Last night at the 46th Legislative District Democrats monthly meeting, elections activist Jason Osgood announced his intention to run for King County Elections Director… which really didn’t come as much of a surprise considering Jason told me as much Tuesday night at Drinking Liberally.
Hmm.
I like Jason, and I appreciate his activism (if at times I think his focus is misplaced), so I sure hope he hasn’t conflated the 1.2 million votes he received in his recent run for Secretary of State into some sort of base of support. Sure, Jason ended up pulling in about 41.5% of the vote while barely spending a dime—but that’s still only a few percent of voters greater than those who would pretty much vote for anybody with a “D” next to their name, and not much better than then-Republican Richard Pope, who in the 2000 Attorney General’s race garnered more than 38% of the vote against popular Democratic incumbent Christine Gregoire. Indeed, Richard actually won 14 of 39 counties, while Jason barely eked out a victory in just tiny San Juan.
Still, if this were a normal election, I’d urge Jason to pursue his bliss, as he’ll certainly add some important issues to the debate. Unfortunately, it’s not a normal election, and as I told him privately Tuesday night, I hope he’s prepared to bow out if support coalesces around a qualified candidate.
See, the Elections Director will be chosen in a February special election, with no primary, top-two or otherwise, to thin out the field. And while the office is officially nonpartisan, we all know that true nonpartisanship is a fiction that lives only in the minds of editorialists and idiots.
From all accounts, Republican wingnut State Senator Pam Roach intends to throw her hat in the ring as the culmination of her decades long quest to earn a six figure salary from the government she loves to cut. And given a crowded field of Democrats on the other side, she very well could win.
This would be a disaster.
A number of other names are being bandied about, but if we want this to be a fair fight they’re going to have to agree to agree to winnow themselves down to one. The name that intrigues me most thus far is Port Commissioner Lloyd Hara, an uninspiring politician, but an auditor by trade, who would arguably bring the appropriate skill set and temperament to the office. Despite his best efforts to show up at the right events, Hara doesn’t strike me as particularly progressive or Democratic; in fact, from a partisan perspective, he doesn’t strike me as much of anything. And isn’t that, combined with competence, exactly what we need from an Elections Director to restore and maintain confidence?
So Jason, good for you for acting on your activism, but if you really care about elections integrity, I’m hoping you’ll step aside if the alternative means handing the election to Roach.
Ha! I met Lloyd Hara once at a community function in Shoreline. Good guy!
He’d have my vote.
Lloyd would do a great job.
And you can move his flowers without asking.
There is something to be said for actually having a clue about voting machine technology. Jason clearly does.
Daniel @3,
No doubt. And I wouldn’t mind seeing Jason working within King County Elections… I’m just not sure he’s the right person to lead it.
But my main point here is that we can’t afford to allow a Democrats and independents to split their vote while Republicans coalesce around Roach.
Jason could beat Roach.
I totally agree with your analysis, Goldy. What were King County voters thinking when they bought this “nonpartisan” bullshit, which was hatched by Republicans, promoted by the Republican shill press, and is a Republican plot to deceive voters? But it’s too late for second thoughts about that. What we have to do now is make sure it doesn’t work. Perhaps Roach is too well known, notorious, and partisan for the spurious “nonpartisan” label to work in her case, but that’s a risk we can’t afford to take. Democrats need a “one candidate” strategy, period. We need to agree among ourselves who that candidate would be, and it must be someone who (a) is competent, and (b) is likely to win. Sorry, Jason, but your quixotic (and losing) run against Reed doesn’t qualify on either score. How do we enforce this? Simple. If some Democrat who won’t listen to reason sabotages this race and puts a wingnut yahoo into the election director’s office, that individual should face permanent electoral ostracism from our party for the rest of his/her fucking life, or at least the next twenty years. The stakes are too high to let any offender off lightly, because if a radical wingnut of the Rove mold gets her hands on King County’s election machinery, the repercussions for our state would be enormous, because statewide elections are won or lost in King County. Nothing less than which party controls the state executive branch in the future is at stake; and that’s precisely why Republicans and their lackeys in the shill press (you know exactly who I mean) worked so hard to sell this “nonpartisan” bullshit to voters who, unfortunately, proved to be too gullible.
This is an elected position. Elected Officials set the tone of the office and then hire professionals to do the day to day work.
Jason is qualified to set the tone for the office of Elections Director in King County. He is also capable of knowing what he needs professionals for.
