In March, when Kate Gallego was inaugurated as the 61st mayor of the City of Phoenix, she made her priorities abundantly clear. The ceremony, held at the historic Orpheum Theatre, was both solemn and celebratory, with strong themes of family, diversity and inclusion. When it came time for Gallego to recite the Oath of Office, her mother walked onto the stage, leading Gallego’s 2-year-old son Michael by the hand so he could be with his mother during that historic moment.
Gallego raised her right hand and placed her left hand on her family’s Bible. As she repeated the oath, she became, at that moment, the only woman mayor among the 10 largest cities in the U.S. (Lori Lightfoot became mayor of Chicago in a run-off election on April 2.)
Gallego was also, as she pointed out in a speech minutes later, the youngest — and “the shortest” — of mayors in that illustrious group, eliciting laughs. Not bad for someone the Arizona Republic editorial board deemed “stilted in social gatherings” when she first launched her campaign. (During the run-off, the Republic endorsed her as “the mayor Phoenix needs now.”)
Gallego, 37, is widely known for her focus and fierce intellect. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University and earned an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. After moving to Phoenix, she worked in strategic planning and economic development for Salt River Project. She was the first woman elected to represent District 8 on the Phoenix City Council in 2013 and was re-elected in 2017.
In 2010 she married Ruben Gallego, a Marine Corps veteran who served in Iraq and went on to become U.S. Representative for Arizona’s 7th Congressional District in 2015. When Kate was pregnant with Michael, the couple announced they were seeking a divorce. Both have kept the details private, but the pressures of a largely long-distance marriage (as Ruben spent much of his time in Washington, D.C.) can’t have helped. Publicly, they have preferred to focus on their enduring friendship and mutual political support, keeping their personal priorities on Michael’s needs.
When former Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton left office to run for Congress in May 2018, four people jumped into the ring to replace him in the special election that followed, including Gallego and former councilman Daniel Valenzuela. The two later squared off in a run-off election March 12, which Gallego won decisively.
Though known as a progressive thinker, Gallego is quick to point out that the office of mayor is nonpartisan. In everything from public speeches to her Instagram feed (@KateGallegoAZ), she repeats her determination that Phoenix be a city where everyone belongs and everyone can thrive.
Gallego is less known, perhaps, for her warmth and sense of humor — characteristics she often keeps guarded but is growing to embrace. At a photoshoot in the lush garden area at the Children’s Museum of Phoenix — a signature city property located in the historic Monroe school — Gallego was relaxed and radiant, her attention fully focused on Michael, who played in the sand with a toy truck or watered the garden with an elephant-shaped pitcher.
You would expect a seasoned politician to know how to “work” a photoshoot. Gallego’s smile was always ready, always confident and consistent. But Michael must have gotten some of that same stuff in the gene pool. During an hour and a half of photographs and interviews, he was “on” in the best possible way — ever curious, always on the move during breaks, and laughing as staff from the museum, the mayor’s office and our own team danced and sang to encourage a perfectly timed smile.
After the photos, we moved indoors to talk with Mayor Gallego. As we exited the elevator on the second floor of the museum, it was a bit of a trick luring Michael away from the museum’s popular Noodle Forest and into the art room, where we sat with the mayor on child-sized chairs at a low, round table covered with newspaper and adorned with art supplies.
Michael immediately gravitated toward a plastic wading pool filled with cornmeal, where he contentedly played with digging utensils and trucks under the watchful eye of a staffer and two members of the mayor’s security team.
We started by asking Gallego if she’d had a moment to breathe since her election. She admitted it had been a quick transition. Had she won more than 50 percent of the vote in the November general election, she would have had a couple of months to prepare to enter office, and possibly some time to take a vacation. But the run-off election was March 12, and she spent many of the nine days afterward preparing for her March 21 inauguration ceremony. There was, however, a much-enjoyed day for a mom-and-son visit to the Phoenix Zoo.
You decided to run for mayor when Michael was about a year old. Those first couple of years as a parent are intense and exhausting enough! Why that timing?
Being a mom makes you think about things more long term — you think about what kind of city you’re going to leave behind for your family. I wanted a Phoenix that he would love, and where he could get a great education, have a safe community, have a great, fulfilling career.
I think as soon as I became a mom, I began thinking longer term. You don’t think about the next year, you think about the next generation, which is a good perspective for a mayor! Not just thinking about what’s happening next week, but what’s happening next decade. If you’re going to take on bigger things you have to think longer term.
