november 2026
general
election

portland, or

By the time the lights from high above reach us, the quality of the incandescence changes from a pert white to a disperse yellow, as if the brightness itself gets tired in the distance between the bulb and floor. It makes the room feel like a television set. 

I have asked for my friends’ patience as I find something. The room’s crowded. They fall silent. Somehow I track their faces as I look down at my phone, like the eerie reptilian feeling of sensing the road when you glance down to change a song. After twenty seconds, I feel them wondering if it’s more polite to keep waiting or if they can move on with the conversation. 

I wish they’d talk amongst themselves, but I hear myself say something inanely to keep them on the hook. “Where is it?” 

They remain quiet. The room burbles beyond us, a pillowy vacuum of sound just where we’re standing. It reminds me of a dream sequence. I flit past the precious junk in my camera roll — a haircut I like, a license plate I like, graffiti I like — and find it.   

I hand the screen over and wait for an instant zap of recognition. It doesn’t come, so I explain: “It’s an ad for a drop-ship necklace that’s Sisyphus pushing the boulder up the hill, except Sisyphus is a silver-plated charm and the boulder is a pearl.” 

They laugh indulgently. It is stupid, they can see, and it shouldn’t exist, they agree. One says, “I guess it looks like it could make a good fidget.”

I realize that I’m waiting for them to scream or howl or rip their shirts off. I click the phone off. We move on. 

It sticks with me like an itch. My positionality as a prissy, indignant consumer in America is so loud. I moan to myself, Someone in a factory strained with their eyes and worked with their hands to mass-produce a necklace so that the girlies can push the boulder up the silver-plated necklace, which also comes in gold-plated, and ranges in price from $113 at an online-only boutique to $11 for an identical drop-shipped necklace sold on Etsy. We’ve commodified this vengeful god Greek myth, this Albert Camus One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy existentialist final boss lesson, so that here in America we can be quirky and self-aware about the grind, rolling the boulder up the hill. 

This, while someone working a factory job repetitively makes the trinket. The trinket requires human skill and labor to craft and ultimately is also ugly. Instagram served me the ad based on my behavior and my interests. 

I care about a lot of things. My family, my friends, my students, my dog, the snow geese, you name it. I care about the world that created the Sisyphus charm necklace as a logical eventuality of overconsumption and self-consciousness. I care about a world without the Sisyphus charm necklace. What can I do to create a world without the Sisyphus charm necklace? Do I have the energy and the integrity to work my whole life, even if it feels futile and resultless, to create a world without the Sisyphus charm necklace? 

This fall, if you caught me unawares when you said hello at the club or in the supermarket line, it’s because I was considering the following: 

I’M NO CENTRIST DEMOCRAT BUT I REALLY NEED TO SEE THE HEAT IN THE PRIMARIES 

Like you, I have a lot of theories about why we’re living on this razor’s edge in the political binary (ideological, epistemological, astrological, and so forth). It sure is sharp underfoot. I hate to drag the heavy Baggu of “Vote Blue No Matter Who” because it keeps rewarding the sort of sniveling mediocrity that pushes the rich, corrupt, spineless Democratic party further to the center-right.  I will not rest until the Zoe Leonard “I want a dyke for president” (1992) manifesto comes true AND EVEN THEN catch me not resting!!! I’d like to see the party gutted and overtaken by Democratic Socialists et al. I think we could and should be doing this in Oregon. 

In our lifetimes, we need to get our furthest left candidates chosen as the Democratic candidates in the primaries so they can run head-to-head against Republicans in the general election. There will be so many barriers against this, but what the fuck are we going to do, never try anything inspired in our entire lives? At the minimum, regular people like us will need to hustle, organize, knock on doors, and convince our family and friends in the primaries to achieve meaningful change in this godforsaken two-party system. 

The General Election in the year of our lord November 2026 is not when we take a brave stand against the centrist Democrats. In statewide races, even our most centrist candidates are neck-in-neck with Republicans who are off-leash and at their most insane — transphobia, violence against immigrants, burying the Epstein files, ad nauseam. I’ve never seen them act worse and pretend to be so reasonable. Our governor race is within 2% of going Republican, and we have a goddamn Green Party candidate in the mix whose voter pamphlet statement literally says, “The Protest Vote” up top. THIS IS NOT THE TIME FOR A PROTEST VOTE IF YOUR PROTEST VOTE RESULTS IN A REPUBLICAN GOVERNOR WHO WILL ROLL OUT THE RED CARPET FOR ICE AND TAKE GENDER-AFFIRMING CARE OUT OF OHP. HELLO????? IS THIS THING ON?????? 

VOTING ISN’T EVERYTHING BUT EVEN THE MOST OPPRESSED AND DISENFRANCHISED AMERICAN VOTER WIELDS SIGNIFICANT POWER OVER THE AVERAGE CLIMATE REFUGEE IN A COUNTRY THAT AMERICA HAS WORKED TIRELESSLY TO EXPLOIT

Aren’t you tired of the stakes continuing to be so, so high for each election? I can feel myself click into heightened rhetoric, and I worry that I sound like the Democrat fundraising text messages begging for donations to defend democracy. But we’re at a fever pitch, no? For our immigrant families and neighbors experiencing Portland’s October surge of ICE arrests, our trans friends, our educators, our nurses in understaffed hospitals? 

Voting is not the most profound site for transformation, but think about everyone who CAN’T vote. They’re still profoundly impacted by the violent wheel of electoral politics. Think about global climate disasters which disproportionately affect brown people in the Global South due to horrendous decisions about data centers and climate change mitigation in the West, like Nepal’s August glacier flash flood, which killed over 1,400 innocent people. Nepal’s terrain makes it extremely vulnerable to deadly consequences of rising global temperatures, though it contributes just 0.08% of global greenhouse gas emissions. In our lifetimes, we will see more and more climate disasters in exploited, “least-developed” nations, and the most-developed nations with the worst carbon emissions will seal their borders, deport climate refugees, crank their ACs on 117 degree days, and use ChatGPT to tell them what to make for dinner.  

