Labor Council Secretary Laurie Wimmer privately suggested councilors sue the city to stop “MAGA of the left” from choosing council president. by Jeremiah Hayden During the City Council president vote earlier this year, Portlande rs may have been surprised to hear City Councilor Loretta Smith (D1) say she wanted to use her office funds to sue the city. After multiple rounds of deadlock, Smith wanted to challenge City Attorney Robert Taylor’s 2025 interpretation of the government charter, outlined in a memo, that said the mayor cannot break a tie during a council leadership vote, because the mayor is not part of the Council. “I would like to ask that we get a declaratory judgment from a judge to view our charter so that we can have an outside person tell us what was meant,” Smith said. “Until we do that, we're going to be going back and forth, back and forth.” New records obtained by the Mercury show the idea did not come from Smith alone. Records suggest it came from Northwest Oregon Labor Council (NOLC) Executive Secretary-Treasurer Laurie Wimmer, a hidden hand in local politics. And the idea wasn’t just to find a way to break a tie. It appears it was one of two pathways floated by local attorney Misha Isaak, which Wimmer believed would give then-President Elana Pirtle-Guiney the position for at least another year. “Misha I has the opinion that the charter contemplated mayoral tie breaking for ALL biz that comes before Council and thinks Taylor erred,” read a text message Wimmer sent to Pirtle-Guiney on her personal phone the morning of January 14. Wimmer was one of a handful of people who brought “Labor For Elana” signs to City Hall during the proceedings. Later that day, the Council instead elected Jamie Dunphy (D1) to serve as its new president. Asked immediately after the vote what she thought of the election of Dunphy—one of 11 candidates NOLC endorsed on the campaign trail in 2024—Wimmer distanced herself from the decision-making process. “I’m an observer,” Wimmer said. “This is their business; it’s none of mine,” she later added. The legal advice texted to the Council president's private cell phone about critical city issues raises questions about how well-connected figures quietly maintain power under a young government structure and recent charter changes that were supposed to increase transparency for Portlanders. It also highlights Wimmer’s behind-the-scenes efforts to whip votes and block any of the six progressive officials—colloquially known as “Peacock,” for “progressive caucus”—from the leadership position, despite her claims.  “This artificial moderate versus Peacock thing really doesn't work,” Wimmer told the Mercury January 14. “It's not a very nuanced way of dividing up differences of opinion.” But a year of public records obtained by the Mercury between Wimmer and all 12 councilors’ offices starkly contrast Wimmer’s laissez-faire, big-tent narrative. The records indicate the labor union executive was more than an observer during the proceedings, and has consistently influenced councilors’ decisions since early 2025. Wimmer did not respond to the Mercury’s multiple requests for comment. Wimmer has a storied history in Oregon politics. Her credentials include working as a state lobbyist for the Oregon Education Association for over 23 years, where she helped pass the Student Success Act in 2019 to increase public school funding. Prior to that, she co-founded and chaired the Oregon Revenue Coalition. She ran for the Oregon Legislature twice, in 1996 and in 2020. Wimmer was elected to the only full-time elected position at NOLC in 2023, and is a member of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 555. NOLC is one of roughly 500 state and local labor councils comprised of American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO)—an association of member unions designed to advocate on behalf of workers at the state and local level. It faced an internal clash last April when its board, including Wimmer, tried to bring Portland’s police union into its ranks. Most recently, Wimmer was tapped to participate in a new bi-monthly city workgroup called the Financial Stabilization and Recovery Plan, co-led by Portland’s Chief Financial Officer Jonas Biery, Councilors Mitch Green and Eric Zimmerman, and others. Details about the group are expected to be announced soon. Despite her assertion, records show Wimmer deeply influenced the council president proceedings in January. In the message she sent January 14, Wimmer told Pirtle-Guiney that Isaak, the attorney, saw two possible options to allow the mayor to break the tie and reelect Pirtle-Guiney. They could reverse language in city code, or get a court to issue a declaratory judgement on the matter. That, Wimmer said, would postpone the vote until a ruling was issued. “If the outcome of either path goes as we believe it will, you hold the gavel another year—time enough to see what the 2026 elections yield,” Wimmer said in the text message. Pirtle-Guiney said multiple people were talking about how to break the tie, and different ways for her to keep the gavel. She added that she was never interested in serving on a technicality, but said she interpreted Wimmer’s 2026 reference to mean she might have more support after that election. “That's a little bit funny to me,” Pirtle-Guiney said. “Because I was pretty clear with all of my colleagues that I was interested in serving for a second year and continuing the work that I had started, but that I was not interested in serving any more than that.” Isaak’s strategy to allow the mayor to break the tie over council leadership is one that Smith and other councilors are still considering pursuing, according to Smith’s office. Isaak declined to provide comment to the Mercury when reached by phone on March 6. Other records show Wimmer acknowledging a genuine political divide between progressive and moderate councilors. “They’re trying to pick you off, I see,” Wimmer wrote to Councilor Steve Novick on January 7, during City Council deliberations over who to install as the next Council president. “Thanks for being clear and firm.” Later that afternoon, Wimmer weighed in on a tense discussion councilors of color raised about an entrenched status quo they said leaves them fighting uphill to combat unconscious race and gender inequities. “I’m outraged that they are saying pro-Elana = racism,” Wimmer wrote to Novick and Councilor Eric Zimmerman, separately. “I’m OFFENDED.” Novick did not respond. Zimmerman did. “Yep. We knew it would devolve into that,” Zimmerman wrote. “Someone should call it out,” Wimmer wrote. “How,” Zimmerman wrote. “Impossible except for Loretta. Dan and Olivia and I can’t.” Wimmer then urged Zimmerman to downplay the notion that race impacted councilors’ decision-making. “Make a distinction between legitimate misgivings and race-based opposition,” Wimmer wrote. The