Thursday Bram

Where does your vote matter? November 2026

Wed, 14 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

These are the races where votes matter the most — outcomes are not a given and one candidate is a substantially better choice than the other. They're worth the effort of completing and returning your ballot, and maybe even talking about with other voters. If you haven't already used your Oregon political donation tax credit this year, you might even want to consider making a donation to them.

Multnomah County Chair — 1. Shannon Singleton 2. Sharon Meieran 3. No candidate
Multnomah County Circuit Court Position 2 — Diana Sykes
Portland City Council District 3 — 1. Tiffany Koyama Lane 2. Angelita Morillo 3. Esther León 4. Cristal Otero 5. Tom Sollitt 6. No candidate.
Portland City Council District 4 — 1. Mitch Green 2. Jamey Evenstar 3. Jeremy Beausoleil Smith 4. Jayne Cronlund 5. No Candidate 6. No Candidate
Measure 26-267 — Yes

Want to understand why I'm prioritizing these races? I've shown the analysis behind these picks below, along with what I think about the races I'm not prioritizing.

US Congress

Senate

Jeff Merkley is running for re-election, seeking a fourth term. There are three other candidates in the race: Gary Lyndon Dye (Libertarian), Chris Henry (Progressive / Pacific Green), and David Brock Smith (Republican). Neither Dye nor Henry look likely to make a significant showing, though Henry may do better than the 1.9% of votes he earned in his 2022 campaign against Ron Wyden due to some Democrats' dissatisfaction with Merkley's age. Smith is putting some effort into his campaign, but as of the June FEC reporting deadline he'd only raised $120,760 to Merkley's $7,893,849. Smith may be able to win over up to 40% of voters, but is unlikely to win.

House of Representatives

Congressional District 1

Suzanne Bonamici is running for re-election and looks likely to win. In her last four re-election campaigns, she pulled well over 60% of votes and she's on track for a similarly large win. I was a bit surprised to see Barbara Kahl win the Republican primary for the district with more than double the number of votes John Verbeek pulled in, but even if she can pick up all of Verbeek's supporters, Kahl isn't going to have the numbers in a district that hasn't elected a Republican since 1975.

Congressional District 3

Maxine Dexter is running for re-election and looks likely to win. While there is technically another candidate in the race, Republican Loran Ayles has done minimal campaigning. He hasn't responded to any interview or information requests that I'm aware of, did not submit material for the Oregon Voters' Pamphlet, and has minimal online presence.

Congressional District 5

Janelle Bynum is running for re-election. CD5 is Oregon's most contested federal election. Bynum won the seat in 2024, beating out incumbent Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer by just a little more than 10,000 votes. However, many news sources describe Bynum's seat as safe in this election. She's facing Republican Patti Adair this go around and Adair doesn't have the name recognition or fundraising capacity that Chavez-DeRemer was able to wield. Andrea Townsend is also running, representing the Pacific Green Party, as she did in 2024.

At this point, the biggest threat to Bynum may be her own politics: her Congressional voting record in her first-term disappointed many Multnomah County Democrats to the point that a group of precinct committee persons and other activists proposed a resolution to the group in July to request Bynum resign and drop out of the election. While the resolution didn't pass, it's still a sign of Bynum's struggles with turning out leftist voters. If Townsend can double the 4,155 votes she won in 2024 and Adair can get the Republican base out, Adair will have a good shot at the seat. Despite that possibility, it's tough to get excited about the race.

Oregon

Governor

Tina Kotek is running for re-election in a race that has sparked breathless headlines about how Oregon may elect its first Republican governor in 44 years. She's facing Christine Drazan, as she did in 2022. The third party candidates on the ballot have changed, though: rather than Betsy Johnson and a few other names, the only other candidate on the ballot is Brett Smith of the Pacific Green Party. So what has the pollsters so hot and bothered? Well, the polls this year have had both Drazan and Kotek hovering around 45%, with enough undecided voters to turn either candidate into a winner. Smith's numbers are drifting between 3 and 6%, which could help tip the scale in Drazan's favor. Drazan has been able to leverage these polls for fundraising, including a $1 million donation from the Republican Governors Association in early October, putting her in a much stronger position than in 2022. Kotek remains ahead in fundraising at the time I'm writing this analysis, and significantly ramped up campaign spending in September. She reported $5.8 million in spending in September, which was more than in the prior eight months combined.

Turnout will be key in this election, and I don't think Kotek is going to be a strong enough pull on her own. Down ticket races may be the deciding factor on who decides to complete and return a ballot and I could easily see Kotek securing re-election based more on the campaigns ran by Portland city council candidates than on her own merits. I could just as easily see Drazan eking out a win due to Kotek's routinely centrist politics pushing away Democrat and further left voters, much in the way that Nathan Vasquez beat Mike Schmidt in Multnomah County's 2024 district attorney election. And in similar ways, letting Drazan slip into the governor's seat would be harmful for Oregonians. While I wouldn't consider this race one to put a ton of effort into as there are already plenty of people sinking millions of dollars into affecting its outcome, voting for Kotek is a better choice than leaving your ballot blank or voting for Smith.

Oregon Senate

District 17

Lisa Reynolds is running for election. While she is the incumbent, she was appointed to the seat in late 2024. Reynolds may have a little less name recognition than the typical incumbent, but she's pulled in most of the endorsements and donors I'd expect an established Democrat in this seat to be able to land. Republican John Chee is also running; however, the Republican Party has struggled to find viable candidates for District 17 in the past and it looks like Chee is no exception. While Chee's platform is focused on investing in young men (who he considers to be the most neglected and demonized group in modern America), I'd be surprised if he manages to win over a majority of that demographic, let alone the rest of the majority Democrat district.

Oregon House of Representatives

All of the seven Oregon House races below follow a set pattern: The incumbent is a Democrat who was elected with more than 75% of votes (often above 85%). There's another candidate in the race (usually Republican but occasionally Libertarian), who has run in a few other races but who hasn't been elected to any office and has raised minimal funds. While I don't like to claim any election outcome is guaranteed, these incumbents all have re-election within easy reach so I'm not going to spend much time on the details.

District 33

Shannon Isadore is running for re-election against Republican Ciatta Thompson. The most interesting fact about this race is that Thompson was a long-time Democrat who switched parties, reportedly based on experiences working downtown.

District 41

Mark Gamba is running for re-election against Republican Elvis Clark. Clark ran unsuccessfully for the seat in both 2022 and 2024 and does not appear to be doing anything differently this go-around.

District 42

Rob Nosse is running for re-election. For the second election in a row, the Republicans have failed to field a challenger. Libertarian Morey Straus is on the ballot though he is refusing all donations and endorsements as he considers the Oregon state government to be illegitimate.

District 43

Tawna Sanchez is running for re-election. Republican Tim LeMaster is running against Sanchez for the third time, and maybe the third time will be the charm for LeMaster to manage to win over more than 8% of voters in the district. I'm not holding my breath though.

District 44

Travis Nelson is running for re-election. Republican Margo Logan is running against Nelson though Logan does not appear to have a website and did not submit information for the Oregon Voters' Pamphlet. She does have a substantial social media presence that includes a significant amount of misinformation, including about Oregon elections.

District 45

Thuy Tran is running for re-election. Republican Jason Boyce is running against Tran. Interestingly, his campaign website includes material about how he will work with Republican gubernatorial candidate Robert Neuman (who did run in the Republican primary this May and garnered 680 votes total). The website also suggests that Boyce gets his mail in Salem, despite running for a seat in Portland.

District 46

Willy Chotzen is running for re-election. Republican Leo Morley is running against Chotzen in this election. Morley has a social media presence for his campaign but has not updated his accounts in nearly a month as I'm writing this analysis.

