Everett council frontrunner to face eligibility questions in court

Published 11:00 am Monday, August 25, 2025

EVERETT — The frontrunner in the City Council race for Everett’s District 4 is facing more questions regarding his eligibility to hold the seat, now through an ongoing court case and a challenge to his voter registration.

At first, 24-year-old Niko Battle faced questions about his voter registration as he had recently re-registered to vote in Everett on May 7. Ambiguous language in the city’s charter meant he may be ineligible to hold the seat, but Everett’s legal department has yet to interpret the language in city code.

Now, Battle is facing a battle in court after residents also called his living situation into question. John Dimas, a District 4 resident and Boeing employee, challenged Battle’s voter registration through the Snohomish County Auditor’s Office and his eligibility to appear on the ballot through Snohomish County Superior Court.

The challenge Dimas filed in court on Aug. 18 contested Battle’s eligibility to appear on the ballot based on an allegation that he doesn’t live at his listed address.

“He seems like a very talented person. Whatever the outcome of this, I wish him the best,” Dimas said of Battle in an interview Thursday. “But there’s a right and a wrong way to go about things.”

On Thursday, the city of Everett filed a motion to intervene in the case by laying out a three-step process on how the registration challenge should be handled by the courts.

The process would include verifying Dimas’ affidavit satisfies state requirements, setting a hearing date to address the case and holding a hearing for the court to rule on the matter. The city clarified in its filing that it is not taking a position as to who should be certified as the primary’s top two lawful vote getters, but is laying out a process to ensure the public has no questions or disputes over the court’s methods.

A hearing on the city’s motion to intervene is scheduled for Wednesday.

Under state law, if a court rules that Battle is ineligible to be on the November ballot, the third-place candidate — in this case, Luis Burbano — would take his place.

Battle did not respond to emails or a phone call seeking comment. But on Aug. 15, he attended a meeting for the 38th Legislative District Democrats where he fielded questions regarding his residency and voter registration.

In that meeting, Battle said he faced a “highly unusual level of scrutiny” for a candidate and has been subject to attacks from “right-wing media outlets, for the most part, that have ulterior motives.”

Battle also said that his previous campaign advisory experience mostly focused on high-level political communications, not the specifics of compliance with election regulations.

“That’s not my area of expertise,” Battle said. “I’ve never pretended to be a compliance expert. I’ve worked on a lot of field experience, building and managing field plans, managing canvassing operations from a small level all the way up to a large scale.”

Dimas filed his challenges against Battle after reaching out to the apartment building he listed on his voter registration and receiving word back from a manager, who said she had no record of Battle living in those apartments.

The apartment building has units set aside for individuals with lower incomes, so residents living there “must be documented and verified,” the apartment manager wrote in a letter obtained by The Daily Herald. In the letter, the manager states that she spoke with Battle, who said he did not feel he was in violation of the occupancy limits in place at the apartment complex.

At the Aug. 15 meeting, Battle said he lived at that apartment building but was not listed on the lease. He also said most of his mail is sent to his father’s home in Granite Falls.

“I asked Niko if he receives mail at this address and he responded, ‘not really,’” the apartment manager wrote. “I told Niko that is a yes or no question.”

Burbano said if he hadn’t run for office, he likely would have voted for Battle. But since the questions over his residency and voter registration have emerged, Burbano said his perception of Battle has changed.

“I think it’s highly unfair for the other candidates. We should all be playing by the same rules,” Burbano said in an interview on Thursday. “But more important than that is what happens to the folks in District 4, because at the end of the day, they’re the ones affected by all this. They don’t get proper representation.”

In a statement, Battle’s other opponent, Alan Rubio, accused members of an unnamed political group of recruiting Battle to run for office as part of an effort to keep Rubio out of the general election.

“They ended up in the scenario of me passing to the general, and their candidate being exposed as unqualified and illegitimate—ergo, Rubio wins,” he wrote in an email.

When asked, Rubio did not clarify who or what he was accusing, saying he preferred “for people to fill in the blank.”

At the Aug. 15 meeting, Battle said if he was found ineligible, “the most important outcome is stopping a threat to our city that remains Mr. Rubio.”

“I still believe I’m the best candidate to do that, and I hope to continue to have your support,” Battle said at that meeting.

Will Geschke: 425-339-3443; william.geschke@heraldnet.com; X: @willgeschke.