I don’t feel discouraged, and you shouldn’t feel discouraged” Jess Spear told the overflowing crowd gathered at Madison Valley’s Habour Pointe Coffeehouse as the ballot drop revealed her winning a meager 16 percent of the votes in the race for Washington’s 43rd Legislative District (two-thirds of ballots were reported, with most remaining to be counted by Friday). The Socialist Alternative candidate—a climate scientist and one of the chief organizers of Seattle’s 15Now campaign—said she was simply happy that her campaign had offered an alternative to incumbent Frank Chopp in a race that otherwise would’ve gone uncontested.

“Two years ago when we ran, Frank Chopp didn’t even run, he sent out a mailer like a week before the vote,” Spear said to laughs, alluding to fellow socialist Kshama Sawant’s run in the 43rd before she took a surprise seat on the city council, stunning Richard Conlin last November. “He didn’t take us seriously. Same with Richard Conlin. These politicians are asleep at the wheel. As soon as Frank Chopp found out we were running, he scrambled. We should be proud that we gave a voice to this anger working class people have at the status quo—that we offered an alternative.”

While nobody at Spear’s party had any illusions that she might win, the small victory of even being present in the larger dialogue, and in fact, shaping that dialogue, was enough for her supporters for now. A cranky Joel Connelly at the Seattle-PI would later allege that Socialist Alternative possessed “an instinct for the public limelight to rival Cinderella’s stepsisters,” and while ol’ Joel might’ve gotten sick of hearing about rent control, it’s hard to deny the Spear campaign’s effectiveness at thrusting the taboo topic into Seattle’s consciousness by “boldly campaigning on the issues,” as Spear put it.

One of the victories Spear cited was getting Chopp to state his support for lifting the state ban on rent control during the two’s televised debate—shifting the Overton window to the left in the same way that the Socialist Alternative party did with the $15 minimum wage effort last year. If Kshama Sawant hadn’t won her surprise victory to the council, I can’t imagine the city council would’ve embraced 15Now’s message like it did.

Before the results came in at Spear’s party, Kshama Sawant delivered a speech attempting to place Spear’s race in a national context, asserting that third parties, while still not dominant by any means, are decisively on the rise. She drew comparisons to New York Green Party gubernatorial candidate Howie Hawkins, who pushed the debate on fracking into the daylight and won surprise endorsements from the New York’s public employee newspaper, The Chief, four democratic clubs, and six teachers unions.

City Councilmember Kshama Sawant sees victory in Spears’ defeat. Photo by Kelton Sears

“What we’re seeing in Seattle is not a Seattle specific phenomenon, this is happening all over the country,” Sawant said. “We are the ones who have driven the political agenda in this city. We forced a debate on rent control, the $9 billion extortion from Boeing, and on the climate crisis and the oil trains coming through this city. Howie Hawkins campaigns will send shockwaves, people will notice that people are voting for alternatives. Frank Chopp can’t possibly run any more races without an alternative, a working class fighter, running against him.”

A recent poll from Publicola found that Sawant, while polarizing, had the second highest citywide favorable ratings of any of the current councilmembers, and indeed was the most popular of all the councilmembers within their own district.

In nearby Vancouver B.C., a similar trend is happening—Green Party councilmember Adrienne Carr, who was very narrowly elected as one of the Canada’s first in-office Greens, now sits 20 percentage points ahead of her competitors in favorable polls. Fellow Green Party candidate Pete Fry is also currently polling to win one of the city’s 10 council seats up for grabs in Canada’s upcoming Nov. 15 election. Vancouver B.C., a city that has had the environmental debate thrust to the forefront thanks to oil giant Kinder Morgen’s shady tactics in trying to build an enormous proposed pipeline through public parks, seems to be warming up to third party politics as well. “We don’t accept that this is the best humanity can do,” Jess Spear said as the night neared its end. “Climate change is clear evidence of this. Capitalism is ruining our lives, and we believe that with strong mass movements, a system that prioritizes human happiness over profits is possible.”

ksears@seattleweekly.com