By Bill Lucia | Editor
With Friday’s candidate filing deadline, the field is locked in for five state Supreme Court seats on this year's ballot.
Justices Colleen Melody and Theo Angelis, both appointed by Gov. Bob Ferguson, face competition. There are also multiple contenders for two open seats, and three candidates are challenging Chief Justice Debra Stephens, who is up for reelection.
The race is especially significant this year as supporters and opponents of the state’s new income tax on millionaire earners expect it will eventually land before the high court.
Also in today’s edition…
More legislative races to watch.
The latest on the legal fight over telehealth access to abortion medication.
And, a conservation rule for federal public land gets ditched.
News tips, feedback, questions? Email us: [email protected]
(Photo by Jacquelyn Jimenez Romero/Washington State Standard)
By Jake Goldstein-Street
Among the candidates challenging Angelis is Dave Larson, a conservative who narrowly lost a 2024 run for the high court. Sharonda Amamilo, a family and juvenile court judge in Thurston County, is also running for the seat. She serves on the Department of Children, Youth and Families oversight board. The other candidate is Greg Miller.
Melody, who previously led the civil rights division at the state attorney general’s office, will face Scott Edwards, a partner at a Seattle law firm, and Laura Christensen Colberg, a family law attorney from Kenmore. Anne Bremner, best known as Amanda Knox’s legal counsel, had filed to run but withdrew on Monday.
By Jake Goldstein-Street and Aspen Ford
There are so many state House and Senate races on the ballot that we split our initial roundup into two parts. Here we have the second installment. (You can find the first cut here.) Among today’s highlights is eastern Washington’s 6th District. There, nine candidates are vying for the pair of House seats opening up with the retirements of Republican Reps. Mike Volz and Jenny Graham.
There’s also the 10th District, covering Island, Snohomish and Skagit counties, where Rep. Dave Paul, D-Oak Harbor, faces challenges from Tim Hazelo, the former chair of the Island County Republican Party, and Carrie Kennedy, a Republican who made a failed 2024 run for the district’s other House seat. The 10th is purple terrain. Republican Ron Muzzall holds the state Senate seat there. The district’s other Democratic representative, Clyde Shavers, drew one opponent — Stanwood City Council member Robert “Chili” Hicks, a Republican.
By Sofia Resnick
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday extended until May 14 a ruling that allows continued telehealth abortion access. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approved medication-abortion regimen remains available via telehealth until then, following a week of uncertainty among patients and providers.
Over the past week, several doctor groups submitted friend-of-the-court briefs arguing that cutting off access to mifepristone could harm women seeking abortions and miscarriage management. Republican attorneys general from 23 states urged the Supreme Court not to allow providers to send mifepristone through the mail.
By Patrick Lohmann
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management on Monday cancelled the so-called “Public Land Rule,” which required the agency to consider conservation and development equally in land-use decisions for millions of acres across the West.
The BLM published a notice Monday in the Federal Register finalizing its elimination of the 2024 rule, officially known as the Conservation and Landscape Health Rule. The agency first announced it was considering eliminating the rule in September.
The Biden-era rule provided guidance for ensuring conservation received consideration along with mining, timber, grazing, recreation or other uses on public lands. It also allowed the BLM to issue leases specifically for conservation, though the agency never issued any.
ICYMI
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