Who's Raising Money for the 2008 Washington State Races?

Some candidates are getting an early start on raising money for the 2008 statewide races. Financial reports filed for the 2008 statewide races show the Governor's race getting the most attention.

As of the latest reports filed with the Washington State Public Disclosure Commission for the period though Nov 30, 2007, Democratic Governor Chris Gregoire, has raised over $4,156,386, spent $1,368,739 and has $2,678,454 in cash on hand.

Republican Dino Rossi, who lost to Gregoire in 2004, is re-running and has raised $1,435,355, spent $525,748 and has $909,607 on hand.

Lt Governor Brad Owen, a Democrat reported raising $16,635, spending $6917 and having $9717 on hand. No Republican has filed yet with the PDC.

Attorney General Rob McKenna, a Republican has raised $635,617, spent $267,364 and has $368,252 in cash on hand. Although Pierce Count Executive John Ladenburg has been rumored to be considering a run for this seat, he has not filed with the Public Disclosure Commission.

Secretary of State Sam Reed, a Republican, has raised $230,899, spent $62,023 and has $168,875 on hand. He has no announced opponents at this time.

The current State Treasurer Mike Murphy, a Democrat, is retiring. Democratic State Legislator Jim McIntire is running for this seat. He has raised $33,945, spent $13,899 and has $20,046 on hand. Allan Martin is the Republican candidate. He has raised $21,530, spent $1786 and has $19,744 in cash on hand.

Commissioner of Public Lands Doug Sutherland, a Republican has raised $157,459, spent $15,370 and has $142,088 in cash on hand. Former Democratic Congressional candidate Peter Goldmark from eastern Washington is challenging Sutherland for this seat. Goldmark has raised $59,969, spent $29,197 and has $30,371 in cash on hand.

State Auditor Brian Sonntag, a Demcrat, has no opponent at this time. He has raised $27,432, spent $4054 and has $23,398 on hand.

Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler, a Democrat, has raised some $38,686, spent $12,046 and has $26,640 on hand.

Superintendent of Public Instruction, Terry Bergeson has raised $27,051, spent $1980, and has $25,071 on hand.

If only one name is mentioned in a race, it means no one else has filed with the PDC at this time.

None of these figures include money raised for independent expenditures in these races. In 2004, eg, the Building Industry Association of Washington, through its affiliated PAC called It's Time for A Change, made $1,053,251 in independent expenditures -most of it to support Republican Rob McKenna in his race for Attorney General. In addition $1.5 million came from out of state from the US Chamber of Commerce opposing Debra Senn in the primary.

Senn received $1,080,028 in contributions for her whole campaign. This approximately matched the $1,211,814 McKenna received directly to his campaign. The $ 2.5 million in independent expenditures supporting McKenna was more than both candidates raised together.
McKenna personally thanked the BIAW for their support on election night saying if it wasn't for the BIAW he wouldn't have been elected.

Grassroots Democrats Missing in Action on Internet for August 21, 2007 Primary

If you were hoping to find insight and inspiration on the Internet from local Washington State grassroots Democrats for the August 21, 2007 Primary you were bound to be disappointed. A close look at the websites of the local Democratic County and Legislative District organizations right before the Primary was disappointing to say the least.

The local grassroots Democratic groups were looked at first for how well they alerted people visiting their websites about the Primary. A second point of comparison was whether the organizations were using their websites to gear up for the Feb. 2008 Caucus and Presidential Primary next year. These are just a little over 5 months away.

The first step in evaluating the Grassroots Democratic organizations was to check whether or not they even had a website. The list of websites used was taken from the list on the Washington State Democrats website . Out of 39 county Democratic organizations, 11 (28%) did not have a website. Out of 49 Democratic Legislative District organizations in the state, 19 (39%) did not have websites.

Here is a summary of what was found when looking at the Democratic websites.

Washington State County Democratic organizations:

Washington counties - 39
county Democratic organizations with websites - 28 (72%)
August 21 Primary date mentioned- 10 on first page + 2 more in calender = 12 (31%)
counties with primary endorsements posted - 5 (13%) King, Pierce, Snohomish, Thurston, Whatcom
number including a link to endorsed candidates - 4 (10%)
counties listing Feb. 9, 2008 Caucus date - 3 (8%)
counties listing Feb. 19, 2008 Presidential Primary date - 3 (8%)
county Democratic websites with links to Presidential candidates - 6 (15%)

Washington State Legislative District organizations:

Legislative districts -49
Legislative district organizations with websites - 30 (61%)
August 21 Primary mentioned - 7 on first page + 6 more in calender = 13 (27%)
Legislative District organizations with Primary endorsements posted - 12 (24%)
number including a link to endorsed candidates - 4 (8%)
Legislative Districts listing Feb. 9, 2008 Caucus date - 6 (12%)
Legislative District organizations listing Feb. 19, 2008 Presidential Primary date - 2 (4%)
Legislative District websites with links to Presidential candidates - 4 (8%)

To be fair 5 counties did not hold a primary. Those counties are Asotin, Ferry, Garfield, San Juan, and Wahkiakum. But that still leaves 34 counties that did hold a primary election.

Why is website presence in a campaign important? Googling on "Democratic endorsements Washington August 21, 2007 Primary" yielded the following results on the first 2 pages:

MajorityRulesBlog
47th Leg District Democrats
Lefty Blogs - Metropolitan Democratic Club
SEAMEC 2007 endorsements
47th District Democrats
the Stranger
King County Democrats
Wash Fed of State Employees

Googling on "Washington State Primary Endorsements" yielded:

MajorityRulesBlog
Sierra Club (MajorityRulesBlog post)
the Stranger
36th Distrct Democrats
LeftyBlogs
Washington State Women's Political Caucus
SEAMEC endorsements

Googling on "King County Democrats 2007 endorsements" yielded:

King County Democrats
34th District Democrats
47th District Democrats
MajorityRulesBlog
Peter Sherman's website
46th District Democrats
Gael Tartelton's website
Jean Godden's website
the Stranger

Having endorsements on the Democratic websites and candidates receiving endorsements and listing them on their website drove traffic to these sites. This gives additional exposure to the Democratic Party and their endorsed candidates.

