5/21 Primary Preview Part II
Idaho and Oregon
Idaho
SD-16 (Boise)
Alison Rabe (i) vs. Justin Mitson
Result: Rabe 88.9%, Mitson 11.1% | Rabe wins
Justin Mitson is a self-financing businessman candidate—a species which is ordinarily a small, but real, threat. However, Mitson, who is branding himself as “Not crazy woke”, has an AI art-filled website where he rails against what he sees as the toleration of pedophiles by the LGBTQ+ community, and argues for looser gun laws. In an in-person interview with the Idaho Statesman, he sounds even more like a Republican, opposing loosening Idaho’s strictest-in-the-nation abortion ban, and programs to feed children in the summer. Is Mitson a Republican plant, or merely a delusional crank? Who knows, and, frankly, who cares—he’s going to get crushed by normal Democrat Alison Rabe.
HD-16B (Boise)
Todd Achilles (i) vs. Jon Chu vs. Nikson Mathews vs. Wayne Richey
Result: Achilles 46.5%, Mathews 28.3%, Chu 22.1%, Richey 3.1%
Former telecom executive Todd Achilles was appointed to this seat in February, giving him incumbency on paper but not in practice, and he’s in a tough fight to earn his spot in the legislature. There’s little that’s actually wrong with him aside from being kind of boring, but in a state like Idaho, where Democrats are in a superminority and basically nonfactors in the legislative process, boring is a real problem. Every legislator needs to be a political leader in their own right, advocating for change and working with activists to put pressure on the government. The candidate in this election that description fits is Nikson Mathews, a trans masculine policy advocate at Add The Words, Idaho who has been intimately involved in the fight against Idaho’s ban on gender affirming care. Matthews is the outsider in this contest, while Achilles has been endorsed by multiple unions and Boise Mayor Lauren McLean. Jon Chu, a doctor, is also running a serviceable campaign, but hasn’t raised as much money as Mikson or Achilles.
Oregon
Attorney General
Shaina Maxey Pomerantz vs. Dan Rayfield
Result: Rayfield 75.7%, Pomerantz 24.3% | Rayfield wins
In 2020, 58% of Oregon voters passed Measure 110, which changed all criminal penalties for simple drug possession (ie: not with the intent to sell or as part of another crime, such as DUIs) into civil penalties, as well as earmarking the money raised from cannabis taxes to fund drug rehabilitation programs. When it went into effect and didn’t immediately halt the growth of drug overdoses in the state, the usual carceral suspects immediately called for its repeal and the Oregon Health Authority launched an official study to determine its effects. When the report, entitled “Too Early to Tell”, came out, it concluded that it was not yet clear what the effects of decriminalization were, but the most evident issue was the underfunding of drug treatment across the state, and fragmentation of the collection of different programs the state has. Naturally, the legislature responded with HB 4002, which recriminalized drug possession and further fragmented drug treatment in the state.
That saga is the necessary background to understand the campaign of nonprofit director Shaina Maxey Pomerantz, running on no budget and a prayer. Pomerantz opposes HB 4002 and wants to direct state agency resources towards treatment and against criminalization in the spirit of Measure 110. Aside from Pomerantz’s lone, dissenting voice, the field has been cleared for former state House Speaker Dan Rayfield, who has “wants to be senator very badly” written all over him.
Secretary of State
Jim Crary vs. James Manning vs. Tobias Read vs. Dave Stauffer vs. Paul Damian Wells
Result: Read 70.0%, Manning 22.4%, Crary 3.7%, Wells 2.1%, Stauffer 1.8% | Read wins
Current Oregon Treasurer and former state Rep. Tobias Read is setting his sights lower after running for governor in 2022 and getting his ass handed to him by now-Gov. Tina Kotek, 56%-32%. As we said when he first announced his gubernatorial campaign:
Read served in the State House in 2007-2017 from a district in the Portland suburbs, before running for and winning the Treasurer’s office in a special election to succeed the outgoing Ted Wheeler. His time in the House was mostly that of a quiet background member (albeit a moderate), but his tenure as Treasurer has been insidiously awful. One of his first acts in the office was to sell off tens of thousands of acres of state forest to a logging company over the governor’s objections. He refused to stop investing state money in private prisons, aided Facebook’s recent destruction of pristine coastline, and fought against the largest expansion of Portland public transit in decades. Imagine how much damage he could do in an important office.
In that campaign, Read did indeed run as the more conservative candidate. Even though he lost, Read is only 48—he could run for governor again and again unless he’s stopped.
