Vote Downballot: NPI talks with Kathleen Drew, candidate for Secretary of State

Every four years, in addi­tion to cast­ing votes for pres­i­dent and gov­er­nor, Wash­ing­to­ni­ans are also called upon to elect more than half a dozen oth­er indi­vid­u­als to serve in the state’s exec­u­tive department.

The con­tests for these posi­tions are often referred to as down­bal­lot races because they appear fur­ther down the bal­lot. They usu­al­ly don’t receive as much pub­lic­i­ty or atten­tion as mar­quee races like gov­er­nor, sen­a­tor, or even U.S. Rep­re­sen­ta­tive, but they are impor­tant nonetheless.

In total, there are eight oth­er exec­u­tive depart­ment posi­tions besides gov­er­nor. Here is a list of the posi­tions with a short sum­ma­ry of the duties of each:

• Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor: Pre­sides over Sen­ate, fills in for governor
• Attor­ney Gen­er­al: State’s chief lawyer
• Sec­re­tary of State: State’s elec­tions admin­is­tra­tor and cus­to­di­an of records
• Trea­sur­er: Man­ages the state’s funds
• Audi­tor: Inspects the state’s books, eval­u­ates effec­tive­ness of pub­lic agencies
• Com­mis­sion­er of Pub­lic Lands: Heads Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources
• Insur­ance Com­mis­sion­er: Reg­u­lates insur­ance companies
• Super­in­ten­dent of Pub­lic Instruc­tion: Over­sees K‑12 pub­lic schools

This year, we have a very com­pet­i­tive race for Sec­re­tary of State between Kath­leen Drew and Kim Wyman. Repub­li­cans have held the posi­tion for more than half a cen­tu­ry, and Drew, the Demo­c­ra­t­ic can­di­date, aims to change that.

Kath­leen took a break from the cam­paign trail to talk to us about why she’s run­ning and what she hopes to accom­plish if she is elect­ed on Tues­day. What fol­lows is our unedit­ed con­ver­sa­tion with her.

NPI: What prompt­ed you to run for Sec­re­tary of State? What skills do you think you bring to the position?

Kath­leen Drew: As a for­mer State Sen­a­tor and pol­i­cy advi­sor to the Gov­er­nor, I’m the only can­di­date with statewide expe­ri­ence, who under­stands how to work with leg­is­la­tors on both the sides of the aisle to get things done.

As a State Sen­a­tor, I authored our state’s Ethics in Pub­lic Ser­vice law and served on the Com­mis­sion on Gov­ern­ment Ethics and Cam­paign Finance Reform. I helped build our high­er edu­ca­tion branch cam­pus sys­tem to increase access for stu­dents across our state and to clean up Puget Sound.

I have a his­to­ry of bipar­ti­san col­lab­o­ra­tion, both as a leg­is­la­tor and as an appoint­ed offi­cial. I bring 25 years of expe­ri­ence work­ing on issues impor­tant to Wash­ing­ton res­i­dents and have worked with peo­ple in every area of our state.

I am run­ning for Sec­re­tary of State to put results over pol­i­tics and get things done for the peo­ple of Wash­ing­ton. I am the only can­di­date com­mit­ted to:

• Increas­ing vot­er infor­ma­tion by print­ing a pri­ma­ry elec­tion statewide vot­ers’ pam­phlet, a bill I spon­sored in the state Senate.
• Expand­ing vot­er par­tic­i­pa­tion by increas­ing bal­lot drop box loca­tions; push­ing for Elec­tion Day vot­er reg­is­tra­tion; and advo­cat­ing for pre­reg­is­ter­ing six­teen and sev­en­teen-year-olds to vote when they get their dri­vers’ licens­es, auto­mat­i­cal­ly reg­is­ter­ing them to vote when they turn eighteen.
• Work­ing with both Democ­rats and Repub­li­cans in a bipar­ti­san fash­ion like I did in the Governor’s office to stream­line the state’s pro­cure­ment process and help make it eas­i­er for over­seas mil­i­tary vot­ers to cast their votes.

