Harger: 511,000 signatures to repeal Washington’s income tax. Five reasons that might not be enough

I have followed Washington state politics for as long as I can remember. Literally. Nobody else in my fourth-grade classroom at Naselle Elementary seemed to care when Booth Gardner, the Democrat, beat John Spellman, the incumbent Republican, in the 1984 race for governor. But I was all over it.

And one thing has been bedrock in our state politics that whole time, and longer. Washington may be solid-blue Democratic, but the voters here hate an income tax. Eleven times since 1932, they’ve been asked to adopt one. The one time it passed in 1932, the state Supreme Court struck it down within a year. Every other time, voters said no, often by crushing margins.

So when Let’s Go Washington turned in more than 511,000 signatures on July 2 to put IP26-645 on the November ballot, a measure that would repeal the legislature’s new 9.9% tax on household income above $1 million, which supporters have branded the “millionaires tax,” I assumed the reflex would kick in one more time.

Then yesterday happened, and the calculus shifted in my mind.

Today’s commentary is analysis, not a prediction. But I think initiative supporters have a lot more to be concerned about than they’re letting on.

The easy thing would be to tell them this is a slam dunk, that there’s no way Washington voters would ever support an income tax. I’d be fine without the comment accusing me of Trump Derangement Syndrome, or suggesting I’m in cahoots with the Democrats. But I’m a pesky moderate who will annoy the left and the right in this piece, and I’d rather play it straight with you and take the angry comments now than have you asking why I didn’t level with you after the election.

I count five headwinds stacking against the repeal side: the ballot language itself, Democratic turnout, progressive populism, yes/no voter confusion, and a Supreme Court bench tilting in the wrong direction.

Rob McKenna called the income tax poll a push poll. Andrew Villeneuve had a correction for me

During my weekly conversation Wednesday with former state Attorney General Rob McKenna, who, full disclosure, is the attorney leading the constitutional challenge against the income tax law, I did something I probably shouldn’t have. I suddenly remembered, poorly, an email I’d gotten last week about polling from the campaign defending the tax, and I kind of blindsided Rob with it on air.

The poll showed voters the actual ballot language they’ll encounter in November, including a legally required fiscal impact statement, and asked how they’d vote. The results were ugly for the repeal side.

57% said they’d vote no on the initiative, 38% said yes, and 5% were undecided. A 19-point hole, before a dollar of advertising gets spent.

“I think you are also aware of the poll out that I believe is from the Northwest Progressive Institute (NPI),” I told Rob. “I could be wrong on that, but I know Andrew Villeneuve will call me up and correct me if that’s not him.”

Sure enough, Andrew, the executive director of NPI, reached out. He may listen to this show more closely than my family does.

My bad. NPI didn’t commission the poll. Andrew’s group belongs to the coalition defending the tax, but the survey came from GBAO for the broader coalition. NPI’s own polling on IP26-645 isn’t out yet. I know this distinction matters in policy-wonk circles, and if I have to give back my high school debate trophies from Junior State of America, I’ll understand that decision.

Now, Rob called that a push poll, “designed to generate the kind of response that they got.” And to be fair to Rob, when you read the poll question, it does sound like one. The wording is devastating. That’s exactly the point. Because the wording isn’t spin, it’s what the ballot will actually say.

IP26-645 ballot language may decide Washington’s income tax fight before a single ad runs

This is the part of the story that isn’t getting enough attention.

A few years ago, Washington passed a law requiring something called a Public Investment Impact Disclosure (PIID) on qualifying ballot measures. Andrew’s group, NPI, championed it. The idea is simple: tell voters what a measure does to public funding. The Attorney General’s Office writes the language using a fixed formula: “This measure would [increase or decrease] funding for [x, y, z].”

For IP26-645, the expected language reads: “This measure would decrease funding for K-12 education, healthcare, human services, and higher education.”

That sentence will appear on every ballot mailed to every voter in Washington. Not in a campaign ad. Not in a mailer from the other side. On the ballot itself, right above the yes and no bubbles.

Now, the income tax revenue doesn’t start flowing for a couple more years. But a voter sitting at the kitchen table filling out that ballot isn’t going to know that. They’re going to read that sentence and think the money for schools disappears the moment they fill in “yes.” It’s going to take a lot of advertising money to erase words printed on the ballot a voter is holding in their hands.

