Washington's 8th congressional district

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The Eighth Congressional District of Washington includes most of the region known as the Eastside and the mostly-rural eastern parts of King and Pierce Counties. It is currently represented in the U.S. House of Representatives by Dave Reichert.

Since its creation after the 1980 Census, the Eight District has been the most reliably Republican district in the state of Washington; it has never elected a Democrat to Congress. In recent years, however, the changing demographics of the Puget Sound region have made the Eighth significantly less conservative. In 2004, Reichert, at the time serving as the sheriff of King County, beat his Democratic opponent Dave Ross by 52% to 48%, a surprisingly small margin, in the race to replace retiring Rep. Jennifer Dunn; that year, voters in the district favored Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.

Former Microsoft project manager Darcy Burner (D) is challenging Rep. Reichert in 2006. Influential election analyst Charlie Cook lists the upcoming contest among 68 competitive or potentially competitive House races to watch in 2006, now categorizing it as a "toss-up" (defined as "the most competitive; Either party has a good chance of winning."^[1] Burner is one of 22 House challengers selected by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) for fundraising assistance with its "Red to Blue" program, aimed at unseating vulnerable Republican incumbents around the country.^[2]

As of 10:48 pm PST on November 13th, CNN reports that Reichert has a 51% to 49% lead over Burner with 75% of the precincts reporting. Burner has a slight edge in King county votes (81,593 to 80,949), but Reichert has a 4,158 vote lead in Pierce county. Burner hoped that the more than 125,000 absentee ballots cast in King county would push her to victory, but by Monday, November 13th this had failed to happen. The Associated Press expects Reichert to be declared the victor, as reported by the Seattle Times.

Burner called Reichert to congratulate him Monday night. She will hold a press conference Tuesday, November 14th.

Contents 1 Representatives 2 See also 3 External links 4 References

[edit] Representatives

Representative	Party	Term
Rodney Dennis Chandler	Republican	1983 – 1993
Jennifer Blackburn Dunn	Republican	1993 – 2005
Dave Reichert	Republican	2005 – present

[edit] See also

• Washington United States House elections, 2004
• Washington United States House elections, 2006

[edit] External links

• Web site of U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert
• Web site of Democratic challenger Darcy Burner

[edit] References

1. ^ Cook, Charlie. "2006 competitive House race chart." The Cook Political Report, October 11th, 2006. (warning: PDF)
2. ^ Hearn, Josephine. "Internal DCCC list pins hopes on 22 challengers." The Hill, April 27, 2006.

Washington's congressional districts
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