records show Wimmer sent the same message to Smith, adding, “They are conflating the two and that’s offensive.” That’s according to a screenshot from Smith’s personal phone that was excluded from the Mercury’s records request, but obtained by another requester and shared with the Mercury. The records suggest Smith did not respond. In a March 9 text message to the Mercury, Zimmerman said “of course” he communicates with Wimmer. “I meet with her at least quarterly, she is the head of the Northwest Labor Council,” Zimmerman said. “She’s a great community and good government advocate, and a D4 constituent, who wants Portland to be successful.” Behind the scenes, Wimmer and others chastised progressive councilors of color over their concerns that racist stereotypes were being deployed to keep Councilor Sameer Kanal from the president role. As the Mercury reported in January, the councilors' assertions weren't unfounded. During that January 7 meeting, local real estate broker Brian Owendoff was photographed in a group chat with two associates from the Future Portland PAC, Tahlia Giardini and Vikki Payne, using racist, sexist, and homophobic tropes about those elected officials. Owendoff was also in a separate group chat with members of the organization Partnership for Progress, which similarly framed the meeting as one that “devolved into personal attacks and the use of the race card” in a January 12 newsletter. The morning of January 8, Wimmer shared her frustration in a message to Novick, particularly at the four councilors affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). “Yesterday's meeting left me heartsick and infuriated,” Wimmer wrote. “The egregious breach of decorum in the final hours, impugning motives, race baiting, violating Robert's Rules, and trashing a smart and high-integrity public servant was just too much. Mitch (Green) told me this would not happen. The DSA team is nothing less than the MAGA of the left. I'm just disgusted. Thanks for being a thoughtful, honest, kind, smart servant leader. Your conduct yesterday saved me from utter despair.” Wimmer’s position within a large labor group, coupled with her frequent communication with councilors suggests her sphere of influence is much greater than that of “an observer.” Records show Wimmer tried to broker a deal with Novick on behalf of Pirtle-Guiney (EPG). “I need to speak with you asap,” Wimmer wrote to Novick’s city phone the morning of January 8. “I want to follow EPG’s wishes and have you accept the nomination for Council Prez. The VP question is strategically and operationally critical. Pls call.” “Laurie, no disrespect, but I am limiting my discussion of council internal business today to councilors,” Novick replied.  “Ok. EPG asked me to call,” Wimmer wrote. Pirtle-Guiney said she had talked to Novick about whether he might be a compromise candidate for president, but didn’t recall asking Wimmer to contact him.  “I certainly don't think it's a bad thing for anybody considering a big step like that, to hear from people who think they would be good at it,” Pirtle-Guiney said. “If Laurie had offered to call him, I'm sure I would have said ‘it doesn't hurt, go right ahead.’” Novick told the Mercury he did not recall talking with Pirtle-Guiney about it, but said his position was clear that he did not want councilors to elect a Peacock member. “Nothing that Laurie was going to say was going to influence how I acted in any of that discussion,” Novick said. Records show that throughout the course of 2025, Wimmer sent messages to councilors’ city-issued devices, but sent a handful of other messages to Pirtle-Guiney, Smith, Zimmerman, and Novick on their personal phones. Novick is seen repeatedly telling Wimmer not to message about city business on his personal phone. Under Oregon law, elected officials are the custodians of their own records on their personal devices. That means in the absence of a court order, elected officials get to determine which, if any, portions of their private communications to turn over in a request for public records. While many legal exemptions apply, Oregon records law is historically a law of disclosure, favoring journalists and the public when it comes to seeking information about the public’s business. “Oregon’s public records and meetings laws establish a simple expectation: that its government will be transparent to her people,” says a 2024 Oregon Department of Justice manual on public records and meetings law. It is unclear whether councilors chose to include all or just a portion of their chats with Wimmer from their private phones in response to the Mercury's records request.  But other city laws also apply, both to elected officials and to influential parties. The city established lobbying rules in 2005 requiring entities that attempt to influence public officials to report their activities to the public. Registered lobbyists are required to file quarterly reports when they spend at least eight hours or $1,000 on lobbying. Wimmer’s lobbyist registration lapsed at the beginning of 2026, and she had not renewed her registration with the city at the time of publishing, according to city records. While she was registered in 2025, she reported no lobbying activity after the first quarter that year. Still, the records show Wimmer weighing in on labor issues—including a police review board’s contract negotiations—putting her thumb on the scale regarding a City Council operations staff unionization effort, and indirectly admonishing councilors she disagreed with. They also show Wimmer serving as an envoy for the police union, which does not have its own registered lobbyist with the city. A voicemail recording obtained by the Mercury shows Wimmer holds enough sway that she appears to expect officials to check with her before making decisions, particularly on police-related issues. On April 28, 2025, Koyama Lane posted a letter to her campaign’s Instagram account from the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT) stating its opposition to the Portland Police Association (PPA) joining NOLC. Wimmer took issue with the post, and reached out to Koyama Lane to disinvite her from NOLC’s annual Labor Appreciation Dinner in May. “This is very awkward to say but with respect, I suggest that you probably plan not to be there after what you did on social media around the PAT letter,” Wimmer said. “I’m not sure that that would be a good idea, and to protect you I am saying this. Maybe there’s a time for us to have a conversation at some point, but right now I'm pretty heartbroken that you did this without a call to me.” Wimmer said it was not about her, but about her council’s feelings. “I know we sent you an invitation, but that was before you did that,” Wimmer said. “So, it’s just my suggestion that it wouldn’t be the best possible environment for you to appear.” ...read more read less