By Ruth Bayang
Northwest Asian Weekly
Pramila Jayapal
FEDERAL
Pramila Jayapal could soon be heading to Washington, D.C. after winning the Democratic primary for Washington’s 7th Congressional District.
She took a commanding portion of the vote (38.2 percent), leaving Joe McDermott (21.5 percent) and Brady Walkinshaw (20.9 percent) to fight it out for second place.
Jayapal’s fellow native of India, Arun Jhaveri, received 1.63 percent of the vote.
If elected, Jayapal would be the first Indian American woman to be elected to Congress. On her Facebook page, Jayapal said, “This is OUR movement and this victory belongs to each of us. Onward to November we go, together.”
STATE EXECUTIVE
The Lieutenant Governor race is essentially tied. Marty McClendon has 20.34 percent of the vote to Cyrus Habib’s close second at 19.58 percent.
Habib, whose parents emigrated from Iran, is a Rhodes Scholar, Yale Law School graduate, and intellectual property lawyer at Perkins Coie.
11 people in all were vying to replace Brad Owen, who retired after 20 years in office.
Among them were Sen. Steve Hobbs, whose mother was a Japanese immigrant; he got 15.6 percent of the vote.
And Phillip Yin, the son of immigrants from Hong Kong and a former journalist, received 9.9 percent of the vote.
Superintendent of Public Instruction
Erin Jones and state Rep. Chris Reykdal were leading a field of nine candidates in the contest to succeed Randy Dorn as state schools superintendent.
Jones captured roughly 22.7 percent of the statewide vote, and Reykdal had 20.5 percent.
KumRoon “Mr. Mak” Maksirisombat, an educator for 30 years, got 3.8 percent of the votes.
LEGISLATIVE
Legislative District 11 — State Senator
Sen. Bob Hasegawa will continue to represent the 11th District in the State Senate.
The lifelong resident of Beacon Hill beat out challenger Dennis Price with 78.8 percent of the votes. Price got 21.1 percent.
Legislative District 1 — State Representative Pos. 1
Kazuaki (Kaz) Sugiyama did not get enough votes (11 percent) to win this seat.
Derek Stanford leads at 49.5 percent.
Legislative District 1 — State Representative Pos. 2
Darshan Rauniyar received 12.4 percent of the votes, and Kyoko Matsumoto Wright captured 10 percent.
Jim Langston leads this race at 39.6 percent.
Legislative District 21 — State Representative Pos. 2
Lillian Ortiz-Self leads this race with 56.6 percent of the votes, beating out her opponents including Mohammed Riaz Khan who got 4.3 percent.
Legislative District 32 — State Representative Pos. 1
Voters in the 32nd District chose to re-elect Rep. Cindy Ryu. She beat out her opponents with 73.7 percent of the votes.
Legislative District 33 — State Representative Pos. 2
Mia Su-Ling Gregerson will keep her seat in the 33rd District. She leads the race with 63.6 percent of the vote.
Legislative District 37 — State Representative Pos. 1
Another incumbent, Sharon Tomiko Santos, is keeping her job. Santos got a whopping 91.9 percent of the votes.
Legislative District 43 — State Representative Pos. 1
Dan Shih has 25.9 percent of the votes, behind frontrunner Nicole Macri (49.1 percent).
Another candidate in this race, Sameer Ranade, got 4.6 percent of the votes.
JUDICIAL
Supreme Court Justice, Position 1
A primary election is held only for seats with three or more candidates.
Mary Yu is the incumbent for Supreme Court Justice, Position 1. She is being challenged by David DeWolf. This election will appear on the November ballot.
The following incumbents are unopposed:
Dean S. Lum (King County Superior Court, Position 12)
Samuel S. Chung (King County Superior Court, Position 15)
John H. Chun (King County Superior Court, Position 16)
Susan Amini (King County Superior Court, Position 20)
Patrick Oishi (King County Superior Court, Position 24)
Alicia H. Nakata (Chelan Superior Court, Position 3)
Ruth Bayang can be reached at editor@nwasianweekly.com.