A Tale of Two Elections – While the Country Goes Red, Washington State Turns Deeper Blue

By Jordan Royer, Vice President of External Affairs

With an all mail-in voting system, Washington State elections results are notoriously slow., But with all the votes finally counted, it is clear that Washington State voters continue to favor Democrats in every statewide race, including Governor and the State Legislature.  –Of course, this is in sharp contrast to the National election which favored Republicans.

Even though a Republican has not won the Governor’s race since 1980 (the longest drought of any party in any state), races for open seats are usually fairly close. This one was not. Democratic Attorney General Bob Ferguson was declared the victor over Republican former Congressman Dave Reichert on election night. In fact, Democrats ran the table on every statewide office, giving them complete control over state government.

In addition to legislative and state officer races, four initiatives were on the ballot to repeal prominent programs that represented some of the major legislative accomplishments of Democrats over the last four years.  This included a referendum on out-going Governor Jay Inslee’s signature policy achievement: the Climate Commitment Act. And even though studies show the Act increased the price of gas, voters rejected its repeal. Voters also rejected an initiative to repeal the new Capital Gains Tax and a payroll tax for a long-term care program. The only initiative to succeed is the repeal of a state law preventing natural gas expansion in new development projects.

What all this means generally is that the policy environment going forward in the state will not be altered dramatically. The funding sources of the Climate Commitment Act and the Capital Gains Tax remain in place. This does not mean, however, that there won’t be pressure to create new funding sources.The latest state revenue projection shows a budget deficit of at least $10 billion over the next four years. With two-thirds of legislators coming into office for the first time in January, and Democrats holding Super-Majorities in both houses, saying it will be a challenging time is an understatement.

The other wild card in all of this is how state leaders respond to policies coming from the new President and Republican-controlled Congress? And given that Washington State is one of the most trade-dependent states in the country, how will potential tariffs and trade fights with China, Mexico, and others affect our ports and agricultural growers and manufacturers?

There is also a lot of federal investment currently slated for port projects around the country. Significant investments are committed to projects on the West Coast. Will politics get in the way of those projects being built? After all, many investments are for modernization and decarbonizing transportation and alternative energy operations – not something the President-Elect seems to be very fond of.

However all of this plays out, it will be more important than ever to continue to ensure that both political parties in Olympia and the District of Columbia understand the importance of trade to our economy and that the modernization of infrastructure deserves to be prioritized.