Was there something about how you were raised that encouraged your interest in running for public office?
My parents were always very interested in giving back to the community and being involved. They would take me with them when they voted. I saw my dad be involved with the [American] Cancer Society board and other community activities. He’d get involved in making sure we had good parks near where we lived. I was raised with a sense that government could really get things done and help people solve problems — which, unfortunately is not a message every young person gets these days.
People always ask my dad, “Did you expect her to be mayor?” He always says, “There was nothing that made me feel she couldn’t be mayor!” They just wanted me to pursue whatever I loved.
How will you set that example for Michael?
I’m planning to take him with me when I go voting, and have him be involved. I try to bring him to [mayoral appearances] that are family friendly. When Harkins Theatres announced they’re opening a new movie theater in Laveen, Michael came out and celebrated with the Harkins movie monkey, which he really enjoyed. He’s never actually been to a movie theater, but he loved the movie monkey. It was just a community announcement. They passed out popcorn and celebrated.
How did your daily life change once you became mayor? You have a security team with you today — are there now people with you everywhere you go?
Yes. It’s definitely very different. I had a moment once when I had to run by a bathroom during an event and it ended up that six people plus a security detail had to be involved. There are certainly moments when you realize “some of the daily parts of my life are going to be very different.” But a lot of it is the same [as being on council]: meeting people, going to community events, going to council meetings.
Does Michael go to preschool?
He’s at a neat, bilingual program, so I’m hoping he’ll learn Spanish. I drop him off and pick him up most days. Every once in awhile my parents will do that. I wouldn’t be here without my parents. They’ve been wonderful, very engaged grandparents, and they just love him. Michael has three grandparents [including Ruben’s mother] all living close by, and they’ve all been wonderful.
There is, unfortunately, that “terrible 2s” label that goes with children Michael’s age. Have you ever been in a situation where you had to quickly switch gears?
My first weekend as mayor, we went to the Encanto-Palmcroft Historic Home Tour. I had him at Encanto Park. He loves being chased, and he’s quite quick! He just goes off shooting off in the park, and I go shooting off after him. Trying to figure out how to look mayoral when you’re chasing a 2-year-old is very difficult. So I may just need a new definition of what it means to be mayoral.
During an interview you did with Brahm Resnik on 12News “Sunday Square Off,” he asked if being a “working mom” was easier than being a “candidate mom” and now a “mayor mom.” You said we need to think of elected officials not as people who are up on pedestals, but as people who have the same daily-life challenges as the rest of us.
I think there is real value in having elected officials who have the same challenges that families do, and are facing the same things. You see the results in little things, like “Do we have a good place to nurse at Sky Harbor?” versus big-picture things like “What are we doing for early childhood [programs] in Phoenix?” A lot of people in this community are struggling to balance everything, and if we have elected officials who are also thinking about how we make that a little bit easier, I think there is real value.
[Being a working mom] does mean that sometimes I’ll show up at a meeting with who-knows-what on my shoulder, or in my hair. I had a funny [example] as a council woman. We were greeting a crown prince from Africa when Michael was quite young. I dropped him with my mom and went in. I felt like everything smelled like Michael! I thought it was just my new reality. And then I got the pictures back, and it turned out he had spit up all over my back! So hopefully babies are universal and the crown prince had some experience with babies, and didn’t think, “Who is this vice mayor of Phoenix who can’t show up with a clean shirt?”
How do you establish boundaries on your time with Michael? You must have people telling you all the time you’re needed here, there, everywhere…
I try to make sure Michael and I have time together every day when we’re just engaging and he gets 100 percent of my focus and I can be totally present for him.
Tell us what Michael is like.
He’s a very warm and friendly guy, very curious. Right now he loves everything involving trucks. His favorite part of the city is definitely our garbage trucks, but the fire trucks are pretty cool as well. He’s just so curious. I’m always surprised at things he knows and understands! When we were just out at the Children’s Museum [garden], he knew the well was for water. I have no idea how he would know that! Wonderful surprises.
Your life has the added dimension of co-parenting with your former husband, Congressman Ruben Gallego. That’s a challenge many parents are navigating right now. What have you learned?
We always try to think about what is best for Michael and put him first, and just stay up to date on whatever happened in his week, what he’s interested in, all of his little milestones. He was getting ear infections all the time, so we both wanted to be there when he got tubes in his ears, and hug that little guy.