But what matters the most in this election is how fast and how well we can build a campaign. We have a lot of energy left over from 2008. We need to get behind one person FAST and build his campaign into one that will win no matter how big the field is. To run campaigns, these candidates need to hit the ground running, not even waiting for filing.
Pick your candidate, watch the filings, stand for something, and let’s put the right person into office. That’s all we can ask.
It might be more appropriate to compare Osgood’s relative strength in King County, versus top-of-the-ticket strength.
In November 2008, Barack Obama had 70.19% of the vote for President in King County. Jason Osgood had only 47.87% of the vote for Secretary of State in King County, a drop off of 22.32%.
In November 2000, George Bush had 34.40% of the vote for President in King County. Richard Pope (that’s me!) had 31.28% of the vote for Attorney General in King County, a drop off of only 3.12%. Which is not bad, especially considering that Libertarian candidate Richard Shepard drew 3.98% of the Attorney General vote in King County, and had the backing of some prominent Republicans, including Kirby Wilbur. (By contrast, Osgood did not have any third party candidate to draw away opposition votes, since he was in a top two general election.)
Probably in a head-to-head match-up, Osgood would have a decent chance of beating Pam Roach — BUT ONLY IF this was a partisan race, with the party affiliations printed on the ballot. However, we have a non-partisan race, where name recognition counts heavily, partisan affiliation is absent, and probably more than one avowed Democrat will be running for this office.
Of course, if Lloyd Hara gets into the race, he may have a lot of Republican backing. The King County Republican Party endorsed Hara for Port Commissioner in 2005, along with a number of Republicans. Interestingly enough, the King County Democratic Party also endorsed Hara for Port Commissioner in 2005.
We should have a legal challenge to a winner-take-all plurality election in February 2009. That provision is not actually part of the charter amendment, but is merely part of the ordinance that the voters approved in November 2007 to put the charter amendment on the ballot.
It is possible for a King County Charter provision to override state election law. However, a mere King County ordinance cannot override state election law.
Under state election law, a special election for a vacant position would have to be held in November 2009, with a top two primary held in August 2009. If there was a need to fill the newly created position prior to the election, then a temporary elections director would be appointed by the King County Council.
A debate between Lloyd and Roach could be…shall we say, interesting.
If this is really the way Toby Nixon intended all this to play out, I guess I’ll have to take back every nice thing I’ve ever said about him.
Richard, if you want to file a legal challenge, go for it. This state is in desperate need of more political lawsuits.
Sigh…
One thing I think I can say pretty authoritatively about Jason Osgood is that he will NOT politicize the office. Nobody can make that claim about Pam Roach with a straight face.
Who wants this office politicized? Where is the outcry to have this office politicized? The candidate who can persuade the voters that this office will NOT be politicized will win this election.
Ivan @5,
Head to head, yes, Jason could beat Roach. My concern is that it won’t be head to head, but rather a crowded field in which Republicans coalesce behind one candidate, while the others divide the remaining vote.
Like I said, if there were a primary, I wouldn’t be so nervous. But considering the nature of this special election, we need a lot of discipline to make sure that a partisan Republican like Roach doesn’t end up controlling KC elections.
How about the current director of King County Elections, Sherril Huff? She seems to have done a good job restoring confidence. She also had a major trial by fire in the recent election.
If Huff doesn’t want to run then Hara would be a good choice.
I suspect the big push to make County offices “nonpartisan” was so John Stanton would have a snowballs chance of winning as county exec.
The true negative potential of having Roach in such an office isn’t from her partisanship. It’s that she’d certainly be so incompetent that any election conducted on her watch would be open to challenge.
This is conjuring up memories of Harley Hoppe’s tenure as King County (Ass)essor.
Chris @ 15.
Yes, Sherril Huff and all of King County Elections did a good job in this general election. Overall, it’s a huge improvement and they should be applauded.
As for her running, she’s not a resident of King County.
Hi Goldy. I hear you.
However, the Director of Elections position is non-partisan. I am not running as a Democrat.
I am running because I am committed to election integrity. Our elections must be transparent and accountable.
With my skills, experience, and understanding of both elections and technology, I am uniquely qualified to be Director of Elections.
I will always do what I think best serves our democracy.
Agree that Dems have to coalesce around a single candidate, and given our recent successful experience, esp in King County…it can and should be done. Let’s put those fresh new voter lists and other resources to work, and quickly.
Part one of our messaging needs to be that Pam Roach is a Republican. As a partisan officeholder, it’s a label she cannot run from. Reprising her batshit craziness shouldn’t hurt either.
