In a Friday campaign event, Seattle mayoral candidate Katie Wilson harkened back to her younger street-musician days when she used to busk at Pike Place Market. Wilson told a gathering of Market workers and community members that she understood their struggles; she has lived them, and Seattle’s mayoral frontrunner told them she is fighting for the little guy.
Emily Pike, who works at a bookstore in the market and helped organize the event, said Wilson’s story resonates with them, and connects with the spirit of Pike Place Market, a tight-knit community of laborers, independent local merchants, and Market advocates.
“There’s a kind of camaraderie that you feel when you spend your days down here,” Pike said. “Because every day in the market, you see neighbors helping neighbors. You see neighbors looking up for each other and supporting each other. It’s the community; it’s the people that make the market special.”
Pike Place Market workers call themselves “market rats” — a nod to the humble professions they ply and their sense of resilience and belonging in the alleys of the market.
“That ethos of communal resilience through communal caretaking is embodied in the work that Katie does and the way that she does it, the way that she leads,” Pike said. “Which is why I trust that when Katie Wilson’s mayor she not going to fight for a handful of millionaires and corporate interests; she’s gonna fight for us little rats.”
Last night, at Candidate Survivor, I had the opportunity to break out some very rusty harmonica skills. See, campaigning is fun. Campaigning is fun? Campaigning is fun.
— Katie Wilson for Seattle (@wilsonforseattle.bsky.social) July 25, 2025 at 10:47 AM
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Sticking with a message that propelled her to an upset win over big-business-backed incumbent Bruce Harrell in the primary election, Wilson said Seattle must become a more affordable place to live.
“The city is so hard to afford, and the fact is, like, Seattle should be a city where you can busk at Pike Place Market and afford to live here,” Wilson said. “What we lose when it becomes this kind of pressure cooker, where you have to have a tech job in order to survive, is so profound, right? It becomes a city that’s more sterile. It becomes a city that’s more alienated. We lose that community. We lose that feeling of just like you can be here. This is your home. And what I want more than anything as mayor is to make the city into a place where we can all live. This is all of our home. And that’s not going to be easy, right? That’s not going to happen overnight, but I really believe that we can make progress.”