Multnomah County

This election is the first time Multnomah County will use ranked-choice voting to elect officials. While I'm familiar with the results of past elections in the county, even predicting turnout for this election feels a little difficult because the electoral process is significantly different. For example, I can't look at primary outcomes when predicting what might happen in the general election. That said, two of the races' outcomes are already obvious: Nicole Pexton is running unopposed for auditor and Nicole Morrisey O'Donnell is running unopposed for sheriff.

Multnomah County Chair

Three candidates are running to lead Multnomah County: Shannon Singleton (who is currently the Multnomah County Commissioner for District 2), Sharon Meieran (who was the commissioner for District 1 from 2017 to 2025), and Julia Brim-Edwards (currently commissioner for District 3). Singleton has been a consistent presence in pushing for evidence-based solutions to homelessness in Oregon for two decades and has proven an effective voice for communities Multnomah County's government rarely remembers to take into account. Whether Singleton can win the seat, however, is a more complicated question.

In elections past, I might have assumed that Brim-Edwards' years as a lobbyist for Nike would make her the most likely winner — she can out-fundraise any comers and can leverage her connections for big name endorsements, as she's demonstrated in her steady climb up the local political ladder. But ranked choice voting may provide enough leverage to change the outcomes of this race. One reason for that is the Don't Rank Julia campaign, which is devoted to convincing voters to, well, not rank Brim-Edwards at all. While there are some other campaigns focused on getting voters to not rank certain candidates, the Don't Rank Julia campaign is unique: it's focused on just one candidate, has a professional appearance, and is operated by a full-fledged PAC devoted to defeating Brim-Edwards. The campaign has helped bring more attention to damning information about Brim-Edwards, such as the open letter seven of her colleagues on the Portland Public Schools board published in July about their difficulties working with Brim-Edwards and concerns about her future involvement in politics. I'm not yet sure how substantially the Don't Rank Julia campaign can affect the election, but it's promising. Of course, not ranking Brim-Edwards isn't enough to ensure Singleton's election — Meieran is still in the race.

Meieran's complained vigorously about how much she hates the idea of running for office again, but she's is actively campaigning and touting a big plan for improving the county. The 23-page plan promises to restructure the county's approach to operations, including creating a functioning approach to reducing homelessness within two years, a concept that certainly appeals to most voters. However, a close read of Meieran's road map shows no real consideration of the root causes of either Multnomah County's struggles with operations or issues like homelessness. It certainly doesn't address how Meieran will get other elected officials on board with changes that limit their power — a crucial step in a county where a district attorney can snap his fingers and derail months of work on a plan to provide treatment for people experiencing addiction rather than criminalizing them. Despite these concerns (and a formal complaint that Meieran may have violated campaign finance laws in creating her plan), Meieran's likely to attract enough voters of all affiliations willing to at least rank her second on the ballot to make her a viable compromise candidate.

Commissioner District 2

Seven candidates are running for the District 2 seat: Bri Williams, Nathan Ong Norris, Serena Cruz, Nabil Zaghloul, Tony Robertson, Bruce Broussard, and Herman Greene. Williams seems best positioned to do meaningful work as a commissioner: She's already familiar with the way the county functions as a county employee and she's handled leadership positions at the county (such as on the county's policy council on HIV/AIDs-specific healthcare). Williams' campaign has gathered endorsements from key progressive organizations around Portland and she seems poised to perform well in the election.

Norris and Cruz have built equally effective campaigns and could do well in the seat. Norris' background in emergency management could be a useful addition to the commission and he's been able to leverage his connections to democratic socialist organizations in ways that will certainly ensure his supporters return their ballots on time. Cruz, on the other hand, already has been a county commissioner — as well as the chief operating officer of Multnomah County. She's already embedded in Portland's power structures and has built a long list of local organizations and elected officials willing to advocate for her as well as donate to her campaign. If ranked choice voting wasn't a factor, I'd expect Cruz to win this race.

Zaghloul and Robertson are both long-time government employees running somewhat smaller campaigns. Zaghloul has worked for Multnomah County for more than 30 years while Robertson works for the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industry. While Zaghloul has garnered a decent list of endorsements, his fundraising suggests that support isn't deep — he hasn't gotten many donations from elected officials, unions, or other power brokers beyond a $250 donation from Dan Ryan's PAC. Robertson's endorsement list is short and his fundraising doesn't appear to have hit the legal reporting threshold at the time I'm writing.

While voters can rank up to six candidates for this race, I'd suggest only ranking five. While neither Broussard nor Greene have been targeted by any of the Don't Rank campaigns I've seen, both have records that suggest they would do particularly poorly in the seat. Broussard is a perennial candidate with well over a dozen campaigns ranging from city council to governor his credit — but not a single win. Greene served on the Portland Public School board until last year and has since worked as a paid consultant to Procedo, a private firm that landed a contract with PPS worth $61.5 million.

Multnomah County Circuit Court

Three judges' seats are on the ballot. Two are run-off races — in both cases, no candidate earned more than 49% of votes on the primary ballot, so the two candidates earning the most ballots in both races advanced to the general ballot. The third is for Position 6 and is essentially confirming the appointment of Sonia Montalbano to the seat in August since Montalbano is not facing an opponent.

Position 2

Diana Sykes is running against Laura Maurer Rowan for Position 2. I consider this race to be one of the most important on this ballot because its outcome will directly impact people's lives — and it's one where even a small number of voters is likely to have a significant impact, since many voters consistently skip judicial races. Position 2 covers Multnomah County's mental health diversion court. Sykes is, by far, the candidate less likely to compound the harms the carceral system enacts, especially in cases where mental health is a factor. Her work in creating the Oregon Department of Justice's Civil Rights Unit, as well as in legal aid and private practice, demonstrates an ability to recognize systemic failures that Rowan seems to lack.

Rowan, in contrast, is a prosecutor's prosecutor. During her time in the Multnomah County District Attorney, she was the point person for handling involuntary commitments on mental health grounds and consistently demonstrated a willingness to criminalize mental illness. Rowan has close ties with the Portland Police Bureau, an organization that the US Department of Justice found to have a "pattern and practice" of using excessive force against people experiencing mental health crises. Given that Rowan has pulled in large donations from the law-and-order crowd, she's been able to spend more on marketing for her campaign. However, Sykes has gathered endorsements from the Portland Mercury and the Oregonian that will likely outweigh Rowan's fundraising advantage.

Position 14

Elizabeth Savage and Joe Hagedorn are running for Position 14. Position 14 is the family law court and both candidates bring relevant experience to the table. Hagedorn has gathered endorsements from the Portland Mercury, Willamette Week, and the Oregonian, which may be enough to clinch a win given the relatively little attention on judicial races.

East Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District

Zone 3

Brad Hunter is running for re-election against Silas Morgan. Hunter was appointed to the seat in 2026 and, despite his short tenure, has been endorsed by other EMSWCD directors. His background in natural resources management and governance seems to have allowed him to jump into the district's work. While Morgan has some relevant experience in geology and farming, Hunter's relevant work experience and incumbency will likely appeal to more voters.

At Large 2

Four candidates are running in this election: Daniel Newberry, Steph Routh, Jeremy Wood, and Alix Parise. Newberry and Routh likely have the most name recognition. Newberry has a long history of involvement with a variety of government organizations dealing with natural resources, including a stint as the former chair of Portland's Urban Forestry Commission and the Johnson Creek Watershed Council. Routh has a long history of policy work in the Portland area, as well as a 2024 run for Portland City Council under her belt where she performed well. Routh is running one of the most active campaigns I've seen in a while for a conservation district seat. While either could do well in the position, Vivek Shandas' endorsement of Newberry bumped Newberry up in my estimation. Shandas' work on addressing climate change in cities rarely comes up in elections, even when a candidate prioritizes climate issues, so seeing a candidate seek Shandas' endorsement feels like a big deal.

West Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District

Zone 5

Terri Preeg Riggsby is running for re-election against Joy VanDervort Fields and Shari Freshman. Riggsby is a long-time incumbent, as well as the executive director of the Network of Oregon Watershed Councils. She looks poised to keep her seat, though Fields presents an interesting alternative. Fields is Clackamas County's principal planner, an expertise underrepresented on the district's board.

Portland

More than thirty candidates are running in Portland's two city council races. I'm limiting my discussion to candidates who seem to be running serious campaigns, typically evidenced by collecting donations and endorsements, participating in interviews, and engaging with voters beyond their personal circle of acquaintances.

Portland's auditor, Simone Rede, is also up for re-election but does not face a challenger.

City Council District 3

Angelita Morillo, Tiffany Koyama Lane, and Steve Novick, District 3's incumbent councilors, are all running for re-election. Morillo and Lane have both been effective representatives of the district as well as advocates for marginalized communities throughout the city. They're two of the three top fundraisers through the city's Small Donors program and are consistently turning out supporters for campaign events. They both look poised to turn that support into the voter turnout necessary to keep them on the city council.

While Novick's fundraising isn't far behind his fellow councilors, he's been tagged in two separate Don't Rank campaigns, based on his voting record supporting big businesses and increasing police funding. That voting record has been rewarded with continuing support from organizations like United for Portland (the political arm of the Portland Metro Chamber). He's positioned himself as enough of a moderate that the Don't Rank campaigns may not prevent his re-election. Kellie Torres is in a similar position, albeit with a less visible career and less name recognition. Torres, who formerly served as Dan Ryan's chief of staff, has raised as much money through the Small Donors program as Novick, despite being on at least one Don't Rank list.

Of the other seventeen candidates in the race, Esther León, Tom Sollitt, Joel Corcoran, and Cristal Otero are running the most significant campaigns. León and Sollitt are both participating in the Small Donors program. León has gathered some significant endorsements, especially those tied to her campaign priorities around affordable housing, community-based public safety programs (like Portland Street Response), and climate preparedness. Sollitt's campaign may seem a little light on endorsements, but that's by choice: he pledged to not accept endorsements or donations from organizations that receive money from the City of Portland or regularly lobby city leaders. Corcoran has a long résumé in Portland politics, including stints as policy counsel for Loretta Smith and Jeff Merkley and treasurer for the Portland Metro Chamber's United for Portland PAC. Otero is on her second run for city council and is leaning on her experience as a program specialist for the Multnomah County Homeless Services Department to talk about key issues like affordability.

While it currently seems likely that Morillo and Lane will be re-elected, the third city council seat seems a bit more up in the air. Centrist and right-leaning voters will likely dictate the third seat, with either Novick returning or Torres moving forward. However, it's still worth ranking other candidates. I'd suggesting the following ranking: 1. Tiffany Koyama Lane 2. Angelita Morillo 3. Esther León 4. Cristal Otero 5. Tom Sollitt 6. No candidate.

City Council District 4

Mitch Green, Olivia Clark, and Eric Zimmerman, District 4's incumbent councilors, are all running for re-election. Green's re-election campaign has gathered quite a bit of attention from opponents looking to manufacture scandals. Those range from Portland Police Chief Bob Day's comments on old anti-police social media posts Green made in 2020 and has since deleted to an attempt to file a campaign finance violation complaint on the basis of Green's use of his official social media accounts. Those efforts don't seem to have harmed Green's fundraising or support from left-leaning groups, though.

Clark and Zimmerman are both on multiple Don't Rank lists and there seems to be a small Don't Rank campaign solely focused on Zimmerman. Both Clark and Zimmerman have consistently opposed police accountability measures and supported increasing police funding. They're also both performing well in the Small Donors program and seem to have enough institutional support to do well in the coming election. But Eli Arnold, who was the first runner up in the 2024 election for District 4, is currently the top fundraiser in the Small Donors program. Arnold has similar politics to Clark and Zimmerman and may be poised to knock either Clark or Zimmerman out of the running, especially given the support he's gathered as an active member of the Portland Police Bureau.

Three other candidates are running substantive campaigns at this point: Jamey Evenstar, Jayne Cronlund, and Jeremy Beausoleil Smith. Evenstar has gathered most of the progressive and left-leaning endorsements in the race and seems to be leveraging her experience in Candace Avalos' and Chloe Eudaly's offices effectively. Cronlund's campaign has focused on the city's parks and supporting small businesses, two platform planks that make sense given her experiences working in land conservancy and running small businesses. She's landed an endorsement from Willamette Week on the expectation that she wouldn't automatically side with existing voting blocs on the city council. Beausoleil Smith has a lengthy history of local organizing, most recently with the Democratic Socialists of America, that combined with his solid fundraising suggests that he'll be able to turn out a respectable number of voters.

While the outcomes in District 4 seem a little less certain than in District 3, voters could easily return the three incumbents to the city council. Arnold may be able to outspend other challengers to unseat either Clark or Zimmerman. But the various Don't Rank campaigns in play may be able to change the numbers enough to give another candidate a shot. I'd suggest the following ranking: 1. Mitch Green 2. Jamey Evenstar 3. Jeremy Beausoleil Smith 4. Jayne Cronlund 5. No Candidate 6. No Candidate

Maywood Park City Councilor

Maywood Park is an independent city entirely surrounded by Portland. Their city council is elected by ranked choice voting. In this election, the two candidates receiving the most votes will serve a four-year term and the third will serve a two-year term. Two incumbents are running: Jim Akers, the current mayor, and Kevin Bussema, the current council president. The three other candidates on the ballot are Katy Collins, Winn Holly, and Kelly Ripley Feller. Akers and Bussema have an obvious advantage in the race that suggests they'll be re-elected. Ripley Feller has garnered substantial endorsements, while Holly regularly publishes a newsletter about Maywood Park's government. Both Holly and Ripley Feller could do well in the election, though Holly seems most likely to bring a new and more inclusive perspective to the council.

Ballot Measures

Measure 26-267 - Amends Charter: Portland residents decide 2% of city’s annual discretionary budget.

This ballot measure would create a new participatory budgeting program in the City of Portland. Despite some suggestions to the contrary, this wouldn't be the first participatory budgeting program in the area. The Oregon Cultural Trust's tax credit program likely has that honor. However, the program this ballot measure could create would be larger than the other participatory budgeting programs currently operating here, setting aside an estimated $16.4 million for city residents' allocation. While starting with a smaller pilot program might have been more appealing to many voters, this ballot measure reflects the reality of how budgeting works in the various local governments around Portland. We've seen multiple ballot measures over the past several elections that create new taxes to cover specific programs that stakeholders haven't been able to get local governments to take on. Many of these programs are important and worth the work that's gone into them, like Preschool for All and the Clean Energy Fund. But they've made paying taxes here much more complicated than in other cities. The only way to avoid even more of these necessary but clunky ballot measures in the future is to give city residents a say in how existing budgets are spent.

The ballot measure appears to be well supported. Your 2 Cents PDX is the organization working to pass the measure. They got a record-breaking 78,743 Portlanders to sign the petition putting this measure on the ballot. In addition to all that work preparing for this election, they've convinced a long list of donors to support the campaign. Most of those donors are contributing amounts under $250. In contrast, Protect Our City Services, the organization campaigning against the ballot measure, has a total of nine donors, with the majority of their funds coming from the Fire Fighters PAC and the Keep Portland Safe PAC.

