WA party officials feeling confident about Election Day vote

From control of Congress to moving the needle on the balance of power in Olympia, there is much at stake this Election Day.

“I would say [we are feeling] cautiously optimistic,” State Republican Party Chair Caleb Heimlich said. “We’ve got a lot of momentum. We’re certainly seeing momentum across the country, the big question is [if] that going to translate here in Washington state.”

“We’ve got Patty Murray running statewide as an incredible U.S. senator. We’ve got Steve Hobbs as an incredible secretary of state. Every single Washingtonian who’s eligible to vote can vote for those two great Democrats and then take a look to see who are your Democrats in your congressional district, as well as your legislators, and vote D up and down the ballot,” State Democratic Party Chair Tina Podlodowski said.

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Will Tiffany Smiley’s momentum be enough?

While Democrats and progressive pollsters say Patty Murray maintains anywhere from a 9 to 14-point lead over Republican challenger Tiffany Smiley, Republicans say the race is tightening, with some calling it neck and neck.

“Republicans have put junk polls out there in the field and that’s skewing what you see in terms of data. They’ve also spent millions of dollars on these terrible ads that are coming from dark money PACs,” Podlodowski said.

2022 Election Preview: U.S. Senator Patty Murray vs. Tiffany Smiley

But Heimlich says even if that were true and Smiley was 10 points behind Murray, that would still be significant.

“Even if she’s ahead by 10, that gap has closed significantly since the primary. In the primary, we were looking at an 18-19 point gap, and so if Tiffany’s closed it to within 10, that shows a lot of momentum and progress,” said Heimlich. “And we had hundreds of people at a bus tour for Tiffany Smiley, and so there’s real momentum, real excitement. She’s the best-funded U.S. Senate candidate we’ve ever had.

“If the Democrats really believe that they’re ahead by 10, then why are all these outside groups dumping millions of dollars in the last two weeks? If they thought they were going to coast to victory because they could go to Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and Pennsylvania or many of these other Senate state seats. So I think they have internal polling that at least shows that it’s too close for comfort, which again, is a major improvement for Tiffany from the August primary, which leads me to be optimistic for the eighth congressional district,” he added.

Election Day preview: Key races to watch for 2022

Schrier vs. Larkin will be close

Rep. Kim Schrier (D) is in a tight race for the eighth congressional district against Republican challenger Matt Larkin.

“We’re working hard to get Kim Schrier in a very contested race back to D.C. to represent us as the only female pediatrician in Congress and one of the few pro-choice doctors in Congress. We’re excited to have her there,” Podlodowski added.

Is an upset brewing in District 3?

Another race Democrats are putting a lot into this year is the 3rd congressional district.

“We’ve got a great upset brewing in Washington three with Marie Pérez, in what’s generally been a Republican district for a little while, taking on Joe Kent. So we’re going to make sure that we win that one as well,” Podlodowski said.

2022 Election Preview: Joe Kent vs. Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez

Republicans are much more confident.

“I think Joe’s going to win,” Heimlich said referring to Republican candidate Joe Kent.

“I think I just saw on Twitter, he has now held 630 town halls in the last two years, the guy campaigns everywhere. I mean, pre-primary, and then over the last two weeks, to three public events every day, every small town across the 3rd congressional district. If you follow him on social media, you find out about small towns that you didn’t know existed, and he’s there. I think his résumé speaks for itself. Given the environment I think people are in a good position to keep that seat,” explained Heimlich.

Will write-in candidate impact Secretary of State race?

In the other statewide race for Secretary of State a write-in candidate, Brad Klippert, has made things more interesting.

Incumbent Democrat Steve Hobbs is vying to keep the post that Governor Inslee appointed him to, following the exit of former Republican Secretary of State Kim Wyman. Hobbs and Pierce County Auditor Julie Anderson (Independent) came out of the primary in August as the top two candidates. Republicans ran four different candidates, ultimately splitting the vote enough for Anderson to edge out any Republican candidates.

2022 Election Preview: Secretary Steve Hobbs vs. Julie Anderson

With no viable GOP candidates, Republicans opted to endorse a write-in candidate.

“It’s a very interesting situation. There are only two names on the ballot, our incredible democratic Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, and then a so-called independent, Julie Anderson. But Brad Klippert is a MAGA-Republican, election denier who is running a write-in campaign, and he’s gaining some traction in Central and Eastern Washington. So we are making sure that Republicans who break with their party around this idea of election denial make certain that they are not writing in Brad Klippert and in fact, will vote for the person who will keep our election system safe: Steve Hobbs,” Podlodowski said.

Heimlich says he is much more confident in a write-in candidate for the election due to the incredibly slim margin that Anderson got second place.

“Obviously write-ins are very tough, and frankly, because we had four candidates as Republicans running in that race, we shot ourselves in the foot. I think it’s important to remember, though, Julie Anderson got 12.8% of the vote in August. It’s not like she got 30 or 40%; she barely beat out other Republicans that were at 12.2% or something like that,” Heimlich said.

Other state races to watch

Both parties are also looking to defend current state house and senate seats and pick up a few new ones.

One state election race being closely watched is the 10th District House of Representatives Position 1 race. Democrat Clyde Shavers had been the only Democrat to lead a Republican incumbent coming out of the primary, but now after reports that he embellished his military record, there has been a shift.

“He, for whatever reason, chose to embellish that in a dishonest way. And so while he was the only Democrat challenger leading a Republican incumbent in August, and he was beating representative Greg Gilday about 52-48 in August, I think that’s the seat we’re going to hold because of his embellishments [and] lies,” Heimlich said.

Democrats acknowledged what Shavers did but had a different type of response.

“We want to make certain that people are being absolutely clear about their background and their experience. Clyde made a mistake, and he owned up to it. That is a very, very good thing. If you take a look at the Republicans in that race, though, Greg Gilday doesn’t own up too much in that area. So I think voters are going to need to decide if Clyde has done enough to make certain that he can win that race,” Podlodowski said.

For up-to-the-minute results on the biggest races in Washington and in-depth analysis of races, strategies, and a breakdown of how the results affect you, tune in to KIRO Newsradio’s election day coverage with Dave Ross and Dori Monson Tuesday night from 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. The special two-hour, commercial-free broadcast will be broadcast live on 97.3 FM, the KIRO Newsradio live stream, and the KIRO Newsradio App. You can also watch the broadcast live on the KIRO Newsradio video stream, in addition to the station’s Facebook and Twitter pages.

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