Raul Garcia exits gubernatorial race in favor of Dave Reichert, will run for U.S. Senate

”Not often in life do you have the chance to do some­thing for the ben­e­fit of the whole,” Gar­cia said, reflect­ing on the moves he’s choos­ing to make. “And I look at the future and I think this deci­sion is for that ben­e­fit of the whole.”

It cer­tain­ly is a log­i­cal move that oth­er Repub­li­cans will applaud.

(Semi Bird, mean­while, has said he’ll stay in the guber­na­to­r­i­al race.)

The Wash­ing­ton State Repub­li­can Par­ty has been with­out a chal­lenger to Maria Cantwell for a whole quar­ter of the cycle. By this point two years ago, they had recruit­ed Tiffany Smi­ley to run against Pat­ty Mur­ray and she had begun fundrais­ing in earnest. Gar­ci­a’s defer­ring to Reichert gives the par­ty two front run­ners it can ral­ly around for the two most impor­tant statewide offices.

With the WSRP hav­ing failed to recruit a chal­lenger to Cantwell before now, NPI has been test­ing for­mer Unit­ed States Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Jaime Her­rera Beut­ler as a hypo­thet­i­cal oppo­nent, and twice found Cantwell with a robust lead.

Gar­cia will face steep odds against the four-term sen­a­tor, who has been very busy this Fourth of July recess. On Tues­day, Cantwell made an annu­al appear­ance at the Seat­tle Cen­ter’s nat­u­ral­iza­tion cer­e­mo­ny. On Wednes­day, she par­tic­i­pat­ed in the Wash­ing­ton State Space Sum­mit that her office orga­nized. Yes­ter­day, she was in Kit­sap Coun­ty with Trans­porta­tion Sec­re­tary Pete Buttigieg on an infra­struc­ture invest­ments tour stop. And today, she and Gov­er­nor Inslee are meet­ing with inci­dent com­mand lead­ers of the Tun­nel 5 wild­fire in the Colum­bia Riv­er Gorge.

Sen­a­tor Cantwell’s pre­vi­ous Repub­li­can gen­er­al elec­tion oppo­nents for U.S. Sen­ate were for­mer KIRO TV anchor and ex-state par­ty chair Susan Hutchi­son (2018), Michael Baum­gart­ner, a for­mer state sen­a­tor who is now Spokane Coun­ty Trea­sur­er (2012), insur­ance indus­try exec­u­tive Mike McGav­ick (2006), and, of course, her pre­de­ces­sor Slade Gor­ton (2000). Cantwell’s only close race was that ini­tial run against Gor­ton, in which she pre­vailed by less than 3,000 votes.

Since then, she has had no prob­lem dis­patch­ing Repub­li­can oppo­nents, who have failed to make the case that they would offer bet­ter rep­re­sen­ta­tion than Cantwell.