ELECTION
A12 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 24, 2022
Drazan rolls campaign into Heppner
BY DAKOTA CASTETS-DIDIER
Hermiston Herald
Christine Drazan rolled her
campaign to become Oregon’s
the first Republican governor
in 40 years into Heppner on
Wednesday, Aug. 17, for an ice
cream social.
The event at the Christian
Life Center drew several dozen
people and some public offi-
cials, including Morrow County
Sheriff Ken Matlack and fellow
Republicans state Reps. Greg
Smith, Heppner, and Bobby
Levy, Echo.
“Getting involved in public
service in the first place for me
was about service,” Drazan ex-
plained, sitting for an interview
within the chapel of the Chris-
tian Life Center. “It was really
about the opportunity to make
a difference and be effective.
What I learned as a legislator
was that my opportunity to re-
ally change outcomes, which is
really what defines effectiveness
for me, was really limited.”
Drazan, 50, served in the Or-
egon House of Representatives
2019-22 for District 39, which
includes parts of Clackamas
County. She also was minority
leader until 2021, when she left
the state House to run for gov-
ernor.
“As Republican leader, my
caucus members proposed a
hundred amendments to var-
ious pieces of legislation, and
repeatedly it was on party line
vote, rejected,” she said.
With Democrats holding a
supermajority in the Legisla-
ture, she said, Republicans have
few tools to stop proposals they
opposed. It became clear, she
explained, there was not going
to be an opportunity for her as a
Republican legislator in Oregon
to work on big issues. But the
governor’s office offers just that.
“The governor’s role is so crit-
ical and so important to provide
Yasser Marte/Hermiston Herald
Oregon Republican gubernatorial nominee Christine Drazan on Aug. 17, 2022, highlights approaches on how to begin fixing homelessness across
Oregon at the Christian Life Center in Heppner.
really don’t have the kind of ac-
countability that I think Orego-
nians want right now.”
She criticized the “one size fits
all” approach in Oregon gov-
ernment. Some rules and expec-
tations that might be workable
and culturally aligned in the
more metro and suburban parts
of our state instead affect the
ability of rural Oregonians to
support their families and lives.
To get to Mahonia Hall, Dra-
zan has to defeat Democrat
Tina Kotek, who served as the
speaker of the Oregon House
2013-22, and Betsy Johnson, a
longtime Democratic Oregon
legislator now running an unaf-
filiated campaign.
As part of her campaign’s
“Roadmap for Oregon’s Future,”
Yasser Marte/Hermiston Herald
Oregon Republican gubernatorial candidate Christine Drazan, right, on
Aug. 17, 2022, greets State Rep. Bobby Levy at the “Get the Scoop” ice
cream social fundraiser at the Christian Life Center in Heppner.
balance and accountability,” Dra-
zan said. “In single party control,
if you’re in a state with only one
party everywhere you look, you
a six-page list of issues and pro-
posed solutions she would im-
plement as governor, Drazan
described a series of “political
agendas and bureaucratic hur-
dles” that interfere with Ore-
gon’s agricultural community.
“Sometimes we’re talking
about banning the equipment
that they use in the fields, like
diesel bans,” she said.
Drazan has also been vocal
about her support for chang-
ing Oregon’s education system,
citing a low overall high school
graduation rate (80.6%) as a
mandate for change. According
to Drazan’s “Roadmap,” this in-
cludes focusing on academic ac-
countability and “keeping pol-
itics out of the classroom.” She
said graduation requirements
that were rolled back during the
pandemic should be reinstated.
“I believe that those were pos-
itive, not negative for our kid-
dos, and that our expectations
should be higher, not lower,”
she said.
And students who are mem-
bers of minorities already face
numerous cultural and social
challenges, she said, and while
there have been leaders focused
on addressing some of the social
and emotional dynamics within
schools, they failed to actually
help those students obtain an
education.
“The thing that we cannot
possibly do is then also put
them into a position where they
don’t even have a strong educa-
tion on the other side of this,”
Drazan said. “We need kids to
be able to have a level playing
field and raise up all kids.”
Pivoting to Oregon’s home-
lessness problem, Drazan has
stated publicly she would de-
clare a state of emergency on
homelessness. She said she
would prioritize repealing Mea-
sure 110, which rescheduled
and legalized small amounts of
narcotics. She said the measure
is one of the many factors that
contribute to Oregon’s home-
lessness problem.
And merely amending the
“regulatory environment specif-
ically around housing,” she said,
does not address the holistic
problem of homelessness.
“Frankly, if we have a chal-
lenge around our land use sys-
tem, let’s tackle it,” Drazan said.
“If it’s affecting our ability to be
responsive to homelessness, it’s
probably affecting our ability to
be responsive in other issues.”
Drazan campaigned all week
in Eastern Oregon, including
stops at Burns, Ontario,
Baker City, John Day and Fossil.
Heppner was the last place
on this swing.
GOP hopes stoked in Oregon as party hits West Coast low
The Center for Politics forecast said
the undulating national political scene
and three strong candidates was enough
to put a question mark next to the
Democrats’ historic win streak for the
Oregon governorship.
“Outgoing Gov. Kate Brown (D) is
deeply unpopular, and there may be
some desire for change in the Beaver
State,” Kondik wrote. “Johnson, the in-
dependent, would still be the most sur-
prising winner, and Kotek and Drazan
both will be working to try to prevent
their voters from flocking to her ban-
ner.”
