Filing week 2018: Look who’s on the ballot now
Now that filing week for candidates to get onto Washington ballots for the 2018 August Primary and November General Election has passed, along with the May 21st deadline for candidates to withdraw their names, here are a few quick facts about this year’s election lineup
With 596 races to be decided on levels from local to federal, 1,151 candidates filed to run — including 30 candidates for U.S. Senate, which is one of the largest fields in Washington history. It isn’t a state record, though. The 1983 special election to fill the U.S. Senate seat of Henry Martin “Scoop” Jackson after his sudden demise drew a 33-candidate field.
Although the entries for this year’s U.S. Senate race shrank by one with a Friday withdrawal, the 29 candidates still in the running comprise the largest such group in 35 years. Until now, no Washington U.S. Senate race since 1983 had drawn more than 2016’s group of 17 entrants.
The total state field of candidates was reduced by 21 candidate withdrawals before Monday’s deadline, leaving 1,130 total candidates on this year’s ballots. You can see who’s running, in statewide and each county’s elections, here.
After all the registrations were in, Elections officials used random selection to decide the candidates’ ballot order, which several academic studies have found can influence how many votes a candidate gets.
Here’s the ballot order for races determined by lot draw at the Office of Secretary of State.
Don’t forget to double-check your voter registration (or register, if you haven’t already!) by visiting myvote.wa.gov.