Read’s main opponent is James Manning, a four-term state senator and one of the most progressive members of the body, as evidenced by his recent vote against drug recriminalization. Manning has been fighting to expand voter access his entire career, making him a perfect fit for this office, which most prominently deals with voting. Read’s objectives for running are considerably more mercenary (he was termed out of his current office and AG is important enough that he figured he’d have a tougher opponent), but he did raise considerably more money than Manning ($914K to $187K), giving him a leg up. The election has split both the Democratic establishment and organized labor, with a majority going to Read, but a substantial collection of figures, from Peter DeFazio, to state Senate President Rob Wagner, to the SEIU, are backing Manning.
Treasurer
Jeff Gudman vs. Elizabeth Steiner Hayward
Result: Steiner 78.9%, Gudman 21.1% | Steiner wins
The overwhelming favorite to be the next Treasurer of Oregon is state Sen. Elizabeth Steiner, a politician with a decade of service demonstrating her to be square in the center of the Oregon Democratic Party, for better or for worse. Her wide coalition includes organized labor, environmental groups, and nearly all elected Democrats in the state—everyone seems fine with the boring choice for a boring job. The exception is Lake Oswego City Councilmember Jeff Gudman. Gudman has not a CPA but an MBA, and brags about working as a financial analyst for NW Natural Gas. Even though Gudman has a few cool ideas, such as a land value tax, he’s still a former natural gas company analyst and self-described “staunch budget hawk”.
OR-01 (Western Portland suburbs)
Suzanne Bonamici (i) vs. Jamil Ahmad vs. Courtney Casgraux
Result: Bonamici 91.1%, Ahmad 5.9%, Casgraux 3.0% | Bonamici wins
Suzanne Bonamici has two pro-ceasefire opponents, but neither have raised any money, and they will unfortunately receive only protest voters.
OR-03 (Portland, Gresham, Hood River)
Ricky Barajas vs. Nolan Bylenga vs. Maxine Dexter vs. Susheela Jayapal vs. Michael Jonas vs. Eddy Morales vs. Rachel Rand
Result: Dexter 47.6%, Jayapal 33.0%, Morales 13.4%, Jonas 2.4%, Bylenga 2.1%, Rand 0.9%, Barajas 0.6% | Dexter wins
This is a three-way race between state Rep. Maxine Dexter, Gresham City Councilor Eddy Morales, and former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal. Jayapal is the sister of Congressional Progressive Caucus chair Pramila Jayapal, and that relationship has implicitly defined this race. Over the course of this campaign, Susheela has become as much of an outspoken progressive as her sister, but she started out a little more subdued. A low-key approach wasn’t enough to ward off AIPAC and its stable of Republican donors, who absolutely hate Pramila Jayapal and are willing to try anything to keep her sister from joining her in Congress. In this race they’ve landed on Dexter as their candidate, and, thankfully, AIPAC sucks shit at covering its tracks. A mysterious May 7 fundraiser in Los Angeles brought in more than $200,000, and two-thirds of those donors have a history of giving to AIPAC, which makes it hard to take Dexter’s campaign seriously when they insist that AIPAC hasn’t endorsed anyone in this race. AIPAC also wasn’t able to keep word of its clandestine efforts under wraps; the Intercept caught wind of behind-the-scenes AIPAC efforts to benefit Dexter on May 3, reporting that AIPAC planned to funnel its money through 314 Action Fund, an ostensibly pro-science group (Dexter is a physician) that doubles as a shameless super PAC conduit. By May 10, the Intercept had confirmation from a 314 staffer about the real reason for the group’s $2 million in pro-Dexter advertising, as well as an admission from a direct donor at that May 7 fundraiser that “I give all my contributions through AIPAC. Whenever I am asked to give to their endorsed candidates I give.” Soooooo…would the Dexter campaign please stop lying to the press? (This morning, we learned who some of 314’s big donors were, and they included Michael Bloomberg and GOP financier John Granieri, both of whom are large AIPAC donors as well.) The 314 Action shell game isn’t all. The Intercept also reported on another likely AIPAC front that did go to the trouble of hiding its donors, Voters for Responsive Government, and VRG has done the dirty work, going harshly negative on Jayapal. VRG has dumped over $3 million into attacks on Jayapal.
