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| 5/28/2008 3:03:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article |
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| Three Democrats will face incumbent Jim McCune (R-Graham) in November: JeanMarie Christenson (left), Chuck Collins (middle) and Ray Harper (right). |
| | Democrats to open local campaign office | The 2nd Legislative Democrats will open a campaign office at 21711 Meridian E., directly across from the main entrance to the Pierce County Fairgrounds.There are now 106,839 voters in the district - almost 30,000 new voters in just the last two years. Over 2,000 voters in the Pierce and Thurston county areas of the 2nd LD participated in the Feb. 9 Presidential precinct caucuses. If you are a voter, committed to a special Democratic candidate, an interested voter or just curious, stop by the office and check it out. There will be literature and contact information on all candidates running as Democrats.
The campaign office will be open after June 1.
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Christenson selected as Democrats' nominee
by Bruce Smith
By an impressive 6-1 margin, JeanMarie Christenson was selected by the 2nd Legislative District Democrats to be their nominee in the race against Jim McCune (R-Graham) for State Representative. The voting took place in Graham on May 19 as part of the Democratic Party's first-ever "Pre-Primary Nomination Convention," and Christenson was chosen over two other candidates in a weighted ballot cast by the Precinct Committee Officers of the district.
"I'm honored to have been nominated," Christenson said, "and I promise to work hard for the people of this district. Together, I hope we can create a future worth walking into."
It is not wholly clear what importance this nomination will bring, but many observers expect that Christenson's selection will place her closest to Party monies, organizational support and public visibility. At the very least, Christenson can now claim to be the official nominee in her campaign literature and signage.
Her election totals were 128 votes, while fellow candidates Ray Harper of Eatonville received 26, and Yelm's Chuck Collins had 27. Each PCO vote was weighted to reflect the size of their precinct, and those in urban areas, such as Spanaway, had up to seventeen votes added while rural precincts had, on average, four or five. These numbers clearly show that Christenson had broad support among the Party stalwarts.
Nevertheless, all three candidates will be able to continue their campaigns, and each is expected to be on the primary ballot in August pending their official campaign filing with the Secretary of State in June.
In her presentation during the Candidates Forum that preceded the nomination vote, Christenson identified a number of issues she is committed to working on, including the abolition of WASL and improving education. In particular, she voiced her concern for the environment and said that if elected in November, she will work to create a statewide seed bank to ensure crop viability in the face of increasing pressures from global climate change.
The Pre-Primary Nomination Convention was created by the Democratic Party this year in response to the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding the Top-Two Primary system. Ostensibly, the Party held this pre-primary selection to ensure one solid candidate would make it through the top-two process and head to the general election in November.
Further, in a show of Democratic solidarity, after the nomination election, all three candidates, Christenson, Harper and Collins, were given official endorsements from the 2nd Legislative District Democrats.
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