Surveillance

Updates on the U.S. surveillance state

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Local News:

I wrote a piece about Seattle’s efforts to pull together a coordinated gun violence prevention strategy, which took some doing given the focus on Chief Barnes’s resignation during the time I was trying to research and write it. 

I also wrote about new Seattle legislation to ban algorithmic price discrimination, or surveillance pricing based on personal information, for Seattleites buying groceries. The committee vote on amendments to the ordinance will be on September 18. 

Speaking of Seattle’s police chief saga, here are a couple of interviews with interim Chief Andre Sayles. PubliCola reported on how much time Barnes spent out of the office (almost 40% of the time this year) and on how much his payout will be. And two of SPD’s command staff brought in by Barnes are leaving SPD.

Meanwhile, councilmembers are still angry that the press conference after the Bite of Seattle shooting was delayed for five hours, and the Mayor’s Office has asked the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) to conduct an independent after-action review about communications. The review won’t be completed until mid-December.

In other news, there’s another hunger strike at the Northwest ICE Processing Center, and the conditions there continue to be terrible and shocking. ICE will be spending up to $20 million on torture gloves that deliver a painful shock at the press of a button. 

In better news, the Washington State Department of Revenue has performed a new analysis on the millionaires tax and thinks it will bring in more revenue than expected. The new estimate expects $3.1 billion in its first year (instead of $2.7 billion originally predicted) and $8.3 billion in the 2029-2031 biennium (instead of $6.9 billion).

Surveillance news:

The Community Not Cameras coalition toured SPD’s Real Time Crime Center (RTCC) this week, and it didn’t go so well. Coalition members left with many concerns in spite of a Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce poll that shows strong support for cameras. Reading the questions asked in the poll is instructive as to how seriously to take it.

Flock Safety’s PR disaster continues, with 404 Media reporting that they pitched a plan to put their license plate readers in the vehicles of Uber and Lyft drivers. In fact, the press around Flock has gotten so bad they’ve announced some changes, including shortening their standard data retention window from 30 days to 7 days. Their efforts at damage control aren’t stopping many cities from switching from Flock license plate readers to Axon license plate readers, which doesn’t permanently address the concerns many residents have about these cameras and the expanding surveillance state. 

Today Wired published a new story reporting that Flock has built an AI system/tool that can identify drivers and track vehicles by their patterns of movement alone, facilitated by the large network of Flock cameras across the country. It appears that the tool is currently in the testing phase. As Wired wrote:

“Privacy and legal experts say Flock’s tools already raise serious constitutional concerns by giving police broad, often warrantless access to a vast record of people’s movement. But the prompts WIRED examined go further, turning a tool for finding a known vehicle into one that casts suspicion on drivers based on where and how often they drive, regardless of whether they are wanted for a crime.”

Meanwhile, the federal government has gotten in on the act by monitoring viral anti-Flock social media posts and surveilling protest gatherings and meetings. And DHS has been using Clearview AI facial recognition to help infiltrate activist groups.

Google’s AI Overview, while gutting newsrooms left and right, is spreading false information about the amount of valuable gold and copper that are inside Flock cameras, thereby accidentally encouraging users to vandalize the cameras for profit.

And people are going around cutting down and destroying Flock cameras, acts of civil disobedience that appear to be receiving significant public support.

Andrea Pitzer, who wrote a book about the global history of concentration camps, wrote an analysis that looks at what the new electric-shock gloves being obtained by ICE and the proliferation of Flock license plate reader cameras tells us about how the concentration camp regime/institutionalization of the police state in the US is going

Housekeeping:

I’m going to be taking some time off starting next week, so you won’t be hearing from me for a little while. But never fear, I’ll be back on the beat in time to cover Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson’s proposed budget. 

Recent Headlines:

Updates on the U.S. surveillance state Read More »

SPD police chief loses his cool

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Seattle News:

I’ve been closely covering the debate around universal school meals for students in Seattle, which you can read about here and here. Right now it looks like Seattle might get both universal school meals starting this fall and a voucher-based food program for weekends and school breaks. Today, Mayor Katie Wilson and the Seattle City Council released a joint statement indicating both branches of government are on board with the plan.

The City Council will be voting on a proposal to fund the universal school meals through the general fund on August 4 as part of their mid-year supplemental budget deliberations. 

I’ve seen a lot of speculation that one or more Seattle city councilmembers might have purposefully blocked Mayor Katie Wilson’s universal school meals proposal in order to tank her political capital and have a more successful mayoral run against her in 2029. I cannot say what lies in the hearts of the councilmembers, but something else to consider is the fact that the council isn’t particularly politically aligned with the mayor and might not be worried about crossing her in the same way they might have feared crossing Mayor Bruce Harrell, who helped many of them get elected. 

In the last few weeks, I also wrote about both the D5 Seattle City Council seat race and the 46th LD state representative race.

I’m sure you’re all aware of the tragic shooting at the Seattle Center during the Bite of Seattle food festival on Sunday. PubliCola reported that SPD Chief Shon Barnes was out of town at the time of the shooting, and indeed, was scheduled to be out of town until mid-August, in spite of summer tending to be a time of increased violence overall, and gun violence in particular. 