The expensive mudslinging has mostly bypassed Morales, who scans as moderate like Dexter but has benefited from very little outside help. It’s not inconceivable that he manages to squeak past Dexter and Jayapal—he does have a well-funded campaign—because he hasn’t gotten a wave of negative media coverage for the dark money stuff like Dexter, and he hasn’t been the target of $3 million in attack ads like Jayapal. Likelier, however, is that one of the two women whose campaigns have consumed most of the oxygen ends up winning.
HD-07 (Springfield)
John Lively (i) vs. Ryan Rhoads
Result: Lively 87.3%, Rhoads 12.7% | Lively wins
John Lively is a 77-year-old moderate, and may one day face a serious primary challenger, but the campaign of Ryan Rhoads simply does not exist, not even in Facebook page form.
HD-08 (Eugene)
Doyle Canning vs. Lisa Fragala
Result: Fragala 72.4%, Canning 27.6% | Fragala wins
Doyle Canning is an environmental champion who ran for Congress in OR-04 last cycle. She lost that race by a wide margin to Val Hoyle, the pick of both outgoing incumbent Peter DeFazio and billionaire fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried, but in the process caught the attention of progressives in Eugene. As luck would have it, her state house rep, Speaker Paul Holvey, decided to retire the next cycle, opening up the house district that contains the University of Oregon and its surrounding neighborhoods. Canning has been running a spirited campaign, but history is repeating itself. The establishment, including the outgoing incumbent, is backing more moderate teacher Lisa Fragala, and she’s getting help from a PAC that’s actually a front for a single rich guy—not Bankman-Fried this time, but developer Brian Clem, who’s placed $1,000,000 into the Oregonians Are Ready Political Action Committee, which seeks to defeat progressives in Democratic primaries. Canning took only 16% of the vote in the 2022 primary, and, even though she’s probably going to do better today, the weight of outside money and a unified establishment means she’s still the underdog.
HD-16 (Corvallis)
Sami Al-Abdrabbuh vs. Sarah McDonald
Result: McDonald 50.9%, Al-Abdrabbuh 49.1% | McDonald wins
Engineer Sami Al-Abdrabbuh and Moms Demand Action Oregon founder Sarah McDonald are pretty similar, right down to them both being elected members of the Corvallis School Board. Both candidates are, bluntly, good but not great: standard, reliable Democrats with little desire to rock the boat. The only policy difference we could find between them is that Al-Abdrabbuh is iffy on nuclear power, and McDonald is straightforwardly opposed to it. Progressives that have waded in are largely split on this contest, with activist groups preferring McDonald, while elected legislators from other parts of the state like Al-Abdrabbuh better.
HD-33 (Northwest Portland)
Brian Duty vs. Pete Grabiel vs. Shannon Isadore
Result: Isadore 51.6%, Grabiel 27.9%, Duty 20.4% | Isadore wins
Corporate lawyer Pete Grabiel is another one of those reactionary backlash candidates that are doing quite well in Portland as of late: he wants a market-based approach to dealing with climate change and also to end bottle deposits in Portland because people might use the money to buy drugs; and supported by both the Chamber of Commerce and the police union, as well as Brian Clem/Oregonians Are Ready PAC. He’s terrible and we’re concerned that the liberal candidates (not even progressives, just regular liberals) are going to split the vote and let him through with a plurality. Urologist Brian Duty and Oregon Change Clinic CEO Shannon Isadore both supported HB 4002 and enjoy the backing of elements of the state party’s mainstream, but neither exhibits the fear mongering of Gabriel, or has attracted any of the usual crowd of moderates in Portland government they way he has. Of the two, we prefer Isadore, both because the legislature would lack any Black women if she loses, and also because politicians we trust, such as WInsvey Campos, have endorsed her.
HD-35 (Aloha, Portland suburbs)
Farrah Chaichi (i) vs. Casey Zimmerman
Result: Chaichi 78.7%, Zimmerman 21.3% | Chaichi wins
Farrah Chaichi is one of the best members of the legislature, and the only open socialist, which is why we kind of assumed there’d be an actual effort to unseat her. Instead there’s some guy, and that guy doesn’t even appear to be that far to her right. Casey Zimmerman is the sales director for a small drone firm, and doesn’t even seem that interested in contrasting himself with Chaichi. Weird. He hasn’t raised any money, so he should be a nonfactor.
HD-37 (Southern Portland suburbs)
Jules Walters (i) vs. Brian Maguire
Result: Walters 89.8%, Maguire 10.2% | Walters wins
Brian Maguire is an extremely obviously Republican rich guy who decided to run as a Democrat because…well, we presume because Republicans don’t win in Portland. Honestly, we don’t know why. But we do know he’s going to lose.