If you sit down with your ballot, read this guide, click around to a few more to cross-reference your opinions, you’ll have spent, what, 30 minutes to vote? For free? So that our trans friends can still have their top surgeries covered by OHP this time next year? So that the National Guard can’t unconstitutionally come to Oregon to support ICE in their deportation circus? HELLO??????? 

AS WE ADAPT, OUR OPPS ADAPT TOO

We just saw this happen on a national scale with AIPAC. After years of endorsing and funding pro-Israel candidates in the US government, the backlash has been so severe and the tracking so precise that AIPAC decided to halt direct endorsements and PAC contributions. But AIPAC influence hasn’t disappeared. Their goons are just going to funnel contributions back through individuals and other less-traceable means. 

Likewise, back on the ranch, the Portland Metro Chamber and Portland Business Alliance have been meddling in elections and local politics since time immemorial. Seeing who they endorse or lobby for is a helpful litmus test for weeding out red flags. I think of them as our city’s local recurring villains, à la Him in the Powerpuff Girls or the Big Bad on Buffy. 

Pro-worker organizers have gotten better and better at pointing the finger at them, so now they and their like-minded cronies have rebranded. Keep your eye out for new incestuous PACs, 501c3s, and alliances such as Go Portland Go, Coalition for Portland’s Future (same folks at Portland Metro Chamber, like Doug Moore and lobbyist Jon Isaacs), and United for Portland (Portland Metro Chamber, Portland Metropolitan Association of Realtors PAC, etc). Read more here and here. 

One of Go Portland Go’s insufferable Instagram-sponsored posts is titled: “THE VOTER GUIDE FOR NORMIES.” LMAOOOO 

This Mercury article explains, “Go Portland Go’s second-highest donor is local billionaire and Columbia Sportswear CEO Tim Boyle, who donated $25,000 in June, the latest in his consistent donations to conservative causes. Boyle recently donated $100,000 to the Community Safety Coalition—a failed effort to move Portland Clean Energy Fund dollars to hire more police officers.” Keep following the money and coalition members, and you’ll see a bunch of bougie restaurant groups, real estate brokers, and advocates for homelessness sweeps. 

Why so many PACs in Portland right now? Well, shit has gotten real interesting around here ever since we introduced ranked-choice voting and an expanded city council. Broadly speaking, PACs can bypass campaign contribution limits because they’re not bound by the same individual or organizational campaign finance limits. They aggregate resources to achieve broad goals. Many of these more conservative/”moderate” PACs have sprouted specifically to unseat the progressive majority we currently have on Portland City Council. They’re dumping money into mailers for all the conservative and “moderate” candidates who otherwise would not have gained much traction on their own. Don’t worry — progressives have PACs and coalitions too, like Portland For All, Progressive Voice for Oregon, Youth PAC, Portland Voter Guide PAC, Oregon Futures Lab, Building Power for Communities of Color PAC, Esperanza PAC, and more.  

We’ll adapt, but so will they. On and on we go...pushing…the…rock… 

MUCH OF OUR SUFFERING EXISTS BECAUSE WE HAVE NOT FIGURED OUT A MEANINGFUL WAY TO TAX ULTRA-WEALTHY CORPORATIONS

I see infighting in the unions. I see the split on the PPS school board about shutting down schools. I see the homelessness crisis. If we could tax corporations even a teensie weensie bit of their fair share, we would be having much different conversations. 


Support candidates who are closing corporate tax loopholes and taking brave stances because these fuck-ass PACs and corporations will do everything in their mighty power to ensure that they fail. They are counting on the average voter being swayable and ill-informed. We have to read through doublespeak and blatant lies and try something different. Many Democrats wring their hands and say that if we tax corporations in Oregon, they will leave, taking jobs and resources with them. Imagine your friend saying, “When I ask my husband to do the dishes sometimes, he says he’ll leave me.” This is what y’all sound like to me……………

We have to try. Let’s see what happens. Maybe in the short term, some corporations will leave. Let’s hold the line and see what happens. We need fair corporate taxes nationwide or even worldwide so that these bitch-ass, profiteering-ass, looting-ass, insatiable-ass, filling-the-void-in-their-souls-ass, can’t-read-a-fucking-poem-and-feel-anying-ass LOSERS have nowhere to run. Problems are getting worse. We have seen that their greed is exponential and insatiable. We have seen the Mark Zuckerberg mega-yacht and the $50M Kylie Jenner Victoria’s Secret bra from our couches, where we decide that we can’t afford to order food tonight even though we are so fucking tired. 

If we give up and don’t keep our feet on the necks of corporations, we’re not even talking about maintaining the status quo. Ours is an inflationary world wherein gas prices can jump 9% in one month and be 34% higher than they were a year ago. If we keep compromising as we have been, our end of the stick gets shorter and shorter. 

We must jump at every chance to support candidates and legislation that bring us closer to an actual funding solution. Apathy and hopelessness cede ground to oligarchs. Ew!!!  

Housekeeping  ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

  • Election Day is Tuesday, November 3rd. Polls close at 8pm. Find your nearest ballot drop-box. Official drop-boxes can accept ballots all the way until 8pm. If you’re mailing, you can drop your unstamped ballot into your mailbox or any USPS blue box until, say, Wednesday, October 28th. After that, I’d go straight to a ballot drop-box. Because of federal cuts, USPS can no longer guarantee that ballots dropped into the mail on Election Day will be counted, though they’re trying. Until very recently, we were able to do that in Oregon. This is another example of systematic Republican despoliation of voting rights. Vanquish this attempt by planning ahead. Your public library is a drop-site, and they will give you an “I Voted” sticker. 

  • You can pick up a replacement ballot at the county Elections Office all the way until 8pm on Election Day. Track your ballot here. It’s worthwhile to double-check in case of some small, rectifiable disqualifier like election officers thinking your signature doesn’t match. Our county elections workers are the crème de la crème (so helpful, so kind, so competent), and can answer many, many questions for you: (503) 988-8683.  