At a press conference about the shooting on Monday, Barnes snapped at a reporter from The South Seattle Emerald who was asking about his traveling habits, and his chief of staff Alex Ricketts had to step between Barnes and the reporter and escort Barnes away. You can watch the video clip here.

At another press conference today, Barnes was asked about the incident with the reporter and said it merely illustrated his passion for being a police officer. Someone has filed a complaint with the Office of Police Accountability (OPA) about the incident. Barnes was also asked again about his travel schedule, a question he tried to dismiss as quickly as possible.

Other News:

ICE is still getting Washington state data to assist in their immigration enforcement efforts, according to KUOW, meaning the state’s sanctuary law isn’t being fully enforced. This is in spite of the state denying tens of thousands of requests from ICE, the Department of Homeland Security, and Customs & Border Patrol. According to KUOW’s article:

““The records we’re getting show that the rejection doesn’t stop them from getting the data,” said Angelina Godoy, director of the UW Center for Human Rights. “They get rejected using one [Originating Agency Identifier] and then just submit their request under another one. There are thousands of still-open [Originating Agency Identifiers] they can use.””

Leaked video from the San Francisco Police Department’s drone program has shown one of the privacy risks of this surveillance technology. Ben Werdmuller, the senior director of technology at ProPublica, wrote an essay on his personal site about the more inherent problems with such ubiquitous surveillance. Furthermore, Werdmuller wrote that the police drones in San Francisco have had no impact on crime. 

Meanwhile, LAPD announced they will be letting their contract with Flock Safety expire. As 404 Media reported, “Notably, the decision came after an audit of ALPR technology found that, in a two-month period, the LAPD had improperly “investigated” 161 people whose cars were flagged as stolen in the LAPD’s ALPR system but were not actually stolen.” Here is that audit. 

Last week, the Renton City Council voted to continue to pause their use of Flock Safety stationary license plate readers in the city. However, they voted to resume use of in-vehicle license plate readers (these readers are from Axon, not Flock). It became clear during the councilmember discussion that in practice, the in-vehicle license plate readers will also not be used at present since they are not compliant with the new state law regulating the use of license plate readers (the same issue faced by the City of Seattle). While a technical fix might be possible to resume use of the Axon in-vehicle license plate readers, it is unclear if and when that will happen. 

Recent Headlines:

SPD police chief loses his cool Read More »

The U.S. is no longer a liberal democracy

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My reporting:

Right before my vacation, I wrote about the two WA state anti-trans initiatives that will be on the ballot this November. 

This week, I wrote about the news that Seattle and King County will be drastically downsizing the King County Regional Homelessness Authority (KCRHA) by taking back all their homeless provider contracts. I also wrote a bit about the new 2026 Point-in-Time Count report that shows that homelessness in the region is continuing to grow, albeit more slowly (meanwhile, unsheltered homelessness is growing more quickly).

In related news, PubliCola reported today that KCRHA CEO Kelly Kinnison might have been trying to avoid the public disclosure of some of her emails.

Stay tuned next week as I turn my attention to the FEPP levy and some interesting local election news. 

Other news:

Marcus Harrison Green has an insightful column out today about the news that Seattle didn’t have any homicides during the month of June. 

Once the World Cup was over, Mayor Katie Wilson did indeed turn off the surveillance cameras in the Stadium District. Their final fate is TBD depending on the all-important results of the audit she ordered earlier this year. At a rally this week, anti-surveillance activists demanded the removal of all the SPD surveillance cameras in the city. 

Speaking of surveillance, a former police officer from the Puyallup Police Department who retired in 2022 wrote an op-ed against the surveillance state and the use of Flock license plate readers in Puyallup. I think it is telling when even former police officers are speaking out against surveillance technology. 

And in Renton, the council voted to postpone their decision regarding their Flock license plate readers, which means for now, the cameras remain off.

Washington State will be on the hook for large penalty fees to the federal government (due to H.R. 1 from last year, what else?) if the state doesn’t improve its accuracy rate when dispensing food stamps. The Washington State Standard reported it could owe more than $90 million, a number that could increase due to the new SNAP work requirements, which could cause more errors as the state works to adapt.  

Yesterday, a judge ruled that the Northwest Detention Center, operated by the GEO Group, must allow Washington state Department of Health inspectors inside the facility. However, the inspectors do not need to be allowed to inspect areas of the facility operated by ICE, which immediately made me think of the recent reporting that CoreCivic sold two of its detention facilities in California to DHS in a move to avoid oversight. 

The injunctions ordered by the judge won’t go into effect for two weeks, giving the GEO Group time to appeal. 

And the U.S. lost its long-term status as a liberal democracy for the first time in over 50 years.

 “The scale and speed of autocratization under the Trump administration are unprecedented in modern times,” reads the V-Dem 2026 Democracy Report. “Within one year, the USA’s LDI score has declined by 24%; its world rank dropped from 20th to 51st place out of 179 nations.” 

