Kiev by the Pacific

Washington state politics

Jan 13th 2005 SEATTLE
From The Economist print edition

Two months late, Washington state has a governor. But was the election fair?

ON JANUARY 12th, Christine Gregoire took the oath of office as Washington state's new governor. Nothing unusual in that, you might say. But the Democrat had been declared the winner only a few days beforehand, in what is by some reckonings the closest governor's race in America's history. And that tussle may well not be over yet.

Ms Gregoire was not the initial winner: the first tally after the November 2nd vote put the Republican, Dino Rossi, 261 votes ahead. An automatic recount narrowed his margin to 42 votes. The 2.8m votes were then recounted, this time by hand, and Ms Gregoire won by 129.

Further retallying could be necessary. Election officials in King County, which contains Democratic-leaning Seattle, have admitted to a wide range of errors: counting 348 “provisional” ballots before they could be verified as coming from registered voters; counting hundreds more ballots than the number of voters listed as having cast them; dead people voting with the help of next-of-kin who filled in and signed mail-in ballots. Other counties had similar problems, and some members of the armed forces claim they received their ballots too late to use them.

Earlier this month, the state Republican party sued to have the election overturned. A judge in Chelan County, a conservative place where Mr Rossi won 63% of the vote, was due to start deciding the suit's merits on January 14th. Whatever happens, the loser will promptly appeal to the Washington State Supreme Court, which will probably get the case at the end of the month.

Most Republicans insist there should be an entirely new vote, not just a recount. “There was just a cascade of errors,” says Chris Vance, the chairman of the state Republican Party. “It's impossible to know who really won.” In a state not known for the animosity of its politics, that view is shared by a surprising number of people. Stuart Elway, a local pollster, says that his surveys (taken in late December) show that most voters felt that the election was inconclusive or even fraudulent; only 65% of Democrats acknowledged Ms Gregoire as the clear, fair winner.

Despite this, the local Democratic honchos are fighting hard to ensure that Governor Gregoire becomes a fait accompli. Earlier this week, the Democrat-controlled state legislature rejected Republican efforts to delay the election certification (and thereby the inauguration). Outside, demonstrators, clad in the same orange that reformers in Ukraine wore to protest their stolen election, shouted for a new contest. These protesters will doubtless move on to the state Supreme Court.

In one way, Washington state was merely unlucky. Its problems—inconsistent voting procedures, antiquated voting equipment, sloppy vote-counting—could have happened in any state, argues Paul Gronke, an elections expert in Portland, Oregon. In 2002, spurred on by the Florida recount, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which was supposed to improve things. But only a small fraction of the $3.9 billion appropriated for the measure has reached states, and even then it has sometimes caused trouble: California's secretary of state has been accused of mishandling $46m in HAVA funds.

The current embarrassment will spark some form of clean-up in Washington state; there is also talk of change in California, Virginia and Ohio. But in America even national elections remain local affairs, with polling places and procedures determined by individual counties. Imposing rules of any sort is unpopular with county auditors, polling officers and the other people who rule the roost in the current system.

If Washington's Supreme Court insists on a revote, it would take place on April 26th. In the meantime, Governor Gregoire and the legislature will have to attend to other business, including a $1.6 billion budget shortfall. It could be an uncomfortable few months for Washington's new—or at least apparent—governor.

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