Suzan DelBene cruising in early returns; redrawn 1st District looks safely Democratic

Ever since Wash­ing­ton’s 1st Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict was redrawn back in 2011, it has been wide­ly char­ac­ter­ized as the state’s most even­ly divid­ed polit­i­cal sub­di­vi­sion… a true “tossup” dis­trict if there ever was one.

But look­ing at tonight’s win­now­ing elec­tion results, a new­com­er to Wash­ing­ton pol­i­tics might be for­giv­en for think­ing that the 1st is a dis­trict with a strong Demo­c­ra­t­ic lean. With What­com Coun­ty, King Coun­ty, Skag­it Coun­ty, and Sno­homish Coun­ty all hav­ing report­ed in, fresh­man Demo­c­ra­t­ic Con­gress­woman Suzan Del­Bene holds a huge lead over her six oppo­nents with 51.71% of the vote.

Repub­li­cans have tried to pin the vul­ner­a­ble label on Del­Bene, but she cer­tain­ly does­n’t look it tonight. She has more votes than her three Repub­li­can oppo­nents twice over. And embar­rass­ing­ly, Pedro Celis, who the Repub­li­can polit­i­cal estab­lish­ment in D.C. recruit­ed to chal­lenge Del­Bene, isn’t even com­ing in first among the Repub­li­cans. He’s trail­ing Robert Suther­land, who has raised lit­tle mon­ey and has­n’t done much active cam­paign­ing. Ouch!

Results as of 9:20 PM Pacif­ic Time, August 5th, 2014

There’s still a pos­si­bil­i­ty Celis could pull it out, but even if he does, his weak show­ing won’t help his cred­i­bil­i­ty for the autumn cam­paign sea­son. Notably, Celis is los­ing big in Sno­homish Coun­ty, which is a cru­cial por­tion of the district.

Pri­or to the elec­tion, Celis’ cam­paign was prac­ti­cal­ly invis­i­ble. About the only evi­dence of its exis­tence were its web­site, an occa­sion­al cable tele­vi­sion adver­tise­ment, and the red “Vote for Pedro” signs placed in a few places around the dis­trict by Celis’ sup­port­ers. (The slo­gan is a riff on Napoleon Dyna­mite).

Bizarrely, the cam­paign barred reporters from attend­ing its kick­off a few weeks ago, and it appears they left a lot of mon­ey sit­ting in the bank ahead of the elec­tion. Celis’ oper­a­tives have act­ed as if their goal was to keep his can­di­da­cy a secret from the vot­ers, and they may have well suc­ceed­ed in doing so.

We’ll have a bet­ter idea tomorrow.

Celis’ can­di­da­cy may also be suf­fer­ing from a lack of enthu­si­asm among the Repub­li­can base, which con­tains the most xeno­pho­bic mem­bers of Wash­ing­ton’s pop­u­la­tion: far-right wing pale­o­con­ser­v­a­tive extrem­ists who don’t like immigrants.

Celi’s poor show­ing is just the lat­est indi­ca­tion that the Repub­li­can Par­ty con­tin­ues to have a big prob­lem on its hands: it is hos­tile and unwel­com­ing to new Amer­i­cans and peo­ple of col­or. That does­n’t bode well for the par­ty’s future.

Amer­i­ca is an increas­ing­ly a non-white nation; before long, whites will be a minor­i­ty of the pop­u­la­tion. Despite this shift, the Repub­li­can Par­ty is becom­ing more xeno­pho­bic, not less. The cau­cus Pedro Celis is seek­ing to join just passed two pieces of shame­ful leg­is­la­tion out of the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives that would man­date more forcible depor­ta­tions — even of children.

Suzan Del­Bene vot­ed against those bills and deliv­ered a strong speech in oppo­si­tion. Pedro Celis, on the oth­er hand, had noth­ing to say about them (at least not that we could find; we checked his web­site and Twit­ter feed).

The Repub­li­can Par­ty itself has rec­og­nized the per­il it faces. “We must embrace and cham­pi­on com­pre­hen­sive immi­gra­tion reform. If we do not, our party’s appeal will con­tin­ue to shrink to its core con­stituen­cies only,” con­clud­ed a five-mem­ber pan­el of the Repub­li­can Nation­al Com­mit­tee fol­low­ing a review of the 2012 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion, which was won by Barack Oba­ma and the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Party.

Since that report was pro­duced, the Repub­li­can Par­ty has shown a total lack of inter­est in work­ing with either Pres­i­dent Oba­ma or the Sen­ate on com­pre­hen­sive immi­gra­tion reform. It final­ly became so embar­rass­ing­ly obvi­ous that John Boehn­er decid­ed he need­ed to bring a bill to the floor of the U.S. House for a vote. But once again, he was foiled by the Tea Par­ty fac­tion of his cau­cus, who demand­ed — and got — a pair of bills that are breath­tak­ing­ly dra­con­ian, stu­pid, and mean-spirited.

Repub­li­cans may not want to admit it, but Suzan Del­Bene is well-liked and well-respect­ed by her con­stituents. She’s not afraid to tack­le tough issues; her work to rein in the NSA has been espe­cial­ly impor­tant. She is respon­sive and eager to con­nect with con­stituents. Case in point: After step­ping off her plane from D.C. this past week­end, she was off to tour the The Root Con­nec­tion with con­stituents and local elect­ed offi­cials from the Wood­inville area.

Suzan’s con­cern for her peo­ple shows. She has spent many days in the Oso area offer­ing an empa­thet­ic ear to peo­ple dis­placed by the hor­rif­ic mud­slide last spring. At her elec­tion night par­ty tonight, she was intro­duced by the may­or of Dar­ring­ton, who repeat­ed­ly praised her as an excep­tion­al leader in a heart­felt introduction.

Thanks in no small part to Suzan’s strong work eth­ic, it looks like the 1st Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict will be stay­ing in the Demo­c­ra­t­ic col­umn for anoth­er cycle.