Brian Dansel resigns; Washington’s Senate Republicans lose their majority (temporarily)

Repub­li­cans are tem­porar­i­ly with­out a major­i­ty in the Wash­ing­ton State Sen­ate owing to the res­ig­na­tion of 7th Dis­trict Sen­a­tor Bri­an Dansel, who has just tak­en a job in neo­fas­cist Don­ald Trump’s administration.

Dansel’s res­ig­na­tion, effec­tive as of 1 PM today, leaves the Sen­ate Repub­li­can cau­cus with just twen­ty-four mem­bers, includ­ing Tim Shel­don (R‑35th Dis­trict), who calls him­self a Demo­c­rat, but walks, talks, and acts like a Repub­li­can, and is con­sid­ered to be a Repub­li­can by this orga­ni­za­tion and this publication.

How­ev­er, the Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion requires that bills pass the Leg­is­la­ture with an absolute major­i­ty in each house. It takes twen­ty-five sen­a­tors to pass a bill; there are forty-nine dis­tricts in the state, each with one senator.

So until Dansel’s suc­ces­sor is cho­sen, Sen­ate Repub­li­cans will not be able to move any leg­is­la­tion off the floor on their own. They will need the coop­er­a­tion of Sen­ate Democ­rats and/or Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Cyrus Habib to do anything.

By law, Dansel’s imme­di­ate appoint­ed suc­ces­sor will have to be one of three names select­ed by the statu­to­ry Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Cen­tral Com­mit­tee, or a cau­cus act­ing in the cen­tral com­mit­tee’s name and with its authority.

The 7th spans mul­ti­ple coun­ties (Pend Oreille, Stevens, Okanogan, Spokane, Fer­ry), so the leg­isla­tive bod­ies of each of those coun­ties will need to agree on one of the names in order to make a joint appointment.

If they can’t agree with­in a cou­ple of months, Gov­er­nor Inslee will pick.

Tim Eyman enabler Doug Erick­sen (R‑42nd Dis­trict: Fer­n­dale, Lyn­den, What­com Coun­ty) is also tak­ing a job in the Trump admin­is­tra­tion but has stat­ed that he does­n’t plan to resign his seat. There is also spec­u­la­tion that fel­low Eyman enabler Michael Baum­gart­ner will also be get­ting a fed­er­al job from Trump and might be resign­ing from the Sen­ate as well.

Dansel’s depar­ture means there will now be a total of five spe­cial elec­tions in Wash­ing­ton State for Sen­ate this year. The affect­ed dis­tricts are:

• 7th (Dansel’s district)
• 31st (vacan­cy cre­at­ed by res­ig­na­tion of Pam Roach, elect­ed to the Pierce Coun­ty Coun­cil in Novem­ber of 2016)
• 37th (vacan­cy cre­at­ed by the res­ig­na­tion of Prami­la Jaya­pal, elect­ed to the Unit­ed States House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives in Novem­ber of 2016)
• 45th (vacan­cy cre­at­ed by the death of Andy Hill from can­cer in 2016)
• 48th (vacan­cy cre­at­ed by res­ig­na­tion of Cyrus Habib, elect­ed as the state’s new lieu­tenant gov­er­nor in Novem­ber of 2016)

The 6th will join the list if Baum­gart­ner resigns.

With all the spe­cial Sen­ate elec­tions, it’s going to feel more like an even-num­bered leg­isla­tive elec­tion year than in odd-num­bered local elec­tion year in many respects.