Recent Headlines:

The U.S. is no longer a liberal democracy Read More »

SPD’s overtime spending has more than doubled in four years due to SPOG contract

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Local News:

I wrote a piece last week about new data out of King County’s DCHS showing that permanent supportive housing in the area is reducing jail bookings…and I attended the opening of DESC’s newest permanent supportive housing building, Birch Grove, located in Lake City. DESC isn’t moving forward on future building projects due to federal funding uncertainties. 

Lime is going to equip their scooters in Seattle with cameras. About half of their scooters have been fitted out with cameras so far, and all of them are planned to have cameras by the end of the year. The idea is it will make scooter riders behave better, but it also ups the surveillance on Seattle streets. 

HardPressed News reported that SPD was waiting for the mayoral election results last year with the belief that if Bruce Harrell won, he’d greenlight a police drone program. 

For more than two years, the Seattle Fire Department has been using an artificial intelligence program to listen to 911 calls and decide which callers won’t receive a rapid response and instead be routed to a nurse line located in Texas. What’s really amazing about this story, broken by The Seattle Times, is that the program has had no public review, wasn’t disclosed to any 911 callers, and has no apparent mechanisms for measuring how well it’s working. It also didn’t go through a surveillance impact review process.

“SFD will be open from now on about its AI use, said Lombard, the assistant chief.” This sentence in the article carries a lot of weight. It implies SFD will be open about their AI use in the future because they got caught. Not exactly the sort of thing that builds public trust. 

DivestSPD reported that SPD Chief Shon Barnes has received 47 OPA complaints since he began his job as Chief early last year, which is a very large number. Most of the complaints appear to be nothing burgers. They sometimes have interesting timing, suggesting a possible SPOG-coordinated attack against the Chief. 

Barnes is on track to receive more OPA complaints than his predecessor, Adrian Diaz.

Seattle City Council’s public safety committee received their SPD 2026 Q1 sworn staffing, overtime, and call time report on Tuesday. SPD’s Q1 2026 actual deployable number of officers is 939, only 13 officers more than in Q1 of 2025. 

The rate of hiring, along with the slow-down of officer separations, means SPD might be on track to overspend their salary budget by $1.7 million this year. Chair Bob Kettle said he and Councilmember Dan Strauss had told SPD not to slow down their hiring to account for this potential overspend. I reached out to Strauss’s office, and he said he has no plans to introduce an item in the mid-year supplemental budget to account for the $1.7 million. 

We also got to see how expensive SPD overtime has become due to the new SPOG contract. In 2022, SPD spent $26.3 million in overtime. In 2026? Their overtime budget stands at a whopping $55.8 million. 

King County’s new Point in Time Count for 2026 came out this week, showing that the region’s homelessness numbers continue to grow, albeit not as rapidly as they did between 2022 and 2024. While the overall number of homeless people grew by 9% in the last two years, the unsheltered population of homeless people grew by 21%, highlighting the urgent need for more shelter spaces. 

Finally, The Economist, that bastion of progressive thought, published an article this week entitled “American police killings are rising, even as murder rates fall.”

From the article: “Killings by police have yet to reignite the broad outrage that followed Mr Floyd’s death, but each day, unfortunately, brings the chance of a grisly event that might. Shootings by sheriffs, who operate mostly in rural areas, have risen especially fast in recent years, countering improvements in some big cities.”

Recent Headlines:

SPD’s overtime spending has more than doubled in four years due to SPOG contract Read More »

Surveillance cameras don’t prevent violence, or why I feel like a broken record

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Seattle News:

Yesterday several elected officials – Mayor Katie Wilson, Council President Joy Hollingsworth, Councilmembers Debora Juarez, Bob Kettle, Maritza Rivera, and Dan Strauss, and Seattle City Attorney Erika Evans – along with SPD Chief Shon Barnes, held a press conference about the gun violence along Aurora Ave N. 

Mostly those named above talked about solving the problem with police and prosecutions, as well as by the strategic blocking of certain streets. Kettle touted the importance of the real time crime center and license plate readers, although there is no evidence that shows these technologies prevent violence. Interestingly, Aurora Ave N is one of the zones where CCTV cameras have been installed and operational in Seattle, and yet somehow there is still gun violence happening there. Hmm. 

Kettle also spoke of the importance of hiring more police officers. 

Evans said her office has asked for funding for a dedicated Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) prosecutor, which she says would help get guns off the streets. Her office is also aggressively pursuing businesses and properties that break chronic nuisance laws. 

Lastly, her office is working to have a dedicated, dually-deputized prosecutor in their office that will work on felony trafficking cases on Aurora in partnership with the King County Prosecutor’s office. I’m not really sure why having this prosecutor work in the Seattle City Attorney’s office (CAO) versus the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s office (KCPAO) makes a difference. Traditionally CAO only prosecutes misdemeanors and gross misdemeanors, while the KCPAO handles all felonies. It could be that this might improve collaboration between the offices or it might be solely an issue of money (who’s going to pay for this prosecutor’s salary). 

