Top Two Primary

Votes are still coming in via the U.S. Mail causing leads to shrink and expand all over the state.

In the governor's race, Dino Rossi has cut Chris Gregoire's lead by a point after two more days of returns, from a four point deficit to what is now 48.8 percent for Gregoire and 45.7 percent for the Republican. He has also erased Gregoire's lead in the two Eastern Washington counties she once held, Spokane and Asotin.

Rossi has also take over Clark and Cowlitz Counties, making the updated Spokesman-Review map look a lot more red

David Ammons, the long time Associated Press reporter turned communications director for Secretary of State Sam Reed, has sent out a press release highlighting what the office sees as the major stories in the first ever top two primary.

The release, seen here, focuses on the races around the state that either led to a slate of all Republicans or all Democrats in the general election, or those that allowed a minor party candidate into the top two. All of those listed occurred in heavily partisan districts.

For all of those who share PolitickerWA.com's visual learning tendencies and general enthusiasm for maps, today's Spokesman-Review graphic is worth a look. The Lilac City paper has color coded the county-by-county results that are in so far for the governor's race where, as of Wednesday night, Chris Gregoire led Dino Rossi by four percentage points, 49.2 to 45.2.

The map assigns the color red to counties where Rossi leads, and blue to those in Gregoire's column, and the stronger the lead, the darker the color. Here is the map for Tuesday's primary. Contrast that with 2004's general election here.

With Spokane and Asotin Counties currently tilting blue, Tuesday's primary map takes an eerily similar look to another map political junkies know by heart.

In addition to the handful of races across the state where the outcome was in doubt prior to Tuesday, there were still plenty of elections with known commodities as far as who the top two would be, but nevertheless had some drama in terms of vote share.

These were the beauty contest races where candidates could get a rough look into the electoral mirror before heading into November's general election.

Republicans will probably be a little disappointed with the results from their coveted state senate seats in the 2nd and 10th LD, where Democratic incumbents rolled with substantial margins.

Same goes for Democrats in the 18th and 26th Legislative Districts. In LD 18 Rep. Jaime Herrera polled fourteen points higher than Democrat VaNessa Duplessie, though Clark County Democrats might take some satisfaction in the unexpectedly close primaries for the 17th and 18th LD senate races. And up in LD 26, Democrat Kim Abel finished behind Republican Jan Angel despite favorable Democratic results in the rest of the district.

Rep. Jim McIntire, candidate for state treasurer: Politicker PhotoState Rep. Jim McIntire, who retired this year in order to make a run for state treasurer, appears well-positioned to continue on to the general election despite the presence of fellow Democrat ChangMook Sohn in the primary, the well-funded and well-respected chief economist for the state. It was widely expected to be one of the closest races of the night between second and third place candidates.

At the end of the night McIntire narrowly trailed Assistant State Treasurer Allan Martin, a Republican, in statewide polling but held a large lead over Sohn. With 766,357 votes counted, Martin had 44.3 percent of the vote compared to 40.7 percent for McIntire and 15.0 percent for Sohn.

Attorney General Rob McKenna has issued a statement expressing his thoughts on the early returns from today's "top two" primary that show him with a 12 point lead over Democrat John Ladenburg.

Read the full statement below.

The state's two major party chairmen both painted a rosy picture of their respective factions' outlooks heading into the general election once all of the primary votes are counted.

Democrat Dwight Pelz felt particularly strong about the state's two most hotly contested reaces and Republican Luke Esser had high hopes for the slate of Republican statewide hopefuls.

SEATTLE -

The crowd at the Gregoire primary night party was lively, clapping their hands and chanting "four more years" as Gov. Chris Gregoire and her husband, First Mike, walked into the room.

Rep. Eric Pettigrew (D-Seattle) introduced Gregoire, and spoke of how the party was proudest of the counties they were competing in, rather than the victory as a whole.  Pettigrew cited Gregoire's 9:30 PM lead in counties like Cowlitz, Grays Harbor, Kitsap, and Pierce that she had lost in 2004. At press time, Gregoire led Rossi 360,428 to 341,474.

Flanked on stage by her husband and daughter/campaign staffer Michelle, Gregoire basked in what appears to be a strong showing for her campaign an hour and a half into the ballot counting.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi has made a statement on tonight's electoral results. He said he was pleased with his showing, which so far is eleven roughly points higher than his 34 percent standing in 2004.

See the full statement below the jump.

The secretary of state's office is reporting smooth going for the "top two" primary so far, with ballot counting having been active throughout the day and the earliest reports coming in at 8:00 PM.

"Things have been pretty smooth so far," said Christina Siderius, the new media communications director for the secretary of state.

Shea said the Secretary of State Sam Reed's predictions of turnout in the high 40s percentage still held, but there would be no way to really tell for a couple of days.