WA voters are sticking with party lines and paying attention

Though sources varied among parties, 91% of Cascade PBS/Elway poll respondents said they look at news several times a week and 64% said they look daily.

A picture of Dave Reichert and Bob Freguson on the debate stage

Gubernatorial candidates Dave Reichert and Bob Ferguson face off in a debate on Sept. 18, 2024. 

As ballots begin to arrive in Washington mailboxes, a new Cascade PBS/Elway poll reveals that voters are voting along party lines this election – and paying close attention to the races through a variety of news sources. 

Ninety-one percent of those polled said they looked at current-affairs news sources several times a week, including 64% of respondents who said they look at the news daily. Only 4% of those polled said they haven’t been paying attention to the news this election.

Age, education and income are factors as well: 45% of those under 35 consume news daily compared to 73% of voters over 65; 57% of those without a college degree said they consumed news daily compared to 66% of voters with a college degree; and 55% of those who make under $50,000 said they consumed news daily compared to 69% whose income is over $100,000.

Asked what types and how many sources of news they consumed, respondents said, on average, they pay attention to 3.7 sources, with those who consume news daily saying they look at four sources daily, compared to those who said they rarely consume news saying they used an average of two sources. 

Online news is a top source of information for 55% of respondents, followed by social media at 43%, network TV at 39%, local TV at 38% and 36% citing friends as a source of information. 

Types of news consumed changed depending on political party, with 57% of Republicans naming online news as their top source and 49% of Democrats saying the same. Other top sources for Republicans included Fox News (53%), local TV (39%) and friends (34%). Top sources for Democrats included network TV (50%), public media including PBS and NPR (42%), and MSNBC (36%). And 42% of respondents from both political parties said they used social media as a top source. The people polled were allowed to choose as many sources as they want, so the numbers do not add up to 100%.

Bob Steenrod, a retired 69-year-old who lives in SeaTac, said that his major sources of news are outlets like local radio stations, the social media platform X, and Newsmax, but that he will also pay attention to other news outlets that are readily available. 

Steenrod said he is not voting for former President Donald Trump as a person, but instead because he liked Trump administration policies such as the economy and support for the police, and because he believed Trump would protect the electoral college.

“So, I’m not really voting for Trump the person, I’m voting for restoring our country to where it was, so that my children and grandchildren have more freedom,” he added.

Steenrod also said he would vote for Republican gubernatorial candidate Dave Reichert because he will align more with his own personal beliefs and because he believes he will support law enforcement. 

The latest Cascade PBS/Elway poll was conducted statewide Oct. 8-12 with 41 respondents on landlines, 144 with live interviewers on cell phones, and 216 responding via text through an online survey. It has a margin of error of ± 5% at a 95% confidence level, which means if the same survey were conducted 100 times, the results would be within five percentage points at least 95 times.

Of the 401 likely voters polled throughout the state, 45% said they identify as a Democrat, 26% as a Republican, 25% said independent and 4% had no answer.

Statewide Voter Guide

Presidential race results

The poll also took another look at individual races this election. 

Vice President Kamala Harris ranked higher in this poll at 57% than she did in September during the last Cascade PBS/Elway poll, when she garnered 53% of support from voters polled. Trump polled at 32%, while 3% noted they will vote for someone else and 8% said they were undecided. This poll looked at a small group of voters. In September we polled a subset of registered voters; this time we polled only likely voters – people who voted at least once in 2022 and 2020, plus new registrants since 2022.

Fifty percent of Harris voters said they were voting to keep Trump out of office compared to 25% who said it was more important to get Harris into office. Another 25% said both were equally important. 

For Democrats polled, the choice to vote for Harris is overwhelming: 97% of base Democratic voters said they will vote for her compared to 86% of Democratic-leaning independents who said they will vote Harris. Only 1% of base and Democratic-leaning independents said they will vote for Trump. 

Trump, on the other hand, polled at only 89% with base Republicans and 76% of Republican-leaning independents. About 5% of base Republicans said they would vote for Harris. 

For Trump voters, 58% said their vote was aimed at putting Trump back in the White House, compared to 21% who said it was important to keep Harris out of the office. Those who said both were equally important polled at 22%.

Harris also led among true independents in the poll, with 41% compared to Trump’s 0%. Among true independents, 52% said they were undecided and 7% said they were voting for someone other than the top two candidates. 

The results are not all that surprising compared to past Washington elections, such as 2020 when President Joe Biden earned 58% of the vote to Trump’s 39%. Similarly, 53% of Washington voters cast their ballots for Hillary Clinton in 2016 compared to Trump’s 37%.

Harris also ranked at 57% in a Seattle Times poll released Wednesday, compared to 35% of respondents who said they would vote for Trump.  

