The Republican National Committee is officially putting Washington’s 3rd Congressional District on the national midterm battlefield, and that is very bad news for Democrats who spent the last two election cycles insisting Marie Gluesenkamp Perez was untouchable.

RNC co-chair KC Crosbie announced the party is heading to Washington next month to help State Sen. John Braun’s campaign, train activists, and raise money for the state GOP. Translation: Republicans see WA-03 as a race they can win, not just one they want to annoy Democrats with.

That confidence is not coming out of nowhere. Braun was recently added to the NRCC’s MAGA Majority program, recent polling has him leading Gluesenkamp Perez by seven points, and Cook Political Report still lists the district as a toss-up heading into November.

Meanwhile, Gluesenkamp Perez’s carefully crafted “moderate Democrat” routine is looking shakier by the day. Sure, she occasionally tosses Republicans a vote or two so Seattle media can write another “independent-minded moderate” profile, but voters are increasingly noticing that her donors, party leadership, and overall voting record still tie her firmly to the national Democrat machine.

Republicans also have one major advantage Democrats would rather not talk about: money. Lots of it.

According to Crosbie, the RNC is sitting on roughly $120 million cash on hand while Democrats are reportedly operating in the red. That financial gap matters, especially in a district where Democrats already face growing frustration over the economy, crime, and the cost of living.

The RNC’s message is simple: Washington is in play.

And unlike Gluesenkamp Perez’s previous races against Joe Kent — a candidate many Republicans viewed as deeply flawed — Democrats may now be facing a much more disciplined challenger in Braun, who already has statewide leadership experience and a far more conventional campaign operation.

After years of Democrats acting like WA-03 belonged to them by default, voters may finally get a race where national Republicans show up ready to compete instead of merely making noise. Read more at Seattle Red.

Reporting from The Center Square continues to raise uncomfortable questions for Democrats in Olympia after investigators uncovered millions in questionable childcare subsidy payments tied to Washington’s Working Connections Child Care program.

According to The Center Square, State Auditor Pat McCarthy identified an estimated $37 million in questionable payments made to childcare providers in 2025, yet state officials have shown little appetite for a broader fraud investigation. Republican lawmakers, including State Sen. Leonard Christian and Senate Minority Leader John Braun, are now openly questioning why agencies appear more focused on shutting down scrutiny than restoring public confidence.

The Center Square’s investigation began months ago after reports of daycare fraud surfaced in Minnesota. Their reporting found numerous Washington daycare providers listed within close proximity to one another, in some cases with little visible evidence of actual daycare operations despite receiving substantial taxpayer subsidies. Records obtained by the outlet also showed at least one provider investigated for billing irregularities and poor recordkeeping, with no further action reportedly taken.

Instead of welcoming oversight, Democrats largely circled the wagons. House Speaker Laurie Jinkins criticized The Center Square’s investigative efforts earlier this year, while state agencies reportedly discouraged further digging and declined to launch expanded reviews.

Meanwhile, Gov. Bob Ferguson’s administration recently announced another $57 million in childcare grants, even as lawmakers continue asking basic questions about accountability and transparency. Adding to the skepticism, some grant recipients were reportedly listed only as anonymous “family home facility” operations without publicly identifying who received taxpayer funds.

Republicans argue the issue is not whether every provider committed fraud, but whether the state has any real interest in finding out. Democrats, on the other hand, appear determined to stick with the Olympia tradition of “move along, nothing to see here” — even when tens of millions of taxpayer dollars are involved. Read more at Center Square.

Let’s Go Washington founder Brian Heywood says the next phase of Olympia’s initiative fight is already predictable: delay, challenge, repeat.

According to Heywood, once the Attorney General’s office issues ballot titles for the latest initiatives, left-wing law firm Pacifica Law is expected to swoop in with legal challenges at the very last possible moment — not because the titles are flawed, but because dragging out the process helps Democrats politically.

Heywood says the strategy is simple. State law gives opponents five days to challenge a ballot title before it becomes official. Rather than filing immediately, challengers allegedly wait until day five at 4:59 p.m., burning nearly the entire clock before forcing the case into Thurston County courts.

Why? Two reasons, according to Heywood: confuse voters with rewritten ballot language and shrink the already tight timeline for gathering signatures.

That matters because Let’s Go Washington is pursuing initiatives to the people, meaning signatures must be submitted by July 2. Every week lost in court is one less week supporters can spend collecting signatures statewide.

And the delays may get even worse.

Heywood points to Thurston County’s growing backlog handling ballot title challenges, which he says has ballooned from roughly one week to as long as six weeks after lawmakers allegedly underfunded the system this session. Whether intentional or simply another example of government dysfunction, Heywood argues the effect is identical: fewer opportunities for voters to weigh in directly.

After watching Democrats attach a necessity clause to the state income tax to block a referendum, conservatives are understandably skeptical that these procedural slowdowns are just random coincidence.

Still, Heywood says grassroots momentum remains strong. He claims more volunteers signed up to collect petitions in the first few weeks of this campaign than during months of previous efforts, with nearly 1,000 small-dollar donors already contributing.

His message to supporters is straightforward: don’t wait for Olympia to stop playing games. Get the signature sheets now and start collecting before the clock runs out. Read more at Seattle Red.

The Washington State Standard recently highlighted just how chaotic Washington’s 2026 legislative races are already becoming. With all House seats and nearly half the Senate up for grabs, Olympia is heading into an election cycle full of retirements, redistricting fallout, and increasingly messy Democrat infighting.

One major flashpoint remains the Yakima Valley redistricting fight that pushed Republican lawmakers like Sen. Nikki Torres out of their districts after Democrats insisted their maps were supposedly fair. Meanwhile, in deep-blue districts, Democrats are now battling fellow Democrats over who can move the party even further left.

Washington State Standard also notes several competitive races (specifically in the 10th, 15th, 24th, 35th, and 39th Legislative Districts), where Republicans are focusing on affordability, crime, homelessness, and education — all weak spots for Democrats after years of one-party control in Olympia.

Even more telling: several Democrat candidates are suddenly branding themselves as “independent Democrats” or moderates, which is usually what politicians do when they realize voters are no longer thrilled with the product they’ve been selling. Read more at the Washington State Standard.

A new state audit found Centralia School District somehow managed to lose track of nearly 1,000 student Chromebooks worth an estimated $295,000 — proving once again that accountability in public education seems to disappear faster than the laptops themselves.

According to the Washington State Auditor’s Office, Centralia School District could not account for 986 of its 6,714 Chromebooks during a July 2025 inventory. Auditors also tested the district’s tracking system by selecting 20 devices at random. Staff failed to locate 11 of them. That is not exactly a glowing endorsement of the district’s asset management system.

The audit blamed the problem on what has become a familiar government excuse: staff were too busy and procedures were too inconvenient. Employees reportedly prioritized getting devices into students’ hands over actually documenting who received them, leading to undocumented swaps, skipped check-in procedures, and widespread tracking failures.

Even better, auditors noted this was not a new issue. The district had already been warned in a prior audit to tighten up controls, but apparently those recommendations were filed somewhere alongside the missing laptops.

Taxpayers fund the district with more than $60 million annually, yet officials still cannot maintain a reliable inventory system for some of the most theft-prone equipment schools own.

The district now says its technology department will take direct control over device assignments in an attempt to stop the chaos. Translation: they are finally implementing the oversight they were already supposed to have in place years ago. Read more at Center Square.

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