Over the weekend, Tina Podlodowski won election to be the Chair of the Washington State Democrats. She beat the incumbent, Jaxon Ravens, riding a wave of anger from grassroots Democrats on the performance of the state party during the 2016 elections.
Tally: Tina: 119 Jaxon: 53 Roger: 2 total votes: 174 two spoiled ballots. Our new chair is Tina Podlodowski. #WADEMreorg pic.twitter.com/PvGGr5HsQ2
— Austin Beiermann (@BeiermannAustin) January 28, 2017
While this win seems to have been secure in recent days, that wasn’t the case when Podlodowski announced her candidacy. Moreover, the fact that a sitting incumbent lost re-election is significant.
State party chairs are, generally speaking, elected by state committee members. Those members are elected at local legislative district and county party levels across the state. Those elections took place generally in December.
When those took place at the local level, there was a groundswell of organizing by folks angry with the state party. In many cases, Bernie Sanders supporters led the effort, building on their organizing work for the party caucuses. So, many of those new state committee members came into their positions with one goal in mind: to elect a new chair to lead the state party.
This isn’t a common occurrence. The last time this happened in the State Democratic Party was 1994 when Paul Berendt beat Charles Rolland following a tough year for Democrats. Berendt beat Rolland via vote count of 102 to 51.
That election was the largest landslide defeat of Democrats in recent memory. In fact, in a huge Republican year, the incoming Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich called Washington State “Ground Zero” for the Republican Revolution. Republicans won more seats in Washington State, from top to bottom of the ballot, than any state in the country in that 1994 election.
Prior to Berendt’s re-election, Karen Marchioro was the last person to beat an incumbent chair, an event that occurred in 1980 following the Reagan landslide election.
This weekend, Podlodowski won her election to the chair by a wider margin than Berendt won his in 1994. She did something that has only occurred twice since 1980, and did so after significant Democratic losses at the ballot box.
Podlodowski’s win wasn’t a normal occurrence. It happened after significant organizing, primarily by those that organized for Bernie Sanders in the caucuses, and within the context of this happening only after Reagan and Gingrich successes at the ballot.
Your support matters.
Public service journalism is important today as ever. If you get something from our coverage, please consider making a donation to support our work. Thanks for reading our stuff.
