The Trump Era is Over. Washington Republicans have a lot of Repair to do

Ten years ago, Donald Trump became the face and the voice of the Republican party. This week the bill came due as the Washington state GOP paid the price for following Trump over the electoral cliff like a pack of obedient lemmings.

Republicans had already lost the third congressional district (southwest Washington) which was drawn to be a safe R seat. This time we didn’t even come close to taking it back, and we might lose the fifth district (Spokane).

We previously lost 15 seats in the state legislature and now stand to lose between five and 13 more seats, including seats in Vancouver, Gig Harbor, YAKIMA (!) and potentially in Puyallup and Shelton. There are a ton of ballots left to count, but Republicans will be even less relevant in Olympia next year.

There is still a sane Republican establishment in this state which is forced to work behind the scenes because they have been driven out of the Party apparatus itself. This election cycle they seemed to focus their money and attention on passing the initiative repealing the income tax on millionaires, and electing conservative, or at least moderate, justices to the State Supreme Court, rather than on electing Republicans to the legislature. 

It didn’t work. Voters rejected the attempt to repeal the income tax and elected at least four out of the five Supreme Court candidates supported by Democrats.

For a long time, conservatives have tried to enact their ideas via the initiative process. That path is a dead end. Initiatives are tough to pass. They are routinely thrown out in court and can be watered down or repealed by the Democrats in the legislature. Now we know that electing judicial candidates that draw the opposition of the liberal establishment is also a non-starter.

There are no silver bullets or shortcuts. There is one and only one way out of this abyss for Republicans. Republicans who know that MAGA has caused this disaster and want the party to return to it’s true Reaganite values, particularly those who led the party pre-Trump, need to stand up and fight. They need to fight to elect new party leadership. They need to fight to nominate mainstream candidates for statewide office, particularly Governor, in 2028. And they need to fight for one or more legacy Republican candidates for President in 2028.

It has never been easy for Republicans in Washington state, but as late as 2015 Republicans had a one seat majority in the State Senate and were within two seats of a majority in the House. Mainstream Republicans like Dan Evans, Slade Gorton, Rob McKenna and Kim Wyman got elected statewide. It can be done, but only if the national brand is not toxic.

Politically, the Trump era is over. The battle of 2028 is upon us. Washington state needs principled Center-Right Republicans to stand up and fight. The alternative is more years of unhealthy one-party rule under a Democratic party that continues to drift to the left.