By way of comparison, googling on ""Washington State Republicans 2007 Primary" produced one relevant Republican hit to a right wing blog at the bottom of the second page. Typing in "Washington State Republicans 2007 Primary Endorsements" yielded little of the Republicans but brought up the following in the first two pages:

Washington State Stonewall Democrats
MajorityRulesBlog
LeftyBlogs
Washington Federation of State Employees
the Stranger
47th District Democrats
BlogNet News
WashBlog

Despite the lack of a strong internet effort by the Democrats in making and listing endorsements, where it was done it obviously had an impact on visibility of the Democrats.

There is a reason that the Republican presence is so minor in the google searches. Despite the untapped potential of the Democrats in using the web to get exposure and use the internet for organizing , they were far ahead of Republican Party efforts.

The Washington State Republican website has only county organizations. There are no Republican legislative district organizations listed.

The Republicans had only 15 county websites listed for the 39 counties in Washington State. And they seemed to be even less aware that a Primary was occurring. Only 4 listed the August 21, 2007 Primary date on their website and only 2 had endorsements. Regarding the Presidential Campaign only 2 had a link to the 2008 Republican Presidential candidates.

Just in terms of number of sites, the Democrat's 58 grassroots organization sites outnumbered the Republicans by almost 4 to 1. Now if they can just get some web savy and get links up for the General Election in November with endorsements listed and links to endorsed candidates they can have a much stronger presence on the web.

And they also need to copy the Democratic State Party's Road to the White House Presidential candidate's links and add them to their webpages. Island County Democrats have links with pictures of the candidates which is a nice touch. So do the Spokane Democrats. and the Walla Walla County Democrats. Whitman County, Thurston County and Mason County are the only other counties that currently have links to the Democratic Presidential candidates.

And I could only find links available on the websites of the 1st , 6th, 44th and 45th District Democrats.

One additional element that the Democratic organizations should add to their websites is the free fundraising link for Democrats by ActBlue. ActBlue is set up to raise funds for all the Democratic Presidential candidates. John Edwards for President, for example, using the ActBlue website has raised $3,599,983 from 44,058 donors.

MajorityRulesBlog recently set up an ActBlue page for all the Presidential candidates. You can click on the link to see what one could look like for the Democratic organizations. Each organization would get exposure and credit for funds raised for the candidates.

Darcy Burner and the U.S. Constitution

Darcy Burner is a Democratic candidate for Congress in the 8th Congressional District in Washington State. She narrowly lost in 2006 to Republican incumbent Dave Reichert. She is already running hard to beat him in 2008.

She is continuing her challenge not by being timid but by speaking up for her principles. Witness this just released web ad posted on U-Tube where she talks about the recent vote by many Democrats in Congress to support Bush's expanded warrantless wiretapping in the name of fighting terrorism. She asks at what price do we give up the principles embedded in our country's Constitution.

Watch it and ask yourself - isn't this someone we need in Congress? Too many, including Democrats, are willing to cave in to fear at the expense of weakening protections in our Constitution. We need more elected officials willing to defend the Constitution.

To support Darcy Burner, you can go to her campaign website and make a contribution today.

"Sherman Gets Nod" says Seattle Times

Bill Sherman has picked up the endorsement of the Seattle Times in the August 21, 2007 Democratic Primary. Sherman is running for King County Prosecutor and has one opponent.

The primary this year is a month earlier than in the past because the Washington State Legislature this year passed legislation to move the date to August. While this helps candidates who win the primary have more time to transition to a general election ballot, particularly if there is a close primary vote, the voting date in August falls on the lazy summer days of August when many folks take vacations before school starts.

Sherman ran last year in a crowded field as a Democrat for a vacant seat in the 43rd Legislative seat. He did not win then but he gained valuable experience and connections and support that is giving him a leg up on his current primary challenger, Keith Sculley. Sculley appears to be a good candidate but this is his first run for public office.

Both Sherman and Sculley were campaigning Saturday at the King County Democratic Picnic at Woodland Park in Seattle. Sherman is a Deputy Prosecutor with the King County Prosecutor's office and is currently on leave. Scully worked in the Prosecutor's Office previously.

The Republican candidate is Interim Prosecutor Dan Satterberg who was appointed temporarily to fill the seat when long time Republican Prosecutor Norm Maleng unexpectedly died.

Bill Sherman has also picked up endorsements from all the Democratic Legislative District Organizations in the county as well as the King County Democrats. The King County Labor Council and Machinists Local 751 are also supporting him.

The Times, in their endorsement of Bill Sherman notes that

"Sherman has worked in the prosecutor's office since 2003. He was a deputy prosecuting attorney in its Domestic Violence Unit before going on leave to conduct his campaign. He has prosecuted sexual-assault cases, gun crimes and juvenile crimes, and says he will focus attention on repeat offenders involved in drugs or domestic violence, will overhaul the fraud division and expand the offerings under victims' services. ... Sherman is smart and well-spoken, ..."

Bill Sherman is a personable candidate that seems at ease campaigning. It is refreshing to see new Democratic candidates emerge on the political scene that are well versed on the issues. Sherman would bring new life and energy to a Prosecutor's Office that already has a strong reputation. He is working hard to win the vote both in August and November.