(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. The pair will likely rematch in this year’s November election.
Source images: Courtesy of the Office of Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez / Troy Brynelson/OPB
A rematch is brewing for Southwest Washington’s congressional seat after incumbent Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Trump-endorsed Joe Kent jumped out to insurmountable leads in the state’s primaries Tuesday night.
Gluesenkamp Perez, a freshman Democrat who won the red-tinted district in a shocking upset last cycle, tallied roughly 56,000 votes in the first night of ballot drops.
Kent, a Republican and retired Green Beret seeking his second chance in November, garnered about 46,000 votes. Another Republican candidate, Camas City Councilor Leslie Lewallen, received 15,000 votes. Lewallen conceded shortly after the ballot drop.
The district’s seven counties will now see a rerun of the 2022 matchup between Gluesenkamp Perez and Kent. Gluesenkamp Perez, an auto shop owner who ran a shoestring campaign and united left-leaning and right-of-center Republicans, defeated Kent by a little more than 2,600 votes last go-around.
U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez listens to a supporter at a bar in Vancouver, Wash., on Aug. 6, 2024. The incumbent is likely to rematch with Trump-backed Joe Kent this November to represent Washington's 3rd Congressional District.
Troy Brynelson / OPB
Both candidates welcomed the results on Tuesday night. Gluesenkamp Perez told OPB that her lead came by a wider margin than she expected.
“It’s encouraging to see the work we’ve been doing reflected in people coming out and supporting us,” she said. “It’s going to be a fight.”
Kent, meanwhile, told his primary night party that former President Donald Trump called him with congratulations. He said his campaign is exactly where they thought it would be and encouraged Lewallen’s supporters, and other voters, to unite behind him.
“We did really well,” Kent told supporters. “We’ve got a lot of really hard work ahead of us. Marie [Gluesenkamp] Perez and the Democrats are nothing to laugh at. These guys are very, very serious. They’re going to run a very hard campaign.”
Lewallen, in a press release, endorsed Kent.
“I support Joe in his campaign to defeat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez,” Lewallen said. “There is no margin for error and we have to flip this seat.”
As a freshman in a precarious seat in Congress, Gluesenkamp Perez has spent her first term making careful decisions about how she votes and with whom she aligns. She co-chaired the Blue Dog Coalition, a caucus of centrist Democrats with Republican-laden constituencies.
Her first term saw her break from Democrats multiple times, including voting against President Joe Biden’s plan to pay off student debt across the country. She was also an early public critic of Biden’s electability after his performance debating Trump.
Her platform has often centered on workers, supporting union efforts and increasing economic opportunities through legislation like Right to Repair, a movement that aims to thwart aggressive warranty tactics by large companies.
Republican congressional candidate Joe Kent speaks to supporters 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, meanwhile, has remained a Trump loyalist. The ex-CIA staffer, whose U.S. Navy cryptologist wife died in a suicide bombing in 2019, recently netted Trump’s endorsement for the second time.
In recent campaign stops, he has focused on immigration and legislation around transgender people. He also previously favored a national abortion ban, but has since has walked that back saying it is a state’s rights issue.
Last time, Kent’s platform largely centered on false claims that Biden stole the 2020 election and that vote-by-mail was designed to benefit Democrats.
Kent also made headlines last cycle for aligning too closely with far-right actors. For example, Kent distanced himself from white nationalist Nick Fuentes after acknowledging to OPB he once held a meeting with him over social media collaboration.