SEATTLE - Voters and political insiders wait to see exactly what this fall's election will mean for the dynamic of the Seattle City Council.
The results that are in so far show current Seattle City Council members will be returning to City Hall. KING 5 declared Sally Bagshaw, Bruce Harrell, Tim Burgess and Mike O'Brien as winning. Kshama Sawant is ahead in her race.
In a speech to her supporters after the apparent win, Sawant mentioned current city council president Tim Burgess directly.
"Does anybody here think that Tim Burgess won tonight because he has great ideas to represent the working class," Sawant asked the crowd as they hollered no. "The days of corporate politicians like Burgess are numbered."
Burgess responded to that Wednesday.
"I ran a very positive campaign and I think one of the problems with American politics today is the personal attacks and trying to tear people down," Burgess told KING 5. "I'm very proud of the broad support I had. I had the business community. I had ... almost all of the labor unions, environmental groups."
"I'll keep focusing on the positive things we're getting done for the people of Seattle and I don't pay attention too much to those kind of personal attacks."
Sandeep Kaushik, a political and public affairs consultant at Sound View Strategies in Seattle, said he doesn't think the results of the election will cause a big shift in the dynamics within council chambers.
"When you look at the kind of candidates that have won their races, I think you're going to see more continuity than you will change in terms of how the council operates," Kaushik said. "I think what we're seeing in these races is more continuity than change."
Political strategists were particularly interested in what Seattle's new district council races meant.
"I think a lot of people thought, going into this new system we have with district elections, that these elections were going to be hyper local: focus just on sidewalks in this district or intersections over here," Kaushik said. "There was a fair amount of that. There was also, I think, a lot more emphasis on door-belling and individual one-on-one contact for the candidates running in those districts."
