Nicholas Ton
Who I am
I’m new to Bellevue, but I’m not new to fighting for a place to call home.
For every year of my adult life until now, I was stuck in the endless cycle of moving: chasing affordability, packing boxes every 12 months, never putting down roots. Then I arrived here. I found something rare: a city with good bones. Kind neighbors. Welcoming communities. City staff who actually care.
You deserve to know who's asking for your vote.
What does some Microsoft tech worker know about financial struggle?
I came from a crowded house shared with three other families in the rougher part of town. Due to family finances, college wasn't a part of the plan; while in High School, I spent my after-school time apprenticing at my uncle's tailor shop, stitching buttons onto suit jackets and hemming trousers, thinking that would be the rest of my life. A good SAT score got me a scholarship and a chance at higher education, but I still hauled tables as student labor for 7.50 an hour between and after classes to help out my family.
I worked my way from IT grunt work making 10.50/hour replacing keyboards and monitors to 15/hr and then 25 as helpdesk. Early in my career making 65/year, I took a gamble to move to a tech hub to try to land a big job which ultimately worked out but only after a few hard years of long hours for not enough pay. I might leave those experiences off my resume, but I'll never unlearn the value of a hard day's work, or how easily the system breaks people who don't have lucky breaks.
We’re losing our soul, one moving van at a time.
I’m someone who’s tired of watching my friends and other people that make this city pack their bags to leave Bellevue and I do not doubt you know what I’m talking about.
The nurse who cared for your mother at Overlake, the teacher who sparked your child's love of learning, even our officers and firefighters who keep our city safe. One by one, they’ve been pushed out, not because they didn’t work hard, but because Bellevue stopped working for them.
I want to bring them back and enable them to thrive
How do we do this?
By making housing affordable.
By giving people real transit options.
By building a city that works for its workers, with living wage jobs, not just tech gigs.
Why it’ll work
I want to solve the daily struggle, so we can focus on what makes this city great, and make it better.
I’m not here to offer vague “family friendly” platitudes. I’m coming here with the real problems we see, potential solutions to solve them, and the gusto to try them.
How can you trust me?
I’m not a politician. I’m not backed by consultants, lobbyists, or party line. I’m just someone who’s lived the struggle:
I’ve been priced out before. I know the sheer exhaustion of a 30% rent hike. The sentence to again pack your life into boxes and start searching for another place to live because an algorithm told your landlord that they’d make more money if you left.
I’ve lived the transit struggle. As a kid, I took the bus to school. As a car-less student, I was reliant on public transit to get me to my classes. As a working young adult, if I was late for the bus (or if the bus was late for me) then I was late for work. I’ve had to bike into the office from over 15 miles away because a route got cancelled
My campaign isn’t funded by the establishment. No corporate PAC money. No dark money Tissot consultants scripting my every word.
No Photo Ops. I actually ride the bus, use our trails, and commute to work regularly, not just to have my picture taken.
You can't build community when no one can afford to stay
We're the ones who make Bellevue - we cook our meals, teach our kids, keep our streets safe, and fix when things in our city are broken.
Not the hedge fund landlords raising rents from their vacation homes.
Not the developers treating our neighborhoods like a Monopoly board.
Not the “senior executives” looking down at us from their hilltop mansions
Bellevue runs on our overtime shifts, our weekend on-call hours, our hope that this can be a city for us.
Endorsed by Democrats for Diversity and Inclusion
DDI is an advocacy organization dedicated to holding elected and appointed officials accountable for championing the needs and aspirations of the diverse communities they serve. At the same time, DDI proudly supports and defends candidates and public officials who take bold, principled stands in favor of diversity and inclusion, and who actively oppose hate and discrimination in all its forms