Bob Ferguson
About a week ago, I asked rhetorically, “Can Dave Reichert get 45%?” And answered, “Don’t bet on it.” (See my posting here.)
Now we have a poll to give us a glimpse of how things are going as we approach the primary. About as I expected: Bob Ferguson will be our next governor, while Reichert will struggle to reach 44% and may not even beat Republican gadfly Loren Culp’s 43.12%.
Washington doesn’t have separate Republican and Democratic primaries. It uses the “top two” system, which means everyone votes in the same primary, and the top two vote-getters advance to the general election. This poll shows Reichert and Ferguson will be their party nominees.
Combined, Democratic candidates get 49%, Republican candidates get 40%. Breakdowns are 42% for Ferguson (D) and 7% for Mark Mullet (D), and 33% for Reichert (R) and 7% for Semi Bird (R).
For readers unfamiliar with Washington politics, in statewide elections a GOP candidate normally can expect to get about 42% no matter what, but doing better by even a couple percent is difficult. These numbers suggest Reichert has much work to do to get to 44%, and no chance of winning.
Washington hasn’t elected a Republican governor since 1980. Eastern Washington, which comprises two-thirds of the state’s land area, votes Republican roughly 2-to-1, but has only a fifth of the state’s population. More than half of Washingtonians live in the Seattle metro area, which typically votes about 60-40 Democratic. This is enough to elect the U.S. senators, statewide offices, and control the legislature.
Republicans in rural counties complain about the Puget Sound urban counties running the state, but why shouldn’t they, when they’re two-thirds of the state population? The fact is, Washington gubernatorial races aren’t competitive, and Republican contenders are relegated to trying to come in a close second. Few succeed in this difficult task.