Washington

Washington had no race for Senate or governor, and five seats on the state Supreme Court were the only statewide offices on the ballot.¹ The broadest measure of the parties is the U.S. House vote, all districts added together, which Democratic candidates won by 26.7 points, up from 14.9 in 2024. Democrats held eight of the state’s 10 U.S. House seats and won all eight again, among them the Third District, which Donald Trump carried by 3.3 points in 2024 and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez held by 8.3. Republicans held the Fourth District, where Amanda McKinney won by 8.1 points. The Fifth, also Republican-held, is not called.

Set against the 2024 presidential vote, the House vote moved 8.2 points toward the Democrats. It drew 80% as many votes as the presidential race and 103% of the 2022 total. Democratic candidates drew 88 votes for every 100 Kamala Harris won. Republicans drew 75 for every 100 of Trump’s.

The move was largest in Washington’s part of the Portland area, which casts 7% of the vote and went from D+6.5 to D+19.0, a shift of 12.5 points. The Seattle metro area, which casts 51%, moved 7.3 points, from D+36.1 to D+43.3. The small towns and rural counties moved least, 7.0 points, and that was enough to change their side: they went from R+4.9 to D+2.1.

Spokane County is the largest of the seven counties that voted for Trump in 2024 and for Democratic House candidates this year. It moved from R+5.0 to D+2.0 on 234,318 votes. The widest swing outside the smallest counties was in Yakima County, which went from R+14.3 to D+3.7. King County, the largest county, moved 4.6 points, to D+56.9. Ferry County and Garfield County were the only counties that moved toward the Republicans.

Democrats kept both chambers of the Legislature, and the governor’s office was not on the ballot.^{1, 2} The change is in the size of the House majority. Our count has Democrats at 69 of 98 seats, up from 59. Two-thirds is 66, a mark House Democrats last reached in 1949, according to the Washington State Standard.³ Their gains include four seats in the 17th and 18th districts in southwest Washington, which Republicans had long held, and two in Yakima in the 14th District, where the Standard credits in part a court-ordered redistricting.^{2, 3} In the Senate our count shows the chamber unchanged at 30 to 19; KUOW reported on November 9 that Democrats flipped one seat and would need two more for two-thirds.²

The constitution sets a veto override at two-thirds of the members present in each house, and amending a voter-approved initiative within two years of its passage takes two-thirds of all members elected to each house. Democrats lack that in the Senate. A House supermajority alone allows procedural changes and the expulsion of a member, KUOW reported.^{2, 4}

The election did not change who draws the maps or who runs elections. A commission set up in each year ending in one draws congressional and legislative districts, with four voting members named by the legislative leaders of the two largest parties. The Legislature may amend its plan only by a two-thirds vote of each house, and the plan is not subject to the governor’s veto.⁴ The secretary of state, an elected officer with a four-year term who was not on this year’s ballot, is the chief election officer and certifies the results on December 3, FOX 13 Seattle reported.^{1, 4, 5, 6}

An initiative becomes law in Washington if it is approved by a majority of the votes cast on it, provided the vote on the measure equals at least one-third of all votes cast in the election.⁴ Let’s Go Washington, a conservative-backed campaign, was behind three initiatives on the ballot. Initiative 645 would have repealed the state’s 9.9% tax on household income over $1 million. It had 42.0% in favor in our count and failed, and the repeal campaign conceded.^{7, 8}

Initiative 638, which keeps transgender athletes out of girls’ K-12 school sports and requires documentation before a student can compete, passed with 56.0% in our count; the Associated Press called it on November 4.^{8, 9} Initiative 001, which would have expanded parents’ access to classroom materials, counseling records and medical information, had 47.6% in favor in our count, short of a majority. FOX 13 Seattle reported on November 5 that it was failing.^{8, 10}

Four of the five Supreme Court candidates backed by Democratic groups won by double-digit margins: Justices Colleen Melody and Theo Angelis keep their seats, Chief Justice Debra Stephens won another term, and King County Superior Court Judge Jaime Hawk joins the court. In the fifth race King County Superior Court Judge Sean O’Donnell, whose side was supported by the state Republican Party, claimed victory over appeals court Judge Ian Birk on November 11 with a lead of 39,000 votes and fewer than 100,000 ballots left to count statewide.¹

In King County, Prosecuting Attorney Leesa Manion, first elected in 2022, was the only candidate listed for the office in the county’s posted count.^{11, 12} Seattle’s Proposition 1, which doubles the city’s transit sales tax rate, was on pace to pass with 72.6% approval, FOX 13 Seattle reported on November 4.⁶ No mayor or school board was up: state law puts city, town and district general elections in odd-numbered years.¹³

Republicans have kept one of the two U.S. House seats they held and lead in the other. The one they have won is the Fourth District, which Trump carried by 20.7 points and Amanda McKinney won by 8.1. Republican House candidates carried 19 of the state’s 39 counties. The Spokane metro area went from R+8.5 to R+1.2. Of the three initiatives backed by Let’s Go Washington, the one on girls’ sports passed. In the one close Supreme Court race, the candidate supported by the state Republican Party claimed victory.^{1, 7, 9}

Patty Murray’s U.S. Senate seat will be on the ballot in 2028, in a state that voted D+18.3 for president in 2024 and D+26.7 in this year’s House vote. By KUOW’s account, Senate Democrats in Olympia would need to flip two more seats for two-thirds, which is not possible before the 2028 election.² The income tax that voters kept still faces a court challenge, which KUOW reports is likely to be decided next year by the state Supreme Court.⁷ The next redistricting commission will be established in January 2031.⁴

Call the Map has not called the Fifth District. Republican Michael Baumgartner leads Democrat Carmela Conroy by 4.4 points in a district Trump carried by 10.8. On election night KUOW described Baumgartner as in a tight race even in typically red Eastern Washington.¹⁴