Joel Connelly (1948-2026) was a revered political journalist and columnist who spent nearly forty-seven years writing for The Seattle Post Intelligencer and its online successor, SeattlePI.com, both owned by Hearst, before joining the Northwest Progressive Institute and Post Alley as a contributor.
Connelly reported on multiple presidential campaigns and from many national political conventions. During his career at the P-I, he interviewed Presidents Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and George H.W. Bush. He covered Canada from Trudeau to Trudeau, wrote about the fiscal meltdown of the nuclear energy obsessed WPPSS consortium (pronounced Whoops) and public lands battles dating back to the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.
He also coauthored a trio of books:
- on conservation and former four-term Idaho Governor Cecil Andrus;
- evolution of the University of Notre Dame under visionary President Father Hesburgh;
- and the season that saved the Seattle Mariners.
Connelly’s coverage of WPPSS was runner-up for a Pulitzer Prize. The Society of Professional Journalists presented him with a lifetime achievement award for his contributions to journalism. He has won two “Best in the West” medallions plus achievement awards from the Idaho Conservation League, Alaska Wilderness League, and the Washington Environmental Council. The most telling honor, however, came at New York news conference when Governor Mario Cuomo told Connelly: “I don’t recognize you. You don’t work here. But you think like people who do.”
Connelly was a graduate of Notre Dame University, although he got tired of endless showings of Rudy during the COVID-19 pandemic. He held a masters degree from the University of Washington. As a college student, he worked on the anti-war campaigns of Senators McCarthy and McGovern. A widower from 2002 until his death in 2026, Connelly divided his time between Seattle home and his family cabin on Whidbey Island prior to moving to Horizon House, a retirement community. He was a conservationist, dating back to when his six-year-old legs climbed Heliotrope Ridge on Mount Baker.
He enjoyed rafting rivers and summiting major peaks; he made it to 19,000 feet on the summit crater of Kilimanjaro as well as in the Himalayas. He was fond fond of watching gray whales at Laguna San Ignacio in Baja. In his later years, he preferred backcountry cabins to tents. His favorite quote, from St. Thomas More, was: “Silence gives consent.”