Evans stated unequivocally that SOAP and SODA orders do not work and that she will be pursuing other strategies. 

Not mentioned were the environmental changes made to Aurora Ave in Shoreline that seem to have helped deter violence there. Solutions such as increased social supports, a coordinated gun violence prevention strategy, and legalized sex work were also not emphasized. 

That being said (see below), Wilson is reportedly working on a gun violence prevention strategy, but unfortunately the details still haven’t been announced. 

Meanwhile, The Seattle Medium reported that Black girls represent between 44% and 52% of child sex trafficking victims in King County. 

Earlier this week, the Seattle City Council passed the one-year data center moratorium and related resolution, after which Washington AI resistance (WA-AIR) held a press conference announcing a new campaign for their People’s AI Bill of Rights, which will be a package of bills regulating AI introduced during the 2027 state legislative session. The campaign will begin with a state-wide listening tour. 

Wilson announced that the City would be turning on the CCTV cameras located in the Stadium District due to “general but credible threats to security during the games” provided to her during briefings with SPD and the FBI. Two days before the announcement, she publicly defined a credible threat in more narrow terms, that being the standard she had originally announced she was planning to use to inform her decision as to whether to turn on the cameras. To read more about it, check out the op-ed by Phil Mocek published by PubliCola.

The Seattle Auditor’s Office released a status report on implementation of their recommendations covering the time period through December 2025. Of note:

  • Re their 2024 Annual Surveillance Technology Usage Review (released in September 2025), SDOT has implemented two out of eight recommendations.
  • Re their Four Recommendations to Better Understand and Address Current Gun Violence Patterns in Seattle (released in March 2025), all four recommendations remain pending: “The Mayor’s Office reported that they have begun development of a comprehensive gun violence reduction strategy that will build on work begun by the Human Services Department and be led by the Mayor. Specifically, the Mayor’s Office has begun to assess existing gun violence reduction programs, identify gaps, and build a comprehensive strategy sponsored by the Mayor.”
  • Re their Addressing Places in Seattle Where Overdoses and Crime are Concentrated: An Evidence-Based Approach (released in July 2024), two out of eight recommendations have been completed: “The Mayor’s Office reported that components of the Downtown Activation Team’s (DAT) work, including its place-based problem-solving methodology, are moving forward under the Stabilize, Activate, and Invest (SAIL) Subcabinet. The Mayor’s Office indicated they will tailor crime and overdose strategies, and the corresponding deployment of resources, to more specifically defined and localized problems, beginning with implementation of the Phố Đẹp safety plan in Little Saigon and the expansion of the Seattle Police Department’s Neighborhood Resource Officer program to 12th & Jackson and 3rd & Pine. The Mayor’s Office also indicated that the current administration does not intend to evaluate the preceding administration’s work of the DAT and Seattle Restoration Framework, but will instead collaborate with public health, public safety, and community partners to establish agreed upon metrics for success for each location and reporting expectations.”

A quick update on an earlier item regarding the possibility of a special fire district tax: PubliCola has reported that the firefighters’ union is opposed to the idea so the Mayor’s Office isn’t pursuing it this year. This means one fewer tool to address the $175 million deficit for 2027.

In SPD lawsuit news, two gay SPD officers are suing the department alleging discrimination and being passed over for promotion. The City of Seattle is paying a $2.6 million settlement in the lawsuit of four female SPD officers alleging sexual harassment from former Chief Adrian Diaz. The Seattle Times reports that three of the four women remain employed at SPD. 

For more uplifting news, I wrote about the soil-turning and future plans for a new health center in Rainier Beach. If you want to read about community members coming together to make a difference, this is the article for you. 

Other news: 

I wrote about an inmate who died of an overdose last year while in custody at SCORE jail. I really encourage you to check this one out because the ongoing issues at SCORE are for the most part not being covered by mainstream media like The Seattle Times or the local news networks. I dove deeper into the quality of healthcare being offered by jails and prisons in general, and it’s an ugly story that has parallels to how people detained by ICE are being treated. 

I also dove into last year’s King County DCHS audit with an update on what’s been found and what measures are being taken to ensure accountability and transparency as DCHS goes about their work. 

King County Executive Girmay Zahilay gave his State of the County address this week and committed to investing “nearly $5 million” in the Regional Office of Gun Violence Prevention. I’m not clear on how much of this is additive, but as an important office that is perennially under-funded, this is good news. 

The City of Edmonds unanimously voted to cancel the City’s contract with Flock Safety for automated license plate readers.

Finally, Jeff Asher wrote that large police departments are beginning to grow their ranks again, after a contraction after the Covid-19 pandemic began in 2020. 

Asher wrote, “The hiring environment still isn’t great for police officers, but it is far improved from where it was three or four years ago. Most medium and large police departments will likely be stuck at considerably smaller levels than they were pre-COVID, but the evidence suggests they might see slow and steady growth over the next few years.”

Recent Headlines:

Surveillance cameras don’t prevent violence, or why I feel like a broken record Read More »

Will Seattle run a ballot initiative next year to unleash the CARE team?

