In the King County Executive Race, Girmay Zahilay Says Community Trust Sets Him Apart

Things are going great for King County Councilmember Girmay Zahilay. He came out of the August primary election for King County executive with 44% of the vote to fellow Councilmember Claudia Balducci's 30%, and he's absolutely swimming in endorsements from major Washington State Democrats, big unions, and community organizations.

However, as Balducci points out, just over 25% of voters chose neither her nor Zahilay. That leaves a lot of votes on the table, but Zahilay has already made a play for many of them. By choosing to meet in person with the only Republican in the primary race, Derek Chartrand, Zahilay earned himself a key endorsement. Chartrand recently released a three-minute video urging his supporters, who account for 12% of the primary election vote, to vote for Zahilay.

Given Zahilay's status as something of a progressive superhero, Chartrand's endorsement came as a surprise to many, including Balducci. Regardless, it puts him in an even more solid position going into the general.

What got him there? Well, it's hard to talk about Zahilay without talking about the Cinderella story that ushered him into the ranks of our region's rising political stars. Zahilay was born in South Sudan in a refugee settlement. He then immigrated to the United States at the age of 3, living in South Seattle and Skyway.

Things were not exactly easy for Zahilay after that. He barely saw his mother, the head of their single-parent household, who was working multiple jobs to keep the family afloat. At one point, the family had to turn to the shelter system for help, briefly staying in a Union Gospel Mission facility run out of the Chinatown-International District's American Hotel.

"This is despite working," he recalled, in a phone interview with the Emerald. "Those early experiences were foundational for me, made me feel like the economy is not working for everyone. At the same time, it made me see the power of good public policy and local government."

Obviously, we know how this story ends, but suffice to say, the beginning of it doesn't suggest that he would grow up to be the front-runner for King County executive. But, as Girmay pointed out, government assistance, when it's done well, goes a long way. Besides L&I benefits saving the family's financial future when his mother got injured, the system showed up for Zahilay in other ways, education chief among them.

He got a great start in our local public schools, got Pell Grants to go to Stanford, graduated into a fellowship on the East Coast doing anti-hunger advocacy, and ultimately went to law school at the University of Pennsylvania. That educational journey was a prelude to his ascent into politics. Established in law, he moved back here, founded an education nonprofit, and then hopped into what he thought was a race to succeed civil rights activist Larry Gossett on the King County Council. That turned into a race against Gossett, one that Zahilay ultimately won.

His backstory, plus the huge upset he pulled off against Gossett, helped him rise to prominence. That said, he's stayed in the public eye on council, working to rush out masks, food, and rental assistance during the COVID-19 pandemic; hosting parking lot events to prevent gun violence; and organizing support for a massive levy to address mental health issues and build crisis care centers countywide.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, he said, "I really felt like I was able to connect with the role and take it to a place where my strengths were able to show up, despite it being a very chaotic and scary time."

He credits that experience with earning him the trust of his constituents and even preparing him for his current campaign. But the defining feature of this campaign is that he and his opponent don't differ that much in their politics. Both self-described progressives, they worked together on rental assistance during the pandemic, were cosponsors on a suite of emergency tenant protections, and have been on the same side of everything from raising the minimum wage to mental health since then.

In Balducci's telling, the main distinction between the two is that she's more tenured. Zahilay sees the trust he earned during that trial-by-fire moment during the pandemic as more important.

"I think that is why I was able to lay the foundation for this executive race despite being on the council for a much shorter period of time," he said. "My community knows me. They know what I stand for. They know that I'm going to be building right alongside them."

The numbers certainly seem to agree, but there are still a few bones of contention.

A recent audit of grants issued by the county's Department of Community and Human Services (DCHS) found that more than $1.8 billion in county funds had been awarded to community partners without proper financial oversight. That's a big deal. (Editor's Note: On Sept. 23, the King County Council unanimously approved legislation mandating tighter fiscal review of DCHS' grant funding.)

Balducci, for her part, had nothing negative to say about Zahilay, leaving that dirty work to The Times editorial board. But while they have worked very, very hard to portray him as a wild-eyed socialist who wants to spend money irresponsibly, he's had his counter-narrative ready for months, in the form of the "King County Delivers" plan.

"It's not really a response because I had released it many months before the audit came out, but it would address the problems that were found in the audit," Zahilay said.

The plan would set up publicly available performance dashboards for county contractors, establish a position within the executive's office dedicated to conducting proactive audits, standardize internal financial controls, and more. The dedicated audit coordinator position is yet another idea that Zahilay and Balducci share.

Maybe, possibly, there's a world in which fiscally conservative voters, alarmed by the big numbers in the DCHS audit and convinced that Zahilay is somehow to blame for it, turn up in droves to hand the win to Balducci. But, as he pointed out, his plan to address the audit is exactly what won his erstwhile Republican challenger over.

"We talked about making government more transparent, effective, efficient, [and] being more accountable with tax dollars," Zahilay said of Chartrand. "And he found that to be compelling."

As it stands, it's looking like Zahilay's race to lose.

You can learn more about both candidates at the South Seattle Emerald's King County Executive Candidate Forum on Saturday, Oct. 4, 12:30–2 p.m., at Albert Talley High School, where you’ll hear each candidate share platform ideas in person. The event includes a free lunch. Please RSVP online.

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Tobias Coughlin-Bogue is a writer, editor and restaurant worker who lives in South Park. He was formerly the associate editor of Real Change News, and his work has appeared in The Stranger, Seattle Weekly, Vice, Thrillist, Thrasher Magazine, Curbed, and Crosscut, among other outlets.