A tied race in WA-03: Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Joe Kent are neck and neck as 2024 rematch heats up, NPI poll finds

First-term Demo­c­ra­t­ic Unit­ed States Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Marie Glue­senkamp Perez and her Repub­li­can rival Joe Kent are run­ning about even with each oth­er as the state’s Top Two win­now­ing elec­tion approach­es, a new North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute sur­vey of Wash­ing­ton State’s 3rd Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict has found. 

Asked who they’d back for Con­gress if the gen­er­al elec­tion were being held now, 46% of 649 like­ly Novem­ber 3rd Dis­trict vot­ers sur­veyed ear­li­er this month by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling said they’d vote for Kent, while 45% said Glue­senkamp Perez. 

9% were not sure. 

Although Camas City Coun­cilmem­ber Leslie Lewallen is also run­ning as a Repub­li­can, Kent is Glue­senkamp Perez’s expect­ed gen­er­al elec­tion opponent. 

Kent — who holds many extreme and con­spir­a­to­r­i­al beliefs — is sup­port­ed by the Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Par­ty and Don­ald Trump, leav­ing Lewallen with­out much of an open­ing. The state par­ty is so enthused about Kent that it has set up a joint fundrais­ing com­mit­tee with him. Check out this text from the foot­er of his web­site:

Paid for by the Joe Kent Vic­to­ry Fund, A joint fundrais­ing com­mit­tee autho­rized by and com­posed of Joe Kent for Con­gress, Keep Elect­ing New Tal­ent PAC, and the Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Party.

Joe Kent Vic­to­ry Fund (“JFC”) is a joint fundrais­ing com­mit­tee com­posed of Joe Kent for Con­gress (the “Cam­paign”) Keep Elect­ing New Tal­ent PAC (the “LPAC”), and Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Par­ty (each, a “Com­mit­tee,” and, col­lec­tive­ly, the “Com­mit­tees”). Any con­tri­bu­tion to the JFC per­mis­si­ble under the Fed­er­al Elec­tion Cam­paign Act, as amend­ed (“FECA”), from con­trib­u­tors who have not exceed­ed their applic­a­ble Fed­er­al con­tri­bu­tion lim­its, shall be allo­cat­ed among the Com­mit­tees pur­suant to FECA and the for­mu­la set forth in this Notice. Indi­vid­u­als or fed­er­al non-mul­ti­can­di­date PACs may con­tribute up to $21,600. Such con­tri­bu­tions shall be allo­cat­ed in the fol­low­ing order: 1. Cam­paign shall receive any con­tri­bu­tion not exceed­ing $3,300 for des­ig­na­tion to the 2024 pri­ma­ry elec­tion. 2. LPAC shall receive the next con­tri­bu­tion not exceed­ing $5,000 annu­al­ly. 3. Cam­paign shall receive the next con­tri­bu­tion not exceed­ing $3,300 for des­ig­na­tion to the 2024 gen­er­al elec­tion. 4. Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Par­ty shall receive any remain­ing funds not to exceed $10,000 annually.

In 2022, Glue­senkamp Perez defeat­ed Kent by 2,629 votes after the two of them eclipsed long­time incum­bent Jaime Her­rera Beut­ler in the Top Two election. 

Repub­li­can vot­ers aban­doned Her­rera Beut­ler in droves after she coura­geous­ly vot­ed to impeach Trump for incit­ing the Jan­u­ary 6th insurrection. 

Her­rera Beut­ler is now seek­ing statewide office in Wash­ing­ton as one of sev­en can­di­dates for Com­mis­sion­er of Pub­lic Lands — although with­out the sup­port of the state par­ty, which endorsed anoth­er Repub­li­can, Sue Kuehl Ped­er­sen, instead. 

Many nation­al pun­dits and observers fig­ured WA-03 was still a safe Repub­li­can dis­trict even after Her­rera Beut­ler’s loss two years ago. NPI’s research showed oth­er­wise: in Sep­tem­ber of 2022, we released the only inde­pen­dent, cred­i­ble, pub­lic polling of the cycle for Wash­ing­ton’s 3rd Dis­trict, which strong­ly sug­gest­ed that Marie Glue­senkamp Perez had a real­is­tic chance of win­ning. In that post, I wrote: “It won’t be easy… but a Demo­c­ra­t­ic vic­to­ry in WA-03 this cycle is an achiev­able objective.”