  • I usually do not comment if a candidate is running unopposed, even if I really like or hate them. This guide is long enough. I stick to Portland, within Multnomah County, but I have a few special shoutouts outside of those boundaries. 

  • IF YOU NEED HELP WITH YOUR BALLOT — disabled, sick, or injured and need a porch pickup? Have a question about a replacement ballot? — DM ME. I will do my best to help find a solution with you. I am so serious. 

  • Positionally-speaking, I am a mixed Korean-American dyke who grew up in a low-income, immigrant family. I have a middle-class job and stable housing now. I write this guide purely as a side project, with a belief in people over profit, and crisis-stabilization over growth. Local government is one lever to reduce suffering and prevent further harm. Sometimes when I game it out, I end up supporting candidates who are more moderate because of polling data and electability. We have to be strategic to avoid losing ground, but when values-aligned risks are feasible, I believe we must jump. 
    My late, great mother raised me to believe in myself and others. She did not like it when I complained about the squirrels digging up my tulips because she believed that we share this beautiful and painful earth with each other, the animals and plants. I owe my special mom, Meehwa Yang 양 매화, my heart, my head, my critical thinking. I learned from her agonies and her untouchable wholeness. Many other people before me and alongside me have given me the gift of their stories, their conflicts, their complaints, their wishes. I thank my students, my families, my friends, my community, and innumerable others for making me a better person and shaping my priorities and perspectives.  
    My perspective also has many limitations because of my identities and experiences, and god knows I’ve been wrong before!

  • To that end, please use this voter guide as one of many sources before you come to your own gorgeous conclusions. I am limited and stupid (complimentary). I don’t work in politics. I work in mental health and public education. I am not an expert. I am not a journalist. I collect credible stories, venomous gossip, and shit-talk. I do this because I care about the city, and about you. Hit my line anytime. 

    I consulted: 

Good luck, I love ya. 

Candidates *ੈ✩·

US Senator: Jeff Merkley 

Remember when we were calling Jeff Merkley and begging him to break his silence and advocate for a Ceasefire in Gaza? Well, he did. I am glad to re-elect him. He hates Trump. He’s looking out for digital security and consumer data protections. He’s on the Senate Budget Committee and has been trying to curtail disastrous Republican cuts to health insurance and wild overspending on evil projects. His opponent, state senator David Brock Smith from Port Orford, loves Trump, loves cops, and wants more AI so we can “compete with China.”

US Representative, 1st District: Suzanne Bonamici 

Another longtime Dem incumbent, Bonamici is staying responsive. She has introduced legislation to put guardrails on AI, votes against Trump authoritarianism, serves on environmental committees and subcommittees, and sponsored Save Our Seas legislation. She gravely disappointed me in 2023 by voting to give Israel money, but came around to co-sponsor H.R. 3565 (the Block the Bombs Act), and snubbed Netanyahu by skipping his address to Congress in July 2024. 

US Representative, 3rd District: Maxine Dexter 

Dexter has earned my respect in a huge, huge way by using her office’s resources to support individual families in Oregon who have been detained by ICE, whether in her district or not. Dexter wants AI data centers to pay for their own energy and water use, and knows that right now, the amendments Democrats have passed to that end are not yet enforceable. She wants to stay on their asses. She will protect voting rights against the extremely insidious authoritarian measures happening in the federal government, will vote against tax breaks for billionaires, and has voted against the War in Iran at every possible turn. It is SO EERIE that no one is talking about Iran anymore. Trump intentionally paused strikes on Iran until after the November midterms because his administration knows how unpopular the war is, just as he timed most of the worst cuts of the Big Beautiful Bill to happen after the midterms. LOL.  

US Representative, 5th District: Janelle Bynum 

I know I had a lot to say about her in the primary election, but she is our most viable Democratic candidate in this race. This district is a very close, very purple one, so we shouldn’t split votes on Andrea Townsend in the Pacific Green Party. We need to use primaries to do that work. I do not understand why she voted yes on the Laken Riley Act twice, screwing over her many immigrant constituents with minor records, took AIPAC money, or voted against EPA waivers for clean cars…but I digress. 

A Democrat in this seat is better than a Republican in this seat, full stop. We had Lori Chavez-Deremer before Janelle Bynum and I hated her Trumpy ass (you can read a little summary of her failed career in the Trump administration before jumping ship to wreak havoc as a lobbyist in the WW endorsement of Bynum), and I’d hate to see this seat flip red to Patti Adair. Adair has an uneasy energy surrounding her at all times. She speaks circularly, doesn’t personally believe in abortion access, and doesn’t think that our kids’ testing rates are so low “because of money,” which makes me think that she won’t support increased funding for education.   

Bynum does vote in line with Democrats over 90% of the time, voted against cuts to Medicaid and abortion access, opposed the Big Beautiful Bill, and in 2026, I greatly appreciate her strong stance against more ICE funding. She issued a statement calling Kristi Noem a liar and said, “ICE needs transparency, accountability, and to follow the law. Full stop.” But in that same statement, she said that Noem caused ICE to “stray from its original mission”…I would argue that ICE is rotten to the core and thus is fulfilling its original mission very well…but this is where we differ, I suppose…

Governor: Tina Kotek

Tina Kotek has drawn my ire for alienating educators’ unions, Preschool-for-All supporters, nurses, and so on…but these are small potatoes compared to the fights we’ll have to fight if MAGA Barbie Christine Drazan wins the election, which she is within 2% of doing. It is a TRUE COIN TOSS SITUATION and we need to suck it up and keep Kotek on the field. Kotek is a policy wonk who genuinely cares about good policy, standing up to Trump’s authoritarianism, and protecting queer people, immigrants, and women in this state. We can duke it out with her on the finer points of funding education, permissibility on data centers in some cases, etc. in a sane manner. I swear to god, if the purist leftists fuck this up for us by abstaining to vote……………

If y’all think things are bad now, just know that without Kotek continually being a thorn in Trump’s side, things could have gotten so much worse. We don’t know how much worse. It’s rather amazing to see billboards of Kotek with the caption “IS THIS WORKING?” because not only is it a homophobic dog-whistle, it also makes Kotek seem responsible for the shambles in affordability that are actually the fault of decades of corporate highway robbery and Donald Trump inflation. And it’s going to get worse because the massive cuts to Medicaid, SNAP, and other services torn up by the Big Beautiful Bill are going to come after the midterm elections. ;) Slay. 