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Seattle news:

I wrote about the imperilment of the Graham Street and Boeing Access Road light rail stations. The Sound Transit vote on the issue took place on Thursday, and the Graham Street station is back on track, mostly because Seattle stepped up to make it happen. Unfortunately, Boeing Access Road and three Ballard stations didn’t fare as well. 

I also wrote about the obstacles facing the CARE team. Yes, I’ve written about it before, but 1.there still seems to be confusion about it, and 2. I wanted to present a few new options on the table to address it. 

As we all know, Seattle is facing a significant budget deficit for 2027. One option on the table, reported on by PubliCola, is a special fire district tax that would move much of the Seattle Fire Department’s budget out of the general fund by raising property taxes to pay for it instead. Interesting idea, and only possible because of a law change earlier this year in the state legislature. 

Residents along the Aurora Ave North corridor have been putting up makeshift barricades to address the gun violence in their neighborhood. Mayor Katie Wilson has directed SDOT to replace these barricades with temporary traffic calming treatments expected to be installed sometime this weekend. 

Meanwhile, the Council will be considering a bill that would allow SPD and SDOT to close streets for public safety reasons.

At the same time, the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office reports that deadly gun violence incidents in Seattle and King County have continued to drop. As Capitol Hill Seattle Blog reports: “In her office’s latest updates, Manion says the first quarter of 2026 marked a new milestone in the return to safer levels as deadly shootings dropped to “single digits” for the first time in nine years.” 

AI/Surveillance/Immigration news:

A new report from the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights found that “without deliberate and outcome-oriented interventions, AI will likely amplify the racial wealth gap rather than narrow it.”

I reported on the large data center moratorium currently being discussed by the Seattle City Council. Committee votes are expected on Wednesday. 

404 Media reported that the FBI wants to buy nation-wide access to automatic license plate reader data. The most likely vendors for this would be Flock Safety and Motorola Solutions.

Meanwhile, the city of Renton suspended their Flock contract and the city of Edmonds cancelled their Flock contract, following in the footsteps of Mountlake Terrace and Lynnwood. Everett and Stanwood have ceased their pause of their Flock networks, however, and are back to using them . 

The Electronic Frontier Foundation analyzed millions of police searches of Flock license plate data and found that “law enforcement agencies have moved beyond specific investigations to use these surveillance networks for virtually any whim.” Their analysis looked at police use of this surveillance for school district residency checks, background checks, and noise complaints. 

I reported on the temporary contract between the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma and ICE, which has lowered the standards for the facility. I also covered the new lawsuit the Washington State Attorney General filed against the GEO Group, who operates the center, to allow the state department of health to perform inspections of the facility.. 

Last week The Stranger reported that ICE transferred leaders of a hunger strike at the detention center away from the Tacoma center in what advocates say was retaliation.

Recent Headlines:

Will Seattle run a ballot initiative next year to unleash the CARE team? Read More »

Seattle looks to tighten its budget belt for 2027

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Seattle News:

I wrote about how Seattle’s new drug ordinance is going about two and a half years in. It’s not good, to put it mildly. Drug arrests are up, LEAD referrals are down. Even Councilmember Bob Kettle thinks it’s a failure. Be on the lookout for a revamped drug ordinance later this year. And District 2 only had 2 LEAD referrals in a one year period. I checked in with Councilmember Eddie Lin’s office after the public safety committee presentation, but he hadn’t yet received any answers as to why that is the case. 

SPOG made an interesting X post last week, calling Kent Loux, SPOG’s new president, “Seattle’s top cop union boss” and blaming “what’s gutting downtown” on socialism. But hey, at least Loux hasn’t started up his own SPOG podcast…yet. 

Mayor Katie Wilson and her Budget Director Ali Pennucchi sat down with Brian Callanan on the Seattle Channel to discuss Seattle’s budget. 2027’s budget now has a $175 million deficit. Wilson has asked all city departments to prepare models for 5% and 10% cuts, and has said she wants to address the deficit through a combination of cuts and new revenue. 

Wilson said there’s no “silver bullet” when it comes to a new progressive revenue source that could provide a permanent fix for Seattle’s structural budget problem. 

Wilson also said she didn’t foresee winding down the work of the United Care Team anytime soon. 

You can read my live-posting of the budget presentation here. It’s worth noting that $175 million is close to 10% of the total $2 billion General Fund. 

PubliCola wrote about an Office of the Inspector General (OIG) audit on the practice of retiring SPD officers going on extended leave to take advantage of accumulated sick leave. A new policy requiring officers to provide verification for taking sick leave is supposed to go into effect later this year. 

Looking at this coming Tuesday’s public safety committee agenda, the OIG will also be doing an audit on SPD overtime usage in the future, so that should be interesting. 

PubliCola covered what appears to be some communication issues between the new Mayor’s Office and the City Council. The land use committee still ultimately approved Wilson’s shelter expansion proposal. 

Surveillance News:

The City Council of Shoreline cancelled a planned meeting with Flock Safety after residents expressed their dismay.

