OLYMPIA – Democratic U.S. Sen. Patty Murray and Republican U.S. Rep. George Nethercutt easily won nomination Tuesday for a coveted Senate seat.
With 8 percent of the precincts reporting, Murray had an overwhelming 93 percent of the Democratic vote, with two little-known candidates splitting the rest.
Nethercutt, the outgoing congressman from Eastern Washington’s 5th District, was running away with his nomination, too, with 84 percent of the GOP votes.
Murray, in an interview from Washington, D.C., announced she has accepted two debates with Nethercutt, one at Gonzaga Law School in Spokane and the other in Seattle.
Although polls show her comfortably ahead of Nethercutt, she said, “I’m going to campaign as I always have, go out and work hard to earn the confidence of people and ask for their votes.”
Nethercutt said he’s closing the gap on Murray and will catch her by Election Day.
“She’s going down and we’re going up,” he said. “The differences between us couldn’t be clearer on taxes, jobs and the economy, on health care and tort reform, on defense and national security.”
Both candidates have been running against each other for months, ever since the White House and Republican leaders recruited Nethercutt as their preferred challenger against Murray.
Murray, 52, a rising star in her caucus, has been the Senate Democrats’ campaign chairwoman and is an important member of the Appropriations Committee and its transportation subcommittee.
Nethercutt, 59, a Spokane attorney, first gained prominence as the poster child for the 1994 “Republican Revolution” by picking off Democratic Speaker Tom Foley in the 5th District.
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