Five big takeaways from initial Pierce County election results
After what felt like days, months and years of anticipation and angst, Tuesday finally brought some clarity to elections across Pierce County and the South Sound.
While, nationally, the final outcome of the polarizing presidential race between Donald Trump and Joe Biden remained uncertain — leading to white knuckles across the country — closer to home most of the area’s significant races were easier to assess.
So, with the dust still settling, what can we make of it?
Pierce County rocking the vote
Back in August, Pierce County voters turned out in “unprecedented” numbers to cast a ballot in the 2020 primary election, County Auditor Julie Anderson told me at the time.
Across demographics and political party lines, voters of all stripes were clearly itching to partake in the democratic process, Anderson said, resulting in nearly 52% of registered Pierce County voters casting a ballot on or before the Aug. 4 primary.
To no great surprise, the same excitement — and then some — appears to have carried over into one of the most hotly anticipated general elections of a lifetime.
On Tuesday, Anderson said Pierce County was expecting a turnout of 85% of registered voters. There are more than 560,000 registered voters throughout the county.
Pierce County’s Tuesday night release of results included more than 70% of the expected overall votes, Anderson said.
With a notable increase over the last four years in the number of registered Pierce County voters, 2020 turnout was on pace to significantly exceed previous presidential elections.
Tens of thousands of registered voters have been added to the Pierce County rolls since the primary alone, according to the Auditor’s Office.
For perspective:
In 2016, approximately 75 percent of Pierce County’s roughly 490,000 registered voters cast a ballot.
In the 2012 general election, nearly 79 percent of the county’s 442,000 registered voters participated.
Beyond the results, all of this means that voter turnout might be the story of the 2020 election, and one big question is what this will mean in the days to come.
According to Republican political consultant Alex Hays, many Democrats decided “early voting was important” this year, which he expects to result in later voters trending conservative across the state.
To varying degrees, Nic Van Putten, a political consultant for Progressive Strategies NW, agreed.
While Van Putten said Tuesday night that “there’s simply too much unknown” to make a definitive declaration, he did offer to “confidently pour cold water on anyone who says that they are expecting the normal leftward trend” in later voting.
“The early ballot returns were very Democratic … and so the question is if that’s indicative of overall higher Democratic turnout or — more likely in my opinion — the same Democratic early voting that we’re seeing nationally, with ballots returned on Election Day skewing heavily Republican,” Van Putten said.
“If the latter, we would expect a pretty pronounced rightward shift post-election day.”
Culp’s pull in Pierce County
Jay Inslee will serve a third term as Washington’s governor, in no small part because of the overwhelming support the Democrat enjoys in King County.
Here in Pierce County, voters were clearly more conflicted.
As of Tuesday night, with four counties yet to report, Inslee held a commanding 60% to 40% lead statewide.
Pierce County results showed a much closer 53-46% split favoring Inslee.
While initial results show Culp under-performing 2016 Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Bryant, his early performance in Pierce County is still worth considering for what it reveals.
Considering Culp was something of a long-shot candidate to begin with — a small-town police chief from Eastern Washington with little experience or name recognition outside of his staunch, defiant and inane defense of perceived gun rights — his showing here suggests many voters were eager to vote for someone (or anyone) who ran contrary to the current governor.
It seems safe to assume that Inslee’s response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic was a big reason why.
Justifiable or not — and public health experts would certainly argue it wasn’t — frustration over government mandates and COVID-19-related business closures likely showed up at the Pierce County polls.
Unfortunately, that frustration seems unlikely to dissipate just because the race for governor is over.
Former Tacoma mayor headed to Washington D.C.?
Roughly three years after Marilyn Strickland last presided over a City Council meeting as Tacoma’s mayor, the Mount Tahoma High School grad took a step toward succeeding Democrat Denny Heck in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday.
Squaring off against current Democratic state representative Beth Doglio, initial results had Strickland ahead on election night by a 50% to 36% margin.
Interestingly, in a race that comes down to two Democrats after the August primary, conservative voters likely helped Strickland at the polls — at least to some extent. There were more than 37,000 write-in votes reported in initial election results.
Doglio ran to the left of Strickland, arguing that she was more progressive on issues like climate change and workers’ rights. Meanwhile, Strickland — who served as president and CEO of the Seattle Metro Chamber of Commerce — received endorsements from established Democrats like Gary Locke, Christine Gregoire and Derek Kilmer.
It’s also worth considering how much Strickland’s name Tacoma recognition in a district that includes parts of Pierce, Thurston and Mason counties might have blunted some of Doglio’s attacks from the left.
Even in left-leaning Tacoma — where many of Doglio’s stances likely resonated — voters’ familiarity with Strickland likely played to her benefit.
Dammeier maintains countywide strength
In 2016, Bruce Dammeier flipped the script in Pierce County.
After years of Democrats occupying the County Executive’s office — largely off the oomph provided by left-leaning Tacoma voters — Dammeier capitalized off a growing suburban population to secure a 52-48 percent victory over Democrat Rick Talbert.
Four years later, Dammeier’s lock on Pierce County’s electorate appears even more solid. As of the initial election results Tuesday night, the current County Executive had secured a 54% to 46% lead.
Perhaps that can be attributed to the tepid challenge Dammeier received from Democrat Larry Seaquist, who despite years of political experience was out-raised nearly five to one, according to Public Disclosure Commission filings.
At the same time, it’s also worth noting that even anti-Trump sentiment and recent dramas in the exec’s office — including Dammeier’s bizarre handling of the firing of whistleblower Carol Mitchell — apparently did little to chip away at his countywide support.
Strong showing for two local Democrats
As of the initial election results released by the Pierce County Auditor Tuesday night, two important races remained relatively close, though certainly not as close as many expected.
In the race for state senator in the 28th Legislative District in Pierce County, Democratic challenger T’wina Nobles held a not insignificant 2,177 vote lead over Republican incumbent Steve O’Ban.
In the primary, Nobles bested O’Ban by a mere 235 votes.
Meanwhile, in the race for Pierce County Council District 6, Democrat Jani Hitchen had an equally strong showing against Republican Jason Whalen.
In the primary, Hitchen beat Whalen by just over 300 votes.
On Tuesday night, Hitchen was more than 2,200 votes ahead of Whalen, securing an initial 53% to 47% advantage.
A Hitchen victory remains the best chance Democrats have of flipping partisan control of the council, with Republican Hans Zeiger holding a sizable lead over Democrat Sarah Rumbaugh in the race to succeed Pam Roach in District 2.
On a night when so much uncertainty remained across the country, the local success of Nobles and Hitchen helped to calm frazzled Democrat nerves, at least a little.
The Pierce County Auditor’s office expects the next batch of election results to drop at 6 p.m. Wednesday.