Both Tukwila and Renton had Flock Safety/ALPRs on their agendas for their Monday, 5/4 meetings. 

Issaquah has Flock on the agenda for their Monday evening meeting on 5/11. 

WA State News:

Last week I published a story all about the Washington State Supreme Court elections, with a majority of the seats on the Court being on the ballot this year. I spent a lot of extra time on this piece because I think so much is at stake with these elections, so I hope you check it out and pass it along to others. 

Oh, election season! The filing deadline for this year was Friday, May 8 at 5pm. In addition to the 5 state Supreme Court justice seats, all 98 state House seats and 24 of the 49 state Senate seats are up for grabs. 

Governor Bob Ferguson and Attorney General Nick Brown have filed a suit against The GEO Group, the private operator of the immigrant detention facility in Tacoma, and the GEO Group recently signed a six-month extension of their contract with ICE. I have a new piece covering this news, including concerning details about this new contract, that should be published any time now. 

Speaking of Ferguson, his tight rules on government agencies and departments’ communications with the press have led to delays on important communications to the public, such as bridge repair updates, public health vaccine guidelines, and the like. Agency officials have been repeatedly complaining about the impacts of these strict guidelines. 

The press also has less access to the Governor in general, with Ferguson holding fewer press conferences and general press availability periods. 

Recent Headlines:

 

Seattle looks to tighten its budget belt for 2027 Read More »

State millionaires income tax: a big swing among budget cuts

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Seattle News:

Last week I chatted with Hannah Sabio-Howell, who is challenging Washington State Senator Jamie Pedersen for his seat in the 43rd LD. I expect this to shape up to be an interesting race!

I also recently covered the current backlog over at the Seattle City Attorney’s Office, and how City Attorney Erika Evans is planning to adjust workflow to try to deal with it. Evans also said the office needs more money, which could be difficult given Mayor Katie Wilson recently asked all city departments to prepare a list of potential cuts for this year’s budget season. 

And I reported on SPD’s committee report in response to a budget SLI passed last November on their federal immigration enforcement policies. I used quotes liberally in this article because it was one of those meetings where I felt it was important for people to know what had been said. 

I’ll have an article out very soon about the detention facilities moratoriums in Seattle, King County, and elsewhere, as well as some more news out of the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma. 

SPD has claimed that its real time crime center has tripled “the odds that a victim receives justice.” PubliCola wrote about what this means, pointing out that SPD is defining “receiving justice” as arrests made (with no details about prosecution, jail time, or how the RTCC was involved), which can also result in overpolicing.

Almost a month ago, CARE Chief Amy Barden attended a Public Safety committee meeting to reiterate what she’s been saying all along: that the new SPOG contract approved in December is preventing Seattle’s CARE team from doing their jobs. I was on vacation at the time, but Erica Barnett wrote a great article on the topic, which also links to her live reporting on Bluesky. 

Memorably, Barden was chided by Councilmember Martiza Rivera for being honest about the impacts of the new SPOG contract on the CARE team. 

“I agree there’s plenty of work to go around, and we need to work together,” Rivera said. “And so what I would like to see is working together, less accusatory language, and how can you be, you know, a person of change, to really work together to make things happen. So rather than constantly pointing out maybe the negative and what is not going well, let’s hear about what is going well and how you can help make things better.”

From her words, it sounds like Rivera doesn’t want to hear about the negative consequences of her vote on the SPOG contract, nor does she appear to want to grapple with the reality that the police are blocking the effective deployment of alternative response in Seattle.

WA State News:

The big news has been the passage of the millionaires’ income tax after over 24 hours of debate in the House. It even looks like Governor Bob Ferguson might agree to sign it! In return, lawmakers have rolled back last year’s increase on the estate tax, bringing down the top rate from 35% to 20%.

Included in the millionaires tax is a rollback of a sales tax on services passed last year, set to take effect in 2029. Because cities and counties collect sales tax (not just the state), this repeal will have an effect on local municipalities’ bottom lines, as well as Sound Transit’s finances.

The legislature also passed the state’s operating budget. There is already an $878 million budget hole expected for 2027, which will have to be dealt with next session. Legislators used the rainy day fund and a few discontinued tax breaks to try to close this year’s budget gap, which was worsened by the state having to pay large amounts on lawsuit payouts for government misconduct. The budget includes cuts to child care, Transition to Kindergarten, and local effort assistance money for public school students.  

The ALPR bill also made it through concurrence and is on its way for the governor’s signature. I’ll be writing in detail about what’s actually in the final bill and what it means for surveillance in the state.

On Flock license plate readers specifically: Flock updated its terms and conditions on February 16, 2026, making several changes. Of particular note, Flock now has a perpetual license to use Customer Data (meaning even after a specific contract ends or is canceled) and Flock is now allowed to use all Customer Data for its own product development. The terms for privacy commitments around training data have been removed from the new contract, including the commitment to never sell or share the training data with third parties. 

Other changes have been made, including making the agreement governed by the laws of the State of Georgia, after mandatory mediation and arbitration. You can read about all the changes here.

