Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), who faced a tough challenge this year from former state Senator and two-time Republican gubernatorial nominee Dino Rossi, has now won her race, after Rossi conceded defeat last night.
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Aside from the Alaska Senate race, this was the last unsettled Senate contest of the cycle, and also the last one in which partisan control of the seat is up for grabs. (The Alaska Senate race is now a contest between two Republicans.) This result finalizes the Senate makeup as being 53 members of the Democratic caucus, to 47 Senators in the Republican caucus.
As the Seattle Times reported, a great many ballots remained to be counted — but the projected numbers were not there for Rossi, as Murray’s lead only kept expanding the more they were counted:
As of Thursday evening, Murray was leading Rossi by more than 45,000 votes, taking 51 percent to Rossi’s 49 percent. That’s up from a 14,000-vote lead on Election Day.
According to a Seattle Times analysis, Rossi would need to get about 54 percent of the estimated 591,000 uncounted ballots statewide to overcome Murray’s lead.
But nearly 264,000 of those ballots are in King County. Murray’s already commanding lead there has only expanded since Election Day. She took 68 percent of the 69,000 King County ballots counted Thursday.
