Here’s how The News Tribune decides when to do candidate endorsements | Opinion
Let me start by saying, I should have published this column over a month ago. Journalists hate missing deadlines, so it pains me to realize this information is overdue.
No, I’m not telling you who The News Tribune editorial board is endorsing in the 2025 Tacoma mayoral race. But we’ve heard from quite a few Tacomans asking where that endorsement was during the primary election. So as Opinion Editor, I’m here to explain what our plan is, and to promise to make our process more clear going forward.
The short version is this: this newspaper’s editorial board will issue an endorsement for the 2025 mayoral race in October, on or before the day you receive your general election ballot in the mail. While the election results aren’t certified yet, the current frontrunners from the primary election are Anders Ibsen and John Hines. In all likelihood, the board will be choosing between those two candidates.
And here’s the why. The editorial board makes decisions each year about which races to offer endorsements for in the primary election, and which to leave for the general. If we’ve already endorsed a candidate in the primary, we won’t revisit that race for the general election.
There are simply too many races to consider in one go. The editorial board is currently made up of two News Tribune employees and three community volunteers, and we have to use our time wisely. That requires a judgment call on when to endorse in a given race.
Sometimes it’s easy to spot when the editorial board should endorse in a primary or a general election. Some races skip the primary, such as the Tacoma City Council District 2 race, which only has two candidates. And some have a more manageable number of candidates in the primary, allowing the board to have a meaningful conversation on each candidate’s stances.
Others present more of a conundrum.
The board this year decided to save the Tacoma mayoral race endorsement for the general election. There were pros and cons for both options, and we understand that many voters would have liked some guidance when choosing among six candidates for an open seat in the mayor’s office.
To arrive at a choice in October, the editorial board will pose questions to both mayoral candidates. We hope that diving deeper with two candidates will offer more insight into their visions for the city’s government, and the differences between them. That’s harder to get at in a six-person panel interview.
There’s still value in vetting the primary candidates. With this in mind, the editorial board did go through the endorsement process with all six candidates running for the at-large Tacoma City Council Pos. 6. What’s more, our news team covered mayoral candidate forums and reported on the race during the primary campaign season.
Going forward, the editorial board will aim to be transparent about what readers can expect leading up to primaries and general elections.