Recent Headlines:

State millionaires income tax: a big swing among budget cuts Read More »

Seattle, Washington State brace for potential ICE impact

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AI, ICE, Surveillance:

During the last two weeks, I’ve written two in-depth articles. 

The first takes a look at Washington state legislators’ attempts to regulate AI this year. 

The second takes a look at state and local leaders’ response to ICE actions in Minneapolis and elsewhere. Washington State Attorney General Nick Brown said we’re now experiencing a constitutional crisis. 

Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson released some responses to prepare for ICE’s possible invasion of Seattle. Notably missing from the list was anything having to do with surveillance. 

404 Media reports that a Houston-area police intelligence center has instructed police to “be as vague as permissible” about why they’re using Flock license plate reader surveillance data. These kinds of instructions will make the audits available via public record request less useful for determining if and when surveillance data is being shared for purposes such as immigration enforcement or seeking out people trying to get reproductive care.

WA State News:

Wednesday marks the policy committee cut-off for this short legislative session. Any bills that haven’t been passed out of their respective policy committees by the end of the day Wednesday will be officially dead for the session. The fiscal committee cut-off is Monday, February 9. 

The Washington State Democrats have finally dropped the bill containing their much touted “millionaires” tax. The bulk of the new tax, which wouldn’t be collected until April 2029 and is expected to generate more than $3 billion a year, would go straight to the state’s general fund, with a few tax breaks and 5% dedicated to a new fund to help counties pay for public defense costs.

Meanwhile, Governor Bob Ferguson, who used his support for this tax to paper over the budget cuts he was proposing, has come out and said he actually cannot support it after all–at least, not without changes. He wants more tax breaks and less investment in services.

Other proponents of the tax would like to see more of the new tax allocated for specific uses such as education, rather than all go into the general fund where it could be used for a mishmash of priorities.

Meanwhile, state Senate Majority Leader Jamie Pedersen says there’s no path forward for a state-wide payroll expense (a la JumpStart) tax. Pedersen implies that big business’s dislike for this tax has played a role in his lack of support for it. 

The Washington State Supreme Court is having a big election in November, with four justice seats (out of nine) up for grabs. These races will shape the future of the court for potentially years to come.

Seattle News:

A King County jury found the City of Seattle negligent in responding to the fatal shooting of teenager Antonio Mays Jr. in the CHOP in 2020. 11 out of the 12 jurors agreed on the verdict, which is sufficient for a civil trial in Washington state. The city will be paying out $30.5 million. 

Last week, Mike Solan, who is still president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG)–although he is expected to step down later this month– responded to Mayor Wilson’s announcement of actions to prepare for ICE’s eventual descent onto Seattle. Solan wrote the following message on X: “Toothless virtue signaling rhetoric like this has already cost two people their lives. The concept of pitting two armed law enforcement agencies against each other is ludicrous, and will not happen. I will not allow SPOG members to be used as political pawns.”

PubliCola reported that CARE Chief Amy Barden has not had a single one-on-one meeting with SPD Chief Shon Barnes since he began in the position a year ago. 

Barden told PubliCola that “the sergeants who decide whether to dispatch CARE are increasingly sending out community service officers (CSOs)—civilian SPD employees without formal training in mental health care or social work—to calls that Barden says should go to CARE.”

Recent Headlines:

Seattle, Washington State brace for potential ICE impact Read More »

Two weeks after UW report, WA’s driver data is still accessible for immigration enforcement

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WA State News:

I’ve written two big stories about surveillance, personal data, and the state over the past two weeks. 

One of them covers a recent University of Washington (UW) Center of Human Rights report that found that the Washington State Department of Licensing is almost certainly still sharing personal driver data with ICE. 

Yesterday, I received an update from the UW Center of Human Rights saying they’ve been able to identify an additional six cases in which ICE or the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) queried data from the Washington State Department of Licensing (DOL) prior to conducting immigration arrests. At least two of these six cases are confirmed to have been civil immigration arrests. The center expects to continue discovering more such cases in the future. 

In addition, the center confirmed that the state has not taken any action to cut off CBP from accessing Washington state’s driver information from the DOL, even though the majority of relevant queries are performed by CBP. ICE Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) also retains the ability to query the DOL’s data. 

It has been two weeks since the UW Center of Human Rights’ report was released showing the DOL’s data is still being used for civil immigration enforcement in the state of Washington. 

Angelina Godoy, founding director of the UW Center for Human Rights, was the guest on an episode of the podcast In the Meanwhile, released today. During the podcast, Godoy said, “We need to demand more of our state governments to hold them accountable to promises that they have already made. I think many state governments, and I believe Washington is one of them, are scrambling to figure out ways to keep folks safe, but this is a way they can do that. It’s a vulnerability they have known about, and it’s a decision on their part not to have taken action to date. So that’s why this is alarming.” 

My other story covers an automated license plate reader (ALPR) bill currently working its way through the legislature. It just had its first hearing on Tuesday. It’s important to note that while regulating the use of these cameras is an improvement over the complete lack of regulation that is the current status quo, privacy advocates told me it would be much safer if ALPRs were banned altogether. 

