Republican Joe Kent, left, and U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, right are competing for the U.S. House seat in the 3rd Congressional District. (Amanda Cowan/The Columbian)
Democratic U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez has defeated Republican Joe Kent, earning a second term and providing her party a much-needed win in its pursuit of the House majority.
Gluesenkamp Perez, who represents the 3rd Congressional District in southwest Washington, had 51.9% of the vote as of Saturday afternoon and led Kent by 16,340 votes, the largest margin since Tuesday’s election.
The congresswoman declared victory Thursday after The Columbian called the race in her favor. The Associated Press called the race following Saturday’s tally of votes.
“I’m deeply grateful for this vote of confidence in the work I’ve done to set aside national politics and represent our community,” she said in a statement issued Thursday. “Our heritage as fiercely independent, loyal fighters for our community is as clear to me as it was the day my family and I decided to ask for the privilege of working for our community.”
Representatives of Kent and his campaign could not be reached for comment.
This was a rematch of the 2022 battle in which Gluesenkamp Perez won by a couple thousand votes in one of that year’s biggest ballot upsets. Her win cost the Republican Party a congressional seat it had held for more than a decade.
Democrats set out this year to retake the House majority and retaining this seat was critical to the party’s chance of success. Republicans, meanwhile, wanted to win back the 3rd District.
As of Saturday, control of the House was still unclear. Republicans have won at least 212 seats and Democrats 201, based on AP estimates. It takes 218 for a majority.
Gluesenkamp Perez, in her statement, rebuked those who doubted she could win again.
“Some far-away pundits and prognosticators swore I would lose this re-election campaign from the moment I took office,” she said. “They dismissed our victory in 2022 as a fluke or an accident, and scoffed at the possibility that someone from the trades, the mom of a toddler, who didn’t have elected experience could effectively fight for her community in Congress, much less win re-election after being targeted as the most vulnerable Democratic incumbent in the country.”
“But like two years ago, pundits made a fundamental mistake by viewing this race through a partisan lens,” she said. “Our community has never seen ourselves this way, and it’s not how we evaluate who merits our vote for Congress.
Gluesenkamp Perez positioned herself as a moderate Democrat, touting her willingness to work across the aisle and to oppose President Joe Biden’s border security policies and his proposals for student loan forgiveness.
She tried to paint Kent as an outsider in the district who’d flirted with anti-government ideas and characters.
Kent, a former U.S. Army Special Forces soldier, was endorsed by President-elect Donald Trump who won the district in 2020 and was on track to do so again in this election.
Kent tried to convince voters Gluesenkamp Perez was too liberal on issues like immigration and law enforcement and had only taken moderate votes for show on legislation that was doomed to fail in the Senate.
Gluesenkamp Perez outraised Kent by a wide margin. She reported nearly $10 million in contributions, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. Kent raised about a quarter of that amount per his Federal Election Commission filings.
Democratic and Republican organizations, and an array of political committees, spent roughly $18 million independent of the candidates in the race, according to Open Secrets.
As of Oct. 31, Kent had been the target of $8.3 million in opposition spending, with the House Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the House Majority PAC accounting for roughly $6 million of the total.
There was $6.2 million spent against Gluesenkamp Perez, nearly all of it by the National Republican Congressional Committee, based on data compiled by Open Secrets.
House Speaker Mike Johnson visited the district twice to help Kent raise money, most recently on Oct. 24 for a get-out-the-vote rally. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise also came to the district. In the final week before the election, Trump joined a call with Kent to help him make a closing argument to voters.
The 3rd district compasses Clark, Cowlitz, Lewis, Pacific, Wahkiakum, and Skamania counties and a small part of Thurston County. The district’s southern boundary is the Columbia River.