I never saw Mr. Osgood this year (I’m in the 11th Dist.) but we do know Lloyd Hara. Looks to me like he has the track record to be successful, to pull together the right support groups and activate the Dem campaign machinery.
Can La Cucaracha raise any money for this race? Legislators aren’t permitted to do any fundraising during the legislative session, and for some time period before and after. When I raised this point at last night’s Jeanne Kohl-Welles event, someone stated that the filing period for this position is December 10-12, and that the fundraising ban for the legislature starts on December 13.
I don’t know whether that includes a prohibition on fundraising for a different and “nonpartisan” position.
Well, I don’t even live in King County, but I do care about election integrity as related to King County and state wide elections.
As for Richard Pope’s fallacy about why Jason gaining almost 48% against Sam Reed who would have earned substantial cross over votes regardless of who us Dems ran, I do not see any relationship with the Pope as R v/s Gregoire as D for AG. The Obama v/s Kerry numbers are also not compelling.
What is compelling is that Jason will be the only candidate to have just run county wide prior to a very short period for campaigning in this race and he got nearly 48%.
I would agree that the D’s should not split the vote, but I like the match up between this guy and Pam Roach, who will be under a fundraising ban unless she resigns from the senate.
As for Lloyd Hara, I think he is a decent enough fellow but I understand he would be under heavy fire, even if he ran for re-election to the Seattle Port Commission.
Lastly, one thing Jason is not, is a partisan demagogue.
A few points:
Pam Roach is not the only Republican in this race. Joe Fain (Chief of staff to Peter VonReichbauer) is running as well. Chris Clifford has also said he is in for sure.
That’s three Republicans and only one Democrat (Osgood) in the race thus far. Fain is going to be a very serious contender – he’s already raising money and will have PVR’s Republican business interests opening their wallets. He and Roach will split the vote of the Right unless they make a deal – and Roach isn’t known for such moves.
This is a scenario in which Osgood could easily win – unless a few Dems split the vote of the Left.
If Hara is going to run he needs to move fast, and he hasn’t shown any sign of doing so. Smart money says he doesn’t do it. Ross Baker seems to still be exploring options, but he hasn’t made a move yet either – not to mention that any Simms-chosen KC insider is going to have a hard time selling themselves as the change voters clearly were looking for with I-25.
Right now Jason Osgood is the leading real Democratic contender for this office and the Republicans are split. And despite Goldy’s crack in the OP, Osgood is more than qualified for this post. He knows as much about election issues as anyone in the State. The administration of the Division will be done by whomever the new Director chooses as their administrator. I’m sure Jason is capable of finding professionals to help run the place. His job will be to set the tone and define the priorities – and on that score he is EXACTLY what KC Elections has desperately needed for a long time.
Democrats need to get behind Osgood TODAY! This race is going to be a crazy sprint and standing around the starting gate waiting for some imaginary dream horse to arrive is just not going to get us a win.
A few points:
Pam Roach is not the only Republican in this race. Joe Fain (Chief of staff to Pete von Reichbauer) is running as well. Chris Clifford has also said he is in for sure.
That’s three Republicans and only one Democrat (Osgood) in the race thus far. Fain is going to be a very serious contender – he’s already raising money and will have PVR’s Republican business interests opening their wallets. He and Roach will split the vote of the Right unless they make a deal – and Roach isn’t known for such moves.
This is a scenario in which Osgood could easily win – unless a few Dems split the vote of the Left.
If Hara is going to run he needs to move fast, and he hasn’t shown any sign of doing so. Smart money says he doesn’t do it. Ross Baker seems to still be exploring options, but he hasn’t made a move yet either – not to mention that any Simms-chosen KC insider is going to have a hard time selling themselves as the change voters clearly were looking for with I-25.
Right now Jason Osgood is the leading real Democratic contender for this office and the Republicans are split. And despite Goldy’s crack in the OP, Osgood is more than qualified for this post. He knows as much about election issues as anyone in the State. The administration of the Division will be done by whomever the new Director chooses as their administrator. I’m sure Jason is capable of finding professionals to help run the place. His job will be to set the tone and define the priorities – and on that score he is EXACTLY what KC Elections has desperately needed for a long time.
Democrats need to get behind Osgood TODAY! This race is going to be a crazy sprint and standing around the starting gate waiting for some imaginary dream horse to arrive is just not going to get us a win.
Don’t forget – it’s not just a local issue. The WA-08 Congressional race is largly decided within King County. And if the Republicans ever put up a decent challenger for the Senate, those races would be decided in King County, too.
