By Bill Lucia | Editor
Welcome back to the Daily Standard's weekend edition, where we recap some of the week's top stories.
Quote of the week: “I want her out of office … Just because you’re not a fascist, doesn’t mean you’re a Democrat.”
That’s Democratic candidate Brent Hennrich referring to U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who he challenged from the left. Hennrich fell short of advancing to the general election in Tuesday’s primary, but had claimed nearly 17% of the vote as of Friday.
In a national election cycle dominated by headlines about the rise of the far left and the democratic socialist movement, Democrats’ fortunes in Washington’s marquee congressional battle depend on one of the few “Blue Dog” centrists remaining in the House, who has developed a reputation for voting with Republicans at times.
Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez walks with her dog and an aide on her way to a vote at the U.S. Capitol last November. (Francis Chung/POLITICO via AP Images)
The more than 35,400 voters who backed Hennrich reveal some appetite in southwest Washington for a politics more liberal than what Gluesenkamp Perez offers.
But the 3rd, as recently as 2020, sent a Republican to Congress and voters there favored President Trump in each of his three runs for the White House. For those in Hennrich’s camp, backing MGP in November will boil down to weighing progressive purity against the pragmatic pursuit of reining in Republican power.
Hennrich told supporters to vote their conscience as he plans to write in an undisclosed candidate in November.
He also said he doesn’t mind if state Senate Minority Leader John Braun, who’s running on the GOP ticket, wins the seat.
Braun, though christened with the “MAGA Majority” label earlier this year, is no firebrand. He, too, has worked across the aisle during his time in the statehouse. He led the race Friday with about 39.6% of the vote. During an event Thursday stumping with U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, he played up his credentials running a family business and a message of getting government out of the way of the private sector.
John Braun speaks to the crowd at his primary night watch party in Chehalis. (Photo by Aspen Ford/Washington State Standard)
When Johnson took the mic, he framed the showdown in the 3rd District in no small terms, saying it would “help us decide the fate of the republic” and warning ominously of the rise of “Marxists and communists.” He reminded those who’d gathered at the morning event, held at Trap Door Brewing in Vancouver, that the 3rd is one of just 18 seats nationwide expected to decide which party controls the House.
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Feeling blue?
The race in the 3rd Congressional District isn’t the only reason that the southwest Washington political landscape is getting attention this week.
In a clear sign of headwinds for the GOP, four Republican incumbents who represent the region in the state House — John Ley, Stephanie McClintock, David Stuebe and Kevin Waters were trailing Democrats in races to keep their seats.
Reasons for Republican concern extend beyond that corner of the state.
For example, in the 35th District, which spans Mason, Kitsap and Thurston counties, incumbent state Sen. Drew MacEwen was leading Friday in his head-to-head matchup with Democrat Carolina Mejia by just 114 votes.
And, GOP Rep. Brian Burnett is in a tight race with Stacy Willoughby, a Democrat, in the 12th Legislative District. He was up 460 votes late Friday. Burnett was ahead by nearly 2,000 votes in Chelan County, but Willoughby was outperforming him in the part of King County the district includes. In Snohomish County, the race between the two was close.
Ferguson’s Supreme Court slate advances
Both state Supreme Court justices nominated by Gov. Bob Ferguson — Colleen Melody and Theo Angelis — are headed for the November general election. Superior Court Judge Jaime Hawk, who Ferguson endorsed, is also poised to make it through in her race. Hawk leads Mike Diaz, an appeals court judge who’d stacked up endorsements from former Govs. Jay Inslee, Christine Gregoire and Gary Locke, Attorney General Nick Brown, The Stranger and The Seattle Times.
There’ll be contrast in these races. Assuming the current results hold, Angelis will compete against Dave Larson, who has called for a Judicial Elections Commission to evaluate candidates for judicial appointments, rather than leaving the decision solely to the governor. He narrowly lost running against now-Justice Sal Mungia in 2024. Hawk would be up against David Stevens, a Mason County judge who defeated an Inslee judicial appointee in 2023 and has the backing of the state Republican Party.
Vote counting continues
Too close to call: In the race for an open state Senate seat in northwest Washington’s 42nd District, Bellingham port commissioner Michael Shepard was leading fellow Democrat Eamonn Collins by nine votes last night, up from two the day before. Shepard is considered the establishment pick; Collins describes himself as a “grassroots progressive.”