We don’t know how much worse things would have gotten for ICE deportations because Kotek raised hell to block Trump from deploying the National Guard to assist with ICE operations in Oregon. We don’t know how much worse things could have gotten for rent prices and affordability in this state because Kotek helped set up Oregon’s rent stabilization in SB 608 when she was House Speaker in 2019, and updated it and signed it into law with SB 611 in July of 2023. These sorts of protections are RARE in this country — things like capping annual rent increases at 10%, 90-day mandatory written notice before any rent increases, and relocation assistance.  

You think we get to keep nice things like OHP paying for top surgery if we have a Republican governor???????? PLEAAAAASE BE FOR REAAAAAAALLLLL 

In a race this close, a protest vote is a vote for Christine Drazan, who has been scrubbing her website of Trump affiliation because she’s trying to snag moderate Democrats. She is polished and good at interviews and debates, stays calm and says, white womanishly, “Now, why are you talking to little old me like that?” Then Kotek looks bad when she’s visibly annoyed and says, “Because you’re lying about me, diva.” 

Drazan will: 

  • Roll out the red carpet for more ICE agents, including the National Guard. She uses Republican fearmongering language around Portland being unsafe and unstable. Meanwhile, we are at the farmer’s market, etc. 

  • Further fuck up already psychotic patient-to-nurse safety ratios. She’s said that it’s more important for hospitals overall to remain profitable…lol…who will run the hospitals…

  • Roll out the red carpet for AI data centers. She opposes a statewide moratorium, and supports enterprise zone tax incentives that tend to benefit data centers (as we saw in her own district, The Dalles). Just last year, she voted against the 2025 POWER Act (HB 3546), a bill requiring data centers to pay higher electricity rates to shield households from rising utility costs. 

  • Support Trump and his agenda, though she had tried to put distance and say that she’s “her own person.” 

  • Support tax breaks for big companies and vote against bills to lower taxes for regular working people. 

  • Further marginalize trans people, including trans kids. In February 2025, Drazan introduced HB LC 3895, which requires K-12 school athletic competitions and extracurricular sports to be designated strictly by biological sex. She says all kinds of silly shit about “preserving opportunities for biological females,” but I’m sure she wouldn’t be caught dead at a Portland Fire game.

PLEASE MAKE THE GOVERNOR RACE A HUGE ISSUE IN YOUR ANARCHIST ROOMMATE AND FAMILY GROUP CHATS. The real, actual impacts to immigrants at risk of detention and deportation, working families, and queer people are IMMENSE. 

State Representative, 42nd District: Rob Nosse

Nosse is our incumbent Dem, running against a straight-up Libertarian. Nosse supports Paid Family and Medical Leave, a corporate activities tax to fund education (!!!! huge if this goes anywhere !!!!!), and keeping OHP funded.

State Representative, 42nd District: Tawna Sanchez

Sanchez is our iconic incumbent, co-founder of NAYA, and an addictions, behavioral health, and domestic violence advocate. She was instrumental in passing HB 2134, Freedom to Find a Place, which allows tenants to move out with a 30-day notice within a landlord’s 90-day termination window so that they don’t have to pay double rent if they find a place and want to move out sooner. That shit just makes sense.

State Representative, 46th District: Willy Chotzen

Former public defender and public school math teacher, our incumbent Chotzen supported unmasking ICE agents, securing funding for public schools, funding Planned Parenthood, and shielding children’s privacy and location data from tech companies. 

State Representative, 48th District: Lamar Wise

Appointed to take over after Rep. Hòa Nguyễn’s death (RIP to a real one), Wise has continued Nguyễn’s legacy of fighting for working families as he serves out the rest of her term. Now voters have a chance to keep him in place. He has worked to close corporate tax loopholes, which could not be more important toward solving major affordability and infrastructure problems.  Endorsed by East County Rising, the Oregon Nurses Association, the Oregon Educators Association, and more.

Judge of the Circuit Court, 4th District, Position 2: Diane Sykes 

In the May election, we went through a first round of votes for these Circuit Court judge positions, and now we’re here to finish the job. As you may recall, circuit courts see most of the cases we associate with ~ people going to trial ~, such as family law, criminal cases, juvenile, civil, domestic relations, etc. These judges have a great deal of contact with the public. I look for even-keel, warm temperament and fair application of the law. I look to the quality of endorsements to gauge things like values alignment, person-centeredness, and so on. 

I was touched to see that Diane Sykes gained the endorsement of my preferred candidate for this position in May, Chris Behre — this means a LOT to me. A civil rights and legal aid attorney, Sykes has almost 30 years of experience in the courtroom. She is bilingual in Spanish, which can be an enormous boon for people in the courtroom, and she’s garnered the endorsements of PCUN (Pineros y Campesinos Unidos Noroeste), Latino Network Action Fund, the Ebony Collective Coalition, former Gov. Kate Brown, and Bitchtucci favorites Duncan Hwang and Ashton Simpson on Metro Council, etc.    

Judge of the Circuit Court, 4th District, Position 14: Joe Hagendorn

I maintain my May endorsement of Joe Hagedorn, and I have loved seeing him campaign and go door-to-door with other progressive candidates, like my former student and current Gresham City Council candidate Teo Ramirez. Back in May, the Willamette Week asked the extremely crowded race of judge candidates who they’d vote for if they couldn’t vote for themselves, and Hagedorn won by a long shot. 

