At midnight on New Yr’s Day — the primary second of 2026 — life will change for legal professional Erika Evans for the second time in 9 months.
Evans will start her time period because the elected metropolis legal professional of Seattle on Jan. 1. Her marketing campaign was a juggernaut – she gained with almost two-thirds of the vote on Nov. 4. However her marketing campaign was additionally surprising.
Evans stop her place as an legal professional within the U.S. Division of Justice in March, despite the fact that she had as soon as thought of that place a “dream job.”
Amid a broader purge contained in the company, she opted to run for public workplace, fairly than go into non-public authorized observe or academia.
Evans rolled to a major victory in August and secured a bigger margin of victory on this month’s common election. As Seattle metropolis legal professional, Evans will characterize town in litigation and civil circumstances. She may even deal with some prosecutions of lower-level felony offenses.
“What we want at a time like that is fighters and folks with grit and expertise to battle what we’re seeing,” Evans instructed CBS Information this weekend.
Evans stated the Trump administration’s dismantling of the Justice Division’s Civil Rights division was amongst her motivations for leaving her submit on the federal prosecutor’s workplace within the western district of Washington this 12 months, the place she was dealing with civil rights issues, hate crime circumstances and violent crime circumstances.
She stated that quickly after Trump took workplace, the Justice Division management despatched emails “requiring that we report any colleagues doing range work within the workplace. We had 10 to 14 days to report them or we might get in bother ourselves. That was fairly disgusting.” She stated she did not really feel protected on the company, partly as a result of she was the co-chair of a range effort.
Quickly after her departure in March, Evans launched her marketing campaign for the Seattle metropolis legal professional’s place and parlayed her frustration with the Trump administration right into a element of her marketing campaign message. In a marketing campaign video, Evans pledged to problem Mr. Trump: “Along with your vote, I am going to tackle Trump and demand the group security we deserve.”
Chatting with CBS Information after her victory, Evans mentioned a sequence of plans. She stated she is going to make it a primary precedence to expedite the processing of DUI and home violence circumstances “to verify we’re being good stewards of public security.”
Evans stated she may even monitor for – and take authorized motion towards – any “federal overreach” into town by the Trump administration, which has already triggered authorized battles with different U.S. cities this 12 months, from Washington, D.C. to Portland to Los Angeles.
Evans is one in all greater than 5,000 Justice Division staff to stop, retire or face termination since January, in response to a evaluation by the Justice Connection group, which is a assist group for ousted and former Justice Division staff.
Stacey Younger, the Justice Connection founder and govt director, instructed CBS Information that “federal prosecutors are deeply dedicated to public service, and extra are pursuing that mission by way of elected workplace when staying on the Justice Division turns into infeasible. We want folks throughout the political spectrum preventing to uphold the rule of legislation, together with on the native degree.”
Evans is the granddaughter of civil rights determine Lee Evans, who was among the many 1968 Olympics monitor stars who raised a fist within the air throughout a medal presentation.