Glue­senkamp Perez trailed Kent by three points in that 2022 polling, but went on to win, just as our team argued that she could. This cycle, Glue­senkamp Perez is the incum­bent and is even bet­ter posi­tioned to com­pete. Despite the dis­tric­t’s Repub­li­can tilt, she’s effec­tive­ly tied with Joe Kent out of the gate in our lat­est sur­vey. She’s also run­ning ahead of the rest of the fed­er­al Demo­c­ra­t­ic tick­et in the dis­trict. Let’s take a look at the ini­tial horser­ace num­bers for each of the fed­er­al races in WA-03:

QUESTION: If the elec­tion for Pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed States were being held today, would you vote for Demo­c­rat Joe Biden or Repub­li­can Don­ald Trump?

WA-03 ANSWERS:

• Don­ald Trump (R): 50%
• Joe Biden (D): 45%
• Not sure: 5%

A quick aside: This is a pret­ty good num­ber for Biden con­sid­er­ing how Repub­li­can this dis­trict is. It’s vot­ed for Trump before, and it may well again this November.

QUESTION: If the elec­tion for Unit­ed States Sen­ate were being held today, and the can­di­dates were Demo­c­rat Maria Cantwell and Repub­li­can Raul Gar­cia, who would you vote for?

WA-03 ANSWERS:

• Raul Gar­cia (R): 47%
• Maria Cantwell (D): 43%
• Not sure: 10% 

This was also not sur­pris­ing giv­en that Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tor Pat­ty Mur­ray like­wise trailed her Repub­li­can chal­lenger Tiffany Smi­ley in our 2022 WA-03 polling. 

QUESTION: If the elec­tion for Con­gress were being held today and the can­di­dates were Demo­c­rat Marie Glue­senkamp Perez and Repub­li­can Joe Kent, who would you vote for?

WA-03 ANSWERS:

• Joe Kent: 46%
• Marie Glue­senkamp Perez: 45%
• Not sure: 9%

Our poll con­sist­ed of inter­views with 649 like­ly 2024 vot­ers who were sur­veyed from June 11th — 12th by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling. 47% par­tic­i­pat­ed via land­line and 53% par­tic­i­pat­ed online via invi­ta­tion sent through text mes­sag­ing. The sur­vey has a mar­gin of error of +/- 3.9% at the 95% con­fi­dence interval.

To reit­er­ate: The ques­tions above appeared in our sur­vey before any ques­tions about the can­di­dates’ pri­or­i­ties or their state­ments on the cam­paign trail. 

WA-03 tru­ly is a dis­trict that deserves a “tossup” rat­ing… it could go either way this Novem­ber. It’s Repub­li­cans’ best pick­up oppor­tu­ni­ty in the region, and it’s the seat Democ­rats will have to work the hard­est to defend. Every can­vass, every phonebank, and every dol­lar donat­ed is going to matter.

For­tu­nate­ly for Glue­senkamp Perez and Democ­rats, our polling finds that sup­port for key issues and pri­or­i­ties they are com­mit­ted to advanc­ing in Con­gress is increas­ing among vot­ers in the 3rd Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict. In 2022, we asked vot­ers in the dis­trict about sup­port for repro­duc­tive rights, police reform, the PRO Act, and democ­ra­cy reform. We asked about those same issues again in this survey. 

Let’s run through the issue findings.

Reproductive rights

First, repro­duc­tive rights.

In 2022, we found 57% in sup­port of the Wom­en’s Health Pro­tec­tion Act and 36% opposed, with 7% not sure. Total sup­port remains at 57% in this sur­vey, with slight­ly greater inten­si­ty (a major­i­ty are strong­ly sup­port­ive now, rather than just a plurality):

QUESTION: Do you strong­ly sup­port, some­what sup­port, some­what oppose, or strong­ly oppose the Women’s Health Pro­tec­tion Act, which would give Amer­i­cans the legal right to deter­mine whether and when to end a preg­nan­cy, and to pro­tect a health care provider’s abil­i­ty to pro­vide repro­duc­tive health ser­vices, includ­ing abor­tion services?

