Seattle Mayor Ed Murray drops bid for second term

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray addresses a crowd protesting the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota in 2016. (Photo by Chloe Collyer.)

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray will not seek re-election for mayor, following allegations by four men that he sexually abused them in the 1980s.

Murray plans to finish his current term as mayor. Murray repeated to reporters at a Tuesday press conference that the accusations against him are not true, but that the campaign would become about the scandal.

A Kent man accused Murray of the sexual abuse and filed a lawsuit last month. The accuser would have been a teenager, and Murray would have been in his 30s. Two other men had made similar allegations before, according to reporters. A fourth man last week signed a sworn declaration that Murray had abused him as a teen.

“To be Irish means that in the end, the world will break your heart,” he said, paraphrasing the Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the New York politician who also served in President John F. Kennedy’s administration.

“I just didn’t know it would come so soon,” Murray said.

Others remaining in the race for mayor include activists Nikkita Oliver and Cary Moon and former Mayor Mike McGinn. State Sen. Bob Hasegawa announced his candidacy Monday and planned a campaign kick off on Tuesday. Filing week starts next week.

Additional Reading

Seattle Times: Seattle Mayor Ed Murray won’t seek second term: ‘It tears me to pieces to step away’

KIRO-TV: Embattled Seattle mayor will not run for re-election

Crosscut: Mired in scandal, Murray quits re-election campaign