It’s important for both of us to be flexible. We both have jobs where you have to be pretty responsive to what’s happening in the world around you. We try to make plans and plan ahead, but adapt if something big happens.
Your inauguration ceremony represented a broad swath of the Phoenix community — a festive mariachi band, a hip-hop group, an invocation by Rabbi John Linder, remarks by Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis … You even had a 6-year-old recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Tell us about that.
The young man is named Anaik Singh Sachdev. I met him on the campaign trail; folks in the Sikh community had invited me to community events. He spoke before the State Board of Education [in October 2018] to advocate for including the Sikh religion [in state standards for K-12 social studies and world languages]. Anaik was 6 years old when he did that. I was really inspired! I liked the idea of having him say the Pledge of Allegiance and showing this is absolutely his country — just the neat symbolism [of that]. A very impressive young man, in his turban, saying the Pledge of Allegiance! That’s part of what being an American is to me, and he did such a great job. He was surprised when I asked him if he was nervous. He said he’d said the Pledge of Allegiance so many times before, why should he be nervous?
You’re known as something of an “in your head” intellectual. Have you had to learn to adjust to the more social aspects of being a politician and now mayor?
I’m a little bit introverted for someone who does this for a living. I really like to read. I had some funny moments during campaign, like when the Arizona Republic editorial board wrote that I wasn’t super fun at cocktail parties. I love being around people. I enjoy it. But I do have to make sure I have some time just for me, and for my son.
What is your favorite part of your job?
I love it when I can shine a light on someone who’s doing amazing things in the community, usually as a volunteer, and just thank them and recognize them for what they’re doing. I love being able to connect people — you get to meet so many people in so many different parts [of the community]. It’s wonderful when you can put people together who would work well together. I love thinking long-term about ways Phoenix can change.
What’s part of that vision?
One of the big projects I hope to take on is redevelopment along the Salt River bed. Tempe created Tempe Town Lake along their [portion of the] Salt River bed, and we haven’t done as many bigger-picture things [along ours]. That’s something I hope to take on. Also I hope to push Phoenix toward a knowledge-based economy with higher-wage jobs. Education so important. We have to figure out how to get people the resources they need to get that education and the jobs of the future. Certainly any job is great, but a call-center job with no healthcare isn’t the job you need to raise your family. You always hope every future generation will be better off than the current one.
You talk about all you are juggling. Every mom wants that chunk of advice that makes it all possible. Anything you can share?
Every mom at work has that question: How much do you talk about being a mom and make sure the people around you know it’s important? I’ve talked to some moms who’ve said “I just don’t even want to talk about being a mom, because I worry it will hold me back.”
I had that real concern when I was running. Would people be accepting of a mayor who was a mom to a 2-year-old? And ultimately, I decided it’s who I am. And so we put Michael in my TV commercial, and I said, “I think this is an asset. I think it will make me better at my job.” And I got a really positive response. People seemed to say, “We like the idea of having a mayor who’s a mom.”
I would hope that would be true for other people at work — that if you’re willing to tell your co-workers “family is really important to me, I’m really glad to be a mom,” we’re in a special time in our country when people are really embracing that.
One thing all moms struggle with is making time to self-nurture and regenerate. What do you do to keep yourself so energetic and positive?
We live right by South Mountain Park. On a bad day on the job you can [hike up and] look down at the city from South Mountain and know everything is OK. It is a beautiful city. It’s just neat to look down, to be part of something that you think is phenomenal. I love Phoenix, and I also feel like our future is in front of us, we’re still telling the story of what Phoenix is and changing the face of it. It’s an honor to be part of that.
Do you take Michael with you to hike?
He prefers to sit in the dirt. So when I take him to South Mountain it is a more stationary experience. He just gets in the dirt and plays.
As he should.
Yes, at 2, he is not yet taking in the view of the city.
THE ART ROOM at the Children’s Museum of Phoenix began to fill with excited children on a school field trip. As the noise level climbed it was clear our interview was over. While wrapping things up, we remarked about the fact that Mayor Gallego had kept her phone turned off during our entire time together.
“You have to be present at what you’re doing,” she said.
So that is her secret.
Karen Davis Barr is the founder and publisher of Raising Arizona Kids. Her 33-year-old son, Andy, a political strategist who lives in Berkeley, California, has worked with both Kate and Ruben Gallego. Kara G. Morrison, the magazine’s editor, contributed to this report.