ANSWERS:

• Sup­port: 57% 
  • Strong­ly sup­port: 50%
  • Some­what sup­port: 7%
• Oppose: 38%
  • Some­what oppose: 9%
  • Strong­ly oppose: 29%
• Not sure: 6%

Repro­duc­tive rights was a top issue for Marie Glue­senkamp Perez in 2022 and will con­tin­ue to be this year. Today is the two-year anniver­sary of the hor­rif­ic Dobbs deci­sion, and the issue remains potent for Democ­rats across the coun­try, as Repub­li­cans work fever­ish­ly to strip away wom­en’s access to repro­duc­tive health­care services. 

Labor rights

Next, labor rights. In 2022, we found major­i­ty sup­port (53%) for the PRO Act, and 26% opposed, with 21% not sure. Sup­port has since gone up by sev­en points: 

QUESTION: Do you strong­ly sup­port, some­what sup­port, some­what oppose, or strong­ly oppose amend­ing fed­er­al labor laws to give more work­ers cur­rent­ly clas­si­fied as con­trac­tors the right to col­lec­tive­ly bar­gain for high­er wages and bet­ter work­ing con­di­tions, pre­vent employ­ers from hold­ing manda­to­ry meet­ings for the pur­pose of dis­cour­ag­ing their employ­ees from union­iz­ing, and tough­en penal­ties on com­pa­nies that retal­i­ate against work­ers who try to form a union?

ANSWERS:

• Sup­port: 60% 
  • Strong­ly sup­port: 43%
  • Some­what sup­port: 17%
• Oppose: 22%
  • Some­what oppose: 7%
  • Strong­ly oppose: 15%
• Not sure: 18%

Police reform

Next, police reform. In 2022, we found that 61% of WA-03 vot­ers sup­port­ed the George Floyd Jus­tice in Polic­ing Act, while only 25% were opposed and 14% weren’t sure. Sup­port has increased by three points for this leg­is­la­tion to 64%:

QUESTION: Do you strong­ly sup­port, some­what sup­port, some­what oppose, or strong­ly oppose cre­at­ing a new fed­er­al law to hold law enforce­ment account­able for mis­con­duct in court, require police depart­ments to report inap­pro­pri­ate use of force and racial pro­fil­ing inci­dents to a nation­al reg­istry, and reform police train­ing and poli­cies to make civil­ian-law enforce­ment inter­ac­tions safer?

ANSWERS:

• Sup­port: 64% 
  • Strong­ly sup­port: 43%
  • Some­what sup­port: 21%
• Oppose: 24%
  • Some­what oppose: 10%
  • Strong­ly oppose: 14%
• Not sure: 12%

Democracy reform

And final­ly, democ­ra­cy reform. In 2022, 63% of our respon­dents sup­port­ed the con­tours of the For the Peo­ple Act, while 20% were opposed and 17% were not sure. 

Sup­port has now risen to 70%. Yes, 70%. Sev­en out of ten vot­ers are in favor! 

QUESTION: Do you strong­ly sup­port, some­what sup­port, some­what oppose, or strong­ly oppose chang­ing the Unit­ed States’ elec­tion laws to expand vot­ing rights, change cam­paign finance rules to lessen the influ­ence of mon­ey in pol­i­tics, ban par­ti­san ger­ry­man­der­ing, and cre­ate new ethics rules for fed­er­al officeholders?

ANSWERS:

• Sup­port: 70% 
  • Strong­ly sup­port: 57%
  • Some­what sup­port: 13%
• Oppose: 13%
  • Some­what oppose: 4%
  • Strong­ly oppose: 9%
• Not sure: 17%

Marie Glue­senkamp Perez will find a very enthu­si­as­tic recep­tion for her anti-cor­rup­tion plat­form among vot­ers in the 3rd Dis­trict. The irre­spon­si­ble, uneth­i­cal, and appalling behav­ior of our ultra MAGA Supreme Court jus­tices Samuel Ali­to and Clarence Thomas appear to have made this issue even more potent for Democrats. 

Want more data? 

If the above has whet­ted your appetite for WA-03 polling, we hope you’ll con­sid­er becom­ing a sub­scriber to The Chi­nook Bea­con, The Cas­ca­dia Advo­cate’s newest sib­ling pub­li­ca­tion. The Bea­con, which launched last month, is a newslet­ter avail­able exclu­sive­ly to pay­ing sub­scribers that pro­vides deep insights from our research as well as com­men­tary on elec­toral and polit­i­cal trends. Sub­scrip­tions cost $20/month or $240/year, and you can also become a Found­ing Mem­ber for $600/year.

