Washington Supreme Court elections, 2022
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The terms of three Washington Supreme Court justices expired on January 8, 2023. The three seats were up for nonpartisan election on November 8, 2022. A primary was scheduled for August 2, 2022.
Washington was one of 30 states that held elections for state supreme court in 2022. That year, 84 of the 344 seats on state supreme courts were up for election. Of those, 64 were held by nonpartisan justices, 13 were held by Republican justices, and eight were held by Democratic justices. For more on the partisan affiliation of state supreme court justices, click here. For an overview of state supreme court elections in 2022, click here.
Candidates and election results
Position 1
General election
General election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 1
Incumbent Mary Yu won election in the general election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 1 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Mary Yu (Nonpartisan) | 97.4 | 1,961,152 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 2.6 | 52,447 | ||
| Total votes: 2,013,599 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Incumbent Mary Yu advanced from the primary for Washington State Supreme Court Position 1.
Position 5
General election
General election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 5
Incumbent Barbara A. Madsen won election in the general election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 5 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Barbara A. Madsen (Nonpartisan) | 97.8 | 1,937,634 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 2.2 | 43,453 | ||
| Total votes: 1,981,087 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Incumbent Barbara A. Madsen advanced from the primary for Washington State Supreme Court Position 5.
Position 6
General election
General election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 6
Incumbent G. Helen Whitener won election in the general election for Washington State Supreme Court Position 6 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | G. Helen Whitener (Nonpartisan) | 97.8 | 1,918,080 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 2.2 | 42,740 | ||
| Total votes: 1,960,820 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Incumbent G. Helen Whitener advanced from the primary for Washington State Supreme Court Position 6.
Voting information
- See also: Voting in Washington
About the Washington Supreme Court
- See also: Washington Supreme Court
The Washington State Supreme Court is the court of last resort in Washington. It is based in Olympia in the Temple of Justice on the state capitol grounds. The court has nine justices. They are elected to six-year terms in nonpartisan elections.
Political composition
This was the political composition of the supreme court heading into the 2022 election.
| ■ Raquel Montoya-Lewis | Appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee (D) in 2019; elected in 2020 | |
| ■ Steven Gonzalez | Appointed by Gov. Christine Gregoire (D) in 2011; elected in 2012 and 2018 | |
| ■ Charles W. Johnson | Elected in 1990, 1996, 2002, 2008, 2014, and 2020 | |
| ■ Barbara Madsen | Elected in 1992, 1998, 2004, 2010, and 2016 | |
| ■ Sheryl McCloud | Elected in 2012 and 2018 | |
| ■ Susan Owens | Elected in 2000, 2006, 2012, and 2018 | |
| ■ Debra Stephens | Appointed by Gov. Christine Gregoire (D) in 2007; elected in 2008, 2014, and 2020 | |
| ■ G. Helen Whitener | Appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee (D) in 2020 | |
| ■ Mary Yu | Appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee (D) in 2014; elected in 2014 and 2016 |
Selection
- See also: Nonpartisan election of judges
The nine justices of the supreme court are selected through contested elections without reference to party affiliation and must run for re-election when their terms expire. Justices serve for six years. In the event of a midterm vacancy, the governor appoints a replacement. The appointee serves until the next general election, at which point he or she may run to serve for the remainder of the predecessor's term.[1] If the resignation and subsequent appointment take place after the filing period for that year's elections opens, the appointee must stand in the next general election in order to remain on the bench.
Qualifications
To serve on the supreme court, a justice must be:
- a resident and qualified voter of the state;
- admitted to practice law in the courts of record in Washington; and
- under the age of 75.
Selection of the chief justice
The chief justice of the court is selected by peer vote for a term of four years.
Analysis
Ballotpedia Courts: Determiners and Dissenters (2021)
In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: Determiners and Dissenters, a study on how state supreme court justices decided the cases that came before them. Our goal was to determine which justices ruled together most often, which frequently dissented, and which courts featured the most unanimous or contentious decisions.
The study tracked the position taken by each state supreme court justice in every case they decided in 2020, then tallied the number of times the justices on the court ruled together. We identified the following types of justices:
- We considered two justices opinion partners if they frequently concurred or dissented together throughout the year.
- We considered justices a dissenting minority if they frequently opposed decisions together as a -1 minority.
- We considered a group of justices a determining majority if they frequently determined cases by a +1 majority throughout the year.
- We considered a justice a lone dissenter if he or she frequently dissented alone in cases throughout the year.
Summary of cases decided in 2020
- Number of justices: 9
- Number of cases: 66
- Percentage of cases with a unanimous ruling: 59.1%% (39)
- Justice most often writing the majority opinion: Justices Gonzalez and Madsen (N/A)
- Per curiam decisions: 1
- Concurring opinions: 15
- Justice with most concurring opinions: Justice Gonzalez (5)
- Dissenting opinions: 24
- Justice with most dissenting opinions: Justice Madsen (7)
For the study's full set of findings in Washington, click here.
Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship (2020)
- See also: Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship
Last updated: June 15, 2020
In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship, a study examining the partisan affiliation of all state supreme court justices in the country as of June 15, 2020.
The study presented Confidence Scores that represented our confidence in each justice's degree of partisan affiliation, based on a variety of factors. This was not a measure of where a justice fell on the political or ideological spectrum, but rather a measure of how much confidence we had that a justice was or had been affiliated with a political party. To arrive at confidence scores we analyzed each justice's past partisan activity by collecting data on campaign finance, past political positions, party registration history, as well as other factors. The five categories of Confidence Scores were:
- Strong Democrat
- Mild Democrat
- Indeterminate[2]
- Mild Republican
- Strong Republican
We used the Confidence Scores of each justice to develop a Court Balance Score, which attempted to show the balance among justices with Democratic, Republican, and Indeterminate Confidence Scores on a court. Courts with higher positive Court Balance Scores included justices with higher Republican Confidence Scores, while courts with lower negative Court Balance Scores included justices with higher Democratic Confidence Scores. Courts closest to zero either had justices with conflicting partisanship or justices with Indeterminate Confidence Scores.[3]
Washington had a Court Balance Score of -5.67, indicating Democrat control of the court. In total, the study found that there were 15 states with Democrat-controlled courts, 27 states with Republican-controlled courts, and eight states with Split courts. The map below shows the court balance score of each state.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ American Judicature Society, "Methods of Judicial Selection: Washington," archived October 3, 2014
- ↑ An Indeterminate score indicates that there is either not enough information about the justice’s partisan affiliations or that our research found conflicting partisan affiliations.
- ↑ The Court Balance Score is calculated by finding the average partisan Confidence Score of all justices on a state supreme court. For example, if a state has justices on the state supreme court with Confidence Scores of 4, -2, 2, 14, -2, 3, and 4, the Court Balance is the average of those scores: 3.3. Therefore, the Confidence Score on the court is Mild Republican. The use of positive and negative numbers in presenting both Confidence Scores and Court Balance Scores should not be understood to that either a Republican or Democratic score is positive or negative. The numerical values represent their distance from zero, not whether one score is better or worse than another.
Federal courts:
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: Eastern District of Washington, Western District of Washington • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: Eastern District of Washington, Western District of Washington
State courts:
Washington Supreme Court • Washington Court of Appeals • Washington Superior Court • Washington District Courts • Washington Municipal Courts
State resources:
Courts in Washington • Washington judicial elections • Judicial selection in Washington
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