Washington: who should earn your vote for Congress in 2026
Opinion · The paper’s scorecard
Washington: every race for Congress on the 3 November 2026 ballot, and how the candidates measure up against our standards.
Sitting and former members are scored on the same key votes, read from the official House and Senate roll calls; each vote links to the record. Candidates who have never served in Congress have no votes to score, and outside the battlegrounds we have not researched them, so they are marked as not scored. Where only one candidate could be measured, the mark rates that record on its own; it is not a verdict on the opponent. How the marks work · All states
District 1 D+15
No mark
Suzan DelBene
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 27 key votes · total +0
- ✗Smaller government
- ~Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ✗Free speech
- ✓No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime
With us (12)
Mary Silva
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
District 2 D+12
No mark
Edwin Feller
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
Rick Larsen
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 27 key votes · total -2
- ✗Smaller government
- ~Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✗Light touch on tech
- ~Free speech
- ~No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime
With us (10)
District 3 R+2
✓ Our pick: John Braun
Our pick
John Braun
Republican
No votes in Congress: scored on platform and record, promises at half weight · total +4
- ✓Smaller government
- ✗Small business over giants
- ✗Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ✓Free speech
- ~No surveillance state
- ~Home first, open trade
- ✓Checks on power
- ✓Right to bear arms
- ✓Hard on violent crime
With us (16)
- Voted Nay on ESSB 5096, the state capital gains excise tax, on Senate final passage (25-24, March 6, 2021) and on the conference report (April 25, 2021). Source
- Voted Nay on the 2025 tax bills ESSB 5813 (more progressive capital gains and estate tax rates, 27-21) and ESSB 5814 (modifying excise taxes; his campaign says it extended sales tax to services) on final passage, April 24, 2025. Source
- Voted Nay on E2SSB 5126, the Climate Commitment Act creating the state cap-and-invest carbon program, on final passage (27-22, April 24, 2021). Source
Against us (3)
- Voted Yea on ESSB 5952 (42-2, November 9, 2013), which extended aerospace-industry tax preferences and expanded a sales-tax exemption for commercial-airplane manufacturing facilities (the Boeing 777X package). Source
- Voted Nay on ESSB 5179 (28-20, February 27, 2023), which increased access to the Washington Death with Dignity Act. Source
- Voted Nay on ESSB 6280 (30-18 on February 19, 2020; 27-21 conference report, March 12, 2020), which requires a warrant or exigent circumstances for ongoing or real-time government facial-recognition surveillance and agency accountability reports. Source
Marie Gluesenkamp Perez
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 20 key votes · total +1
- ✗Smaller government
- ✓Small business over giants
- ?Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ✗Free speech
- ✗No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ✓Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✓Hard on violent crime
With us (12)
District 4 R+10
No mark
Dan Newhouse (R): incumbent retiring.
John Duresky
Democrat
No congressional voting record; not scored
Amanda McKinney
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
District 5 R+5
Leans our way: Michael Baumgartner
Leans our way
Michael Baumgartner
Republican · incumbent
Scored on 11 key votes · total +1
- ✓Smaller government
- ✓Small business over giants
- ?Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ?Free speech
- ✗No surveillance state
- ✗Home first, open trade
- ✗Checks on power
- ?Right to bear arms
- ✓Hard on violent crime
With us (6)
Carmela Conroy
Democrat
No congressional voting record; not scored
District 6 D+10
No mark
Teresa Fox
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
Emily Randall
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 10 key votes · total -1
- ✗Smaller government
- ✗Small business over giants
- ?Live and let live
- ✗Light touch on tech
- ?Free speech
- ✓No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ✓Checks on power
- ?Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime
With us (5)
District 7 D+39
No mark
Pramila Jayapal
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 27 key votes · total +0
- ✗Smaller government
- ~Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✗Light touch on tech
- ✓Free speech
- ✓No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime
With us (13)
Nirav Sheth
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
District 8 D+3
No mark
Spencer Meline
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
Kim Schrier
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 26 key votes · total +0
- ✗Smaller government
- ~Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ✗Free speech
- ✗No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✓Hard on violent crime
With us (12)
District 9 D+22
No mark
Doug Basler
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
Adam Smith
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 27 key votes · total -4
- ✗Smaller government
- ~Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✗Light touch on tech
- ✗Free speech
- ✗No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime
With us (8)
District 10 D+9
No mark
Chris Chung
Republican
No congressional voting record; not scored
Marilyn Strickland
Democrat · incumbent
Scored on 24 key votes · total +0
- ✗Smaller government
- ✓Small business over giants
- ✓Live and let live
- ✓Light touch on tech
- ✗Free speech
- ~No surveillance state
- ✓Home first, open trade
- ~Checks on power
- ✗Right to bear arms
- ✗Hard on violent crime