SEATTLE (AP) — Longtime Democratic Attorney General Bob Ferguson was elected governor of Washington on Tuesday, defeating former U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert, a Republican, in a state that’s considered a Democratic stronghold.
Ferguson will take over for three-term Gov. Jay Inslee, a fellow Democrat, who declined to seek reelection. Washington hasn’t had a Republican governor in nearly 40 years.
Ferguson, 59, is a two-time Washington state chess champion who has served since 2013 as the state’s attorney general. He came to national prominence by repeatedly suing the administration of former President Donald Trump, including bringing the lawsuit that blocked Trump’s initial travel ban on citizens of several majority Muslim nations.
Ferguson touted his efforts to ease restrictions on abortion medication and to strengthen gun control laws, and he criticized Reichert for voting in favor of a nationwide ban on abortion starting at 20 weeks of pregnancy.
Public safety was also a key issue in the campaign, with the state experiencing a rise in violent crime and ranking last in the nation in law enforcement officers per capita for more than 12 years running, according to the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. Both candidates vowed to hire more police.
Ferguson’s plan includes directing $100 million to help local jurisdictions bring more officers on board, including through hiring bonuses. Reichert argued that elected officials need to show they support law enforcement, including by protecting qualified immunity laws, in order to recruit more officers.
Ferguson prosecuted three Tacoma police officers in the 2020 death of Manuel Ellis, a Black man who was restrained face-down on a sidewalk while pleading that he could not breathe. A jury acquitted them of second-degree murder and manslaughter charges last year.
Reichert, 74, served two terms as the elected sheriff of King County, which includes Seattle, before spending seven terms in Congress. Reichert highlighted his 33 years at the sheriff’s office, including helping track down the Green River serial killer, Gary Ridgway. He spent much of the campaign contending with Ferguson’s assertions that he would not protect abortion rights.
Ferguson received about 45% of the votes in the August primary to qualify for the general election, compared with about 27% for Reichert. Another Republican in that race, military veteran Semi Bird, got about 11% of the primary vote.
Ferguson’s tenure as attorney general also included consumer protection lawsuits against major student loan and opioid companies over what he described as predatory practices. He sued former President Barack Obama’s administration over cleanup of the Hanford nuclear reservation, where the government made plutonium for weapons, and he took a florist to court for refusing to serve clients staging a gay wedding.
When he sued the agrochemical giant Monsanto over pervasive pollution from PCBs, he noted that he is an avid backpacker and mountain climber. He said he was angry that one of Washington’s major rivers, the Skagit, along which his great-grandparents homesteaded in the 19th century, is now contaminated.
At times, Ferguson has been criticized as overly zealous as attorney general, including a long-running case against the thrift-store chain Savers Value Village. The Washington Supreme Court unanimously rejected the attorney general’s claims that the chain’s marketing practices were deceptive, and the state was ordered to pay the company more than $4 million in legal fees.