Worth watching: Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos, the longest actively serving member in the state House, is trailing by about 1,000 votes against another Democrat, Kelabe Tewolde. Santos, first elected in 1998, represents the 37th District, which cuts a swath through southeast Seattle. Though Santos chairs the House Education Committee, Tewolde conspicuously has the endorsement of state Superintendent Chris Reykdal. Santos’ campaign was in the news earlier this summer over apparently getting defrauded out of $20,000.
Middle lane: Rep. Amy Walen, a moderate King County Democrat who voted against the income tax on high earners, was up by 133 votes on Friday over progressive challenger Jessica Forsythe. Meanwhile, in Pierce County, Rep. Melanie Morgan, another Democrat who voted against the tax, was down by 377 votes, fending off a challenge from her left from Krista Perez. All four candidates will get through to the general election, but Walen and Morgan will have work to do if they want to hang onto their seats.
Initiative battles
A Thurston County judge on Friday upheld a one-sentence statement that will appear on ballots describing the budgetary consequences of an initiative to repeal Washington’s new income tax on high earners. Superior Court Judge Chris Lanese denied open government activist Arthur West’s request to amend the disclosure statement or remove it from the ballot. That decision abruptly ended a separate legal fight over the statement’s content set to play out in front of a different judge Friday.
Let’s Go Washington, sponsor of the ballot initiative, condemned the court process, which led to the cancellation of Friday’s scheduled hearing on its challenge to the statement. “We came prepared to make our case,” said Brian Heywood, founder of Let’s Go Washington. “Instead, a civilian who does not represent us was invited to argue issues from our challenge, and then the court shut the door.”
READ MORE: WA judge rejects bid to ditch description of income tax initiative’s budget effects | by Jerry Cornfield
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Meanwhile, Let’s Go Washington held a campaign kickoff event for the income tax initiative and two other ballot measures it is behind this year. One of the other initiatives would undo changes Democratic lawmakers made in 2025 to an earlier Let’s Go Washington initiative on the rights of parents of public school students. The other seeks to bar transgender K-12 students from competing in girls’ sports.
A few dozen people turned out for Saturday’s event at Marathon Park in Olympia. Let’s Go Washington said some of those on hand would head out door-knocking in support of the ballot measures after the event wrapped up.
Brian Heywood speaks at a press conference in Olympia on Saturday morning, promoting the three ballot measures his group Let’s Go Washington is pushing this year. He repeated his criticism of Friday’s court proceedings, deriding Lanese as an “activist judge.” “The Legislature has gone too far, and we're pushing back,” Heywood said. “We will fight in November. The real battle is not in the courts; it will be at the ballot box.” (Photo by Bill Lucia/Washington State Standard)
Frances Staudt, a high school athlete, speaks in support of Initiative 638, which would block transgender students from competing in girls’ sports. “The opposition is counting on you to not pay attention,” she said. “They are counting on you to dismiss concerns like mine as exaggerated or unimportant, and to ignore what is actually happening in our schools in sports.” (Photo by Bill Lucia/Washington State Standard)
Where’s the governor?
He traveled to Spokane last Sunday after the destructive fires there. A spokesman for his office said Friday that Ferguson returned to the west side of the state Monday evening, but would likely visit Spokane again as the fire response continues. He’s done at least a couple of national television interviews on CNN, discussing the fires.
No word on whether he’s received a response to the letter he sent to President Trump inviting the president, or someone in his administration, to visit Washington state to see the damage. Trump approved initial federal emergency assistance for Washington this week in response to wildfires here. The Department of Health and Human Services approved a separate public health emergency.
Because of the fires, Ferguson canceled a planned trip to Florida this week to celebrate the start of construction on the first of three new hybrid-electric ferries that the state has on order from Eastern Shipbuilding Group. On Monday, the governor has separate meetings penciled in with Sen. Marko Liias and Rep. Jake Fey, the transportation committee leads in their respective chambers.
IN OTHER NEWS
Top brass from Washington State Ferries gathered Wednesday at a shipyard in Panama City, Florida, to celebrate construction getting underway for the first of three new ferries.
As Washington reels from the devastating wildfires that destroyed hundreds of homes in Spokane last weekend, experts say the disaster has cast newfound uncertainty over a property insurance market that had just begun to stabilize.
Wildland fire veterans are fearful that aggressive fire suppression tactics ordered by the Trump administration — coupled with extreme, fast-moving blazes — could put firefighters in danger as conditions escalate this month.
South-central Washington’s Klickitat County is increasingly an epicenter for tensions over the use of land for farming versus data centers and clean energy projects.
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