I’m the only pro-choice woman run­ning for statewide exec­u­tive office. I will stand up for vot­ers’ rights, women’s rights and mar­riage equality.

NPI: In many states across the coun­try, we are cur­rent­ly see­ing long lines at polling places. Some frus­trat­ed vot­ers are giv­ing up because the ear­ly vot­ing lines are so long. We don’t have this prob­lem in Wash­ing­ton because we vote by mail. Do you believe oth­er states should fol­low the Pacif­ic North­west­’s lead and adopt vote-by-mail?

Kath­leen Drew: Absolute­ly. Vote by mail has increased vot­er par­tic­i­pa­tion, which I believe should be the top pri­or­i­ty of a Sec­re­tary of State.

NPI: What is your posi­tion on same-day vot­er reg­is­tra­tion? Should­n’t it be pos­si­ble for vot­ers who are not on the rolls to reg­is­ter and par­tic­i­pate up until the dead­line for return­ing bal­lots arrives?

Kath­leen Drew: Wash­ing­ton State had 32,000 vot­ers reg­is­ter between Octo­ber 8, the last day to reg­is­ter online, and Octo­ber 29, the last day to reg­is­ter in-per­son. When I am Sec­re­tary of State, I will work to enact Elec­tion Day vot­er reg­is­tra­tion, so that no Wash­ing­ton­ian ever miss­es a dead­line to vote. Elec­tion Day vot­er reg­is­tra­tion is a proven way of allow­ing eli­gi­ble cit­i­zens to cast their vote. It boosts turnout by approx­i­mate­ly five to sev­en points in the sev­en states that allow eli­gi­ble cit­i­zens to reg­is­ter on Elec­tion Day—with a decreased depen­dence on pro­vi­sion­al bal­lots and with­out any report­ed increase in vot­er fraud.

Ralph Munro led the move­ment for Motor Vot­er reg­is­tra­tion and on-demand absen­tee vot­ing. Sam Reed led the way for all vote-by-mail vot­ing. The result has been to increase reg­is­tra­tion and vot­ing by eli­gi­ble cit­i­zens. I look for­ward to mak­ing my own con­tri­bu­tion by enact­ing Elec­tion Day vot­er reg­is­tra­tion for all eli­gi­ble cit­i­zens in Washington.

NPI: Not long ago, as part of a vot­er out­reach cam­paign, the Sec­re­tary of State’s office sent out con­fus­ing post­cards to thou­sands of Wash­ing­ton­ian house­holds which stat­ed “You may be eli­gi­ble to vote, but don’t appear to be reg­is­tered.”

The post­cards were not addressed to spe­cif­ic indi­vid­u­als. Many vot­ers who *are* reg­is­tered report­ed receiv­ing these post­cards and becom­ing very con­fused. The Sec­re­tary of State’s office said improp­er data entry could have result­ed in post­cards get­ting sent to vot­ers who should­n’t have been on the mail­ing list for the cam­paign. If you are elect­ed, what mea­sures will you put into place to ensure that mis­takes like this do not happen?

Kath­leen Drew: It is clear that send­ing out post­cards to vot­ers about their reg­is­tra­tion sta­tus is some­thing that should not be hap­pen­ing forty-six days before an elec­tion day. It is con­fus­ing to vot­ers. At the time, I urged the Sec­re­tary of State’s office to do what­ev­er they could do cor­rect this error imme­di­ate­ly. When I am Sec­re­tary of State, I will not be con­duct­ing that type of vot­er edu­ca­tion effort so close to an elec­tion day. This sit­u­a­tion also taught us that our data­base con­tains many errors and a high pri­or­i­ty should be placed on clean­ing it up. I would also put in place addi­tion­al over­sight mea­sures when send­ing out infor­ma­tion to vot­ers to ensure that avoid­able mis­takes are not made that cause confusion.

