Photo: GENNA MARTIN, SEATTLEPI.COM
Seattle Mayoral candidate Jenny Durkan and her supporters celebrate her first place position in the primary race, as returns come in Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017.
Seattle Mayoral candidate Jenny Durkan and her supporters celebrate her first place position in the primary race, as returns come in Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017.
Guess who deep-pocketed Republicans like for Seattle mayor?
Coming off a primary election that included 21 candidates, the Seattle mayor's race was left with two liberal Democrats contending in the nonpartisan election.
Standing to the left of center -- but just barely is former U.S. Attorney Jenny Durkan. Durkan is a liberal political insider in the image of her endorser, embattled incumbent Mayor Ed Murray. She draws backers from many of the same people and groups who supported Murray before he left the race in May amid sex abuse allegations.
And in the farther left corner is Cary Moon, an urban planner and activist who fought hard against the state Route 99 tunnel. Moon has self-identified as a city hall outsider, and her politics are considerably less moderate than Durkan's.
RELATED: Connelly: It's Durkan vs. Moon for mayor, but with Oliver declaring victory
Each has announced her platform, but that only tells part of the story. They have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars together and, like all fundraising, there is another story to be told there.
Campaign finance records filed with the Washington State Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) and collected atFollowTheMoney.org show who donated to whom, and what that might say about each candidate. We looked back at many donors' history of giving to see what they supported in candidates and issues.
The story that emerged was simple: Only a sliver of Moon's donors have given to anything other than Democrats or Dem-backed issues. Durkan's donors, however, include a sampling of the city's wealthy, some of whom almost exclusively backed Republicans or Republican-backed causes in the past.
(Moon, who was something of an underdog in the crowded primary, has self-funded more than half the $181,478 that she has raised so far.)
Take Tom Alberg who donated the maximum $500 to Durkan's campaign. Alberg, the managing director of Madrona Venture Group, has given to candidates 72 times since 1999. Of those donations, 57 went to Republicans, including Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush in 2016, according to data from FollowTheMoney.org. In 2010, Alberg gave $25,000 to a campaign against a measure to institute a state income tax. He also backed campaigns in seven states outside Washington.
Suzanne Burke, president of real estate organization The Fremont Dock Company, gave Durkan $500 toward her candidacy. Burke, who has donated more than $86,000 to campaigns since 1995, has given most of that to Republicans, including $250 in 2016 to U.S. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. She has also made several donations to the King County Republican Central Committee.
Durkan has a number of endorsements from labor groups, but the business sector has given to her campaign, either through CEOs and other figureheads, or directly from companies themselves.
RELATED: Connelly: Labor Council endorses Jenny Durkan for mayor
Kansas-based Ash Grove Cement Company (they have operations in Seattle) handed Durkan $500, but the company has a tendency to back more conservative candidates overall. Of the $1.1 million donated by Ash Grove in the last 23 years, $812,000 has gone to Republicans, according to data from FollowTheMoney.org.
Moon has set herself out as the anti-establishment candidate, and pointed to Durkan as more her opposite than a kindred leftist.
"The fact that we had an unprecedented turnout, and 70 percent of voters were for one of the more progressive candidates, the five of us to the left of Jenny Durkan, is a real sign that voters have had enough with big money and the political establishment running this city in the wrong direction, and they're ready for change," Moon told Seattle Weekly.
In Durkan's case, big money is certainly accurate, as she has accrued more than $523,000 in 2,470 donations compared to Moon's 380 donations totaling just shy of $69,000 in cash, according to PDC records. But Moon pledged not to accept corporate donations and instead has funded $109,000 of her total campaign funds out of her own pocket.
And those who gave to Moon bear little resemblance to Durkan's donors.
Jabez Blumenthal, an investor who is known for being a big campaign giver, gave Moon $500. He has donated more than $400,000 over the last 14 years. Most of it has gone to campaigns on ballot initiatives backed by Democrats or Democrat-minded interests; none went to Republican candidates.
A number of Moon's donors had no records of campaign donations at FollowTheMoney.org, which collects campaign finance data from across the U.S. in local, state and federal elections.
But still, some of her donors have lobbed money to the right before.
Steven Fetter, a consultant, gave $2,700 in support of efforts to get Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich on the presidential ticket.
And then there's Peter H. Van Oppen, a partner in Trilogy Equity, who has mostly given to Dems, but in 2012 gave $1,000 each to President Barack Obama and Republican opponent Mitt Romney.
Even if most of her donors are, in fact, honest leftists not of the Seattle establishment, Moon is known around town as a powerful figure and she's not exactly poor (as evidenced by her funding more than $100,000 of her own campaign).
Daniel DeMay covers Seattle culture, city hall, and transportation for seattlepi.com. He can be reached at 206-448-8362 ordanieldemay@seattlepi.com.Follow him on Twitter:@Daniel_DeMay.
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Guess who deep-pocketed Republicans like for Seattle mayor? - seattlepi.com