As Andrew told me, the poll was “just a single ballot title test before messaging with a hypothetical public investment impact disclosure at the end.”

I think they found the wording they want.

Democratic turnout, progressive populism, and yes/no confusion all cut against IP26-645

The PIID is the biggest problem for the repeal side. I count three more behind it.

Democratic turnout will be enormous. There’s no governor’s race or U.S. Senate contest here this year, but the anti-Trump energy driving Democratic voters nationally will be just as potent in Washington. Democrats don’t need a local proxy when they already have a national one. And Democrats, at least the elected leaders I talk to, love this tax. Expect them to treat the initiative as a referendum on Republican priorities, fair or not.

Progressive populism is surging. The socialist wing of the Democratic Party has its own brand of populism going right now, and “make millionaires pay their fair share” is a message practically engineered for this moment. For a lot of progressive voters, this one is personal. It’s wrapped up in who they are.

The yes/no confusion might be getting underestimated.

Let me walk you through this. If you want to kill the income tax, you vote yes. If you want to keep it, you vote no.

I had to read the poll question out loud a couple of times before I was sure which answer meant what. I report on this stuff for a living.

We’ve seen what happens when ballots get confusing. In November 2014, Washington voters faced dueling gun measures, I-594 and I-591, with overlapping yes/no framing. Plenty of voters in each camp filled in the wrong bubble. Confusion generally favors the status quo, and the status quo here is the tax staying on the books.

The repeal campaign will burn enormous money just teaching people which bubble to fill in, before it can spend a dime arguing the merits.

Washington Supreme Court races tilt toward the income tax surviving a legal challenge

Sixteen candidates are competing for five seats on the state Supreme Court, and the progressive incumbents appointed by Governor Bob Ferguson are collecting endorsements from every corner of the Democratic establishment. The August primary sets the field. Expect any moderate in these races to get painted as aligned with President Trump and the Republicans, which is not a winning brand in Washington in 2026.

Why does a judicial race matter to a tax fight? Because the income tax faces a constitutional challenge regardless of what voters do in November. A friendlier bench for the state means a harder road for the challengers.

Why IP26-645 supporters shouldn’t count themselves out

All that said, I’m an analyst today, not a fortune teller. The repeal side has real cards to hold onto.

Start with history. Washington voters have said no to an income tax at the ballot box ten times across nearly a century: 1934, 1936, 1938, 1942, 1944, 1970, 1973, 1975, 1982, and 2010. That last one, a tax on earners above $200,000, lost badly in a year when Democrats otherwise did fine here. Cultural reflexes run deep, and “income tax” still triggers skepticism across party lines in this state.

The grassroots energy is real, too. Those 511,000 signatures didn’t come from country clubs. I saw the gatherers myself at Walmarts and hardware stores, and they weren’t short on takers.

This is also an off-year election. Without a marquee statewide race to anchor the ballot, it’s at least possible Democratic turnout won’t reach the levels my hunch says it will.

And something big could shift the national picture between now and November. It always can. An event nobody saw coming, a crisis that reshuffles what voters care about, a moment that changes the energy entirely. Four months is a long window, and the country isn’t exactly stable.

The legal team challenging the law is also bipartisan and formidable. McKenna, a Republican, is joined by Phil Talmadge, a Democrat and former state Supreme Court justice. Talmadge doesn’t oppose an income tax in principle. He believes this one is unconstitutional without amending the state constitution, given precedent treating income as property. It’s entirely plausible that the court strikes down the law, no matter what voters decide.

Brian Heywood’s IP26-645 campaign faces five headwinds at once

Four months is a lifetime in politics. But initiative backer Brian Heywood is staring at a ballot that will literally tell voters his measure cuts school funding, an electorate supercharged by anti-Trump energy, yes/no framing that favors his opponents, and a Supreme Court bench trending in the wrong direction.

Washington voters have rejected an income tax ten times. I’ve been watching since Naselle Elementary, and this is the first time I’ve wondered whether 11 is a sure thing.

Charlie Harger is the host of “Seattle’s Morning News” on KIRO Newsradio. You can read more of his stories and commentaries here. Follow Charlie on X and email him here. 

Follow @https://twitter.com/kirocharlie