Gregory Joseph (left) and Omari Salisbury (right) pose in the Hubbard Radio Seattle Studio on Monday. (Photo: Erik Kalligraphy)

Political strategist Gregory Joseph joined host Omari Salisbury on this week’s episode of The Mother’s Justice Show on 1150 AM KKNW to confront a reality Seattle can no longer avoid: a city in shock after a mass shooting at the Bite of Seattle and a region still struggling to turn bold rhetoric into real protection for its youth.

Joseph, the former communications director for the Alliance for Gun Responsibility, didn’t come to soften the blow. He came to connect the dots between guns and hunger, policy and political will, neighborhoods and neglect, and to make it painfully clear that we already know enough to act.

“Enough talk. We need to start,” he said. “We don’t need to gather any facts. We know what’s happening. We know the communities that it’s happening in. We know the children who are impacted. Let’s get to work.”

“A Perfect Storm”

Salisbury opened the show naming what many in Seattle are feeling after the mass shooting at the Seattle Center during the Bite of Seattle: grief, anger, and a deep sense of violation that such a beloved public space could be turned into a crime scene.

Joseph framed the event not as an isolated tragedy, but as the latest flashpoint in a national pattern. He pointed to an influx of guns, loose regulations and laws, a lack of economic opportunities for our young people, healthcare budget cuts.

All of this… creates this perfect storm where violence becomes one of the only options in neighborhoods,” Joseph said.

For Joseph, gun violence is not a single-issue crisis. It’s a system failure across education, jobs, healthcare, nutrition, and public safety.

“A Whole-Body Problem”: Everyone Has to Step Forward

When Salisbury asked where government ends and community begins, Joseph didn’t hesitate: the problem is too big for any one sector to carry alone.

“I think everybody needs to step forward,” he said. “Government, community, the religious community, ethnic communities… This is a whole‑body problem. So we need every doctor with every specialty to be at the table.”

He lifted up the work of Community Passageways and other community-based organizations already on the ground in the neighborhoods most affected by the Bite of Seattle shooting and by violence more broadly. But he was clear: community alone cannot carry what government refuses to fund.

“Getting those resources on the street so people can actually tangibly touch them is a good first step,” he said. “Dollars need to be allocated to organizations that are doing the work of CVI [community violence intervention] in the community.”

Joseph’s prescription was as follows:

Safe storage funding and free lockboxes for gun owners
Deep investment in youth jobs and summer opportunities
Expanded education, after-school programs, AP and enrichment
Year-round universal free meals for children
Fully funded community organizations in the most impacted neighborhoods

“We Don’t Want to Feed Children, But We’ll Build More Missiles”

Joseph continually connected gun violence to hunger and poverty. For him, the debate over universal free school meals in Seattle is inseparable from the conversation about violence.

“Imagine if you’re a 13‑year‑old kid… you go into the kitchen, and there’s nothing there,” he said. “Now what are you supposed to? Sit in the classroom and learn like every other kid who had breakfast? It doesn’t really make any sense.”

Joseph contrasted the ease with which the federal government finds billions for defense contracts with its reluctance to feed children:

“We give money to defense contractors to build bombs… and then we have 15 million children living in poverty. How is that even possible?” he said.

On Seattle’s ongoing fight over universal free meals versus targeted support, he cut through the political spin.

“I don’t know why there needs to be a conversation between all and some,” he said. “Do you want to have kids fed year‑round, or do you not?… I don’t want to sit here and have conversations about who should get it or not. I think all children should wake up in the morning and not have to worry about food.”

For Joseph, universal meals are violence prevention, and part of addressing the “root causes” so often invoked, but rarely funded.

The Geography of Neglect: When Investment Follows Income

One of the hardest truths Joseph surfaced is the uneven way government responds depending on who is harmed and where it happens.

Salisbury recalled how quickly a unified front of city leaders mobilized around sex trafficking and public safety issues on Aurora Ave in Seattle, compared to the slower, more fragmented responses in South Seattle and the Central District.

Joseph didn’t mince words:

“Response times and government response definitely change per the income level of neighborhoods,” he said. “When you start getting into the upper‑income levels… you start getting police and government that are responsive to you.”

He warned against superficial fixes like surveillance cameras at the Seattle Center while ignoring the neighborhoods where the young people involved actually live.

“This is not a problem that needs to be solved at Seattle Center… That kid doesn’t live here. He lives in a neighborhood, and that neighborhood is not being looked at by government, by law enforcement, by anyone besides maybe the community leaders,” Joseph said, calling for more investment in these neighborhoods.

That investment, he argued, must look like fully funded schools, after-school programs and mentorships, job opportunities for teens, year-round food access, and infrastructure and transportation equity.

Political Power, Budgets, and Excuses

Time and again, Joseph returned to a central barrier: a chronic lack of political will, especially when it comes to communities of color.

“There is a reluctance to invest in communities of color across this country, not just here in Seattle,” he said.

He rejected the idea that budgets are destiny.

“We’re not broke as a city or a state or even as a country. The money is there. The will isn’t,” he said.

And he had a message for underrepresented elected officials in particular.

“We have elected officials who are people of color, and they need to start making sure that these neighborhoods are no longer going to be left behind,” he said. “All it takes are the leaders to do so.”

Beyond Thoughts and Prayers: A Call for Unified, Concrete Plans

Both Salisbury and Joseph criticized the press conferences that followed the Bite of Seattle shooting as heavy on sentiment and light on solutions.

Joseph argued that after decades of shootings, no city should still be improvising its response.

“You would think after all of these years, after all of this violence… that there would be a break‑in‑case‑of‑emergency thing that you would just pull out a scroll and go, ‘Okay, now we do this.’ But it doesn’t seem like there is,” he said.

He called for:

A clear, unified plan from the mayor, council, and police
Fewer competing microphones, more coordinated messaging
Real partnership with community organizations already in the work
A public, transparent roadmap that families in Rainier Beach, the Central District, and South Seattle can see and measure

Hurt, Hope, and What Comes Next

Joseph spoke warmly about the joy and unity he witnessed during the recent World Cup in Seattle and how proud he felt of the city’s energy and hospitality before the shooting reminded everyone how fragile that sense of safety can be.

“It was just an honor to be a resident of the city of Seattle,” he said. “I’m still kind of riding that high.”

And in a city that prides itself on being progressive, Joseph left listeners with a simple, urgent truth: investment is the only evidence of seriousness.

“You’re not going to get very far without investment. Everything else is just words,” he said.

The question now is whether Seattle’s leaders, and its voters, are ready to move beyond statements, beyond press conferences, beyond “thoughts and prayers,” and build the whole-body response this moment demands: from safe storage to summer jobs, from universal meals to community violence intervention, from City Hall to the block.

Because as Joseph reminded us, Seattle already knows where the violence is, who is most at risk, and what the root causes look like. The missing piece isn’t data.

It’s courage.

Listen to Joseph’s full interview on The Mother’s Justice Showhere.

Tune in to The Mother’s Justice ShowMondays from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. on 1150 AM KKNW.

Gregory Joseph Talks Gun Violence, Hunger, and Political Will in Seattle on The Mother’s Justice Show

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