HD-44 (North Portland)
Travis Nelson (i) vs. Christine Nair
Result: Nelson 91.4%, Nair 8.6% | Nelson wins
A direct quote from leadership coach Christine Nair, the only challenger to Travis Nelson: “I really do hope our constituents vote for Travis.”
HD-46 (Southwest Portland)
Willy Chotzen vs. Mary Lou Hennrich
Result: Chotzen 72.8%, Hennrich 27.2% | Chotzen wins
After three straight primaries where absolutely nothing of note is happening, HD-46 is a real barn-burner. Mary Lou Hennrich, a public health professional seeking to become a 76-year-old freshman, has been fighting necessary battles for small things like finally fluoridating Portland’s water, to the big-picture battle for single payer. We can’t really find fault with her. But we also like public defender Willy Chotzen a lot—in fact we like him a lot for a handful of small reasons. One is that he talks about urbanist issues like traffic deaths, which is something that every urban legislator needs to be persistent about, or else the legislature will entirely ignore them. Another is that the left in Portland needs to rebuild its bench, and Hennrich simply can’t be part of a bench for other offices at her age. And there’s also the endorsements made in the race so far—while single payer groups and many who’ve worked with her before love Hennrich, Chaichi, Campos, unions, and the Working Families Party have put up a united front for Chotzen. It seems like he’s someone worth getting excited over.
HD-48 (Southwest Portland and suburbs)
Hoa Nguyen (i) vs. Elizabeth Petersen
Result: Nguyen 74.6%, Petersen 25.4% | Nguyen wins
Freshman state Rep. Hoa Nguyen can rest easy knowing that her only opponent, oncology research nurse Elizabeth Petersen, has no campaign to speak of.
Multnomah County DA
Mike Schmidt (i) vs. Nathan Vasquez
Result: Vasquez 53.5%, Schmidt 46.5% | Vasquez wins
In 2020, Mike Schmidt ran for the open DA’s seat as what we’d call a lightly progressive prosecutor: he didn’t make any big, concrete promises, but his language and tone leaned towards diversion programs not declining to prosecute more minor offenses. Schmidt was backed by the entire spectrum of the Democratic establishment, and defeated his only opponent, cop-endorsed Mike Knight, by an astounding 77% to 23% margin. It was all downhill from there. Schmidt has had to juggle a police department engaging in a years-long work slowdown akin to what Chesa Boudin faced in San Francisco, along with a drug overdose crisis, and a city that won’t stop arguing with itself over whether it’s dying as it adds thousands of people per year. Some reform DAs are able to navigate the immense public relations challenges of an immensely hostile business and media class, but Schmidt hasn’t been one of them. He’s spent the last four years flustered and defensive, which would be a problem even if Portland hadn’t been clearly turning towards the right recently.
Schmidt is now in the fight for his political life against tough-on-crime prosecutor Nathan Vasquez, a former Republican who has raised over $1,000,000 from this city’s business community, and has used the money to continuously blast Schimdt as the root cause of the fentanyl crisis in the city. Scrolling through Vasquez’s endorser list can put a bad feeling in the pit of your stomach, as cop unions, landlord associations, business owners, and conservative suburban politicians move past your screen and you consider just how possible it is that they’re about to get exactly the prosecutor they want. Vasquez has out-raised Schmidt roughly $1,018,000 to $975,000, a figure that is only even close thanks to the Working Families Party spending hundreds of thousands on Schmidt. Let’s hope it’s enough.
Multnomah County Commission District 1 (North Portland)
Kevin Fitts vs. Chris Henry vs. Meghan Moyer vs. Vadim Mozyrsky vs. Margot Wheeler
Result: Moyer 47.0%, Mozyrsky 39.5%, Wheeler 5.5%, Fitts 4.7%, Henry 2.9% | Moyer and Mozyrsky advance to runoff
Mental health professional Kevin Fitts would bring an appreciated perspective to the County Commission as it decides on action in an addiction crisis, Chris Henry chairs the Oregon Progressive Party, and Margot Wheeler (no relation to Ted) sounds like a fire-starter (in a good sense) who would at least try to disrupt the path the commission is on. But this is really a race between Meghan Moyer and Vadim Mozyrsky. Portland is rapidly approaching Seattle levels of every election being a battle between the moderate and progressive factions who each choose one candidate, and you can tell which based on who was endorsed by the semi-official newspapers for their factions. In Seattle it’s The Seattle Times and Stranger, while in Portland it’s The Oregon and Willamette Week, the endorsees being the moderate and the progressive candidate, respectively.
