Days after President Joe Biden upended the presidential election by abandoning his bid for a second term, a Clark County man asked Republican congressional candidate Joe Kent for his thoughts.
(Left to right) U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.) testifies before the House Armed Services Committee in April 2024. Joe Kent speaks with supporters at the Clark County Republican Party Headquarters in Vancouver, Wash., July 31, 2024. Political insiders expect the pair will rematch in this year’s November election.
Source images: Courtesy of the Office of Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez / Troy Brynelson/OPB
“Crazy times we’re living in, huh?” Kent said, shrugging his shoulders. Supporters laughed as they set up camp chairs at the rural county park for a mid-summer town hall. “It’s definitely not boring, and it’s only July.”
Kent, who is running for a second time to represent Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, was unbothered. To him, Biden’s departure changed nothing about his accusations that the president’s administration floundered the economy and welcomed droves of immigrants across the southern U.S. border. Vice President Kamala Harris was just as culpable, he said.
And his opponent, Democratic U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, moved “in lockstep” with that agenda, he told the crowd.
“I don’t think it matters because her voting record, and basically every Democrat voting record, reflects that they support these policies,” Kent said, even though Gluesenkamp Perez has also been critical of federal immigration policy.
Despite floods of donations and headlines about a rejuvenated Democratic ticket, Kent and other Republicans have downplayed Harris’ sudden rise and its potential to buoy down-ballot Democrats.
Washington’s 3rd District, which will have its primary Aug. 6, is a tried and true swing district, and a potential window into how the latest unexpected turn in the presidential race could affect local politics. But analysts, political insiders and the candidates here believe that the presidential reshuffling will have little effect on the race.
Rather, both candidates seem to agree that the best path to victory in the primary, and possibly November, is to distance themselves from the Biden administration.
‘No plans’ to endorse Harris
Gluesenkamp Perez urged Biden to step aside July 11, two weeks after the president’s fateful debate performance. Days prior, she had told TV reporters that she believed Trump would win head-to-head.
U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.) is seen in this undated supplied image. Gluesenkamp Perez joined Congress in 2023.
Courtesy of Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez
On Tuesday, she told OPB even with Biden out, she still has “no plans” to endorse Harris.
“Like a lot of people in my community, I’m interested to learn more about her. I’m interested to see what policies she puts forward, what her vision is for getting our economy and cost of living and those things reoriented,” the incumbent said.
Gluesenkamp Perez defeated Kent two years ago by a hair more than 2,600 votes. A rematch appears likely if trends hold in the August primary. Both candidates believe it will be the case come November.
Leslie Lewallen, a Camas city councilor running as a Republican, has raised about $820,462. While significant, it is considerably less than the other two candidates and their respective committees.
She doesn’t believe Kent can win enough right-of-center Republicans. She calls him extreme; and, like Kent, has portrayed Gluesenkamp Perez as a Biden proxy.
“Complete strangers come up to me and say, ‘I’m so excited there’s an alternative to Joe Kent and I didn’t want to vote for Marie Gluesenkamp Perez the last time,’” Lewallen told OPB.
Kent, at his town hall in a rural Clark County park, wore the flannel shirt and rolled-up sleeves that have become his uniform as a politician. He discussed little about his personal history that was his trademark during his 2022 campaign — a retired Green Beret who lost his wife to a suicide bomber in Syria — as he’s much more of a known quantity this cycle.
Congressional candidate Joe Kent speaks to a crowd of volunteers in Kalama, Washington, in September. Kent, a career soldier and Gold Star husband, has sought out the most conservative wings of Southwest Washington voters.
Troy Brynelson / OPB
He remains a Trump protégé and invoked the city of Portland as a cautionary tale of crime and lawlessness unleashed by Democratic policies.
“We’re going to expose Perez’s record, we’re gonna expose Kamala Harris’s record,” Kent told the crowd.
Gluesenkamp Perez, meanwhile, is wrapping her freshman term in Washington D.C. The Skamania County resident, who co-owns an auto body shop in Portland, deployed a blue-collar, middle-of-the-road campaign to garner enough Republican and independent support to win the 2022 midterms.
