Lorena González

Maria Lorena González (born February 20, 1977) is an American lawyer and former politician who was a member of the Seattle City Council from position 9. She was the first Latina elected to the council. She was a candidate for mayor of Seattle in 2021 but was defeated by Bruce Harrell 59 percent to 41 percent.

Early life and education González was born on February 20, 1977, in Prosser, Washington and raised in Grandview. She has five siblings. Her parents came to the United States as undocumented immigrants in the early-1960s and became legal permanent residents in the 1970s. She described her early life as a "Spanish-speaking migrant farmworker household." González was crowned Grandview Miss Junior in 1994. She moved to Seattle in 2002 and began attending the Seattle University School of Law, earning her Juris Doctor in 2005. In 2012, she represented a Latino man in a civil rights case against the city of Seattle for discriminatory police conduct. Her client received a $150,000 settlement, but she told The Seattle Times that the Seattle Police Department seemed incapable of admitting that the incident was an example of biased policing. In 2014, she became legal counsel to Seattle Mayor Ed Murray.

González and Bradford both ran as progressives, and both candidates criticized the city's growth and lack of affordability. Bradford accused González of being in a cabal of "unfettered capitalists," while González said Bradford focused to narrowly on city growth plans.

In the November general election González defeated Bradford, 78% to 21%.

2017 election In 2017, González ran for reelection and faced six challengers in the primary, which included a supermarket cashier, a homeless person, a South Seattle neighborhood activist, and a quixotic blogger. The King County Labor Council, King County Democrats, the political arm of the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, Planned Parenthood and the Sierra Club endorsed her. Murakami criticized González in her role as chair of the public safety committee, saying the council was too slow on adopting police body cameras, and failing to negotiate a new police contract.

Tenure Gonzalez took office on November 24, 2015, and replaced John Okamoto, who was temporarily on the council after Clark resigned to take a job at the University of Washington. González was the first Latina to be elected to the council.

While on the council, González advanced legislation that created scheduling protections for retail and restaurant workers and legislation that backed workload restrictions for hotel workers. Other progressive legislation that she pushed for included funding legal defense for immigrants and an expanded subsidized pre-school program. She also co-wrote a gun storage law.

González was a supporter of the Bernie Sanders 2020 presidential campaign.

2020 attorney general campaign

On August 8, 2019, González announced her intention to run for state attorney general in 2020, to replace Bob Ferguson, who was expected to run for governor. She also announced her intention to remain a member of the Seattle City Council during the campaign. On August 22, 2019, González suspended her campaign following Ferguson's decision to run for re-election after Jay Inslee announced he was running for a third term as governor.

2021 Seattle mayoral election

In February 2021, after Mayor Jenny Durkan stated that she would not seek reelection, González announced her candidacy for the 2021 Seattle mayoral election. In her announcement, González said Seattle needed "bold, transformative action" and that "I believe we need everyone, especially big business to do their part." In the August primary, Harrell came in first, with 34% of the vote, and advanced to the general election with González, who earned 32.11%. Harrell ran as a moderate, focusing on expanding the police force and addressing visible homelessness, and was endorsed by former governor Gary Locke, and former Seattle Mayors Norm Rice and Wesley C. Uhlman.

In the final days of the election, Gonzalez released an ad that focused on Harrell's initial support of Ed Murray during the abuse scandal. The ad featured a white woman, who was a rape survivor but not a Murray accuser, who stated that she could not trust Harrell because he sided with Murray. González would pull the ad, and apologized saying, "I am sorry we did not work harder to center the voice of a sexual assault survivor from our community of color who was also willing to tell their story." Harrell released a statement accusing González of trying to distract voters from issues like homelessness and public safety.

Electoral history

2015 election

2017 election

2021 mayoral election