46% of Seattle voters already favor a Democratic challenger to City Attorney Ann Davison, NPI’s new Civic Heartbeat poll finds
Nearly half of likely November 2025 voters surveyed from January 31st - February 5th, 2025 for NPI by Change Research said they'd vote for a Democratic challenger to Davison, a Republican, if the election were being held now. Only 32% backed Davison.
Almost four years ago, Republicans gained a rare foothold in Seattle politics when Ann Davison edged out Nicole Thomas-Kennedy to become Seattle City Attorney.
NPI’s public opinion research that cycle suggested that Davison — along with Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell and current Seattle City Council President Sara Nelson — would win, and they each went on to do so, along with Teresa Mosqueda and three candidates running citywide for positions on the Seattle Public Schools’ board of directors.
Now, however, our research suggests that Davison’s bid for a second term is in trouble — deep trouble. Nearly half (46%) of likely November 2025 Seattle voters surveyed by Change Research for the Northwest Progressive Institute’s inaugural Civic Heartbeat poll last week say they’re prepared to support a Democratic challenger to Davison, while only 32% said they would vote to reelect Davison. 22% said they were not sure.
Seattle city positions are officially “nonpartisan,” but Davison ran for statewide office as a Republican in 2020 and lost, and has made public statements identifying herself as a Republican and renouncing the Democratic Party. Anticipating that those statements will be raised and discussed by Davison’s opponents (of which there are already two filed and declared) as well as the media and independent expenditure campaigns, we decided to ask voters whether they’d vote for Davison if the election were being held today, or whether they would support an unnamed opponent who identifies as a Democrat.
Davison’s fourteen point deficit is pretty significant. With seven out of ten voters identifying as Democrats in Seattle, Davison was already considered to be vulnerable. But this data puts that vulnerability into pretty stark numerical terms. Take a look:
QUESTION: Although Seattle positions are officially “nonpartisan,” most people serving in elected office in the city identify as Democrats. The notable exception is Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison, who joined the Republican Party in 2020, saying the Democratic Party had become too “far left” for her. Davison was elected to a four-year term in November of 2021 that will end this December. If the 2025 election for City Attorney were being held now and the choices were Davison and a challenger who identifies as belonging to the Democratic Party, who would you vote for?
ANSWERS:
Would vote for the challenger belonging to the Democratic Party: 46%Would vote for Ann Davison to serve a second term as Seattle City Attorney: 32%Not sure: 22%
Our inaugural Civic Heartbeat survey of 684 likely November 2025 Seattle general voters was in the field from Friday, January 31st, 2025, until Wednesday, February 5th, 2025. The poll was conducted entirely online for the Northwest Progressive Institute by Change Research and has a modeled margin of error of 4.3%.
Davison has made a few moves that put some daylight between herself and the Washington State Republican Party. One that comes to mind is Seattle’s participation in the lawsuit against Brian Heywood and Jim Walsh’s Initiative 2066. If you read the complaint, you’ll see Davison’s name on there; her office is representing the City of Seattle as a plaintiff, alongside King County and nonprofits represented by Pacifica Law Group.
But curiously, Davison has not been forcefully speaking out against the atrocities being perpetrated by Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the federal level, nor has she renounced the support of right wing podcasters and influencers who regularly use Seattle and its elected leadership as a punching bag for their regular programming. Davison’s only recently published news release concerns HB 1228 — a bill “that would significantly improve prosecution of DUI cases in Seattle and throughout the state.”
Seattle voters are very much in favor of efforts to improve public safety and clear the backlog of pending cases in our courts. However, they know they can obtain pro-public safety representation from a candidate identifying as a Democrat, and, at least at this juncture, they are set to have two alternatives to Davison to choose from: Rory O’Sullivan and Nathan Rouse. O’Sullivan jumped in early, several weeks ago, while Rouse declared his candidacy more recently… Whichever challenger gets through in the August Top Two election is likely to be an extremely credible, compelling opponent for Davison in the November general election.
Compared to Mayor Harrell and Council President Nelson, Davison’s favorability rating is actually pretty good, with 31% holding a favorable view of her and 31% holding an unfavorable view. It’s far better to be even than to have a negative spread, as Harrell and Nelson do — Harrell is fourteen points underwater and Nelson is twenty points underwater. However, Davison’s affiliation with the Trump-adoring, Trump-obsessed Republican Party looks like it could be a dealbreaker for a critical mass of voters.