Marie Gluesenkamp Perez evaluates a part that requires maintenance at Dean's Car Care, an auto-repair shop located in NE Portland which she co-owns with her husband on June 30th, 2022. Gluesenkamp-Perez, a democrat, is a candidate for Washington's 3rd Congressional District.
Jenna Deml / OPB
While Kent is a direct opponent to Democrats and the president, Gluesenkamp Perez has gained a reputation for distancing herself from the party’s preferred policies at times. She believes her centrist streak and the district’s purple makeup will win voters who are on the fence.
“Who is at the top of the ticket does not change the demographics and basic facts of this community,” she said in a phone interview from her home. “We are very independent over here.”
According to a recent analysis by FiveThirtyEight, Gluesenkamp Perez and Biden agreed about half the time. In 54 bills passed by the House in 2023, she voted yes on 53.7% of bills — the second-lowest percentage among Democrats.
This time, Trump is on the ballot, too
The congresswoman acknowledged that the dynamics of the midterms are not the same during a presidential election. Former president Donald Trump, who won the district in 2016 and 2020, will be on the ballot this November.
“This is a deep-red seat,” Gluesenkamp Perez said.
Yet, it’s rife with middle-of-the-road voters. Her Republican predecessor, Jaime Herrera Beutler, outperformed Trump in both election years. Her ouster came only after she voted to impeach him.
Jordan Evich, a former Herrera Beutler campaign staffer who is now a lobbyist, said the district doesn’t skew as conservative as Trump and Kent. The district favored Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton in 2016, for example.
“There’s been a lot of vote switching in Southwest Washington,” he said. “I think with split-ticket voting, Southwest Washington is a little more unique than the country at large.”
The district made Herrera Beutler the first Hispanic woman in Congress, Evich noted, and picked a Latina to succeed her.
Still, a congressperson’s first re-election campaign is often difficult, he said. You learn the nuances of the job. And powerful constituencies, such as timber groups, law enforcement or shellfish growers, have a better sense if they want to support you or not.
“You want to make sure that you show them you have a reason to return,” Evich said.
Gluesenkamp Perez and Kent are in a dead heat, according to one recent poll. The Northwest Progressive Institute in June released a poll of 650 likely voters showing Kent had garnered 46% of support to Gluesenkamp Perez’s 45%. Nine percent remained undecided.
Andrew Villeneuve, Northwest Progressive Institute’s executive director, noted that poll predated Harris’ rise, which has electrified the party and led to a $200 million deluge of donations to the vice president’s campaign in its first week.
“There is such a thing in politics as the coattails effect, so we shouldn’t be surprised if we see it,” Villeneuve said. Still, he noted, it’s too soon to say what, if any, coattails Harris has.
“We don’t really know if it will be helpful just yet, because it’s such a fresh development, but the early indicators are that nobody in Washington state politics as a Democrat is hurting at all from this change,” Villeneuve said.
Republican congressional candidate Joe Kent waves to a supporter at Clark County Republican Party headquarters on July 31, 2024. Kent is likely to face a rematch with Democrat U.S. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez for Washington's 3rd Congressional District seat.
Troy Brynelson / OPB
Kent said he’s not worried. The Republican numbers are large enough to overcome any late bump for Democrats, he said, and the GOP is also much more unified behind Trump now.
“I think we’re going to see much more Republican unity,” he told OPB.
Similarly, Republicans aren’t in-fighting as much as last cycle. Kent and two other Republicans split the right-leaning vote during the 2022 primaries.
That hard-fought Republican race cost him financially, Kent said, which won’t be the case this year with Lewallen as the only other conservative competition.
“It’s a huge relief to not watch our war chest get sucked down every single day as we head into the primary,” Kent said.
Unlike Gluesenkamp Perez, Kent is leaning into his party’s nominee. Trump endorsed him in the last cycle and did so again on Sunday. The Republican told OPB he believes Trump’s second bid for the White House will give him a better chance to win this time.
“How bad things are in the country, that’s going to bring people over to our side,” he said. “But then, also, Trump brings out the energetic base.”