Known to be extremely fair-minded and a believer in second chances and rehabilitation, Hadegorn says he tries to apply the law in a restorative manner to help people instead of discipline them. I look at endorsements from former Gov. Kate Brown, Portland for All, Oregon Representative darlings like Thuy Tran, Willy Chotzen, Ricki Ruiz, Metro Councilors Duncan Hwang, Ashton Simpson, etc.   

Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District, Director, At-Large, Position 2: Steph Routh

In this seemingly small and obscure race, Steph Routh, our very own she/they, has been endorsed by the Oregon Working Families Party, Basic Rights Oregon PAC, Sunrise Movement PDX, APANO Action Fund, Next Up Action Fund, and Easy County Rising. Soil & Water Conservation Districts work on the conservation of our state’s natural resources, which can look like fixing soil erosion, monitoring watersheds, keystone species conservation efforts, working alongside farmers on land policies, and so on. In practice, it’s a lot of talking to stakeholders, hiring and maintaining contracts, managing the district's public property tax funds, and securing funding for conservation projects, especially as federal funding evaporates. There are some good candidates in the race whose Voters Pamphlet statements reveal consideration and care about the position and its importance to our beautiful Oregon climate and land. Routh’s extensive local government sustainability leadership roles and strong endorsements tip me toward her.     

Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District, Director, Zone 3: Silas Morgan

The League of Conservation Voters questionnaire responses and some digging about the candidates’ careers were helpful in this race, about which there is practically nothing available outside of the Multnomah County Voters Pamphlet. Brad Hunter is the incumbent here, with a lot more experience, and is likely to win. This seems like a low-risk race where we might offer our support to a new candidate who is speaking more directly to climate change mitigation, offering farmers resources for chemical and pesticide alternatives, and has experience with his family’s regenerative farm. Hunter, though more experienced, is a logger, though I do not doubt that he also wants to protect wildlife and water quality, and increase investments in green spaces. 

Multnomah County Commission, Chair 1 

Rank 1
Shannon Singleton

As the dust in this race is kicked up all around us, Shannon Singleton has risen to the top of the pile. She has maintained her endorsements, from places like the Merc, Willamette Week, APANO Action Fund, Basic Rights Oregon, Imagine Black, Oregon Futures Lab, Portland Association of Teachers, Portland For All, The Sierra Club, The Street Trust Action Fund, SEIU Oregon, etc. 

A former social worker, Singleton has served as a Commissioner in Multnomah County since 2024. The WW highlights her ability to see potential implementation pitfalls and correct course on important budget matters. They explain: 


[Crucially,] it was Singleton who averted a budgeting catastrophe that Vega Pederson had introduced by allocating one-time dollars to fund many of the homeless services programs at the core of the county’s mission. Only Singleton’s judicious use of amendments to build the 2025–26 budget on recurring funds saved the county a year later from a fiscal cliff—the kind Mayor Keith Wilson walked the city over when he opened a bevy of shelter beds, then had to close them months later.

Singleton has a reputation among some of my sources who have sat with her at county homelessness meetings as being a strong listener, thoughtful, humble, and more concerned with implementation than taking center stage as a shiny politician. She supports Preschool for All,  wants to expand eviction prevention services, and understands that affordability and keeping people employed and housed is the best defense against homelessness. In discussions about workforce development, she is continually supportive of unionized trade fields. 

Singleton has lost the support of some when she displayed exasperation when the county’s direct-service workers begged to keep their frontline jobs amid budget cuts, especially during the worst budget cuts at the beginning of her tenure as Commissioner. She seemed to say that closing some programs was inevitable (vs. cutting from highly-paid director positions at the top). If elected as Chair, I would like to see how she maintains direct services programs. I hope that her skills in responding to direct-service workers have increased, and that she has more creative solutions up her sleeve to keep as many helping professionals employed by the county as possible.  

DO NOT RANK / USE UR JUDGMENT
Julia Brim-Edwards, Shannon Meieran

This race is a mess, y’all…We got Julia Brim-Edwards billboards calling her progressive, funded by the same creepy, conservative Portland Metro Chamber PACs who are running the Mitch Green attack ads. We got allegations of Julia Brim0Edwards working behind closed doors as PPS School Board member to keep trans girls out of sports. We got a virulent Don’t Rank Julia campaign going around that uses AI music on their Instagram posts and Claud to run their website lol. We got trusted Multnomah County employees who say that they’re going to rank Brim-Edwards as #1 or #2 because she is the only candidate in the race who follows through on her word promptly, protects people-facing, direct service county jobs at the bottom like therapists, gun violence prevention specialists, and advocates trimming from the top in director positions to close budget gaps. But we got sketchy corporate ties and a near-universal consensus among actual progressive PACs, orgs, and electeds to not rank her. We got Portland Association of Teacher members who hated working with her and would throw hands in the street to this very day! We got it all!!!!   

With Sharon Meieran, we got an ER doctor who brands herself as an outsider who wants to completely restructure County bureaus, homelessness response, and funding due to what she calls an inherent dysfunction. She might have more of a chance because of this incredible, ranked-choice voting intersection: there will be people who would never vote for Shannon Singleton who will rank JBE first and Meieran first or second, and there will be people who rank Singleton first and do not rank JBE at all, which miiiiiight be impactful enough to take her down. Meieran, to her credit, actually goes into the streets with PPOP and works with homeless folks. Her urgency is well-placed, and she has some good ideas…but she often goes off the rails.  

I don’t believe that she can effectively form coalitions and lead the county. Sources who have worked with her at the county find her impatient, off-putting, and conservative on certain issues. She filmed a campaign video with abhorrent right-wing provocateur Kevin Dahlgren. I cannot abide by the weird power moves with unions Meieran has been accused of throughout her career, like alienating MultCo employee union AFSCME Local 88 in the 2022 primaries: 

According to AFSCME,“Meieran told [Local 88 President Joslyn] Baker that she felt like the AFSCME’s decision to endorse [Vega] Pederson was a ‘fuck you’ to Meieran and so Meieran was calling to say ‘fuck you’ to AFSCME.”
“I was stunned,” said Baker. “In all my years, I’ve never had an interaction with an elected official that was so callous, and with such disregard for the people they’re supposed to represent.”

