Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

Although the votes aren’t all counted and the election isn’t certified until November 26, we can pretty confidently provide a final wrap-up of what happened.  The big question now; what does this mean for the legislature?

Both Democrat majorities picked up one seat for 30-19 control in the Senate and 59-39 control in the House.  Although it may make our job more difficult on certain legislation, it is nowhere near the super majority the democrats were looking for.  However, the ideology of both majorities moved farther left with the new members they picked up across the state.

Although the progressive wing of the House and Senate majorities hoped, maybe even expected, to pick up enough seats in the House and the Senate to form super majorities, it didn’t happen. The two seats that flipped were Senate District 18 with Battleground Mayor Adrian Cortes (D) beating Brad Benton (R), son of Republican firebrand Don Benton and in House District 26, Position 1 Adison Richards beating problematic former state representative Jesse Young.  The pundits will tell you the two seats that flipped, did so because the republican party put up far right candidates in purple districts basically ceding the seat to the other side. They are most likely right.  The Senate and House minority supported centrist candidates in the primary; Representative Greg Cheney for the Senate in District 18 and Jim Henderson for the House in District 26. Ultimately the party faithful selected the other republican candidates in the primary that would  have a hard time getting elected in the general.

Although 7 initiatives qualified for the ballot, only 4 were put before the voters because the other 3 were adopted in a similar form during the legislative session. The initiatives that became bills were the police vehicle pursuit bill (Initiative 2113), a prohibition on a state income tax (Initiative 2111), a “parental bill of rights (Initiative 2081).”

Of the four initiatives on the November ballot, only one passed, the “Ban the Gas Ban" (Initiative 2066).  The defeated initiatives were the repeal the capital gains tax (Initiative 2109), repeal the “cap & trade” climate action plan (Initiative 2117), and the opt out of the long term care plan (Initiative 2124)

Some believe that this strategy may be a way for Washingtonians to push back against the progressive leaning legislature, but it is very expensive and will take more than one election to establish a true precedent.

Unfortunately, the one local race of consequence resulted in Alexis Rinck soundly defeating incumbent Tanya Woo for Seattle City Council. Contrary to her ads and the ideology she portrayed during the campaign, Alexis is a far left progressive that will prove a problem for pro-business and especially pro-housing provider legislation.

WMFHA went 3 for 5 on endorsements made this election cycle. Unfortunately, Sen. Mark Mullet failed to make it through the primary in his run for Governor and Tanya Woo was roundly defeated in the general for Seattle Council Position 8.  Our friends, pro-housing officials, Lieutenant Governor Denny Heck, Secretary of State Steve Hobbs and Senator Annette Cleveland all easily kept their seats. View the most recent election results for our highlighted races here.

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