The grand tradition of Yom Kippur balls

Tue, 15 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The idea of partying on Yom Kippur may seem like it goes against everything the Day of Atonement stands for, but it fits in better with Jewish tradition than you might expect.

This zine examines the tradition of the Yom Kippur ball: why Yiddish anarchists held parties and served pork during the High Holidays, how that custom evolved into traditions in other communities, and why modern organizers have seen value in bringing the custom back.

Content notes: Discussions of anti-Jewish violence, forced assimilation, and government repression.

The Grand Tradition of the Yom Kippur Ball by Thursday Bram

Where Does Your Vote Matter? May 2026

Fri, 01 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Electoral politics can often feel repetitive: the same candidates receive money and endorsements from the same supporters year after year. Most voters rarely get a chance to support real change.

But in every election cycle, there are at least a few races where the outcome is not a given and a few where one outcome is substantially worse than the other. This analysis is an attempt to identify where those races overlap in Portland's 2026 primary. Consider focusing your efforts on these races, even if you don't vote in any others.

Oregon State House District 38 — John Wasielewski
Multnomah County Circuit Court Position 2 — Diana Sykes
Multnomah County Circuit Court Position 12 — Peter Klym
Multnomah County Circuit Court Position 15 — Joe Hagedorn

Below you'll find analyses of individual races with two or more candidates.

Oregon

US Senate

Two candidates are on the Democratic ballot. Jeff Merkley is the incumbent and has been the junior US Senator for Oregon since 2008. (Yes, that means that his incumbency is officially old enough to vote in this election, if it was, y'know, a person!) Paul Damian Wells is running against Merkley, on a platform focused on Palestine and voting reform. Wells has run three times unsuccessfully for state office and does not appear to have raised money for this latest election. Merkley looks likely to coast through the primary and into the general election in November.

In comparison, seven candidates are on the Republican ballot. Of the seven, Jo Rae Perkins likely has the most name recognition, based on winning the 2022 and 2020 Republican nominations for those year's US Senate races and for her presence at the US Capitol building on January 6, 2021. While the Republican primary may prove tight, Perkins has an edge. It's unlikely, however, that any of the seven candidates running will be able to gather enough votes to beat Merkley in November.

US House

Congressional District 1

Suzanne Bonamici has represented Oregon's first congressional district since 2012. She won the 2024 Democratic primary with more than 90% of votes, and the 2024 general election with more than 68% of votes. Little has happened in the last two years to endanger that strong support and it's likely Bonamici will retain her position in the November general election. The only challenger Bonamici faces in this year's Democratic primary is Jamil Ahmad. Ahmad also ran in the 2024 primary, pulling in 6% of the votes. He may do better this year — perhaps as high as 9% if he can pull all support that went to other challengers in 2024.

Two candidates are running in the Republican primary: John Verbeek and Barbara Kahl. Of the two, Verbeek has more name recognition as a perennial candidate for both the state legislature and for Congress. While he tends to perform well in Republican primaries, Verbeek has failed to earn more than 34% of votes in any general election. In his 2018 match up with Bonamici, she won roughly double the number of votes Verbeek received. Kahl is running for the first time and has yet to establish herself as a more effective primary candidate than Verbeek.

Congressional District 3

The 2024 Democratic primary for Oregon's third district was contentious. Maxine Dexter, the incumbent, won a tight race with the help of out-of-state PACs spending millions in support of her campaign. Since her win, Dexter has gone head to head with ICE multiple times, which has won her some significant support on the left. However, there are still plenty of voters who are open to an alternative. Jessica Salas, a Democratic Socialist, is running in the Democratic primary. While she can't outspend Dexter, Salas may be able to tap into enough voters dissatisfied with Dexter and the Democratic Party to draw some serious attention. Unseating Dexter seems unlikely, but Salas is a candidate to watch. There's also a third candidate in the Democratic primary, Andrew Castilleja, but his campaigning seems minimal.

Only one candidate, Loran Ayles, is running in the Republican primary. Little information is available about Ayles, beyond a failed run for the Hood River County School District.

Congressional District 5

Incumbent Janelle Bynum may be the most vulnerable of Oregon's current congressional representatives. District 5 has more nonaffiliated voters than any other party, although more voters are registered as Democrats than as Republicans. Bynum beat Lori Chavez-DeRemer, the former incumbent, in 2024 (Chavez-DeRemer has since been appointed and resigned from the office of US Secretary of Labor). Bynum faces one challenger in the Democratic primary: Zeva Rosenbaum. Rosenbaum is running a grassroots campaign and refusing money from corporate donors and lobbyists; so far her fundraising has not hit the $5,000 necessary to trigger federal reporting requirements. She has lined up some noteworthy endorsements (including ACLU Oregon). But Bynum's place on lists of vulnerable Democrats nationally has brought in hundreds of thousands of dollars — more than enough to drown out Rosenbaum's critiques of Bynum's congressional record.

Two candidates are campaigning in the Republican primary: Patti Adair and Jonathan Lockwood. Adair's fundraising is significant: she has raised over $270,000 as of the beginning of May, with many of her largest donations coming from individuals outside of Oregon. Lockwood has not raised enough to require reporting. Between her funding and her position as a Deschutes County commissioner, Adair seems poised to win the primary. It's worth noting that despite claims by Lockwood that Adair has a liberal record as county commissioner, she's been a loyal Trump supporter for over a decade and toed party lines in her time as a county commissioner.

Governor

Democratic Primary

As an incumbent governor, the odds of any primary challenger unseating Tina Kotek are low. While growing dissatisfaction with Kotek's recent focus on improving business prosperity and other centrist policies might suggest that the right challenger has a chance in this primary, none of the nine other candidates in the race seem to be making a dent in her position. A write-in candidate is getting more attention and funding than all nine challengers put together.

The current federal situation means that Kotek can easily position her re-election as a way to ensure stability in Oregon, both in the primary and in the general election. Any chance of seeing anyone else in Mahonia Hall next year requires a seismic shift in the political landscape. That stability does mean that Kotek isn't getting the full-throated support she might otherwise expect, however. The Oregon Education Association, the union that represents more than 40,000 Oregon teachers, has declined to endorse Kotek in this election, for instance. Such signals of reduced support may not elevate other candidates, but may translate to less power for Kotek during a second term.

Republican Primary

Fourteen candidates are running in the Republican primary for governor. Christine Drazan, the 2022 Republican nominee for governor and current state senator for the 26th district, has been polling well ahead of the rest of the field. However, Chris Dudley, the former Trail Blazer player, has double the funds to spend on the race as Drazan, thanks to $1 million from Nike co-founder Phil Knight. Dudley was the 2010 Republican nominee for governor and lost by only 22,000 votes to John Kitzhaber. (Dudley has no other political experience beyond that race.) The real question in the Republican primary is if Dudley can generate enough name recognition by Election Day. In 2010, he was able to leverage recognition from his NBA career, but Dudley hasn't been on a professional court since 2003 — he's going to struggle to pick up youth voters who weren't even born yet when Dudley last played. If Dudley manages to win the nomination, however, he may have an easier time lining up money and other support than Drazan.

There is little to differentiate any of the fourteen candidates in terms of their actual policies and legislative priorities: they're all campaigning on making Oregon friendlier to business interests, cutting taxes, and reducing regulations. Ed Diehl (current state representative for the 17th district) is the closest to a stand-out in terms of policy, based on his efforts to oppose the 2025 transportation funding bill in the state legislature, which is one of the causes of the Oregon Department of Transportation's current funding gap. While that effort may win Diehl points in the Republican primary, it would be a major obstacle in the unlikely event Diehl moves on to the November general election.

