For sev­er­al weeks now, it’s been rumored that State Sen­a­tor Mark Mul­let, the dean of East King Coun­ty’s del­e­ga­tion to the state’s upper cham­ber, was think­ing about run­ning for gov­er­nor in 2024 in the wake of Jay Inslee’s retire­ment announce­ment. Today, Mul­let made it offi­cial, con­firm­ing his inten­tions and unveil­ing a cam­paign web­site, ini­tial slate of endorse­ments, and priorities.

“There is no can­di­date for gov­er­nor at this point focused on the biggest chal­lenges fac­ing our state includ­ing afford­able hous­ing, reduc­ing home­less­ness, cre­at­ing jobs and mak­ing neigh­bor­hoods safe,” Mul­let said in a statement.

(It’s worth not­ing that Mul­let’s rivals, Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son and Com­mis­sion­er of Pub­lic Lands Hilary Franz, did cite those same issues as con­cerns that they’d be focused on when they announced their cam­paigns last month.)

“Too many fam­i­lies can’t afford, even on good salaries, the ris­ing cost of liv­ing,” Mul­let con­tin­ued. “Too many fam­i­lies are wor­ried about the direc­tion of pub­lic safe­ty in our state, which is why we need dif­fer­ent lead­er­ship in Olympia.”

Mul­let’s Pri­or­i­ties page con­tains the fol­low­ing headings:

• Make more afford­able hous­ing a reality
• Invest in skills train­ing and manufacturing
• Pri­or­i­tize safe streets and neighborhoods
• Sup­port Wash­ing­ton farmers
• We can’t tax our way out of every problem
• A green econ­o­my is a strong economy

“As a proud Demo­c­rat, Mark will put the needs of the peo­ple at the fore­front, lead­ing Wash­ing­ton State towards a bet­ter future,” the page says.

But curi­ous­ly, the word “edu­ca­tion” does­n’t appear any­where on it.

Nor does the word “schools.” Not even in passing.

What an omis­sion! The Con­sti­tu­tion declares in Arti­cle IX that it is the state’s para­mount duty to amply pro­vide for the edu­ca­tion of all youth resid­ing with­in Wash­ing­ton’s bor­ders, and it is the gov­er­nor’s duty to pro­pose and sign into law bud­gets that meet this con­sti­tu­tion­al requirement.

Large majori­ties of vot­ers sur­veyed by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling for NPI say that Wash­ing­ton’s pub­lic schools are under­fund­ed and we need to raise rev­enue to ful­ly fund them. Majori­ties also agree that the fis­cal dif­fi­cul­ties school dis­tricts are fac­ing are the respon­si­bil­i­ty of the Leg­is­la­ture (and gov­er­nor, by exten­sion) to fix.

How’d our K‑12 schools get over­looked as a pri­or­i­ty giv­en that their well-being the state’s para­mount duty? There is sim­ply no men­tion of Mul­let’s views on pro­vid­ing for the future of high­er edu­ca­tion, child care, or ear­ly learn­ing either.

Here’s a screen­shot of the entire page so you can see for yourself:

The ini­tial Pri­or­i­ties page on Mark Mul­let’s cam­paign web­site (Click to enlarge)

Mul­let mem­o­rably vot­ed against levy­ing a cap­i­tal gains tax on the wealthy to fund our schools two years ago — a tax that is now bring­ing in cru­cial­ly need­ed rev­enue for our kids and our schools. (He was only one of three Demo­c­ra­t­ic sen­a­tors to do so — the oth­ers were Kevin Van De Wege and Steve Hobbs.) But he can’t expect to avoid the top­ic dur­ing the course of the campaign.

Our sus­pi­cion is this page gets updat­ed to say some­thing about edu­ca­tion, pos­si­bly as soon as some­one from Mul­let’s cam­paign reads this post.

The home page does say this:

Mark knows our pub­lic school sys­tem cre­ates the best lad­der avail­able to help raise peo­ple out of pover­ty – which is why expand­ing preschool access is a top pri­or­i­ty for him.

