Analysis: Everything You Need to Know About the Aug. 6 Primary Results

Speaking of Councilmember Tanya Woo, who is running to defend the citywide seat she had bestowed upon her after that loss in 2023, she's through to the general. No surprise there, as she has the solid support of most of the city's current political establishment and the large and growing number of Seattleites who watched Seattle is Dying and lapped it up.

The big question in this race was always going to be who her progressive challenger would be. Well, question answered. It's former King County Regional Homelessness policy wonk Alexis Mercedes Rinck. While one might have expected Mercedes Rinck and her fellow progressives, Tariq Yusuf and Saunatina Sanchez, to have split the lefty vote into relatively equal parts, leaving Woo with the overall highest vote total, that's not at all what happened. With 21.41%of eligible voters reporting, Mercedes Rinck is the frontrunner, boasting 45,914 votes to Woo's 40,790. When you factor in the votes she's likely to gain from her progressive runners-up, she could be in great shape for the general. Of course, the general elections always attract less-politically-engaged voters, which is to say voters who might be more drawn to Woo's more conservative ideas, so you never know.

It's incumbent Sen. Maria Cantwell versus her most serious Republican challenger, ER doc and medical entrepreneur Raul Garcia. No surprises here, but also not a great result for Garcia, who took home 21% of the vote to Cantwell's 58, with 21% of registered voters reporting. Sure, lots of less-engaged voters show up to the general, but that's a hell of a hill to climb.

Another predictable one. Rep. Pramila Jayapal will take on Republican Dan Alexander in the general and, not to get too far ahead of ourselves, probably wallop him. With 110,000 votes counted and 85,000 votes left to count in King County, Jayapal has the absolute lion's share of it, at 78%. Alexander took 9%, while Jayapal's Green Party opponent, Liz Hallock, held onto another 8%, all votes that Jayapal is several orders of magnitude more likely to inherit than Alexander.

Longstanding Rep. Adam Smith is, of course, one of the candidates going into the general here. But who's going against him? Is it glutton for punishment and perennial candidate Doug Basler? Or is it Smith's challenger from the left, the stridently anti-war Melissa Chaudhry? To be honest, we really can't say. With only about two-thirds of potential votes counted, Basler leads Chaudhry by a mere 907 votes. Smith is, of course, miles ahead of both, with 42,347 votes amounting to 56% of the total. If things stay the way they are, we'll probably get another lopsided affair between Smith and Basler. That said, late ballots break left. For some reason, Democratic and left-leaning voters tend to get their ballots in just before deadline. No one knows why, exactly, but the so-called "blue shift" could set us up for a much more interesting race in the 9th, as there are still 105,000 uncounted ballots in King and Pierce Counties, according to the Secretary of State.

The race for governor narrowed itself down pretty quickly from 30 hopefuls to the two biggest names. It's going to be Attorney General Bob Ferguson versus former King County Sheriff and U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert. While Republican Army vet Semi Bird and Democratic State Sen. Mark Mullet made somewhat respectable challenges to the presumptiveness of the two presumptive nominees, everyone's presumptions turned out to be correct. Ferguson and Reichert fetched 45% and 28% of the vote, respectively, to Mullet and Bird's 6% and 9%. That's with about two-thirds of submitted ballots counted, so it's fairly safe to say the runners-up have run out of steam here. Can Reichert hold a candle to one of the most popular, likable Washington State attorney generals in the history of that relatively obscure position? His straight shooter persona and past in law enforcement will certainly help him on the dry side of the state. Only problem is, there are, in many cases, more cows than people over there.

As predicted, it's current Lt. Gov. Denny Heck versus someone whose name you — or even the most obnoxiously over-engaged political journalist — would never in a million years know. But now you shall! Heck will very likely be facing Dan Matthews, a retired airline pilot, in the general. Matthews has 22% of the vote, while his nearest competitor, project manager and AI art aficionado Bob Hagglund, has only 17%. Heck, for reference, is sitting at 49%.

It's to be expected that a competent incumbent Secretary of State, which by all accounts Steve Hobbs is, would breeze past the primary. But did Marquez Tiggs, the young Black veteran who wants to make elections more inclusive, make it to the general? He did not. Hobbs will face Republican Dale Whitaker, who took home 37%of the vote to Tiggs' 10%. Whitaker is up in arms over Hobbs' approval of a no-bid contract with London-based firm Locally to keep an eye on election-related misinformation on social media, saying it impinges on Washingtonians' free speech and is a misuse of government funds. While Whitaker favors some measures to make voting easier, like same-day registration for in-person voting, he's also in favor of more rigorous background checks for voters. Hmm, where have we heard that dog whistle before? Anyway, Hobbs hauled in 49% of the initial drop to Whitaker's 37%, and his fellow Democrat Tiggs took another 9%, so Nov. 5 may be the last we'll have to hear of it.