Meieran, though she says she did not solicit endorsements, has nevertheless been endorsed by red flag Future Portland.

Multnomah County Commission, District 2

Rank 1 & 2
Bri Williams, Nathan Ong Norris

Bri Williams is a Multnomah County employee who has lived in this county, gone to school in this county, worked in this county, and is running for office in this county. A social worker and mental health professional, she was Preschool for All’s first culturally specific mental health consultant, where she refined her policy priorities for stable jobs, housing, mental health services, and education to improve county outcomes on addiction, homelessness, and Preschool for All. She wants to keep people housed and employed, and would follow barriers to housing and employment all the way to their sources (childcare, training, apprenticeships, opportunities). She wants to work with partners like the Albina Vision Trust and the 1803 Fund to develop affordable housing in NE Portland. She says that keeping affordable housing in the city proper matters to her so deeply because her family was displaced by the Vanport floods in 1948. Bri Williams is endorsed by the Portland DSA, East County Rising, NAYA, APANO Action Fund, AFSME Local 88, the Oregon Nurses Association, and more. I found her write-up here extremely thoughtful and informative. 

Nathan Ong-Norris is a Democratic Socialist with a master’s in emergency management who worked as a hazardous waste technician. His schooling and experience have given him extremely specific and measurable goals around climate disaster preparedness and coordinating emergency management, as well as true goals for cleaner water and air. Not many other commissioners have this experience; it’s something fresh he could bring to the table. Like Bri, he wants to keep people housed as part of homelessness prevention and protect Preschool for All. He is endorsed by the Portland DSA, League of Conservation Voters, the Merc, Portland Association of Teachers, current Portland City Councilors Angelita Morillo, Tiffany Koyama Lane, Mitch Green, and Sameer Kanal. 

Rank
Serena Cruz, Tony Robertson

Cruz has worked at the county level before — both supporters and detractors call her a lifelong bureaucrat. She has much experience within government and the private sector, with some question marks and bumps along the way, including conflict with current Chair Jessica Vega Pederson. As a Multnomah County Commissioner from 1996-2006, she helped secure gender and sexuality as protected classes at a crucial juncture for gay rights, and was part of launching the Bridges to Housing program for homeless families. 

Robertson is more of a long-shot candidate, but I appreciate his experience on BOLI and the Urban League. He is endorsed by the Portland DSA because he supports local rent control and statewide single-payer health care.

City of Portland, Councilor, District 3

Rank 1 & 2
Tiffany Koyama Lane, Angelita Morillo 

Tiffany Koyama Lane and Angelita Morillo are cornerstones of our progressive bloc on City Council. I have seen some voters think about ranking other lefty candidates higher, to give them more weight in the ranked-choice system, but I will caution against this in both City Council races because I’m not so sure our progressive incumbents are a shoo-in, and we need more time to see how ranked-choice plays out before we alter strategy. We’ve only done this ONE TIME. Let’s earnestly rank our top viable candidates first, and see how this election shakes out. 

A great deal of effort has been made to unseat these Morillo and Koyama Lane. Mainstream media outlets have uplifted all kinds of narratives. When they were elected last year, they were accused, along with Mitch Green and a few others, of collaborating unfairly. It wasn’t true and didn’t stick. Morillo’s been accused of being too snappy, some even calling her unprofessional and divisive. These critiques were tedious and prissy, and it feels insane to call Morillo’s deadpan delivery unprofessional when we have a convicted rapist in the White House. Didn’t really stick. 

Morillo’s response to allegations of so-called dysfunctionality was to look at their records: Morillo and Koyama Lane have sponsored the most legislation in the past year, and vote yes more than most other council members. Morillo says that the format of the expanded City Council lends itself to fewer backroom deals, so naturally, more debate and conflict are happening out on the Council floor. 

Dark money conservative PACs are throwing their weight behind other candidates, taking care to dressi up some candidates as more progressive than they actually are, hoping to convince left-leaning people to just vote for anyone else. 

Meanwhile, please understand that both Koyama Lane and Morillo are really up to some good shit. Angelita Morillo is Lil Miss Big Ideas. She proposes and passes extremely ambitious progressive policy. Even on occasions where her ideas get chewed up by the more moderate members of city council, she is so effective at getting things on the table that otherwise wouldn’t have been there in the first place. Look to her proposed Fair Share Tax Ordinance, which pushes on the Business License Tax levers, cutting taxes for small businesses that make less than $500,000 in sales, increasing Business License Tax liabilities by 25 - 500% for corporations whose CEOs are paid 50 to 500 times more than their median workers. Thissss is gooood. Even if this ordinance gets dissected on the council floor, if any version passes, it will be so much more than we had before. Morillo helped sponsor and ban AI price fixing on rents in Portland. She is focused on rent prices and affordable housing instead of shelter beds when it comes to preventing and mitigating homelessness. 

Koyama Lane, aka Teacher Tiffany, has those same progressive values and is extremely effective at sponsoring legislation, garnering consensus, and operationalizing. If you look at her track-record section at the bottom here, you can see how much she’s co-sponsored with City Councilors who often piss me off LOL. She supports (like all of the progressive bloc members) a moratorium on data centers; she was a co-sponsor on the AI price-fixing ban;  she earmarked Transportation Utility Fee/Vision Zero funds for improvements to sidewalks, crosswalks, and other pedestrian safety projects. 

Rank
Esther León, Cristal Otrero, (with a held breath) Steve Novick

Esther León is an actual great option for the third seat.


Cristal Otrero is a longshot, but more ideologically aligned than Novick or others.

Steve Novick, environmental lawyer, is the incumbent and will likely keep his seat. I think of ranking him low, below León and Otrero, as a strategic choice because I’d rather he stay in his seat than give Dan Ryan a potential ally in Kellie Torres. The Merc has a good summary of his foibles and victories in their endorsement of him. I hate that he voted in 2025 to continue homelessness sweeps, I hate that he’s received endorsements from United for Portland and Future Portland, but I can appreciate that he voted to ban masks on law enforcement, voted against the Moda Center deal, and defends the Portland Clean Energy Fund. 