NPI: Do you agree with lead­ing soft­ware engi­neers and pro­gram­mers (like Richard Stall­man of the Free Soft­ware Foun­da­tion) that vot­ing should be done on paper?

Kath­leen Drew: Yes, I believe that a paper trail for vot­ing is important.

NPI: If elect­ed, what kind of assis­tance do you envi­sion­ing pro­vid­ing to peo­ple who would like to form social ben­e­fit cor­po­ra­tions (also known as “B” cor­po­ra­tions) under the “low prof­it” model?

Kath­leen Drew: Audi­tor Bri­an Son­ntag just released a per­for­mance audit on reg­u­la­to­ry reform, which found that laws that have been passed to reduce the reg­u­la­to­ry bur­den haven’t been prop­er­ly imple­ment­ed. I will ded­i­cate myself to using his rec­om­men­da­tions to imple­ment one-stop-shop­ping for com­pa­nies to con­duct busi­ness with the State, includ­ing new­ly cre­at­ed “B” cor­po­ra­tions who will need spe­cial atten­tion, as they are new in Wash­ing­ton. This will save tax­pay­er dol­lars and save busi­ness­es time and money.

The reg­is­tra­tion of cor­po­ra­tions, char­i­ties and non­prof­its is an area where the Sec­re­tary of State can and must pro­vide a high­er lev­el of ser­vice. Today, when busi­ness­es reg­is­ter with the state, they must run around between dif­fer­ent state agen­cies in order to com­ply with state law. That’s just bad for busi­ness. As Sec­re­tary of State, my office, the first stop for all new busi­ness­es and orga­ni­za­tions, will coor­di­nate with oth­er state agen­cies to cre­ate a one-stop por­tal, through which all relat­ed gov­ern­ment require­ments and ser­vices can be eas­i­ly accessed.

I’ve got just the back­ground for this, hav­ing stream­lined the state’s pur­chas­ing of goods and ser­vices from busi­ness­es, pulling those func­tions out of five sep­a­rate agen­cies, into a sin­gle loca­tion. I will also expand accep­tance and secu­ri­ty for elec­tron­ic sig­na­tures through­out state government.

The soon­er we stop giv­ing busi­ness­es and oth­er cor­po­ra­tions the runaround, the more effec­tive­ly we can reg­u­late the entire reg­is­tra­tion process to pro­tect the pub­lic against fraud and abuse.

NPI: As Sec­re­tary of State, what will you do to pro­tect vot­ing rights for Washingtonians?

Kath­leen Drew: I strong­ly oppose efforts to dis­en­fran­chise select groups of eli­gi­ble vot­ers under the guise of “vot­er fraud”. I will fight any effort to insti­tute the par­ti­san, polit­i­cal­ly-moti­vat­ed vot­er sup­pres­sion laws that a dozen states around the coun­try have passed in an attempt to reduce vot­ing among seniors, the poor, and vot­ers of col­or. The job descrip­tion of the Sec­re­tary of State requires her to be fair, bal­anced, impar­tial and non-par­ti­san in per­form­ing her responsibilities.

The vot­ers of Wash­ing­ton don’t want and won’t stand for a Kather­ine Har­ris or Ken­neth Black­well as our Sec­re­tary of State. I’m run­ning for Sec­re­tary of State to pro­tect these laws, the tough­est and most effec­tive in the nation, from being ignored, under­mined or overturned.

I believe that all vot­ers are equal. As Sec­re­tary of State, I’ll take a sys­temic look across the state to iden­ti­fy and remove bar­ri­ers to reg­is­tra­tion and vot­ing, espe­cial­ly to engage our minor­i­ty and stu­dent pop­u­la­tions. I will be prac­ti­cal, cre­ative and cost-effec­tive in meet­ing these vot­ing challenges.