Two other major national forecast-
ers — the Cook Political Report and
FiveThirtyEight — have previously
moved the Oregon governor’s race from
a likely Democratic win to the less cer-
tain leaning Democratic victory.
BY GARY A. WARNER
Oregon Capital Bureau
A new election forecast says there’s
wobble in Democrats’ 40-year hold on
the Oregon governor’s office, even as Re-
publicans hit a historic low point along
the West Coast.
The Center for Politics at the Uni-
versity of Virginia on Thursday, Aug.
18, moved the Nov. 8 race for Oregon
governor from “Leans Democratic” to
“Toss-Up.”
“This is despite the state’s blue lean
and the fact that Republicans have not
won a gubernatorial race there since
1982,” wrote Kyle Kondik, the center’s
managing editor.
The key change is the near certainty of
a three-way race for governor that might
trip up Democrats seeking to hold onto
a job last held by a Republican when Vic
Atiyeh won a second term 40 years ago.
Former Democratic State Senator
Betsy Johnson of Columbia County
turned in nominating petitions with over
48,000 signatures on Tuesday — more
than twice the minimum needed to get
on the Nov. 8 ballot as an unaffiliated
candidate.
Secretary of State Shemia Fagan has
until Aug. 30 to verify a random sam-
pling of petition signatures in time to
officially add Johnson to the general elec-
tion alongside Democrat Tina Kotek of
Portland and Republican Christine Dra-
zan of Canby.
“The race sets up an unusual situation
where the winner may not need to crack
even 40%,” Kondik wrote.
THREE CANDIDATES — AND NO
‘CENTRIST’ NOMINATION
Much of the election debate has cen-
tered around who Johnson would most
hurt, Kotek or Drazan. All three served
as late as last year in the legislative lead-
FEEL THE SPEED,
EVEN AT PEAK TIMES.
Jaime Valdez/Pamplin Media, File
Republican nominee Christine Drazan, left, and unaffiliated candidate Betsy Johnson,
right, listens to Democratic nominee Tina Kotek speak during a governor’s debate July
29, 2022, that the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association hosted at Mount Hood
Oregon Resort in Welches.
ership. Kotek as House speaker, Drazan
as House minority leader, and Johnson
as a swing-vote Democrat and co-chair
of the budget-writing Joint Ways &
Means Committee. All left office early
to run for governor — with Johnson
also dropping her Democratic party af-
filiation of 20 years.
Adding to the scrambled election
math is a decision by leaders of the In-
dependent Party of Oregon — known
as the IPO — to forego an alliance with
one of the candidates.
“There will be no cross-nomination
on this one,” Independent Party board
member Andrew Kaza of Redmond
said Aug. 18.
A cross-nomination by the self-de-
scribed “centrist” Independent Party
is usually used by a candidate as sym-
bolic of being the less partisan choice
in a race.
GOP MISSES EARLY CHANCE TO END
WEST COAST SHUTOUT
The Oregon election speculation
came on the heels of Washington
voters earlier this month ensuring
the official end of a 56-year winning
streak by Republicans for the office
of Washington secretary of state. The
Aug. 2 Washington state primary ce-
mented Democrats’ hold on every
executive state office on the West
Coast states of California, Oregon
and Washington.
Kim Wyman, a Republican, won a
third four-year term as Washington
secretary of state in 2020, retaining the
office held by the GOP since the 1964
election. In 2021, she resigned to ac-
cept an appointment by President Joe
Biden to oversee federal election secu-
rity efforts.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee ap-
pointed Washington Sen. Steve Hobbs,
a fellow Democrat, to the position.
So far in 2022, the Independent
Party has cross-nominated 52 candi-
dates for federal, state, and local offices.
Cross-nominations were awarded to
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, and
two Democratic candidates for open
U.S. House seats: Terrebonne attorney
Jamie McLeod-Skinner in the 5th Con-
gressional District and Rep. Andrea Sa-
linas of Lake Oswego in the 6th district.
The Independent Party of Oregon
has heavily favored Democrats in 2022.
Still, Sen. Bill Kennemer, R-Oregon
City, and Rep. Mark Owens, R-Vale, are
among five GOP candidates to win the
IPO nod.
Kaza said Independent Party lead-
ers are free to announce their personal
preferences. But no one in the gover-
nor’s race will be able to have the party’s
identification added to their ballot line
that a cross-nomination would allow.
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infuriating to state Republicans. Unlike
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requiring that the governor appoint a
replacement from the same party.
GOP officials said the interruption
in the line of Republicans in the office
would be swiftly reversed with the spe-
cial election in 2022 to fill out the re-
mainder of Wyman’s term.
Washington uses a system that in-
cludes an open primary. The top two
candidates, regardless of party affilia-
tion, would advance to the Nov. 8 gen-
eral election.
Seven candidates, including three
Republicans, ran against Hobbs in the
primary.
Hobbs finished with 40% of the
vote. In the scrum of others, unaffili-
ated candidate Julie Anderson finished
second with 13%.
There would be no Republican on
the ballot.
Anderson, the Pierce County audi-
tor, would be the first secretary of state
without a party affiliation to win the
office since 1896.
Hobbs would be the first Democrat
to hold the office since Victor Aloysius
Meyers, described by the Seattle Times
as a “former Depression-era jazz-band
leader” lost his bid for a third term in
1964.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was
the last statewide Republican office-
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son was the last Republican elected to
statewide office in Oregon, winning
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