Who is spending what in the battle for the 43rd District

The biggest political race playing out across Seattle’s Capitol Hill this Election Day is more of a preliminary heat with the top two vote getters destined to battle again into November. Still, the primary carries huge stakes. An overwhelming showing for the incumbent now could snuff out the challenger’s momentum before November arrives, while a close finish could legitimize her upstart run.

There are signs the final race will be a costly affair.

In the race for the state Senate’s 43rd District seat, cash has piled up for the incumbent, a statewide Democratic leader with twenty years of experience in Olympia.

His plucky upstart challenger has been out-fundraised by nearly five times — but she isn’t doing too badly, either.

According to filings with the Washington State Public Disclosure Commission, incumbent Sen. Jamie Pedersen is in the top tier of legislative fundraisers in Washington State this summer, reporting contributions of more than $460,000 through the latest updates.

His “Tax the Rich” challenger Hannah Sabio-Howell has been out-raised by 4.7 times, reporting $98,000 in contributions, a still-solid showing for a grassroots primary challenger up against a powerful incumbent.

There are other signs that the spending is just getting started. According to the filings, more than $220,000 in independent expenditures supporting Pedersen — and $45,800 against — are making this one of the most heavily messaged legislative primaries in the state.

PEDERSEN — DETAILS

SABIO-HOWELL — DETAILS

That Pedersen has nearly doubled his contribution totals this time around is telling. More is on the line.

CHS reported here as the 43rd District Democrats group chose to endorse the democratic socialist upstart Sabio-Howell over Pedersen, the current Majority Leader in the Senate, an architect of the Millionaires Tax, and a veteran lawmaker who has been part of 43rd District leadership for twenty years.

Sabio-Howell has been a First Hill resident who most recently served as the communications director for Working Washington, a labor advocacy and workers’ rights non-profit organization. She has also previously worked for the Washington State Legislature as a legislative assistant and communications specialist for various state representatives and senators.

The candidate has described herself as a progressive community organizer running for the Washington Senate on a platform centered on ending corporate political influence and establishing services like universal childcare. Having spent years organizing alongside underpaid gig workers and agricultural laborers, she says she is championing aggressive housing reform and structural tax code overhauls to address the region’s deepening affordability crisis.

Sabio-Howell and incumbent 43rd District Rep. Shaun Scott are political allies and organized a “Tax the Rich” forum last summer. Scott, by the way, has needed to raise only just over $18,000 this political season as he is running unopposed in the 43rd.

Pedersen lives with his family on Capitol Hill and is an experienced legislator first elected in 2007 who has represented Seattle’s 43rd District in the State Senate since 2014 and currently serves as the Senate Majority Leader. A champion for LGBTQ+ rights and progressive fiscal policy, he is relying on his long track record of delivering milestone legislation such as the state’s capital gains tax and landmark gun safety measures to advocate for collaborative, systemic solutions to the state’s challenges.

Pedersen serves as the Executive Vice President and General Counsel for McKinstry, a Seattle-based construction, engineering, and energy-efficiency firm.

What comes next in the race will partly depend on how big of a dent Sabio-Howell can put in Pedersen’s primary totals. In 2022, Pedersen took home more than 97% of the vote running unopposed that August. In 2018, a Republican challenger squeezed out 9% of the vote.

This time around, the 43rd primary pitting Democrat vs. Democrat is seeing contribution outlays normally reserved for larger Democrat vs. Republican battles in November.

While competitive swing-district races typically see fundraising surge or double between August and November, safe-district intra-party battles often hit their financial now in the primary. If Pedersen delivers a decisive blowout on Tuesday, institutional donors and statewide PACs may consider the job done and shift their war chests to competitive general election battlegrounds elsewhere in the state.

That will be much harder if Sabio-Howell makes a strong showing starting with Tuesday night’s first counts.

Big names are already in on Pedersen. Key institutional donors include the Washington Senate Democratic Campaign ($15,897.12), BECU ($3,000.00), Snoqualmie Tribe ($2,400.00), Washington Indian Gaming Association ($2,400.00), Regence BlueShield ($2,400.00), and corporate PACs like Microsoft and Weyerhaeuser ($2,400.00 each).

When it comes to smaller contributions, Sabio-Howell holds a distinct edge. Unitemized contributions of $25 or less account for 21.8% of Sabio-Howell’s total direct funding, compared to just 3.1% of Pedersen’s.

The largest pool of financial support for Sabio-Howell so far has been the small contributions and support at the $2,400 maximum from a half dozen or so supporters.

Meanwhile, outside groups have poured more than $266,000 into messaging around Pedersen’s record. Nearly all of that pro-incumbent firepower — over $216,000 — came from the caucus-aligned New Direction PAC in an early blitz designed to solidify Pedersen’s standing before the primary closes. Sabio-Howell’s public presence, by contrast, relies almost entirely on her campaign’s direct communications.

The challenger also has one peculiar political ally this summer.

The conservative and pro-business Political Action Committee Concerned Taxpayers of Washington State probably would think twice about supporting Sabio-Howell’s calls for a wealth tax but is giving the candidate a boost with its last-minute $46,000 in expenditures deployed against the Pedersen campaign in late July — just days before the August 4 primary election — to influence late voters in District 43 and, of course, possibly tilt the playing field to force even more large expenditures here through November.

You can look up campaign finance in the 43rd and other state races at pdc.wa.gov.

To view campaign finance filings for City of Seattle races, visit seattle.gov.

Ballots can be returned via an official King County drop box including the Broadway box by 8:00 PM on Election Day, August 4th. Don’t drop them in a mailbox today or you’ll risk your vote not being postmarked by the deadline.

You can find CHS coverage of the races and issues at capitolhillseattle.com/tag/elections.