Write-In

An anthropomorphized pencil is running a write-in campaign for governor. The campaign is surprisingly substantive in comparison to several more human-shaped candidates running in both primaries. The pencil is the idea of J. Schuberth (one of the founders of Oregon Kids Read), who has personally funded the Pencil Political Action Committee with $29,000 as of the end of April. That's substantially more funding than write-in candidates usually have, and is actually more than any other candidate in the Democratic primary aside from Kotek. The campaign is intended to build awareness of on-going issues around reading proficiency in Oregon. The write-in campaign is targeting both the Democratic and Republican primaries. The pencil is more likely to pull votes away from Kotek than any other candidate, but so far does not seem likely to affect the outcome of either primary.

Labor Commissioner

While incumbent Christina Stephenson is facing a challenger during this election, that challenger, Chris Lynch, is poorly positioned to oppose her. Several of Stephenson's backers have individually donated more to her campaign than the total Lynch has raised. The core of Lynch's campaign is that Stephenson has been an ineffective leader and failed to prioritize workers over management. While Lynch may have some insight into BOLI's operations based on his work there, his claims don't match reporting or audits of the department. In fact, Stephenson may be one of the more effective labor commissioners in recent history, given her effective use of recent audits as well as a work stoppage to get BOLI more funding. She even structured the work stoppage to limit harms to lower-income workers.

Oregon State Senate

District 17

Incumbent Lisa Reynolds is facing a challenger, Autumn Sharp, in her first Democratic primary since being appointed to the seat in late 2024. While Reynolds doesn't have the entrenched power of a typical incumbent, she has garnered most of the endorsements and money in this race.

John Chee is running unopposed in the Republican primary. However, as Republicans in the 17th senate district haven't managed to get more than 34% of the district's votes in over twenty years, Chee doesn't have good odds of winning the general election in November.

Oregon State House

District 38

Perhaps one of the most interesting races in Portland this year is in District 38. Daniel Nguyen has held the seat since 2022. He's been challenged by John "Waz" Wasielewski with the backing of the Oregon Working Families Party, as part of a larger effort to replace centrist Democrats with more active supporters of leftist policies. Wasielewski is running a strong campaign with enough funding and other support that he may be able to overcome Nguyen's advantage as incumbent — to the point that power brokers with organizations like the Portland Chamber of Commerce have been running surveys with loaded questions describing Wasielewski as 'too extreme' to test ad language. The joke's on the Portland Chamber of Commerce, though: between voters who didn't even know the primary was happening and media attention on their surveys, they may have given Wasielewski's campaign a useful boost.

District 42

Sanchez first won the 42nd house district in 2016 after a narrow primary win. Sterling is the first primary challenger she's faced since then — and he's not running a particularly serious campaign. Sterling's policies are fairly standard for a Democratic Socialist, but don't feel like enough to match Sanchez's legislative work on issues like mental health. Frankly, given Sanchez's position as the only Indigenous legislator in the Oregon legislature* and her work with NAYA, Sterling's attempts to position himself as further left verge on laughable.

*Evaluating Indigenous identity is complicated. There may be up to three additional legislators in office at time of writing who could be described as Indigenous in specific or limited contexts, but who do not consistently identify themselves as such in the context of their legislative work.

Ballot Measure 120

Under this ballot measure, voters are being asked to increase the state's gas tax, payroll tax for transportation, and vehicle registration and title fees. It's the result of Republican opposition to the 2025 funding bill for the Oregon Department of Transportation, which is currently dealing with a major funding gap. The ballot measure is likely to be defeated as there's no one campaigning for its passage.

There's a whole lot of inside baseball behind Measure 120: Diehl and other Republican legislators cherry-picked only certain parts of the funding bill to force to a referendum, Kotek and other Democrats don't want to run a campaign increasing fuel costs, and there was even a special legislative session in January 2026 to shore up ODOT's funding that led to a lawsuit about this ballot measure. But despite all the political maneuvering, this measure doesn't matter.

Multnomah County

Note: Multnomah county commissioner elections will be on the November ballot.

Multnomah Circuit Court

Position 2

Of the five candidates vying for the second judicial seat on the Multnomah Circuit Court, the candidate with the strongest establishment endorsements (including Multnomah County District Attorney) is Laura Rowan. However, Rowan's prosecutorial record and cozy relationship with the Portland Police Bureau suggest that, on the bench, she would be the candidate most likely to compound the harms of the judicial system. While Chris Behre's work in public defense and in building diversion programs suggest that he might be one of the most effective choices for this position, Diane Syke's endorsement by the Portland Mercury and the Oregonian suggests that she has a better chance at beating Rowan. Sykes' work in creating the Oregon Department of Justice's Civil Rights Unit makes her a workable choice in this race.

Position 5

Neither of the two candidates for position 5, John Casalino and Joanna T. Perini-Abbott, are known for reformist tendencies. Perini-Abbott is enough of a better candidate, given her support of drug treatment diversion courts and lack of direct support from prosecutors. While this race may be close, the potential outcomes are not different enough to make this race a priority.

Position 12

Peter Klym is challenging incumbent Adrian Brown in an unusually complicated judicial election. Vasquez, Multnomah County's aggressively oppositional district attorney, has been targeting Brown in the media, demanding she be prevented from presiding over major cases. While Vasquez's attacks were mostly baseless, however, they led to stories about some troubling behavior. And since this election has kicked off, Brown has attempted to reschedule or pass cases to colleagues to ensure she has time to campaign after missing key campaign deadlines.

In contract, Klym is an experienced public defender who has advocated for restorative justice and other approaches. He's active in his union, understands appellate law, and even got teargassed in the streets in 2020. As much as voting for Brown to stick it to Vasquez appeals, Klym is the better candidate — and running a more effective campaign.

Position 14

An impressive six candidates are running for position 14, five of whom have serious community support. Joe Hagedorn is arguably leading the pack with endorsements from the Portland Mercury, Willamette Week, and the Oregonian. Given his familiarity with family law (the focus of position 14's docket), interest in restorative justice, and experience with public and juvenile defense, Hagedorn is a better choice than at least three of the other challengers.

Measure 26-261 — Renewing OHS Levy

Multnomah County homeowners have paid a levy to support the Oregon Historical Society (as well as the East County Historical Organization, Gresham Historical Society, Troutdale Historical Society and Crown Point Country Historical Society) since 2010. This ballot measure will renew the levy at $0.05 per $1,000 of assessed property value through 2031. The owner of a home valued at $250,000 will continue to pay $12.50 per year towards this levy if it is renewed, while the owner of a home valued at $500,000 will pay $25 per year. The levy renewal is expected to pass; the last two renewals passed with more than 70% support and public perception of OHS has not changed dramatically in that time. The main opponent to this ballot measure is the Taxpayers Association of Oregon, which opposes any ballot measure around taxation as a matter of course.

In 2025, OHS received $3.5 million from the levy, around a quarter of its yearly operating costs. The other organizations received around $30,000. OHS reports more than 20% of its in-person visitors came from Multnomah County. The levy is generally in line with the local usage costs of OHS' resources, especially given that OHS offers free admission to Multnomah County residents with proof of residency. Other sources of funding include the State of Oregon and private donors. While OHS has committed similar institutional harms as other museums and schools in the Pacific Northwest, the organization has been proactive for the last decade or so in returning human remains and cultural artifacts to the communities they belong to.

Measure 26-263 — Riverdale School District Local Option Tax

Property owners in Riverdale School District have used a local option levy to fund the district's operations since 2000. This year's ballot measure proposes increasing the tax from $1.37 per $1,000 of assessed value each year to $1.67 per $1,000 of assessed value each year. The owner of a home valued at $250,000 would pay $417.50 every year after this increase (up from $342.50 annually under the existing rate), while the owner of a home valued at $500,000 would pay $835 annually (up from $685). According to the Riverdale School District, failing to pass this increase will result in either firing seven teachers or cutting 21 school days from the calendar.

