The ink is barely dry from Governor Gregoire signing into law a huge change in the state’s presidential voting, and a critic has already filed a referendum measure that would send the whole question to the statewide ballot in November.

The new plan, Senate Bill 5599 , is for Washington to join a compact of states that commit themselves to casting their electoral votes for the White House ticket that wins the national popular vote. Right now, the state’s 11 electoral votes go, winner-take-all, to the ticket that carries Washington.  We are the fifth state to join the compact, with a total of 61 electoral votes. Once states representing 270 electoral votes join the compact — the minimum need to win the White House — the switcheroo would occur.  In some cases, it would mean Washington’s votes are awarded to a ticket other than Washingtonians prefered. (Bush 41 and Bush 43 being two recent examples out of nine since statehood.)

Referendum 70 has just been filed. If sponsor David John Anderson of Shaw Island secures 120,577 valid voter signatures by July 25, the new law will be put on hold and will go on the November 3 statewide ballot. Here was today’s banner story in The Olympian.