Washington’s election laws are facing renewed criticism after the Heritage Foundation’s 2026 Election Integrity Scorecard placed the state 46th among 50 states and Washington, D.C. The assessment identifies gaps between Washington’s rules and Heritage’s recommendations on voter identification, documentary proof of citizenship and other election procedures. It measures policy differences, not proven fraud, but it gives critics a concrete set of requirements to challenge.

Republican state Rep. Jim Walsh argues that Washington’s standard registration process relies too heavily on applicants swearing they are citizens rather than presenting citizenship documents. That distinction matters: Washington requires an eligibility declaration and identity verification, but its standard registration process does not universally require documentary proof of citizenship. Automatic registration through designated agencies, by contrast, requires proof of citizenship during the underlying agency transaction.

Secretary of State Steve Hobbs’ office pushed back, claiming that some of Heritage’s recommended safeguards are tied up in litigation. The office also defended Washington’s existing security measures and pointed to the rarity of documented voter fraud – for what that’s worth. Of course, those responses don’t settle the underlying dispute over whether the state should require stronger citizenship verification and voter-roll maintenance.

The sharpest question raised by the report is whether Washington’s current verification requirements are sufficient—or whether additional checks are needed to improve security. Read more at The Center Square.

The Washington Supreme Court’s 6–3 decision striking down Initiative 2066 has created a new legal argument against the state’s income tax. Washington Policy Center’s Ryan Frost points out that ESSB 6346 bundles a 9.9% income tax on income above $1 million with B&O tax changes, sales tax exemptions and an expanded Working Families Tax Credit. His argument: If voters can’t combine unrelated policies into one measure, lawmakers shouldn’t get a constitutional hall pass for calling theirs an integrated tax reform package.

The income tax already faces a challenge rooted in Washington’s longstanding precedent treating income as property. The single-subject argument adds another potential constitutional hurdle, with earlier court decisions striking down tax measures that combined unrelated provisions. Whether ESSB 6346 crosses that line remains an unresolved legal question.

Frost also takes issue with the Seattle Times editorial board’s criticism of Initiative 645. He argues that repealing the income tax while leaving the accompanying tax relief intact would not prevent lawmakers from subsequently changing those provisions. The dispute centers on whether the constitutional two-year restriction on amending voter-approved laws would apply to provisions the initiative leaves untouched.

The Supreme Court hasn’t ruled on ESSB 6346’s compliance with the single-subject requirement. But its natural gas decision puts a pointed question on the table: Does Olympia’s tax package satisfy the constitutional rule the court just enforced against a voter-approved initiative? Read more at the Washington Policy Center.

Republican state Rep. Josh Penner is demanding answers after discovering that the online voters’ pamphlet displayed larger text for the argument opposing Initiative 645, the measure to repeal Washington’s new income tax. According to Seattle Red’s reporting, Secretary of State Steve Hobbs’ office initially denied any discrepancy but reversed course two days later, acknowledging a slight font-size variance and replacing the PDF. The office attributed the error to text imported from another file format and said the printed pamphlet showed no visible difference.

Penner says the discrepancy extends beyond I-645 to three separate initiative files, with larger text consistently appearing on the side opposing repeal. He told Jason Rantz that he reviewed 30 previous ballot-measure pages without finding the same issue and now suspects the pattern may have been intentional. That allegation remains unproven, and the Secretary of State’s Office attributes the acknowledged discrepancy to a formatting error.

Penner has filed a public records request and is calling for Secretary Hobbs to personally oversee an investigation, an independent third-party review and legislative scrutiny when lawmakers return to Olympia. His concern is that the office initially dismissed a measurable discrepancy in official voter information before acknowledging it only after he demonstrated the problem.

The controversy adds another dispute over how I-645 is being presented to voters, following the Washington Supreme Court’s 4–4 deadlock over the initiative’s public investment impact disclosure. Penner argues that the repeated formatting differences warrant an investigation independent of the office responsible for producing the pamphlet. Read more at Seattle Red.

In a new piece, Seattle Red’s Jason Rantz argues that the Washington Supreme Court’s 6–3 decision striking down Initiative 2066 should draw greater attention to the five Supreme Court races on November’s ballot. The natural gas measure received 1,941,474 votes in 2024, but the court’s majority ruled that it violated the state Constitution’s single-subject requirement. Three justices dissented.

The ruling demonstrates how consequential Washington’s judicial elections can be. Five of the Supreme Court’s nine seats are on the November 3 ballot. These races deserve far more public attention given the court’s authority over taxation, elections, criminal justice and voter-approved initiatives. Read more at Seattle Red.

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