Historically, school levies and bond measures have passed easily in Oregon and nearby states. But in the past two years, school districts have faced more difficulty in passing such ballot measures — at a time when funding from other sources is also dropping. As a result, this measure may be harder to pass than it would have been in years past.

Measure 26-264 — Burlington Water District Local Option Tax for Fire & Ambulance

The Burlington Water District is asking voters to approve a new levy of $1.70 per $1,000 of assessed value on the roughly 400 property owners living in the district. The funds will cover expenses the Burlington Water District pays to the City of Portland Fire and Rescue Bureau and to build a contingency fund for the district. This ballot measure will not district water rates. The average assessed value for a property in the Burlington Water District is $166,000. The owner of a property valued at $166,000 will pay an estimated $288 more per year in taxes. There's very little information to be had on this measure — even the Taxpayer Association of Oregon can't be bothered to oppose it, even though they always oppose taxes because that's their whole thing. It's one of the hardest outcomes to predict as a result.

Portland

Note: Portland's city council elections will be on the November ballot.

Metro

Metro Council President

The race for Metro council president is getting more attention than usual in this election cycle, at least partially due to the expiration of the Metro Supportive Housing Tax in 2030 and uncertainty around its renewal. The impact of money raised through the tax has been debated, although a close reading of Metro's annual reports on that subject suggest that the tax has funded significant improvements in local housing supports. The real issue is that the number of households needing this help has increased by more than 20 percent since 2020 at the same time that federal aid has dropped. Metro's next council president is practically guaranteed to get tagged with claims that Metro has failed to do anything about homelessness in Portland, despite the underlying reality.

Of the five candidates volunteering for the job, Juan Carlos Gonzaléz has the most support from elected leaders, labor, and community activists — and the only active fundraising committee. Bruce Broussard and Chris Christensen run in just about every election cycle. Philip Fensterer and Ken Ross both work for Metro and could bring important perspectives to the council, but don't have the necessary backing to get elected in this race.

One note on Christensen and Broussard: the Oregonian and other media refer to Broussard as a perennial candidate and Christensen as a retired real estate professional. Given that Christensen has also run for multiple offices (his only win was the 2020 Republican primary to challenge Suzanne Bonamici for the congressional seat she still holds), journalists may want to interrogate their own choices in describing these two candidates.

Metro Councilor, District 1

Ashton Simpson is running for re-election against Noah Ernst. Ernst may be familiar from his run for Portland City Council in 2024, when he was eliminated second. Simpson has focused on transportation during his time on the Metro Council — no surprise given his history as the executive director of Oregon Walks. Ernst also considers transportation a priority, specifically around protecting car usage against 'special interest advocacy groups,' along with advocating for increased policing and streamlining the permitting process for real estate developers. Unfortunately for Ernst, many of the solutions he's advocating for are not under Metro's purview and have also been demonstrated to be ineffective. While comparing Simpson's 2022 win to this year's race is difficult (he won with 98% of votes as there was no other candidate), his community ties and name recognition seem likely to put him well ahead of Ernst. Just comparing Simpson's long list of endorsements (including from other Metro councilors) to the four Ernst has listed (including the company Ernst works for and an organization active in the 2024 election but that appears to be defunct now) makes clear that Simpson has a better sense of electoral politics.

Metro Councilor, District 4

Two candidates are running for the District 4 seat, Alex Phan and Miles Palacios. Palacios' work experience in both non-profit and political settings makes him a stronger candidate for the position, as he's likely to be able to get to work faster than his opposition. His community ties also suggest Palacios has more capacity for bringing stakeholders into conversations. The two have both made housing a central plank of their platforms. While both candidates have a slew of endorsements from various officials, unions, and other standard sources, Phan's endorsements from business interests, especially real estate organizations, creates questions about his approach to housing policy, along with his ability to separate his own interests as a real estate agent from the work necessary to reduce homelessness in and around Portland. However, given Phan's backing from organizations with financial power, he may have the edge in this race.

Phreeli: an early analysis

Sun, 01 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Available to download as a PDF

Phreeli¹ launched as a new wireless service in December 2025, promising significant privacy and security improvements on other providers. The goal of this analysis is to evaluate whether activists, organizers, and other people facing government repression should use Phreeli in the immediate future.

The information available

Evaluating brand new tools can be difficult: we can't look to past behavior, we can't compare past audits to current performance, and we can't even look at customer service complaints to spot trends. The information available about Phreeli at time of writing is limited to: - Phreeli's website and marketing materials - Phreeli's sub-reddit (currently containing 11 posts, although there appear to have been additional posts requesting support that have been since deleted) - A handful of articles from tech news sites (the most in-depth of which is behind Wired's paywall²) - A few posts on community and personal sites that amount to speculation

An in-depth analysis of Phreeli just isn't possible yet. Most potential users concerned about privacy and security likely should wait to use any new wireless provider until external audits and other data are available. However, an initial analysis of these materials and of materials relating to people involved in the company does have value, both for identifying possible concerns Phreeli may face moving forward and to consider the trustworthiness of Phreeli as an organization.

The network

Phreeli offers fairly standard wireless plans, including unlimited calls and texting, along with data. But the company doesn't have its own cellular network or towers: it's reselling T-Mobile's wireless services (as well as services from other providers such as NetworkIP / Elite Telecom). T-Mobile works with a variety of resellers known as mobile virtual network operators (or MVNOs), as do the other large wireless providers³. Other MVNOs include providers like Cricket Wireless, Google Fi, and Mint Mobile⁴. As an MVNO, Phreeli's startup costs are likely in the seven figures. If the company had instead attempted to build out its own network from scratch, the costs would be at least a hundred times higher, so acting as an MVNO is a logical business decision. As a result, though, Phreeli's users are subject to T-Mobile's terms of service, as well as those of other third-party providers Phreeli works with.

While practical from a cost perspective, Phreeli's status as an MVNO means that T-Mobile will always have access to certain kinds of information about Phreeli's users, as may the other service providers Phreeli works with. In order to connect a call or a text from or to a mobile phone, the network has to have certain information, such as the phone's number and location⁵, which are logged as Phreeli's privacy policy notes⁶. That information, combined with users' phone numbers, is generally enough to track users⁷.

And that's not the only information a mobile phone provides⁸. Using mobile apps leaks data in a number of ways and a variety of companies capitalize on connecting information from apps with information from wireless providers, for purposes ranging from advertising to political repression⁹. All this information is accessible to data brokers and law enforcement offers without needing even a user's name and payment details.

There's a good chance that Phreeli's promised privacy will face regulatory threats in the near future. Industry experts have suggested that MVNOs should expect increased enforcement for Know Your Customer regulations for eSIMs, requiring companies to be able to provide more user information to law enforcement¹⁰. Some industry analysts even suggest that the launch of Phreeli and other similar services could spur new regulations requiring wireless providers implement identity verification¹¹. However, predicting future regulatory changes in the MVNO space is complicated by the existence of Trump Mobile, an MVNO likely operating on T-Mobile's network launched in mid-2025¹², as well as other factors which have increasingly politicized the FCC (which is responsible for regulating MVNOs) since the beginning of 2025¹³. It's especially difficult to predict if Phreeli's founder will be an asset in regulatory wrangling, given that Nicholas Merrill is perhaps best known for his multi-year lawsuit against the FBI and US Department of Justice related to the USA PATRIOT Act in the early 2000s.¹⁴

The data

So how does Phreeli plan to counteract this data collection? The company's marketing materials focus on plans to collect as little information about users as they possibly can, as well as separating account details (like names and payment details) from the information necessary to actually place calls (like phone numbers and locations).

