Washington state will be the next test of ‘uncommitted’ protest against Biden

Washington state’s primary voters will offer another glimpse into how many Democratic voters oppose President Biden’s policies on Israel’s war in Gaza, although it could be days before a full picture of the results becomes clear.

The state’s primaries on Tuesday come after notable numbers of Democratic voters in other states chose “uncommitted” in apparent protest of Biden’s position, including 13 percent in Michigan, 19 percent in Minnesota and 29 percent in the little-watched Democratic caucuses in Hawaii. , where the anti-war groups that organized elsewhere were not present.

Washington’s anti-establishment liberalism in the Pacific Northwest has the potential to fit well with the “uncommitted” mood that has captured more and more parts of the Democratic electorate in recent weeks.

And it is unlikely that Biden’s strong performance in his State of the Union address last week would have a strong impact on the results in Washington, where voting takes place exclusively by mail. By Thursday, when he gave the speech, he said, more than 512,000 ballots for the Democratic primaries had already been received. data from the Washington Secretary of State’s office.

Stuart Holmes, the secretary of state’s elections director, said he expects about half of the state’s ballots to be counted and reported when polls close Tuesday evening. The remainder of the ballots will be tabulated and reported once a day until all votes are counted, with the vast majority of counting expected to be completed by the end of this week, Mr. Holmes said.

Shasti Conrad, the Democratic chairman in Washington state, said the party would support Mr. Biden.

“We know that President Biden and Vice President Harris are working tirelessly to bring an end to violence and a just, lasting peace in the Middle East,” Ms. Conrad said. “Washington voters understand the tremendous progress Democrats have made.”

“Uncommitted” donors have set the bar for success low in each of the previous states in which they have operated.

Larry Cohen, the chairman of Our Revolution, the political organization founded by supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders that supports “uncommitted,” sets the goal for success in Washington state at 10 percent – ​​far less than previous states but more than “uncommitted” received in 2020, when 6,450 people, about 0.4 percent of Democratic primary voters, chose “uncommitted.”