The congressman representing the district surrounding the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state is facing off with five challengers in an Aug. 4 primary for which voting by mail has already started.
Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) has represented the 4th Congressional District in central Washington since January 2015. As a member of House Appropriations Committee and its energy and water subcommittee, Newhouse has frequently lobbied to fund cleanup at the former plutonium production facility and for money to resume licensing for the planned nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
An 18-day vote by mail period started July 17. The top two candidates will face off in the Nov. 3 general election. In his last race in November 2018, Newhouse easily defended his seat by carrying almost 63% of the vote against Democrat Christine Brown.
This time around, Newhouse is facing: Democrat Doug McKinley, an attorney; Libertarian Ryan Cooper, a former Army National Guard member who previously ran an unsuccessful race for the Washington state Senate; Independent Evan Jones, a consultant and former high school educator; Republican Sarena Sloot, a nurse practitioner; and Republican Tracy Wright.
There are roughly 690,000 people in the 4th District, which includes Adams, Benton, Franklin, Grant, Okanogan, and Yakima counties and parts of Douglas and Walla Walla counties.