During an executive session of this bill on Thursday, a substitute bill was approved that raises the retention time of the ALPR data from 72 hours (which advocates already said was too long) to 21 days. Negotiations are ongoing, and some local privacy groups have set up an action to take.

Unsurprisingly, some people are unhappy with all the cuts proposed in Governor Bob Ferguson’s 2026 supplemental budget. Rep. Shaun Scott’s bill to impose a payroll expense tax similar to the JumpStart tax across the state received a hearing on Thursday, but we already know Ferguson is “not a big fan.” 

In other tax news, the legislature is revisiting the idea of a tax on short-term rentals like Airbnb and Vrbo, to be used by local municipalities for affordable housing and rental assistance. In favor are the aforementioned cities and counties; opposed are Airbnb operators. 

Rep. Julia Reed’s bill, HB 2098, would close a tax loophole for big tech companies and use the money to provide a fully funded higher education for Washington families earning 100% of median family income or below. It had a hearing on Wednesday, and both the University of Washington and Washington State University Pullman testified against the bill in spite of the cuts to higher education in Ferguson’s budget proposal. 

Reed noted on social media that both of those universities receive donations from Amazon and Microsoft, who are current beneficiaries of the tax loophole. 

Fewer people are buying Obamacare coverage for 2026 due to the failure of Congress to renew the enhanced federal subsidies that made such coverage more affordable. In Washington State, 277,255 people enrolled for Obamacare in 2026, compared to 291,493 in 2025–a difference of 14,238. I’ll take this opportunity to remind us all that studies show that expanding Medicaid eligibility decreases violence. Assumedly, kicking people off their insurance (or making it unaffordable) could have the opposite effect. 

PubliCola reported on a few bills that would help codify the rights of unhoused people in the state. HB 2266 would prohibit shelter and temporary housing bans and make it easier to site these housing resources, while HB 2489 would prohibit cities from passing bans on sleeping and other survival activities unless they can show they have enough available “adequate” shelter, which means shelter that wouldn’t involuntarily separate a person from their partner or their pet, for example.

PubliCola also reported on HB 1125, which would allow people to apply for resentencing. (Washington State doesn’t have parole, making this bill especially salient.) 

Seattle News:

During her first week in office, my Urbanist editor Doug Trumm and I were able to go to City Hall to interview new Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson. 

Last week I also sat down and spoke to Nilu Jenks, who is running for the Seattle City Council District 5 seat this November. 

Carolyn Bick recently published some top-notch investigative reporting in The Stranger. They uncovered a recent report from Madison’s  Office of the Independent Monitor documenting a failed body-worn camera pilot program stewarded by Chief Shon Barnes at his old police department in Madison. Critically, the report found that “Barnes had ignored City Council’s “multiple directives” for essential, specific guardrails, which likely violated state law.” 

The report specifically said the failure was Barnes’. 

This information is especially important given Barnes is overseeing the rapid expansion of SPD’s surveillance program. Seattleites may wonder: if Barnes felt comfortable disregarding many of the Madison City Council’s directives about the body worn camera pilot in 2024, will he feel similarly empowered to run Seattle’s surveillance “pilot” as he sees fit today? 

Given the current federal risks towards immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community, and people of color, the stakes around surveillance are very real and very high. 

Last week, SPD’s policy office sent an unsigned directive to instruct officers on how to respond to calls about ICE. PubliCola sums up this policy succinctly: “If you see someone being grabbed off the street or attacked by ICE in Seattle, feel free to call the local police—just don’t expect them to do anything about it.”

PubliCola also reported on SPD hiring in 2025, finding that 90% of its officer hires were men.

Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE are looking into expanding their detention capacity in the local area. According to a 187-page draft contract dated December 2025, “The objective of this contract is to obtain comprehensive detention, transportation, and food services for ICE detainees located in the Seattle, WA area in support of the ICE ERO Seattle Field Office.”

Body camera footage from the protest at last year’s Memorial Day far-right Mayday USA event was released that shows SPD officers’ intent to respond violently to protesters. SPD Officer Matthew Didier can be heard saying, “We’re here to fuck people up now,” and “We’re going in this time with guns blazing and all our pieces in place.”

This was only a few months after the Seattle City Council passed a new ordinance giving SPD greater leeway to use less lethal weapons at protests. This legislation paved the way for Seattle’s exit from an extremely lengthy consent decree that was prolonged due to SPD’s violent behavior during the George Floyd protests of 2020. 

The Seattle LGBTQ Council sent a letter last week saying that nearly all investigations relating to misconduct at the 2025 Memorial Day protest have been completed. Out of 28 allegations against 13 officers, only two have been sustained against a single officer, who received a written reprimand. 

Finally, the board of the Seattle Social Housing Developer fired its CEO, Roberto Jimenez, last week. Tiffani McCoy of House Our Neighbors has stepped up to serve as its interim CEO. 

Recent Headlines:

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Everything else:

Two weeks after UW report, WA’s driver data is still accessible for immigration enforcement Read More »