If King County doesn’t go to all-mail voting, then a simple allocation of resources could favor the Republican precincts over Democratic ones, like happened in Ohio in 2004 (voters in Democratic precincts wait hours in line to use one or two voting booths, voters in Republican precincts stroll in and out in less than five minutes because there are 20+ voting booths available).
Jason, if you’re still here, would you stick with the move in KC to all mail voting if elected?
rhp6033 @ 24
And if King County did go to all-mail voting, the number of intending provisional voters would increase further from the present 35,000 or so in presidential years. A Republican elections director could get rid of all the local early voting centers, and require that all provisional voters go to the Elections Department headquarters in Renton to cast a provisional ballot. Imagine how long the lines would be on election day for provisional voters! This would really suppress an even more Democratic-intensive section of the electorate in a very Democratic-leaning county.
26 Renton? Heck, there’s probably nothing to keep the elections director from moving the headquarters to Skykomish….or maybe to Proofer’s Cabin.
ONE more tidbit – nice discussion so far – chewing well.
Pam Roach is an active Mormon, and an active long time virulent public office homophobe.
She has voted any thing down that even alluded to protecting gay Kids in High School from bullying…. and on down the line.
Seattle’s gay community – in high high high gear right now – will mobilize to stop her… with relish and vengence.
Trust me.
Homophobes do not win King County all county political votes. None.
#27
King Co just spent million on the news hq. in Renton – it is Renton for a century…
Hi Daniel @ 25.
Very good question.
My job as Director of Elections is to run the elections, not make law. The King County Council legislates and I would abide by their decisions.
So I have no interest in revisiting the vote by mail decision.
I do have other concerns. Even with vote by mail, there will still be regional voting centers. With the budget crunch, their number has been reduced from 17 to 3 (last I heard).
This last general election, there were ~250,000 poll ballots (not counting drop offs) and ~30,000 provisional ballots. I remain very concerned that inadequate infrastructure will cause very long lines and effectively disenfranchise voters. Especially in 2010 and 2012.
King County Elections projects that 40,000 voters would cast ballots on touchscreens at the 17 regional voting centers. Accepting 40,000 for now, how that many people will be served has never been explained.
And, of course, I utterly oppose replacing paper ballots with touchscreens.
Jason wrote:
As Director of Elections can you block that from happening or is that also a decision made by the King County Council?
Except for the AVUs, all votes in King County are cast on paper ballots.
In the quaint days of “polling places”, there was one AVU per site. At my old polling place, with 12 precincts, there were maybe 18 booths for paper ballots and that single AVU.
Even in 2004, the only counties using DREs for their poll voters were Snohomish and Yakima. No-paper-trail never had much penetration in Washington.
If worrying about Pam Roach makes your head hurt, take a break and imagine Elections Director David Irons.
Jason Osgood is unquestionably the smartest guy in the room when it comes to how to ethically and accurately run an election, and to argue otherwise is fallacy. He did very well in the SoS race despite having been thrown under the bus by the state party, and he has name recognition, press attention, and the ability to serve with integrity.
The best investment we could make in our future is to focus on Jason Osgood as Director of Elections. We simply can’t afford to lose this one, because we need someone we trust to do the job right. And I trust Jason Osgood.
N @ 20 — It’s true, the state legislators’ fundraising blackout period starts the day after filing – and it IS in effect for this race – BUT Pam (or any other candidate) can raise funds well in advance of filing. There’s also the “independent” expenditure route, of course.
A more interesting question: How do you SPEND money on this abbreviated, distracted campaign? (Less than 8 weeks long, over xmas, new years, bowl games, inauguration, MLK day and the Super Bowl.)
From afar in Pullman, I have no real axe in this race. If I did, I’d be for Jason all the way. For what I know, He’s far and away the most qualified individual for that job in the State.
So tell me Dave, over there in Pullman, do folks engage in real axe racing?
They grind horses don’t they? Here on the water we often proclaim that one should “fish or get off the pot”
@31…DK…
What difference will it make since we’re going to all mail-in voting, which is itself an invitation to a whole different level of fraud and abuse.
The Piper
Well, yah know, Particle, I often wonder about the water most commentaters that post here are drinking. Can’t smoke water, but who knows.
@35 Well, considering the typical turnout on Special Elections I think that the emphasis would be more on getting the Democratic district organizations to get their members out to vote and getting the backing of groups like Fuse than running a media campaign.