Maria Lorena González is an American politician and civil rights lawyer. She is a member of the Seattle City Council in the city-wide 9th seat. She was the first Latina elected to the council.
Early life and education
González was born on February 20 in Prosser, Washington and raised in Grandview. She has five siblings. Her parents came to the United States as undocumented immigrants in the early 1960s, and became legal permanent residents in the 1970s. Her mother became a citizen 1996. She described her early life as a "Spanish-speaking migrant farmworker household." González was crowned Grandview Miss Junior in 1994. González attended Yakima Valley College at the Grandview Campus and earned a degree in business from Washington State Universityin 1999. During this time, she says she worked three jobs and relied on the assistance from scholarships to pay for her education. She moved to Seattle in 2002 and began attending the Seattle University School of Law, earning her JD in 2005.
Legal career
After graduating from law school, González became an attorney at Gordon Thomas Honeywell. In 2012, she represented a Latino man in a civil rights case against the city of Seattle for discriminatory police conduct. Her client received a $150,000 settlement, but she told the Seattle Times that the Seattle Police Department seemed incapable admitting that the incident was an example of biased policing. In 2014, she became legal counsel to Seattle mayor Ed Murray.
Seattle City Council
In 2015, González ran for the 9th position on the Seattle City Council after Sally J. Clark dropped her reelection bid for one of the two remaining at-large seats on the council. González won the election with more than 78% of the vote, and replaced John Okamoto, who was temporarily on the council after Clark resigned to take a job at the University of Washington. González was the first Latina to be elected to the council. In 2017, González was reelected to office with more than 70% of the vote. González was selected as the Council President in January 2020, succeeding Bruce Harrell.
On August 8, 2019, González announced her intention to run for state attorney general in the 2020 election, to replace Bob Ferguson who was expected to run for governor. She also announced her intention of continuing to work on the Seattle City Council during the campaign. On August 22, 2019, González suspended her campaign.
