Manka Dhingra now has a double digit lead over Jinyoung Lee Englund in 45th LD

The sec­ond week of bal­lot count­ing is under­way in Wash­ing­ton’s 2017 Top Two elec­tion, and with today’s drop, the good news con­tin­ues for Man­ka Dhin­gra and the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty. Dhin­gra today achieved the sym­bol­ic thresh­old of a dou­ble dig­it lead over Repub­li­can oppo­nent Jiny­oung Englund, once again widen­ing her lead in what has become the dis­tric­t’s most lop­sided Sen­ate race in years.

Pun­dits and polit­i­cal observers had been expect­ing a close con­test, with a nar­row win pos­si­ble by either side. But this result is basi­cal­ly the oppo­site of that.

With today’s count in, Dhin­gra has 19,545 votes (51.49%); Englund has 15,745 votes (41.48%). The gap between Dhin­gra and Englund is now 3,800 votes.

Dhin­gra’s lead in this elec­tion is big­ger than any that have been held by either Andy Hill or his pre­de­ces­sor over the past eleven years. Take a look:

• 2014 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, 45th LD Sen­ate (Dif­fer­ence: 2,660 votes)
  
  • Andy Hill (R): 25,816 votes
  • Matt Isen­how­er (D): 23,156 votes
• 2010 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, 45th LD Sen­ate (Dif­fer­ence: 1,124 votes) 
  • Andy Hill (R): 29,606 votes
  • Eric Oemig (D): 28,482 votes
• 2006 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, 45th LD Sen­ate (Dif­fer­ence: 2,780 votes) 
  • Eric Oemig (D): 25,027 votes
  • Toby Nixon (R): 22,247 votes

Repub­li­cans seem utter­ly bewil­dered that the $642,636.19 they sunk into ads smear­ing Man­ka Dhin­gra have failed to bol­ster Englund’s can­di­da­cy. Not only did Englund begin Elec­tion Night in a big hole, but that hole has got­ten deep­er… and deep­er… and deep­er… which isn’t what they were expect­ing.

With noth­ing but bad news com­ing out of the 45th LD, the state Repub­li­can Par­ty has opt­ed to ignore the elec­tion results and instead focus on oth­er (most­ly triv­ial) things. The par­ty did post a tweet the day after the elec­tion which read:

Thank you to our hard­work­ing can­vassers Dio, Bren­dan, Joe, and Austin. They’re mak­ing can­vass­ing great again!

More like the Democ­rats are mak­ing can­vass­ing great again. The Dhin­gra cam­paign has tru­ly demon­strat­ed a mas­tery of field oper­a­tions in this elec­tion. As a con­se­quence, the par­ty is an excel­lent posi­tion head­ing into the gen­er­al elec­tion, and will ben­e­fit from high morale and enthu­si­asm down the home stretch.

I can’t remem­ber a leg­isla­tive con­test in which a can­di­date down by as much as Englund is in this elec­tion came back to win in the gen­er­al. (Read­ers, if you know of an exam­ple, please men­tion it in the com­ments.) Top Two per­for­mance does not pre­cise­ly pre­dict gen­er­al elec­tion per­for­mance, but there is a correlation.

A reprise of what we’re see­ing now in the gen­er­al elec­tion would mean more than just a change in who runs the Sen­ate. For decades, the East­side of King Coun­ty has been a polit­i­cal bat­tle­ground, where leg­isla­tive majori­ties have been made and unmade. But increas­ing­ly, the East­side is becom­ing Demo­c­ra­t­ic territory.

Two of the region’s four core leg­isla­tive dis­tricts are now all-Demo­c­ra­t­ic (the 41st and the 48th). The 45th is weeks away from poten­tial­ly join­ing them. And next year, Democ­rats will have a fresh oppor­tu­ni­ty to make inroads in the 5th when House posi­tions held by Repub­li­cans Jay Rodne and Paul Graves are up.