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Amazon gives $1 million to pro-business campaign aimed at Seattle City Council

caption: A crowd is showing crossing the street in front of Amazon's biospheres during Amazon's bring your parents to work day on Friday, September 15, 2017, in Seattle.
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A crowd is showing crossing the street in front of Amazon's biospheres during Amazon's bring your parents to work day on Friday, September 15, 2017, in Seattle.
KUOW Photo/Megan Farmer

Amazon is pouring more than a million extra dollars into the campaign for business-minded candidates in Seattle.


Spokesperson Aaron Toso said Tuesday that the $1.05 million contribution to CASE – Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy – brings the company’s total donations to the group to $1.45 million.

Vulcan Inc also $235,000 10/14/2019

Washington Association of Realtors $145,000 10/14/2019

Amazon had given earlier donations, but this is by far the biggest to CASE.

CASE is a political action committee sponsored by the Seattle Metro Chamber of Commerce. CASE has been spending heavily on candidates for Seattle City Council who appear to be more allied with business.

They include Egan Orion in District 3, Heidi Wills in District 6 and Jim Pugel in District 7.

For example, the group’s expenditures on behalf of Orion total about $245,000 (including expenditures for him and against his opponent, incumbent Kshama Sawant). Another business-friendly PAC, People for Seattle, has spent about $37,000 for Orion, and the Seattle Fire Fighters PAC has added $74,000.

CASE's spending for Wills now tops $102,000. People for Seattle has added another $102,000 on Wills’ behalf, and the Seattle Fire Fighters PAC has spent about $59,000.

Labor has made one large expenditure in the council races. The UNITE HERE Local 8 PAC has spent about $150,000 on behalf of Andrew Lewis, Pugel’s opponent in District 7. CAPE, the Civic Alliance for a Progressive Economy, which is sponsored by a labor group called Working Washington as well as SEIU's local PAC have also raised hundreds of thousands of dollars.

In the primary we spent 17,500 directly on seattle city council IEs, and gave 10K to CAPE and 10K to working people for an affordable Seattle which then spent the money on council IEs In the general we have given $100,000 to CAPE. So about 140K altogether. Adam

But overall, so far labor's spending has been dwarfed by the three other groups.

Correction, 12:25 p.m., 10/15/2019: An earlier version of this story understated CASE's expenditures on behalf of Egan Orion and Heidi Wills.

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