NPI's Cascadia Advocate

Offering commentary and analysis from Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, The Cascadia Advocate provides the Northwest Progressive Institute's uplifting perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

Congressman Dennis Kucinich to speak at NWroots 2011 in Seattle on July 9th

Hav­ing already made mul­ti­ple trips to Wash­ing­ton State this year, Ohio Con­gress­man Den­nis Kucinich will return on July 9th for the 2011 NWroots Con­fer­ence in Seat­tle. Kucinich has been mak­ing fre­quent vis­its here, pre­sum­ably in prepa­ra­tion for a redis­trict­ing that may leave him with­out a con­gres­sion­al dis­trict to rep­re­sent. Spec­u­la­tion is that he could set­tle and run in Wash­ing­ton’s tenth, first, sev­enth, eighth, or even third dis­trict. Demo­graph­ics for each of these dis­tricts will not be ful­ly known until redis­trict­ing is complete.

The Tenth Dis­trict will like­ly be an open seat. The Eighth may or may not include Mer­cer Island, where incum­bent Dave Reichert cur­rent­ly lives. The First Dis­trict will be vacat­ed due to Jay Inslee’s bid for gov­er­nor. The Third is cur­rent­ly a swing dis­trict and not safe­ly in Repub­li­can hands. There is talk that Jim McDer­mott may be appoint­ed Ambas­sador to India, which would leave the Sev­enth open (although I talked to a McDer­mott staffer last week who said the rumor that McDer­mott is angling for the India ambas­sador­ship is com­plete nonsense).

There are prob­lems with any sce­nario which includes Kucinich as a can­di­date, and it is not at all cer­tain he would be a good fit any­where in Washington.

State Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty Chair Dwight Pelz recent­ly made it clear in a phone con­ver­sa­tion with Kucinich that he’d rather the Con­gress­man not poke around the state in search of a dis­trict to serve.

Regard­less, Kucinich obvi­ous­ly sees poten­tial in Wash­ing­ton. It will be inter­est­ing to see how it all plays out. One thing Kucinich was clear about when I had din­ner with him last month is that he won’t run against an incum­bent Demo­c­rat any­where. If he has to relo­cate it will be in a dis­trict where he can run in an open seat, or against an incum­bent Repub­li­can. He will not take on an office­hold­er from his own party.

Kucinich will join Con­gress­men Jim McDer­mott and Jay Inslee, for­mer Cana­di­an Health Min­is­ter Ujjal Dosan­jh, and Wash­ing­ton State Labor Coun­cil Pres­i­dent Jeff John­son at NWroots 2011 on July 9th.

NWroots is a region­al con­fer­ence for lib­er­al blog­gers, activists, and cit­i­zens inter­est­ed in pro­gres­sive pub­lic pol­i­cy. The event will fea­ture keynote speak­ers, pan­el dis­cus­sions, doc­u­men­taries, and a can­di­dates social.

The clos­ing keynote address will be deliv­ered by Ujjal Dosan­jh. In last mon­th’s Fed­er­al elec­tion, Dosan­jh lost his seat in Par­lia­ment and announced his retire­ment from pol­i­tics. He has pre­vi­ous­ly served as Health Min­is­ter in Paul Martin’s cab­i­net, Pre­mier of  British Colum­bia, and B.C.’s Attor­ney General.

The con­fer­ence will be fin­ished off with a spe­cial per­for­mance by the Total Expe­ri­ence Gospel Choir.

NWroots, which is being orga­nized by NPI and the NWroots Fel­low­ship, will be held at the Com­e­dy Under­ground in Pio­neer Square. Break­fast and lunch are includ­ed in the reg­is­tra­tion price of $50 ($25 stu­dents). An after-par­ty will take place one block away at the his­toric Cen­tral Saloon. It should be a fun and inter­est­ing day.

I hope you’ll join me and the NPI team at NWroots on July 9th!

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One Comment

  1. I’m intent on tak­ing CD‑3 from Her­rera. Dis­abled Vet­er­an of the Jar­head Clan. Sem­per Fi, Gung Ho for Wash­ing­ton. Tommy

    # by Tommy Peterson :: June 26th, 2011 at 8:50 PM

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  1. […] Con­gress­man Den­nis Kucinich to speak at NWroots 2011 in Seat­tle on July 9th […]

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