The fourth of six submitted initiatives to the 2024 Washington State Legislature sponsored by Republican State Party Chair Jim Walsh and funded by right wing multimillionaire Brian Heywood was certified today, which means it is destined for the November 2024 ballot for approval or rejection by voters.
Initiative 2109 would eradicate nearly $900 million a year in funding from Washington’s K‑12 schools, early learning, and childcare to give a tax cut to the very wealthiest Washingtonians… the 0.2% of the state’s residents with huge fortunes. Meaning multimillionaires like Brian Heywood, who by his own admission moved from California to Washington in part because he wanted to live in a tax haven for the rich and is upset about having to pay dues to support our kids.
According to the Secretary of State’s Elections Division, 26,611 pages of signatures were received for I‑2109, containing 436,474 lines.
324,516 valid signatures are currently required to qualify a statewide initiative.
Initiative 2109 had a sufficient cushion of extra signatures to qualify for a random sample check as allowed by state law, which consisted of 13,095 signatures.
Of those, 10,752 were accepted and 2,343 were reviewed. 2,324 signatures were determined to be invalid, and nineteen were determined to be duplicate.
Secretary Hobbs today transmitted a certification message to the Legislature affixed with the state seal, advising of I‑2109’s qualification.
Legislative staff have given I‑2109 its own bill-style page on leg.wa.gov.
The ballot title for I‑2109 is as follows:
Initiative Measure No. 2109 concerns taxes.
This measure would repeal an excise tax imposed on the sale or exchange of certain long-term capital assets by individuals who have annual capital gains of over $250,000.
Should this measure be enacted into law? Yes [ ] No [ ]
The summary is as follows:
This measure would repeal an excise tax imposed on the sale or exchange of certain long-term capital assets by individuals who have annual capital gains of over $250,000.
Legislators have three choices as to how to respond to I‑2109:
- Do nothing, in which case it goes to voters
- Adopt the measure into law
- Send it to the November 2024 ballot with an alternative
NPI opposes Initiative 2109 and is working for the measure’s defeat. Because the chances of the Democratic-controlled Legislature approving I‑2109 are pretty much nonexistent, it will be getting forwarded automatically to the ballot, as mentioned above. NPI’s Stop Greed project is urging a no vote on I‑2109; if you’d like to support this effort, you can donate to Stop Greed here using ActBlue.
“After failing in the legislature, failing to qualify for the ballot last year, losing in the Washington Supreme Court, and losing in the U.S. Supreme Court, a mega-millionaire is making a last-ditch attempt to buy himself a tax break with this initiative,” said Treasure Mackley, executive director of Invest in Washington Now. “Poll after poll shows the capital gains tax is overwhelmingly popular because Washingtonians want the super rich to pay what they owe our communities.”
“Last year the wealthiest Washingtonians raked in nearly $13 billion in profits off of stocks, and paid a modest 7% tax on those profits to raise nearly $900 million for schools, childcare and early learning. We will not allow a mega-millionaire to grab this money from Washington’s kids just to enrich his wealthy friends.”
We agree and we invite you to join us in voting NO on I‑2109 later this year.
