Mike Solan

The result of this betrayal has caused 350 police officers to flee Seattle since the riots. Many of these former police employees left for lower paying agencies just to escape Seattle’s toxic political climate, we also have another 100 officers now off the street due to the Mayor’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate and another 130 officers currently unavailable for service who are out on extended leave. When totaled, that is just under half the department gone/unavailable in almost two years. Seattle’s current police staffing crisis was caused by our current politicians and sadly it all could’ve been avoided. This political betrayal will forever be their legacy.

We have to protect jobs. Whether it's one or a couple hundred. That's our mission here, to protect jobs. It's not vaccinated versus unvaccinated, it's about the mandate in and of itself is a problem and they need to bargain this. Jobs are on the line. That's our purpose as a union.

If you are advocating for more police officers because you know crime is on the rise, you need more cops because of what the City Council did, why are you threatening us with our jobs (if) you don’t get this vaccination. It’s unbelievable to me, it doesn’t make any sense.

I believe that the case file in and of itself has glaring holes in it, i believe just after 2 p.m., that's when a lot of the criminality was occurring inside the Capitol. There was really nothing occurring outside in terms of criminality or law enforcement officers being assaulted.

Right now, more than ever, we need no division, we need unification.