Friend of Washington’s Environment,

With Tuesday’s federal General Election results, so many of our communities are whiplashed back to a darker time in America. Women, queer and trans people, immigrants, people of color, people with disabilities, low-income people, Tribes and more–all face the same anxiety, fear, and insecurity that was all too familiar just four years ago. We are grieving, to say the least.

For everyone struggling and mourning right now, we are with you. We always will be. We did everything in our power to fight for the future of our communities and our environment.

 And the results in our state provide a glimmer of hope that we all could use right now.

In our Washington, environmental champions won overwhelmingly across the state, and we defeated Initiative 2117, which would have repealed the landmark carbon pricing law we passed in 2021. Initiative 2066, which would slow our transition from gas to electricity, is still too close to call. We fought hard to defeat I-2006, We found that as voters learned more, they leaned toward rejecting 2066. We hope that trend will hold.

• Bob Ferguson is our next Governor. As attorney general, he sued the first Trump administration 100 times, and only lost three times.
• Nick Brown, becomes our state’s first Black man elected as Attorney General.
• Dave Upthegrove is our next Commissioner of Public Lands, the first out-LGBTQ person elected to executive office.
• And, many environmental champions won across the state
• We got more than 58,000 new or infrequent voters to vote for the environment.

I share this because, when conservation voters show up, we are a force. And that is because of YOU! We cannot do this work without supporters like you. The time, the money, the attention, the volunteering, and the sharing with your networks–that is why we have such strong environmental leaders winning and the defeat of a majority of far-right ballot initiatives.

I want to end with this quote from Wilma Mankiller, who was the first woman elected as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, “The secret of our success is that we never, never give up.”

We can’t. We won’t. And when you’re with Washington Conservation Action, together, we are a powerful force for progress. Today, take the time you need for yourself, because tomorrow we fight.

-Alyssa Macy (she/her)
CEO, Washington Conservation Action
Citizen of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Oregon