Governor's race 

The poll also looked at statewide elections including the governor’s race, but not much has changed since the last Cascade PBS/Elway poll from September. Of those polled in October, Democrat Bob Ferguson led 51% to Reichert’s 37%. In September, Ferguson led Reichert 50% to 39%. 

While 72% of respondents said the choice was clear between the candidates, 10% said it was a hard choice between “not very good” candidates and 6% said it was a hard choice between two good candidates.

The poll revealed some interesting surprises about voting preferences this election cycle. 

Carl Pierce, a 56-year-old real estate asset manager who lives in Black Diamond, said he is a registered Democrat voting for Harris and Reichert this year. Pierce said he pays attention to the news every day through outlets like The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and other local news outlets, and believes that Harris “is very qualified based on her experience as an attorney general in the state of California, a senator from California and vice president.”

“I also feel like she will respect the Constitution and she will not try to destroy our republic,” Pierce added. 

As someone who manages some large real estate investments in Seattle’s downtown area, however, Pierce said he feels like crime and open drug use have “gotten out of hand” while Ferguson was attorney general, and said he will be voting for the Republican gubernatorial candidate.

“I just feel like Dave Reichert would bring a more sensible, moderate approach to handling crime in some of the major cities in the state,” he said. 

While Pierce is undecided on the attorney general race, his answers to the poll showed that he will be supporting Democrat Upthegrove in the lands commissioner race.

Democrats polled at 92% support for Ferguson, while only 74% of Democratic-voting independents said they supported Ferguson. Reichert’s support from base Republicans and Republican-voting independents polled at 89%. Reichert led with support from true independents with 30% compared to Ferguson’s 19%. 

Party and philosophy ranked high as a reason to vote for both candidates: 19% cited party and philosophy as a reason to vote for Ferguson while 17% cited party and philosophy as a reason to vote for Reichert. For Ferguson, 17% cited his experience and job performance as a reason, while 10% said the same for Reichert. And Reichert appears to be slightly more popular than Ferguson, with 14% of likely voters saying they "don't like him" about Ferguson compared to 6% saying they don't like Reichert. 

Attorney General race

Attorney general results come from 339 interviews instead of 401 due to a mislabeling error for the first 64 interviews. The margin of error for this question is ±5.3% instead of ±5.0% like all other questions in the poll. 

Democrat Nick Brown leads in what appears to be a party-line election, with 47% of polled voters saying they would vote for Brown over Pete Serrano, who polled at 29%. Of those, 79% of base Democrats said they would vote for Brown and 66% of Democrat-voting independents said the same. For Serrano, 82% of base Republicans said they would vote for him, with 67% of Republican-voting independents saying the same. 

Stuart Elway noted that Serrano has a long-shot chance as 24% of those polled still remain undecided and Brown is still polling under 50%, but said that 18% is still a “big gap to close.” 

Lands Commissioner race

The closest of the races polled this month is the lands commissioner race, with 41% voting for Democrat Dave Upthegrove, 35% voting for Jaime Herrera Beutler and 24% still undecided. 

Poll results show that support for Herrera Beutler has more unified party support, with 82% of base Republicans and 78% of Republican-voting independents saying they would vote for her. Upthegrove’s support was not as strong, with only 72% of base Democrats and 50% of Democrat-voting independents saying they would vote for him.

Among true independents, Herrera Beutler led with 30% over Upthegrove’s 15%.

Some voters polled said they are making different choices this year. 

A 30-year-old oncology nurse who did not want her name printed due to fear of retaliation in her profession told Cascade PBS that while she considers herself an independent, she is voting for all Democratic candidates this election year to make a statement based on what she has seen in health care. 

During her career, she has seen the direct impact of having to tell patients day-to-day that a hospital no longer offered Death with Dignity care or ectopic pregnancy care after it was bought out by one of the many Catholic health care systems in Washington.

“Health care access is a huge concern of mine,” she said. “Abortion rights is a really big issue of mine because it doesn’t just affect a small population of people who are financially unable to care for a child and that’s their main concern. It affects much wider than that.”  

The latest Cascade PBS/Elway poll also looked at responses to the initiatives, and that information can be found here

The last day to turn in ballots for the general election is Nov. 5. 

CORRECTION: This version corrects the section about the popularity of the gubernatorial candidates to clarify that those answers came from all the people polled, not the individual candidates' supporters.

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About the Authors & Contributors

Shauna Sowersby

Shauna Sowersby

Shauna Sowersby is the state politics reporter for Cascade PBS. She previously covered the Legislature for McClatchy’s northwest newspapers and freelanced for several local and national publications. Before that, Shauna worked for the U.S. Navy as a photographer and journalist. You can find her on X at @Shauna_Sowersby.