 14, 2026

Story Highlights:

• GGLO Architects proposes converting Georgetown’s historic Malt House into apartments.
• The 72,466-square-foot project includes around two dozen one-bedroom and studio units.
• Seattle City Council must approve the former brewery redevelopment plan.

What was once part of the largest brewery west of the Mississippi could become a residential development.

GGLO Architects will present a proposal to the city of Seattle’s Landmarks Preservation Board on Jan. 16 to renovate the former Malt House in the Georgetown neighborhood into apartments. Portland-based ScanlanKemperBard Cos. is the owner.

The Malt House, at 5900 Airport Way S., was the second structure constructed for the former Seattle Brewing and Malting Co. plant that opened in the late 1890s. It eventually became the Rainier Brewing Co., and the plant is now known as the Original Rainier Brewery campus. The property is just south of downtown Seattle and just north of Boeing Field between Airport Way South and the BNSF rail lines. (The former Rainier Brewery with the big “R” is 2 miles north.)

The proposal notes that Airport Way through a portion of Georgetown has become a destination for restaurants and shops but lacks residential options that “add to the livability and vibrancy” of the neighborhood.

GGLO says in its Landmarks Preservation Board packet that it is targeting preservation efforts on usable areas of the building while focusing new construction on areas that aren’t. It says it is “committed to maintaining the historic character” along Airport Way South. Seattle’s Story Box Architecture is serving as historic consultant on the project.

Two different proposals show four residential levels above a street-level commercial/retail level in the 72,466-square-foot project area. Each residential level would house about two dozen one-bedroom units, plus a handful of studio apartments. The project also has potential for a rooftop amenity that could be used as a common recreation space. The height limit is 55 feet, though a rooftop recreation area could add 15 more feet.

The area was rezoned in 2023 from industrial to neighborhood commercial, and it’s now a mixed-use zone where both residential and commercial development are allowed. The complex is currently home to Fran’s Chocolates and a handful of other small tenants.

The Seattle City Council must eventually approve the project for it to move forward.

Writing in HistoryLink.org, historian Paul Dorpat notes that the brewery site was the sixth-largest in the world and the “largest industrial establishment” in the state prior to Washington introducing prohibition in 2016.

At El Centro de la Raza on Beacon Hill, Mayor Katie B. Wilson announced two executive orders at her transition team meeting this morning: one to accelerate the expansion of emergency shelter and affordable housing, and another to establish a bus lane along Denny Way.

Text of Emergency Shelter and Affordable Housing executive order: https://wilson.seattle.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2026/01/Executive-Order-202602-Accelerate-housing-and-shelter.pdf

Text of Denny Bus Lane information executive order: https://wilson.seattle.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2026/01/Executive-Order-202601-Denny-Way-Transit-Infrastructure.pdf

Link skips past 45 minutes of preamble, ceremony, introductions and the governor yammering about his family.

If the link doesn’t do it automatically, jump forward to 45:01 to get to where he actually starts talking about state matters.