Washington 2020: The Calm Before the Drizzle

[CultureKing]

Hmm:

LD 3 (Spokane) is currently a D v D race. One of the republicans is currently in 3rd place, 25 votes short of making it to the general.

[RI]

I'm going to make up some statewide maps real fast.

[RI]

[Fuzzybigfoot]

Cool!  Can I make the legislative maps?

[RI]

Cool!  Can I make the legislative maps?

Sure.

[Fuzzybigfoot]

Cool!  Can I make the legislative maps?

Sure.

[RI]

Here's a few more statewide maps:

[Ogre Mage]

Thank god for King county. I was getting worried about Gonzalez until results from King (75-25 in favor of Gonzalez) came in. Any reason he was so weak in the rest of the state?

Some reports and Gonzalez himself expressed concern that his Latino surname might work against him given that he has not yet been able to establish a statewide profile.  This is especially true given the lack of statewide voters pamphlet in paper format this year which might otherwise show Gonzalez's credentials. Fortunately, he was a judge in King County for a decade.  That is the one place he is well-known and the voters came through.

From The Stranger:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/does-his-name-sound-too-mexican/Content?oid=14030223


Similar reporting can be found in the Seattle Times.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2018773276_supremecourt26m.html

[bgwah]

Whatcom split the super Republican precinct north of Lynden. There's now an even more Republican precinct. Only 8% Cantwell! And for Governor, it's 72% McKenna, 20% Hadian, and 5% Inslee. Koster got 92% there.

[Tender Branson]

Looking good for Inslee ...

[Fuzzybigfoot]

Here are the primaries for the state senate seats:





Once all the precincts are in, maybe I'll do some maps for the legislative positions (including some which show what got more votes as a whole).

[bgwah]

In the latest episode of "SW Washington's results are confusing," Democrat Rob Hill, who ran for Governor on platform solely consisting of taxing cigarettes more, received 12% in Clark, 17% in Cowlitz, 13% in Klickitat, 16% in Skamania, and 12% in Wahkiakum.

[RI]

In the latest episode of "SW Washington's results are confusing," Democrat Rob Hill, who ran for Governor on platform solely consisting of taxing cigarettes more, received 12% in Clark, 17% in Cowlitz, 13% in Klickitat, 16% in Skamania, and 12% in Wahkiakum.

I thought SW Washington was almost irrationally anti-tax?

[LastVoter]

Somebody want's to explain the maps and stuff for the results here?

[bgwah]

Inslee's best county in Eastern Washington is Yakima, where he got 40%.

Not huge or anything, but certainly a noticeable bump from his days as a Congressman over there, I think.

[LastVoter]

So what does teal blue and red mean on that map?

[RI]

So what does teal blue and red mean on that map?

Teal blue are seats not up for election, I believe.

[bgwah]

Here's a map comparing Murray 2010 (46.04%) and Inslee 2012 (46.77%).



Inslee got a bump in his old 1990s 4th CD, especially in Yakima, but not so much in his 2000s 1st CD.

Murray did better in SW WA, where Rob Hill took around 1/3 of the Democratic vote from Inslee...?

[Fuzzybigfoot]

So what does teal blue and red mean on that map?

Teal blue are seats not up for election, I believe.

Yah.

[Meeker]

The odd Inslee results in SW Washington have a very simple explanation: They didn't run ads in the Portland media market. None of those counties were a part of the ad blitz that the rest of the state has been experiencing.

[Alcon]

The Gonzalez/Danielson map is really mind-blowing.  I never would have expected such a little-publicized race (that was so easy to vote in) to have such predictable polarization.  75-25 in King and 29-71 in Adams.  Damn.

I think it's pretty clear that the lack of a Voters' Pamphlet hurt Gonzalez significantly.  Compare King, Pierce and Kitsap (Danielson's home county) to other comparable counties.  (Did Snohomish publish a pamphlet? If not, kind of throws that off, but oh well)

Other observations:

* 3rd LD Rep #1 The 3rd LD (Spokane) is very tight.  Young Democrat Marcus Riccelli clearly leads with 27%, flanked by conservative Democrat Bob Apple, Republican Tim Benn and Democrat Jon Snyder, all with about 20%.  Both of the trailing Dems are on Spokane City Council; Apple is a social conservative.

* 5th LD Senate Cheryl Pflug's mutiny seems to have helped -- Democrat Mark Mullet leads 53%-47%.

* 10th LD Senate Rep. Barbara Bailey has a thin lead in her attempt to unseat long-time incumbent Mary Margaret Haugen.

* 10th LD Rep #2 Democratic Tom Riggs narrowly leads Republican Dave Hayes in Bailey's abandoned seat.  I have no idea who either of these people are.  Google says Riggs is a park ranger and Hayes is a sheriff's deputy.

* 11th LD Rep #2 Democrat Steve Bergquist leads with 28%, followed by certifiably insane Republican Sarah Sanoy-Wright at 25%, and Democrat Stephanie Bowman with 23%.  This downscale Seattle/Renton district added to its Republican minority in redistricting.

* 16th LD Rep #1 Incumbent Republican Maureen Walsh, who voted for marriage equality, is trouncing right-wing primary challenger Mary Ruth Edwards, 63%-37%.

* 17th LD Senate Republican incumbent Don Benton is barely beating Democratic Rep. Tim Probst -- only 133 votes' difference.

