Washington 3: Same Place, Different Face
Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is one of the unlikeliest stories in the House of Representatives. First, the body shop owner who grew up in a Spanish-language evangelical church in Texas was the only Democrat to flip a Donald Trump-won district in a year that saw her party lose control of the House. Then, she cemented her position with a statement win in 2024, outrunning Vice President Kamala Harris by 7 points.
That’s given Gluesenkamp Perez outsized prominence in her caucus, where she’s quickly become a media darling and one of the more recognizable and eccentric Democrats in Washington, DC.
But Gluesenkamp Perez had help along the way, from an unlikely source: her two-time GOP opponent, Joe Kent, a Special Forces veteran who angered many Republicans in the district by ousting a moderate six-term incumbent in the primary and whose personal baggage made him toxic to some outside GOP groups,donors — and general election voters.
Should Gluesenkamp Perez’s wins in 2022 and 2024 carry an asterisk? The answer may lay in the next election, where Republicans look to nominate a candidate quite different from Kent: John Braun, a well-liked, low-key state legislator with a healthy Rolodex.
All that points to a highly competitive race in the Pacific Northwest for a district that was on few pundits’ bingo cards at the start of the decade.
The Lay of the Land
Washington’s 3rd District sits in the Olympic State’s southwest corner, bordering Oregon to the south, the Cascades to the…