The company's core claim is that users need only a zip code to sign up, with no need for an address, although this claim is misleading. Phreeli only clarifies that all users must provide not a zip code but a ZIP+4 code in its terms of service¹⁵ and during the actual sign-up process. The US Post Office uses ZIP+4 codes to identify specific addresses within the larger zip code; it's functionally equivalent to providing a full address in most cases¹⁶. In practice, users can sign up without providing a name or information beyond beyond their ZIP+4 code, as long as they use cryptocurrency to pay for their service.

Phreeli also requires an address for users requesting hardware SIM cards. Users will be able get eSIMs via Tor in the future. That option may be a useful innovation for some users. However, Tor¹⁷ isn't perfectly secure any more than cryptocurrency¹⁸ is. Both can be deanonymized and Phreeli has not indicated any steps the company may take to reduce such risks.

Phreeli also points to a cryptographic protocol they've named 'Double-Blind Armadillo' to prevent account information from being associated with a specific phone number¹⁹. According to a white paper written on Phreeli's behalf by Last Authority, the protocol will eliminate the need to connect a user's account details and the information necessary to connect calls. When a user pays their monthly bill through a system running this protocol, for instance, the payment system will generate a cryptographic token marking the account current without saving any information about the user. That token is then mixed in with other tokens and batch-processed to limit de-anonymization opportunities (like checking what tokens were issued at the same time given users made payments) before the entire batch of tokens is transmitted to T-Mobile or another wireless provider.

However, the white paper does not demonstrate a working version of this protocol, discuss what technologies are used to build it, or even say that the protocol has been implemented at all. Instead, the white paper states that, at time of launch, Double-Blind Armadillo is not in use. Initially, Phreeli is using a less secure system that the white paper describes as "an acceptable level of security and privacy" despite marketing materials suggesting otherwise²⁰.

Assuming Double-Blind Armadillo is ever fully implemented, this approach will only protect a limited amount of user data. That's true even for users who pay with cryptocurrency and use eSIM cards obtained via Tor in brand new phones that are purchased anonymously and only used to call other users taking the same precautions²¹. Protection will be more limited for a user who uses a phone they transferred from another wireless provider, ports over their existing phone number, logs into accounts associated with their name on their phone, or plays mobile games with ads. Users without the technical skills to use Tor and cryptocurrency may also struggle with setting up a Phreeli account without leaking data somewhere along the way.

Of course, as there are so far no audits of Phreeli's implementation of any protocols or infrastructure, there's no way to know that Phreeli's systems actually provide even limited protection. Such audits can take significant time to prepare and may not be available for months.

The key players

Without access to more details about Phreeli's operations, potential users have to decide whether they trust the people behind the wireless startup.

Nicholas Merrill: The founder of Phreeli is the only individual named on the company's website. His resume includes founding Calyx Internet Access (an ISP) in 1995 and cofounding the Calyx Institute (a non-profit focused on digital privacy)²² in 2010, as well as filing the first constitutional challenge against gag orders under the USA PATRIOT Act in 2004. Merrill left the Calyx Institute in August 2025, as part of a series of changes that led the organization to cease offering CalyxOS²³.

Louis Rossmann: While not listed on Phreeli's website, Rossmann posted a video announcing the launch of Phreeli and mentioning that he is a board member²⁴. He is also listed on a 2024 SEC form detailing transfer of shares in Phreeli²⁵ Rossmann is an advocate for consumer rights, especially the right to repair, as well as the owner of an independent computer repair business founded in 2007. He operates a popular YouTube channel on related topics and is involved with multiple non-profits²⁶.

Steve Gelmis: Gelmis is also listed on Phreeli's 2024 SEC paperwork as a director, though has not publicly announced ties to Phreeli. Gelmis is founded Public Interest Network Services / Public Interest Telecom in 1984²⁷.

Least Authority: The consultancy that developed Double Blind Armadillo is named in Phreeli's white paper describing the protocol. Least Authority has worked on projects around decentralized systems and security since 2011²⁸. In 2015, the company spun off the Electric Coin Company to operate Zcash, a privacy-focused cryptocurrency²⁹.

Zooko Wilcox: The founder of Least Authority³⁰, Wilcox has spoken to multiple publications about Phreeli and can be assumed to have worked on Double Blind Armadillo. Wilcox also worked on Zcash, including a stint as the CEO of the Electric Coin Company, and remains active in the community³¹.

Additional staff: Phreeli likely has around 10 staff members, although information is extremely limited. Two additional staff members are listed on the company's LinkedIn profile: Phil Weiss and David Moo³². Weiss lists a position as Phreeli's general counsel, along with operating his own law firm and teaching part-time. Moo lists a position as Phreeli's director of operations and appears to have worked at Calyx Internet Access with Merrill.

Funders: A single angel investor seems to have provided most of Phreeli's $5 million in funding. When asked about the investor's identity by Wired reporter Andy Greenberg, Merrill declined to provide their name³³.

The lack of details about most of the people involved in Phreeli's operations is concerning. It's not surprising that people who care about privacy decline to be identified publicly — but doing so limits an organization's ability to build trust. Without information on who is funding Phreeli, outside evaluators can't even guess if those funders might make demands of the company that endanger its ability to function, let alone to keep users data private³⁴. It's a known issue in the space — even Tor routinely has to address funding the project received from the US government in order to maintain users' trust³⁵ — which makes Phreeli's lack of transparency all the more noteworthy.

Addressing concerns around Phreeli from other security-focused projects is virtually impossible without the organization increasing its transparency. Since Phreeli's launch, makers of secure phone operating systems other than the Calyx Institute have leveled accusations at Merrill, as well as unnamed Phreeli co-founders³⁶ and discussed warning their own users against the company. Many of these concerns are tied to Merrill's exit from the Calyx Institute, which was part of a larger chain of events that dramatically reduced users' trust in CalyxOS and other offerings from the non-profit³⁷. Most of the details around his departure are not publicly available. When one departure can start such a damaging chain reaction, though, it's reasonable to assume that the people involved need to consider how to better work within organizational structures in the future.

Worse, what information Phreeli offers can be seen as misleading. For instance, Phreeli recommends using privacy-focused cryptocurrencies such as Zcash or Monero, going so far as to mention them in the company's privacy policy, adding that "Zcash and Monero are in no way affiliated with Phreeli--please take the time to learn about these services before using them."³⁸. While technically a correct statement, Least Authority's work with Phreeli makes complicates that claim, as Least Authority created and then spun off Zcash and Wilcox remains a Zcash advocate.

Trustability

If you take Phreeli's claims of privacy at face value, the company's offerings seem impressive. If you dig deeper, however, you will find that Phreeli seems to be promising more than they can actually offer (at least at the time of offering). It's unclear how many of the privacy measures the company promises have actually been implemented. Worse, the company's marketing materials frame details in ways that are at best overly-generous and at worst are misleading.

Phreeli seems to be quickly building an organizational culture that limits information, as well as downplays users' concerns, perhaps best evidenced in the company's sub-reddit. At time of writing, the sub-reddit contains 11 posts. However, multiple posts have been deleted from the sub-reddit, though comments associated with those posts are still discoverable via the accounts that posted them. The company's moderator appears to follow a policy of deleting posts requesting support from the company's sub-reddit after users have connected with support through Phreeli's website. Reviewing four such posts since Phreeli's launch suggests that multiple users have struggled with accessing eSIMs while signing up for the service³⁹, information that may be useful for potential users considering signing up. This approach is not necessarily unusual for many startups as it can be seen as eliminating negative comments, as well as reducing users' ability to search for common issues and solutions. Overall, the strategy reduces both transparency and trust, which is worrying to see in an organization already lacking in both.