The progressive is Meghan Moyer, a public policy specialist. Supported by Kate Brown, the Working Families Party, several unions, Portland for All (another semi-official designation of being The Progressive Candidate), and what’s left of Portland’s progressive political class, Moyer is one of the few hopes progressives have to once again hold the levers of power in a city that angrily rejected them over the last couple cycles. The moderate is failed Portland City Council candidate Vadim Mozyrsky. Mozyrsky is doing the usual bit about complaining about high taxes and homeless people being allowed within the sight lines of people who have homes, and is just ignoring that his ideological fellow travelers have been running the place for years and that the failed policies he rails against are his own. Given the mood of the Portland electorate recently, it probably won’t matter. The big money coalition of business owners, landlords, and developers have given him a financial advantage, and the moderate political class has embraced him.
Multnomah County Commission District 2 (South and West Portland and suburbs)
Sam Adams vs. Jessie Burke vs. Nicholas Hara vs. Carlos Jermaine Richard vs. Shannon Singleton
Result: Singleton 46.5%, Adams 23.6%, Burke 22.2%, Hara 4.0%, Richard 3.3% | Singleton and Adams advance to runoff
We just made a whole deal about how progressives and moderates choose a single candidate to fight every battle in the permanent war that is Portland politics. This election is actually an example of that not happening. Progressives figured out who they wanted early: former Kate Brown staffer Shannon Singleton, who has worked on housing policy for most of her career. Singleton, though she comes from the nonprofit world, doesn’t actually seem to have Nonprofit Industrial Complex brain, and straightforwardly wants to expand government services, especially when it comes to homelessness. She’s leaning heavily on the endorsement she got from Kate Brown (and, come to think of it, could be the reason Brown endorsed Moyer in District 1), but is wholeheartedly supported by the full range of progressive groups in the city.
Moderates, meanwhile, are split. Our theory is that they were ready to go for hotel owner (and self-dealer) Jessie Burke, but then couldn’t bring themselves to say no to former Mayor Sam Adams when he came barging into the race like an asshole, which he is known for doing. Adams may have been accused of sexual harassment multiple times, and admitted to sleeping with a 17-year old who was “looking for a mentor” in him, but he’s also the guy who wanted to set up literal FEMA concentration camps for the homeless, so he’ll always have a spot in the heart’s of the city’s moderate politicians. The result is all these awkward double endorsements from semi-official moderate campaign groups like United for Portland and the Revitalize Portland Coalition. Singleton has to be hoping that she gets to run against the disgraced former mayor known for sleeping with a high schooler, but we honestly have no clue who’s more likely to get into the runoff with her.
Multnomah County Commission District 3 (Southeast Portland)
Julia Brim-Edwards (i) vs. TJ Noddings
Result: Brim-Edwards 73.0%, Noddings 26.2% | Brim-Edwards wins
TJ Nodding’s website URL is tj4housing.com. Not tj4commission.com or tj4multnomah.com, but tj4housing.com. The man knows what he’s about, and what he’s about is trying to grab county government by the shoulders, shake them violently, and yell “don’t you understand we’re in a housing emergency?” Social housing, rent control, increased housing vouchers, a tenant bill of rights, government conversion of empty buildings: Noddings wants to throw everything at the wall and hope something sticks, because rents have risen to the level they imperil the ability to “maintain a society”. He’s a single-issue advocate more than an actual candidate, but if you’re going to go that route, housing advocacy in a city like Portland is the route you want to go. Incumbent Julia Brim-Edwards has been in office for less than a full year and is about to be the longest tenured member of the board after none of her colleagues ran for reelection, which is pretty interesting, even if she isn’t.
Multnomah County Commission District 4 (East Portland and Gresham)
Vince Jones-Dixon vs. Brian Knotts vs. Timothy Youker
Result: Jones-Dixon 50.15%, Knotts 41.4%, Youker 7.5% | Jones-Dixon wins
Gresham City Councilor Vince Jones-Dixon is in suburban government, and kind of a feckless liberal. The man endorsed both candidates in the DA’s race, which is not how endorsements work, Vince. Yet he’ll be winning, and that’s for the best. Tech consultant Brian Knotts comes off as a conservative angry at Portland in general, and Timothy Yourker, a self-described “Philanthropist”, says his qualifications for the job are “Having cathlic background with high morals and family values” [wording exactly his.]