The next edi­tion of The Bea­con, due out lat­er this week, will be WA-03 focused. 

Takeaways

Joe Kent was a for­mi­da­ble oppo­nent for Marie Glue­senkamp Perez in 2022 and will be again — but no one should doubt that he is beat­able. Our research shows that Glue­senkamp Perez is hold­ing her own in a Trump dis­trict… and with­out the ben­e­fit of ranked choice vot­ing, which two of her Blue Dog col­leagues in the House Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus have made use of. Alaska’s Mary Pel­to­la and Maine’s Jared Gold­en have both ben­e­fit­ed from their states’ use of RCV in past elec­tions and may again this year. 

Like Glue­senkamp Perez, they have to run for reelec­tion in places that are expect­ed to sup­port Don­ald Trump. But she must win in a dis­trict that uses first past the post. 

Glue­senkamp Perez’s cam­paign knows they have to be proac­tive to win. That’s why this morn­ing, they went up on the air in the dis­trict with their first TV spot of the cycle. 

Here’s the spot:

And here’s what the cam­paign had to say about it and the stakes this year:

Glue­senkamp Perez faces an inevitably expen­sive rematch in Novem­ber against far-right extrem­ist Joe Kent, who she defeat­ed in 2022 by two votes per precinct in one of the country’s clos­est House races.

Joe Kent wants to ban all immi­gra­tion for 20 years to ensure a white racial major­i­ty, calls for a nation­al abor­tion ban, dis­putes the out­come of the 2020 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion and believes indict­ed mem­bers of the Jan­u­ary 6th mob are “polit­i­cal pris­on­ers”, refers to Vladimir Putin as “rea­son­able”, and wants to arrest Dr. Antho­ny Fau­ci for mur­der, among oth­er dan­ger­ous and polit­i­cal­ly unpop­u­lar views.

Bor­der Security

The 30-sec­ond spot high­lights the con­sis­tent pres­sure Glue­senkamp Perez has put on Pres­i­dent Biden since she took office last year, espe­cial­ly on bor­der secu­ri­ty. Glue­senkamp Perez helped lead a group of 5 Democ­rats and 5 Repub­li­cans who pushed for stronger bor­der secu­ri­ty mea­sures this win­ter, after the Sen­ate and the White House gave up on find­ing a compromise.

Glue­senkamp Perez also led a group of House Democ­rats this spring in repeat­ed­ly demand­ing Pres­i­dent Biden take urgent action to empow­er the Bor­der Patrol and secure the South­ern border.

Law Enforce­ment

Glue­senkamp Perez’s bipar­ti­san work to com­bat fen­tanyl and sup­port pub­lic safe­ty in South­west Wash­ing­ton is anoth­er theme of the TV ad, which fea­tures tes­ti­mo­ni­als from two coun­ty sher­iffs in her dis­trict — one sher­iff an elect­ed Repub­li­can and the oth­er an elect­ed independent.

The ad also high­lights Glue­senkamp Perez’s sole endorse­ment from Washington’s largest and old­est police union, the Wash­ing­ton Coun­cil of Police & Sheriff’s Deputies, as well as the Van­cou­ver Fire­fight­ers, the largest IAFF local in her district.

State of the Race

Glue­senkamp Perez is the only Demo­c­rat run­ning in WA-03. The dis­trict, which Trump won twice, was drawn in 2021 to elect a Repub­li­can, but has shown a will­ing­ness to sup­port main­stream, inde­pen­dent-mind­ed can­di­dates of both par­ties like Glue­senkamp Perez.

Glue­senkamp Perez can’t win with­out at least some Repub­li­can crossover sup­port, so she’s mak­ing it clear to Repub­li­can and Repub­li­can-lean­ing vot­ers at the out­set that she under­stands their con­cerns and is work­ing to address them in Congress. 

Demo­c­ra­t­ic vot­ers appear to appre­ci­ate that Glue­senkamp Perez needs to make these over­tures in order to pro­vide effec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion and secure reelec­tion in a dis­trict that is like­ly vot­ing for Trump again. Our polling sug­gests the vast major­i­ty of Demo­c­ra­t­ic vot­ers in the dis­trict are behind her and ready to vote for her this sum­mer and autumn. That sup­port from the base will be crit­i­cal in a race that will prob­a­bly be the clos­est fed­er­al con­test in the region and has the poten­tial to go to a recount.