Reichert maintains his lead over Burner for 8th District

Published 9:00 pm Thursday, November 9, 2006

SEATTLE – Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert maintained his slim lead over Democratic challenger Darcy Burner as new vote tallies were announced Thursday. The race remained too close to call.

With about 171,000 ballots counted in the 8th District race, Burner had 49.1 percent to Reichert’s 50.9 percent – the same percentages as Wednesday, representing a 3,120-vote gap. Both campaigns were sitting tight.

“It’s looking even better than it did yesterday,” Reichert spokeswoman Kimberly Cadena said.

Burner’s campaign was pinning its hopes on the remaining votes to be counted in King County, where she leads slightly. Her camp put that number at an estimated 70,000. About 15,000 of the new votes posted Thursday were from King County, while about 3,000 were from Pierce County.

King planned to post new numbers at 6 p.m. today; Pierce, not until Monday.