DO NOT RANK
Kellie Torres, Heart Free Pham, Tom Sollitt, Martin Ward

Kellie Torres, Dan Ryan’s former chief of staff and longtime colleague from their All Hands Raised days. Sources tell me that they were very buddy-buddy, which bodes differently for alliances than a simple coworking dynamic. I completely understand why she wants to be considered as her own candidate, but I have a sour taste in my mouth from the association. Torres is endorsed by conservative-leaning red flag PACs United for Portland and Future Portland. I think she would likely vote progressively on some issues like maintaining Portland’s status as a Sanctuary City, but end up being a voice for businesses. She’d be chill giving Portland Clean Energy Funds to police. She repeatedly talks about voting to protect Portland’s assets — she says she would have voted yes on the Moda Center proposal with that in mind. She is smart and has logistical chops, for sure, but she is not a better candidate for working people of Portland than the candidates I’ve opted to rank. 

Heart Free Pham opposes universal pre-K and taxing the rich. Tom Sollitt appears progressive at first glance, but went on NW Fresh, a Zionist and anti-trans podcast in January. Martin Ward doesn’t support gender-affirming care or fairly taxing the rich.

City of Portland, Councilor, District 4

Rank 1
Mitch Green 

When I drive down Foster, I see that cursed billboard which reads, “Mitch Green voted to raise your taxes [but] didn’t pay his own taxes.” United for Portland — aka the Portland Metro Chamber !! — paid for these cursed billboards, establishing three new PACs along the way to conceal funding sources: goPDX, DitchMitch, and fix Multco. The fix Multco PAC is also responsible for the Julia Brim-Edwards billboards calling her “The Progressive Candidate.” More on that later…

Regarding this shady PAC-splitting business, Seth Woolley, a campaign watchdog, filed a complaint with multiple local and state agencies, alleging violations of local and state election laws. An article about this from the Merc went into state disclosure reports and found the following: 

United for Portland reported sending $100,000 to goPDX on September 11, according to state records. The same day, goPDX sent $50,000 each to DitchMitch and fix multCo. Then on September 24, United for Portland sent $60,000 to goPDX. The next day, goPDX sent $6,000 to “The Rally Point”—a consulting firm run by former Emerge Oregon director Annie Ellison. The goPDX PAC then sent $25,000 each to DitchMitch and fix multCo.

Bizarrely, according to state records, the person running those PACs is Kyle Prosen, a disgruntled drag queen comedian who goes by the name Poly Poptart. Prosen says that he became irate with Mitch Green after learning that Green burned something in his backyard during a burn ban. The twists and turns, y’all! Something very fucking weird is afoot. I picture the meetings and phone calls in which Portland Metro Chamber director Doug Moore and lobbyist Jon Isaacs agreed to move over $200,000 to disgruntled drag queen comedian Poly Poptart for progressive city councilor attack ads and my head fucking spins. 

Green, for his part, has apologized for burning something in his backyard and I’m sure is up-to-date on his property taxes now. When asked about the attack ads, Green said to the Willamette Week, “I’m not surprised the Metro Chamber is targeting me, because my office is uniquely equipped to defend popular programs like Preschool for All from their attacks and has been very successful at it.” I address the billboards here because I want you to know that this shit is fishy as fuck. Disregard them. 

Mitch, on his own terms, has my Number 1 rank because he’s an extremely effective councilor with true progressive interests. He is collaborative with other members of the council, co-sponsoring tons of legislation. He held the line in the Moda Center deal, defends and expands tenants' rights, found funding for a new social housing program, voted to maintain Portland’s status as a Sanctuary City, protects the Portland Clean Energy Fund, and more. He worked with Loretta Smith and PBOT to research adding and improving sidewalks to treacherous areas in Districts 1 and 4. He’s part of our progressive bloc and is working quickly and efficiently at improvements for Portland working families. 

Endorsed by the DSA, the Merc, PAT, SEIU, Sunrise Movement PDX, Imagine Black, Basic Rights, APANO Action Fund, and many, many more. 

Rank 2
Jamey Evenstar

Evenstar has worked in local government in many capacities: as part of the Portland Charter Transition Team, Chief-of-Staff to Councilor Avalos, staffer in former Councilor Chloe Eudaly’s office. Her track record is simply fabulous. In Portland, we loooove the Relocation Ordinance, which makes landlords pay tenant moving fees on no-cause evictions or rent increases of 10% or more — that was Evenstar behind the pen, working in Eudaly’s office. I would truly love to see what Evenstar could do with her own staff and a seat at the table. As a working mother of five who does not own a car, she relies on transit and wants to see these public services fully funded. She wants more public housing and an expanded Portland Street Response. She would be ready to rock and roll and grow progressive power on city council on day one. 

Rank
Jeremy Beausoleil Smith

Newcomer with great ideas, especially for tenants’ rights. 

DO NOT RANK
Eli Arnold, Olivia Clark, Eric Zimmerman

Arnold and Zimmerman, two literal cops….Clark, claims to be moderate, votes for business interests all the goddamn time…The Merc’s coverage is succinct and ready to be texted to your family group chat for more specifics.

Ballot Measure ༺

City of Portland Ballot Measure 26-267 (Your Two Cents): YES 

Your Two Cents has reached your ballot via 78,742 signatures from Portland residents. It would allocate 2% of the city’s $800 million discretionary budget to participatory budgeting. Portlanders would choose projects to fund. In other cities, this tends to look like riverwalks, playgrounds, parks, emergency rental assistance funds, emergency domestic violence grants, and so on. While funds can be used to save jobs cut by the city, Your Two Cents can’t fire employees by cutting into the city’s budget. Participatory budgeting is used in thousands of cities around the world. It tends to fund livability-centered and civically-minded projects. 