More concerning is the response one poster received when asking about Phreeli's terms of service around forced arbitration and class action waiver clauses — clauses Rossmann is known for advocating against. When asked about these clauses in Phreeli's sub-reddit, Merrill replied personally, essentially saying that the company would never take advantage of these clauses: "We're a small business, just getting started - and our advisors explained to us the many ways our existence is threatened if we don't have this, so we put it in... we - just like our customers - are little guys. We don't want to void warranties, post-hoc change terms of sale on people in disadvantageous ways, or hold people in abusive contracts. We just don't want to get destroyed in the early stages of launching a new company by bad faith opportunists using lawfare to wipe us out."⁴⁰ Merrill's philosophy seems to be that users should trust him and his company to do the right thing in any given situation. But as Rossmann says in his video about Phreeli, "I don't believe in 'Trust me, bro.'"⁴¹ Customers can't trust a company's leaders claiming they would never use a given clause, because those leaders may change their minds or be replaced. Merrill suggesting otherwise demonstrates either willful ignorance about the realities of running a business or a concerning lack of care about users' security in the long run.

Ultimately, Phreeli is asking users to take a lot on faith — and users should refuse. In the absence of any audit or other evidence that Phreeli has implemented any of its promised security measures, users have to assume that Phreeli is just another MVNO passing data along to its wireless provider with no protection. And when you consider the little information that is available about the organization, its technology, and its staff, there's reasons to worry that Phreeli may even be worse than the average MVNO:

a significant mismatch between marketing materials and terms of service demonstrates a willingness to deceive users
an organizational culture of avoiding transparency endangers users' ability to access the services they pay for
promising protection via technology that currently doesn't exist creates a false sense of security for users
a founder whose departure impacted one organization's ability to continue operations could do the same again and leave users stuck

At this time, potential users should pass on Phreeli, especially if privacy and security are key concerns.

tl;dr

Activists, organizers, and individuals facing government repression should not use Phreeli. Even if Phreeli fully implements their proposed Double Blind Armadillo protocol, the company would need to address significant concerns around transparency and trustability to be considered a useful option for individuals looking to protect their privacy.

https://www.phreeli.com/ ↩
https://www.wired.com/story/new-anonymous-phone-carrier-sign-up-with-nothing-but-a-zip-code/ ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_virtual_network_operator ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mobile_virtual_network_operators_in_the_United_States ↩
https://kiledjian.com/2025/12/17/in-the-final-weeks-of.html ↩
https://www.phreeli.com/privacy/policy ↩
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/08/t-mobile-claimed-selling-location-data-without-consent-is-legal-judges-disagree/ ↩
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/how-federal-government-buys-our-cell-phone-location-data ↩
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/01/ice-going-surveillance-shopping-spree ↩
https://hwglaw.com/2025/02/07/client-advisory-on-the-fccs-enforcement-of-the-know-your-customer-rule-against-telnyx/ ↩
https://www.wirelessdealergroup.com/post/phreeli-mvno-launches-with-zip-code-only-sign-up-privacy-focused-wireless-service-and-what-it-means ↩
https://www.fierce-network.com/wireless/trump-mobiles-made-america-phone-still-mia ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Communications_Commission#Attempted_abandonment_of_independence_by_FCC_chairman_Brendan_Carr ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union_v._Ashcroft ↩
https://www.phreeli.com/terms-of-service ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZIP_Code#ZIP+4 ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_(network)#Attacks_and_limitations ↩
https://www.cnet.com/personal-finance/crypto/are-cryptocurrency-transactions-actually-anonymous/ ↩
https://www.phreeli.com/files/PhreeliDoubleBlindArmadilloWhitePaper.pdf ↩
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLOXsFmLayw ↩
https://www.phreeli.com/privacy/policy ↩
https://calyxinstitute.org/ ↩
https://www.reddit.com/r/CalyxOS/comments/1mf74e3/a_letter_to_the_calyxos_community/ ↩
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8SnNNq6MaI ↩
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/2009536/000200953624000001/xslFormDX01/primary_doc.xml ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rossmann ↩
https://pinsarchive.ejcg.net/about/management.html ↩
https://leastauthority.com/about-us/ ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zcash ↩
https://leastauthority.com/about-team/ ↩
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooko_Wilcox-O'Hearn ↩
https://www.linkedin.com/company/phreeli/people/ ↩
https://www.wired.com/story/new-anonymous-phone-carrier-sign-up-with-nothing-but-a-zip-code/ ↩
https://startupwired.com/2025/08/04/why-most-series-a-rounds-are-financial-traps-for-founders/ ↩
https://blog.torproject.org/category/financials/ ↩
https://piunikaweb.com/2025/12/29/grapheneos-warns-users-against-privacy-first-carrier-phreeli-recommends-silent-link-esim-instead/ ↩
https://www.reddit.com/r/CalyxOS/comments/1qe2410/what_are_your_plans_for_regaining_trust/ ↩
https://www.phreeli.com/privacy/policy ↩
https://www.reddit.com/user/Team_Phreeli/ ↩
https://www.reddit.com/r/Phreeli/comments/1pr4hnb/forced_arbitration_and_class_action_waiver/ ↩
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8SnNNq6MaI ↩

a pocket guide to time travel mail drops

Wed, 05 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Are you a time traveler who needs to send a message a thousand years into the future? This pocket guide from the Distressed Time Travelers Association will guide you through strategies to ensure your message arrives exactly when you need it to — whether you need to hide it in a library, carve it in stone, or take more drastic measures!

a pocket guide to time travel mail drops by Thursday Bram

The Once and Future Latke

Sat, 01 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

We all think we know what a latke is: a traditional potato pancake fried up for Hanukkah. But where did that tradition come from? And what is the future of the latke?

This zine looks at the history of the latke and its ingredients, showing that this simple treat is a lot more complicated than you might expect.

Content notes: Discussions of nationalism and militarism.

The Once and Future Latke by Thursday Bram

Ditch work for a Yom Kippur ball

Thu, 11 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This zine discusses how not working on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur can be a tool for solidarity with both your coworkers and coreligionists.

Ditch Work for a Yom Kippur Ball by Thursday Bram

Now Showing: Your WiFi router name

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Ever seen a WiFi router name that made you laugh? What about one that made you angry?

Since WiFi router names are public, they are a form of media. This zine explores common router names, goes through the laws and standards dictating those names, and uses media analysis to consider the options we have in choosing our own router names and responding to the names others have selected.

Now Showing: Your WiFi Router Name by Thursday Bram

Desire built this place: Why Archive of Our Own works

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This zine explores human-computer interaction through the lens of Archive of Our Own. It covers how accessing fan-fiction differs from other forms of media, how platform ownership impacts design choices, and how feminist HCI impacts security.

Desire Built This Place: Why Archive of Our Own Works by Thursday Bram

Protest arrest / jail support form

Sun, 01 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Headed to a protest? Make sure you’re prepared!

Download, print, and fill out this form, then give it to a trusted friend or family member who won’t be at the event. In the event of arrests or other problems, they’ll be better equipped to support you — whether that means contacting a local bail fund, posting bail themselves, or supporting you until your release.

The questions in this form can feel scary, but having this information available will help you and your community keep each other safe. Having this information on hand can even be useful for other situations where you need support — like travel delays or personal emergencies.

One way to make filling out this form less stressful is to do it as a group activity: get together with friends and talk through what support you each may need and how to make sure you get it. You can also talk about who will hold your forms and handle contacting the necessary people in the event of an arrest.

Please copy and share this form with anyone who needs it.

Click here to download the form!