I

mean, I, you know, look, I think one of the things that makes people smile or laugh, depending on where they are in Olympia is the idea that I'm particularly moderate.

You know, I got my start in politics fighting for marriage equality.

I've been working on gun violence prevention for years and years.

And, um, also for years and years working on trying to make our tax system more fair.

Um, you know, it's funny, there was a suggestion that I was part of the roadkill caucus, which is also kind of made people laugh because the roadkill caucus was a group of folks, you know, Steve Hobbs and Mark Mollett and Brian Hatfield, um, who were really anti-tax, pro-business people.

They felt like they were middle of the road, and so they would get run over, right? So they called themselves the Roadkill Caucus.

Can you bring me into your head about how you think about your calculations around which taxes are worth pursuing?

I

mean, you know, look, I think one of the things that makes people smile or laugh, depending on where they are in Olympia, is the idea that I'm particularly moderate.

You know, I got my start in politics fighting for marriage equality.

I've been working on gun violence prevention for years and years.

And, um, also for years and years working on trying to make our tax system more fair.

Um, you know, it's funny, there was a suggestion that I was part of the roadkill caucus, which is also kind of made people laugh because the roadkill caucus was a group of folks, you know, Steve Hobbs and Mark Mullet and Brian Hatfield.

Um, who were really anti-tax, pro-business people.

Can you bring me into your head about how you think about your calculations around which taxes are worth pursuing?

And I'd start with just the very question to you, which is: how concerned are you, and how much do you worry that if you put these taxes in place, uh, that some of the wealthiest in your state, who work at places like Amazon, and Microsoft, and Starbucks, and others, are gonna leave?

Yeah, so let's be really clear about what we're talking about.

This is not a tax on intangible property, the, the so-called wealth tax that we con- we were considering last year.

This is an income tax on very wealthy people, so people who have more than a million dollars of income each year.

And the tax rate that's proposed, which is 9.9%, is actually lower than in most other states.

So there are 41 states at this point that have some s- form of personal income tax.

This would be a personal income tax that has a million dollar standard deduction, so that the only people who would pay it are ones who have more than a million dollars in income.

the Starbuckses and the like?