If you’re feeling on the fence about this ballot measure, I highly recommend going through some of the stats in the Multnomah County Voters’ Pamphlet, starting on page 78 — too many for me to list here. On page 85, Metro Council shares their argument in favor, saying that the Metro Council’s Community Choice Grants Program is an example of participatory budgeting already working in the Portland Metro Area. In 2025-26, they report:

“Residents developed and selected $3 million for parks and nature projects…Residents voted to fund 23 out of 170 projects. Winning projects included $119,083 for stream and garden improvements [to] End of the Oregon Trail Park, $160,000 for Clackamas river access, and $166,000 for a small skate park and habitat improvements at Milwaukie’s Water Tower Park….Take it from us, elected officials who have implemented participatory budgeting programs in our region. Participatory budgeting works!” 

The Voters Pamphlet is juicy and messy for this ballot measure. The very first argument in favor, on page 79, is written by a man who thinks he is inventing the concept of satire. I love when men think they have invented the concept of satire, don’t you? He says that to keep your public sector job, “Cry in front of the committee…Have an idea for a non-profit? Get your friends on the committee before you pitch it. It’s like a reality TV show.” 

The implication here is that there’s room for corruption with the Two Cents committee. Brother, I hate to break it to you, but corruption and backroom deals are already happening all over this godforsaken city. This ballot measure was designed to free up funds from, say, Portland Metro Chamber lobbyists, pressure, and deals. THIS EXACT problem of business interests and backroom deals enmeshed in Portland politics, at this VERY MOMENT, is the heart of why I am supportive of Your Two Cents even though I also have concerns about implementation, city budget deficits, and so on. 

Devin Ruiz, Movement Building Director at Next Up, puts it simply: “The powerful are always going to fight to retain and maintain their interests, but they can’t buy votes in a participatory budget system like they can in regular politics.” 

Further, the committee doesn’t decide which projects get funded — Portlanders do. The committee vets final proposals for feasibility so that we don’t waste time or resources on impossible projects; the people decide through a public process which projects to fund; and then the committee and the city oversee implementation. 

I’ve looked at example after example of other cities using participatory budgeting as an efficient, no-fuss way to get very basic, practical, helpful, and progressive city improvements accomplished. Rather than being a place for more inefficiency and waste, I see opportunities for New York-esque pothole-filling marathons and other straightforward city improvements. 

This is why so many of our progressive community organizations have thrown their weight behind it, including Next Up, Coalition of Communities of Color, Imagine Black, Democratic Socialists of America, and East County Rising. 

Detractors, funded in huge part by conservative PACs who stand to lose influence over 2% of the discretionary budget if this passes, say we don’t have the money in the city. In fact, even smart and left-leaning opponents say that the budget is too tight, and there’s too much room for the public to bungle it right now. Supporters say that we do have the money. Who can say! 


Special treats outside of PDX ☾⋆⁺₊✧

Gresham City Council, Position 4: Teo Ramirez

I met Teo when he was fourteen years old in an AVID classroom at Gresham High School. I was basically a kid myself, working three jobs, one of which was AVID tutor. AVID is a college prep program for public school kids to get homework help, learn study skills, and hold Socratic seminars. Teo made us LAUGH. I can crack myself up just thinking about his facial expressions. Teo was prepared. Teo would help others. Teo would remember the tiniest details of his classmates’ personal lives and find a way to circle back or connect. When I was hired to run the Speech and Debate Team and Gender and Sexualities Alliance at the high school, Teo joined. He had a natural charisma that drew people to him. He could befriend anyone, bring the shyest or wildest kid into the fold. On the debate circuit, he was articulate, surprising, bringing a flair to his rounds that endeared judges and rivals alike. He has been training to see multiple sides of an issue or argument since he was a teenager. 

When I talk about the critical thinking crisis, I am not talking about Teo. So many others have lost hope and checked out, but Teo is always trying to figure it out, asking members of the community what they think, remembering the little things about their families and jobs. He has true progressive values paired with a radiant genuineness and self-assuredness that allow him to find common ground and think strategically about coalition-building even with folks who do not exactly share his ideals. Though young, he has worked in Gresham’s local government for years, and has an MBA from Portland State under his belt. 

He’s got that special sauce for making an effective public servant alongside community: lived experience in this town as a citizen and a community leader, true love for working-class people and people of color because those are his people, a methodical mind for connecting people to resources, the ability to wheel and deal with anyone while staying true to his progressive values, and (blow the whistle!!!!) a Capricorn sun, Capricorn moon, and Pisces rising. He genuinely cares for others and possesses long-term follow-through and organizational skills. 

Endorsed by tons of unions, including Gresham Firefighters, SEIU Oregon, Teamsters 37, OR AFSCME, the Oregon Working Families Party, Next Up, East County Rising, Latino Network Action Fund, and his high school Speech and Debate coach, BITCHTUCCI!!!!!! 

Washington County Commission, At-Large: Nafisa Fai

State Representative, 27th District: Tammy Carpenter

Oregon Senate, District 15: Myrna Munoz

Measure 26-268 - Bonds to Increase Safety, Security; Repair, Construct Schools; Increase Accessibility for Reynolds School District: YES    


✿

  • If you or someone you love is worried about having enough food to eat, look here for free food near you.

  • If you are looking for ways to support Portland’s immigrant community right now, in addition to any individual family fundraisers you come across, I recommend and uplift the work of PIRC. The Salas and Flores families still need help with stabilizing rent and legal assistance.  

  • I know you haven’t forgotten about Gaza — consider eSims for Gaza, Tamara’s family fundraiser, any of the families listed by Operation Olive Branch.  

  • If you’ve had a chance to share resources with folks in need and would like to treat me to a little coffee or something, I’m @marissayangbertucci on venmo, cash app, and paypal ✿


*ੈ༺

I am wishing you care and rest. Thank you for making it this far. Thank you for caring for our neighbors using every tool at our disposal. 

xoxo,

bitchtucci * ੈ♡‧₊˚