Mark has advo­cat­ed for the invest­ment of tens of bil­lions of addi­tion­al dol­lars in our pub­lic school sys­tem dur­ing his time in the Sen­ate. With edu­ca­tor reten­tion still a major chal­lenge, Mark will work towards solu­tions that involve new ideas that aren’t just about more dollars.

Of course, as men­tioned, the state’s cur­rent strat­e­gy for expand­ing preschool access is reliant on that cap­i­tal gains rev­enue that Mul­let vot­ed against levying.

Mul­let’s ini­tial endorse­ments are as follows:

• Sec­re­tary of State Steve Hobbs
• Yaki­ma May­or Jan­ice Deccio
• State Sen­a­tor Annette Cleveland
• State Sen­a­tor John Lovick
• State Sen­a­tor Kevin Van De Wege
• For­mer Sen­ate Major­i­ty Leader Sharon K. Nelson
• For­mer State Sen­a­tor Bri­an Hatfield
• State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Amy Walen
• State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mia Gregerson
• Tuk­wila May­or Allan Ekberg
• Yarrow Point May­or Katy Harris
• Kent May­or Dana Ralph
• Wood­inville May­or Mike Millman
• Sno­qualmie May­or Kather­ine Ross
• Seat­ac May­or Jake Simpson
• Ren­ton May­or Armon­do Pavone
• Maple Val­ley May­or Sean Kelly
• Issaquah May­or Mary Lou Pauly
• Car­na­tion City Coun­cil Mem­ber and Serv­ing May­or Jim Ribail
• Cov­ing­ton May­or Jeff Wagner
• Black Dia­mond May­or Car­ol Benson
• Everett May­or Cassie Franklin
• North Bend May­or Rob McFarland
• Seat­tle City Coun­cilmem­ber Sara Nelson
• Sno­homish Coun­ty Coun­cilmem­ber Jared Mead
• Sno­qualmie Val­ley School Board Direc­tor Car­olyn Simpson
• Steve Hoop­er, Seat­tle Restau­rant Alliance
• Ker­ri Lon­er­gan-Dreke, Lom­bardi’s Restau­rant Group
• NW Chap­ter of the Nation­al Con­struc­tion Alliance
• Inter­na­tion­al Union of Oper­at­ing Engi­neers Local 302
• Tiffany Tuner, own­er of Adrift Hospitality

Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son, wide­ly con­sid­ered the fron­trun­ner in the con­test, “wel­comed” Mul­let to the race by releas­ing a video crit­i­ciz­ing his record as a state sen­a­tor. The video, titled, “Three Rea­sons,” can be seen below:

Tran­script:

Three rea­sons why Mark Mul­let is the wrong choice for governor.

• One — Mul­let was the only Demo­c­rat to vote against pro­tect­ing our repro­duc­tive health data. Pro-choice Wash­ing­ton strong­ly opposed his vote.
• Two — Mul­let opposed the $15 min­i­mum wage for Wash­ing­to­ni­ans, includ­ing his own workers.
• Three — Mullet’s bankrolled by big cor­po­ra­tions. Big Oil, Big Phar­ma, and Big Insurance.

Three rea­sons why Mark Mul­let is com­plete­ly out of touch, and the wrong choice for us.

Com­ment­ing on the video, The Stranger’s Rich Smith observed:

The video fails to men­tion his efforts to open up mul­ti-mil­lion-dol­lar tax loop­holes for big busi­ness­es, keep the state’s ban on affir­ma­tive action, gut a bill that end­ed the racist prac­tice of using cred­it scores to deter­mine car insur­ance amounts, lim­it col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing for teach­ers, block attempts to pass pro­gres­sive rev­enue, block mod­er­ate pro­pos­als to fight cli­mate change, and advo­cate for loos­en­ing indoor din­ing ahead of a major COVID spike in 2020. The video also did­n’t men­tion the $80,000 pool that he had installed in the back­yard of his McMan­sion dur­ing the pan­dem­ic (which, to be fair, seemed like a bad tim­ing thing), but there’s only so much you can shove in a 30-sec­ond spot, I guess.