Current Treasurer Mike Pellicciotti will face Republican challenger Sharon Hanek, the only other candidate who showed up. Hanek lost badly in a general election bout in 2012, but since then, the seat has swung Republican once, to Hanek's sole endorser: former Treasurer Duane Davidson. Hanek got 41% to Pellicotti's 59%, so it ain't looking too good for her.

Current auditor Pat McCarthy is through to the general, where she'll face Republican Matt Hawkins, who really doesn't like it when the government does stuff. The breakdown in this two-candidate, two-party affair is pretty much the same as above: 60-40 in favor of the Dems.

In the absence of current Attorney General Bob Ferguson, a lot of candidates stepped in to fill his shoes. Statewide MAGA lawyer Pete Serrano is leading with 42% of the vote. However, former U.S. Attorney Nick Brown is definitely in, with 36%t of the initial drop. Democratic State Sen. Manka Dhingra took another 22%, which is good news for Brown.

This race was largely about whether incumbent Chris Reykdal could defend his seat from both sides. Given that, as both of his challengers have been quick to point out, our state's kids are in crisis, it's not exactly the best time to be an incumbent. Even the best president, saddled with a bad economy, isn't going to last long. However, Reykdal held on. He'll be facing right-leaning and GOP-endorsed candidate David Olson, who is leading Reykdal's internecine challenger Reid Saaris 31% to 23%. Reykdal took in a pretty solid chunk, with 40%. Saaris' positions barely differ from Reykdal's, so it's safe to assume some of Saaris' 23% is getting passed on to Reykdal, putting him in a pretty comfortable position here.

The Commissioner of Public Lands race could have, as the Washington State Standard's astute politics reporter Jerry Cornfield pointed out, ended up with two Republicans on top, given how split the Democratic ticket was. Cornfield's 20 years of covering Olympia apparently paid off, because he absolutely called it. With around two-thirds of submitted ballots having been counted, former U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler leads the pack with 23% of the vote, followed by fellow Republican Sue Kuehl Pederson at 20%. The strongest Democratic challenger, King County Councilmember Dave Upthegrove, is behind her by 3,931 votes. The blue shift could certainly help, as the Secretary of State reports over 400,000 uncounted ballots remaining. Upthegrove had to fight for his 20% stake with fellow Democrats State Sen. Kevin Van De Wege, Makah Tribal Councilmember Patrick DePoe, and firefighter Allen Lebovitz. While Lebovitz may have played spoiler here, you do gotta hand it to a guy who took 11% of the vote with only $4,000 in his war chest. For reference, Van De Wege, who he beat handily, raised just under $341,000 and got only about 8%. Guess it helps to be a handsome, dog-rescuing wildland firefighter with a small shellfish farm.

As we predicted, it's going to be a State senator slugfest here. State Sen. Patty Kuderer, a Democrat, will face off against State Sen. Phil Fortunato, a Republican. Kuderer is a proponent of things like a public option for health insurance and says her campaign is informed by her experience trying to get lifesaving care approved for her severely premature daughter by recalcitrant insurance companies. Fortunato says he wants to get rid of "burdensome regulations." Kuderer got 45% of initial votes to Fortunato's 28%.

In our primary guide, we narrowed down the state-level legislative races to ones in our coverage area that involved some actual competition, leaving us with just the 43rd District. The primary race centered around a scramble to fill the seat vacated by the venerable Rep. Frank Chopp, one of the state's most tenured legislators. While the most recognizable names were We Heart Seattle CEO Andrea Suarez and Democratic Socialist, activist, and political filmmaker Shaun Scott, a few other challengers filed. Long story short, they did not make it, leaving us with Suarez versus Scott. While both filed as Democrats, it's safe to say they're as far apart as you can get within the party. Suarez is a darling of tough-on-crime types and has cozied up with all manner of Republicans over the years, even speaking at a recent Republican fundraiser. Scott is a socialist who has written extensively in favor of police and prison abolition. So while this is, in theory, an internecine battle, it's really a bog standard bout between right and left. While Scott came in with a clear majority, at 54% of the initial drop to Suarez's 23%, he can't rest easy yet. Also-ran Daniel Carusello, whose views seem to align more with Suarez's than Scott's, took 17%.