Article by Erik Smith. Published on Tuesday, November 03, 2010 EST.
Suburban Swing Districts Blowing to the Right – Looking Like Blowout in Spokane Senate Race
By Erik Smith
Staff writer/ Washington State Wire
OLYMPIA, Nov. 2.—The earliest counts in the state’s legislative races show a decided Republican trend, particularly in the suburban “swing” districts that will tell which way the Legislature goes this year.
In those districts must be lumped the 6th District of Spokane, where the early results showed Matt Baumgartner with a huge lead over incumbent Democratic Sen. Chris Marr. The first count showed Marr with just 40 percent.
The early results reflect ballots mailed in to county auditors’ offices before election day. Most of them were mailed before the weekend. About half of voters submit ballots at that point. But what it means is that results can shift, especially in close races – and where last-minute mailers and campaign robo-calls flooded mailboxes and phone message machines, anything can happen.
The big news – Democratic incumbents were trailing, among them longtime veteran Rep. Kelli Linville of Bellingham, chairwoman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Rep. John Driscoll was going down in Spokane.
Democratic senators in swing districts were going down – Democrat Randy Gordon in the eastern King County suburbs was losing to challenger Steve Litzow, 53-47.
Democratic Sen. Claudia Kauffman of Kent was being blown out by Republican Joe Fain, 56-44.
Democratic Sen. Rodney Tom of Bellevue, a recent party-switcher, was in a dead heat with Republican Gregg Bennett, who had a slight edge. Also in a dead heat was Sen. Steve Hobbs, D-Lake Stevens, who was down a few votes against Republican Dave Schmidt.
Republican Sen. Pam Roach of Auburn is surviving, by a huge margin – 68-32 against Democrat Matt Richardson.
House Finance Chairman Ross Hunter of Bellevue had only a slight margin over Republican challenger Diane Tebelius, 51-49.
And in the state’s most controversial race, Everett’s 38th District, where Democratic interests staged a sneak campaign to knock out incumbent Sen. Jean Berkey of Everett, Democrat Nick Harper is way ahead of Republican Rod Rieger, 59-41. But the race may be overturned by the courts.
For the state House, Democrat Dawn Morrell in Pierce County has staged a huge comeback, and is beating Republican Hans Zieger 51-49. She was losing in the primary.
Fence-straddling Republican Tom Campbell is going down in his 10th legislative campaign. Fellow Republican J.T. Wilcox is blowing him away, 60-40.
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