One way is by enlist­ing com­mu­ni­ty col­lege and uni­ver­si­ty stu­dents to assist as coun­ty elec­tion work­ers dur­ing peak vot­ing sea­sons. That way, we not only get the next gen­er­a­tion engaged and involved for the future of our democ­ra­cy, but we put them to use­ful work in the mean­time – some­thing any stu­dent, any par­ent and every vot­er can appreciate.

I also sup­port increas­ing drop box loca­tions espe­cial­ly so stu­dents and trib­al com­mu­ni­ties can more eas­i­ly turn in their bal­lots. We should be mak­ing it eas­i­er for folks to vote, not more difficult.

NPI: Years of bud­get short­falls have tak­en a toll on the state’s abil­i­ty to pre­serve and pro­tect its his­to­ry. As Sec­re­tary of State, what actions will you take to ensure the integri­ty of our state archives and library?

Kath­leen Drew: My oppo­nent had sent out a let­ter regard­ing my posi­tion on libraries that con­tains a num­ber of inac­cu­ra­cies. I am absolute­ly a strong sup­port­er of our state library. In fact, when I was a pol­i­cy advi­sor to Gov­er­nor Gre­goire and the Sec­re­tary of State pro­posed elim­i­nat­ing the bud­get for cor­rec­tion cen­ter libraries, we told them to go back to the draw­ing board.

Elim­i­nat­ing those libraries was not an option.

I am opposed to build­ing a brand new build­ing for the Her­itage Cen­ter on the Capi­tol Cam­pus in this tough eco­nom­ic cli­mate. Instead, I believe we should focus on dig­i­tiz­ing our state archives and being cre­ative with the resources that we have.

NPI: There has been talk of elim­i­nat­ing the print­ed voter’s pam­phlet or reduc­ing its size and scope to save mon­ey. How­ev­er, many rur­al Wash­ing­to­ni­ans lack high-speed Inter­net access (or don’t have Inter­net at all) and would not be able to eas­i­ly access a voter’s guide that was only avail­able elec­tron­i­cal­ly. If you are elect­ed, will your bud­get request include fund­ing for the tra­di­tion­al voter’s pam­phlet Wash­ing­ton has print­ed for years?

Kath­leen Drew: Absolute­ly. I believe that a democ­ra­cy works best with an active and informed elec­torate. As Sec­re­tary of State, print­ing a statewide vot­ers’ pam­phlet to send to all vot­ers in pri­ma­ry elec­tions will be a top priority.

Near­ly twen­ty years ago in the state Sen­ate, I spon­sored leg­is­la­tion that would allow for a print­ed pri­ma­ry voter’s guide.

My oppo­nent, Thurston Coun­ty Audi­tor Kim Wyman, kept crit­i­cal infor­ma­tion from vot­ers by refus­ing to include infor­ma­tion about state can­di­dates in the vot­ers’ pam­phlet sent to vot­ers before the pri­ma­ry elec­tion. She says it was because she was a can­di­date for statewide office this year.

I think this shows a lack of judg­ment on her part. We must ensure that all print­ed vot­er pam­phlets include not only local can­di­dates and bal­lot mea­sures, but also statewide can­di­dates and bal­lot mea­sures. In East­ern Wash­ing­ton, where no pri­ma­ry vot­er pam­phlet was print­ed, we saw a 13.6% drop-off in vot­er par­tic­i­pa­tion, and a 25% drop-off in coun­ties like Garfield.

Coun­ties that did print a vot­ers’ pam­phlet had half the drop-off: Pierce 6.3%, King 7.9% and Sno­homish 6.9%.

These are not just num­bers and per­cent­ages. They are vot­ers. They rep­re­sent Wash­ing­ton State vot­ers who did not have enough infor­ma­tion to par­tic­i­pate. This is sim­ply unacceptable.

We extend our thanks to Kath­leen Drew for tak­ing the time to talk with us.