* 17th LD Rep #1 Monica Stonier, Probst's Democratic hopeful replacement, is in some trouble -- she's got only 47.3% against two Republicans, the easy winner being Julie Olson (40.4%).

* 20th LD Senate Incumbent Dan Swecker's three-way GOP primary is actually endangering him.  He's only up 46%-41% over John E. Braun.

* 25th LD Rep #1 Dawn Morrell, who Hans Zeiger defeated, did very well tonight, earning 49.3% against a field of mostly Republicans (although another Dem got 4.8%.)  The easy winner among the GOP was Shelly Schlumpf, at 28%.

* 27th LD Senate Rep. Jeannie Darneille easily dispatched self-funding, socially conservative trial lawyer Jack Connelly, 59%-41%, in the state's most expensive leg race.

* 27th LD Rep #2 Tacoma City Councilman Jake Fey (D) narrowly leads Tacoma City Councilwoman Lauren Walker (D) 52%-48% in a battle to decide who gets to vote the same on everything.

* 28th LD Rep #2 Democratic incumbent Tami Green, who I will refrain from disparaging, has 52% to Republican Paul Wagemann's 36%.  Green's showing means she's probably lower-priority from the GOP, but the 28th is always a swing district.

* 29th LD Rep #1 Despite rumblings of a possible D-vs-D race, Democrat David Sawyer (41%) dispatched fellow-D Ben Lawver (24%), and will crush Republican Terry Harder (35%) in the General.

* 30th LD Rep #1 Republican Linda Kochmar (27%) advances to face Democrat Roger Flygare (26%) in a crowded open-seat field where the partisan vote split 53%-47% Republican.

* 30th LD Rep #2 Freshman Republican Rep. Katrina Asay had a somewhat weak showing (47%), and will face somewhat weak Democrat Roger Freeman (33%).

* 36th LD Rep #2 Gael Tarlton (30%) and Noel Frame (21%) advance.

* 39th LD Rep #1 Not sure who Democrat Linda Wright is, but she's giving a scare (48%) to incumbent Republican Dan Kristiansen.

* 46th LD Rep #2 Dem Jessyn Farrell (28%) will advance, probably against Dem Sarajane Siegfriedt (22%).

* 47th LD Rep #1 Incumbent Republican Mark Hargrove, who seems dumb, narrowly leads Democrat Bud Sizemore, 52%-48%.

* 48th LD Rep #2 Bellevue open seat.  Ridiculously impressive Democrat Cyrus Habib leads Republican Hank Myers 55%-45%.

[Alcon]

State race thoughts:

Governor
This is a pretty obvious win for Jay Inslee tonight.  First, his win of 4 points will probably expand -- King County tends to have more late-counted ballots, and they tend to be more Democratic, although Inslee's performance there is already impressive.  Second, the primary electorate is widely assumed to be more pro-McKenna (frequent voters, older, conservative) than the General.  Third, minor Republicans did more poorly than many expected, and Democrats actually lead the partisan ballot here by 4 points.  It's not a disaster, but it's a bad result for McKenna.

Lt. Governor
It looks like Brad Owen will, once again, bleed some affluent social liberals who are paying attention -- probably a little more this time.  The main difference here appears to be that the Republicans are viewed as more credible, and Owen seems to be getting a lot less Republican cross-over than he did last time.  That's enough to finish probably just across the 50% line.  Fools' gold, I'm afraid.

Secretary of State
Greg Nickels being competitive for second kind of surprised me -- he did better outside of King County than I expected (i.e., Kastama didn't slaughter him.)  I think the big surprise here is that Kim Wyman, who a lot of insiders here were expecting to be really tough to beat in the General, didn't even hit 40%.

State Auditor
On the other hand, I think the Republican -- James Watkins -- had pretty impressive performance (46%) here.  I'm also mildly surprised that Troy Kelley beat Craig Pridemore (24%-20%).  I hope Mark "Single Digits" Miloscia feels like a dick.

Attorney General
I know anti-gay Stephen Pigeons's 9% will almost all go to Reagan Dunn, but I still think Bob Ferguson's showing was reasonably impressive.

Commissioner of Public Lands
Does anyone else think that Stephen Sharon got 8% of the vote because he looked so damn friendly?  I think most of his vote will go to Goldmark, but I think Goldmark's 52% against Didier was a little under my expectations.  Didier is just ridiculous.

Superintendent of Public Instruction
Ron "Sexual Anarchy" Higgins, seriously?

Insurance Commissioner
Yawn.

[Alcon]

I wonder why John Koster did noticeably worse on the vote to fill the unexpired one-month term than in the primary overall.

Does King seriously have only 46 ballots on-hand to be processed?  Maybe turnout was just so godawful they finished counting everything they had tonight, and the only thing left is tomorrow's mail receipts.

I'm running out of interesting observations until I look at precinct stuff more closely.

[RI]

I wonder why John Koster did noticeably worse on the vote to fill the unexpired one-month term than in the primary overall.

There were several more candidates on the one-month term ballot, including another Republican and a member of the "Democrat" Party. That doesn't account for all the shift though.

EDIT: Oh, I got it. The districts were different. The short-term ballot was still for the old WA-01 in Kitsap, Snohomish, and King.

[bgwah]

Yup, it shows us what a gerrymander it is.