Also not men­tioned in that video are Sen­a­tor Mul­let’s com­ments about Pres­i­dent Joe Biden from last year. Appear­ing on the late Dori Mon­son’s right wing talk radio show in April of 2022, Mul­let told Bran­di Kruse he was­n’t yet on board with Biden-Har­ris 2024 and was­n’t going to “make any promis­es now because I just want to see what the play­ing field looks like in two years.”

Hilary Franz’s cam­paign has not yet com­ment­ed on Mul­let’s entry into the race.

Mul­let is expect­ed to have the back­ing of pow­er­ful busi­ness inter­ests for his cam­paign, whether direct­ly or indi­rect­ly through inde­pen­dent expen­di­tures. The Real­tors, Build­ing Indus­try Asso­ci­a­tion of Wash­ing­ton, and the Asso­ci­a­tion of Wash­ing­ton Busi­ness are exam­ples of enti­ties that may be play­ers in sup­port of Mul­let’s 2024 cam­paign. Giv­en Repub­li­cans’ lack of com­pet­i­tive­ness in Wash­ing­ton, the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty has no incen­tive to invest in a Republican.

Mul­let, in their eyes, would be the next best choice.

For­mer Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Par­ty Chair Chris Vance, who left the Repub­li­can Par­ty after it began to wor­ship Don­ald Trump, has blunt­ly declared on many occa­sions — and as recent­ly as this week — that Repub­li­cans have no chance of win­ning the gov­er­nor­ship in Wash­ing­ton. And we agree with his assessment.

Repub­li­cans just aren’t com­pet­i­tive at the statewide lev­el here any­more. They hold no statewide offices and their bench is incred­i­bly thin. Repub­li­cans last won a guber­na­to­r­i­al race in Wash­ing­ton in 1980. Yes, 1980. It’s been that long!

Mul­let’s Sen­ate seat comes up in pres­i­den­tial years, so he has to give it up in order to run for gov­er­nor. State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Bill Ramos declared this morn­ing that he is run­ning for that Sen­ate seat, which will open up his state House seat.

“I’m excit­ed for the oppor­tu­ni­ty to build on my record and bring my exper­tise to the State Sen­ate,” said Ramos.

“The 2024 elec­tions are going to be crit­i­cal for the future of our state and nation, and I’m eager to con­tin­ue work­ing for good jobs and infra­struc­ture invest­ments, safe­guard­ing health care rights, and mak­ing sure kids get the future they deserve– with good schools, safe com­mu­ni­ties, and action on cli­mate change.”

Ramos has the back­ing of his seat­mate, Lisa Callan, the 5th Dis­tric­t’s oth­er State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive, a for­mer Issaquah school board member.

“Bill and I have a strong part­ner­ship in the House, which will con­tin­ue when he is in the Sen­ate,” said Callan. “Togeth­er we’ve deliv­ered for the com­mu­ni­ties we serve, and we can do even more in the com­ing years.”

“I’m hap­py to endorse his cam­paign for Sen­ate, and appre­ci­ate his sup­port for the lead­er­ship I’ll con­tin­ue show­ing in the State House.”

With Mul­let now a declared can­di­date, the field of cred­i­ble con­tenders on the Demo­c­ra­t­ic side stands at three. King Coun­ty Exec­u­tive Dow Con­stan­tine has decid­ed against run­ning in 2024 and won’t be a can­di­date, while Franz and Fer­gu­son have launched their cam­paigns and are busy fundrais­ing. On the Repub­li­can side, there’s Raul Gar­cia and Semi Bird. Gar­cia ran in 2020 and is try­ing again; Bird is an ultra MAGA can­di­date court­ing the par­ty’s extrem­ist base.