The greatest hits of the 2026 WA legislative session

I'm just a bill. Yes, I'm only a bill.

We all remember this song. It made it all seem so simple and turns out it's not. Who writes,

influences, and kills, bills, it gets messy. I'm Scott Greenstone.

And I'm Libby Dankman. On Sound Politics, we tell that story. The inside track on how

policy gets made in this Washington and the other one. And how it impacts you.

It's now on the KUW app or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, good morning. I'm Patricia Murphy. It's Wednesday. This is Seattle now.

After 60 days, the Washington State legislative session is over 267 bills are headed for the governor's desk.

The so-called millionaires tax caused to stir every step of the way.

KUW State Government reporter Sarah Meises Tan was there keeping tabs on things.

She's here to talk about the tax and what other bills made the cut. But first, let's get you caught up.

Washington Senator Patty Murray plans to speak out against the Save Act this afternoon.

The legislation which passed the House last week would require people to prove their citizenship in person when registering to vote.

The Trump administration says the law would ensure that only citizens can vote.

Murray says the bill amounts to voter suppression by purging Americans from voter roles.

She'll speak to the press at 145 this afternoon.

There's another local effort to ban new detention centers from being built.

The Pierce County Council has unveiled a proposal that would impose a six-month moratorium.

It would apply to unincorporated parts of the county. Similar proposals have already passed in Seattle,

C-TAC, Takwila, and King County. Pierce County Council members are expected to vote on the moratorium next week.

And the owners of the Space Needle are expanding their footprint at the Seattle Center.

They're purchasing property from the nonprofit Paxi for more than $17 million.

Seattle Times reports the sale includes the IMAX theater which will continue to operate after renovations this spring.

Paxi has struggled financially since the pandemic. According to the Times, the sale will help them survive.

We're back with more headlines on tonight's episode of Seattle Now.

This year's Washington State legislative session has come to a close.

The rapid 60-day session just flew by. Still lawmakers dug in for a 25-hour debate to tackle the state's tax system.

Five o'clock PM yesterday. So it was light when we started. It got dark. We went all night. It got life.

Now it's midday and we're not done yet. It's probably going to be a 25-hour debate by the time it's all done.

That was representative Jim Walsh talking to Q-13.

Lawmakers did more than just pass the millionaires tax, though. They set their sights on affordability and federal policy.

KUW State Government reporter Sarah Meises Tan joins us from Olympia to talk about this year's session.

Sarah, really glad to have you.

Of course, thanks for having me. So the millionaires tax dominated a lot of legislative conversation this session.

How will it show up now that it's going to the governor's desk?

Yeah, so just some top line facts about the millionaires tax for folks who may not have been keeping up.

This bill would levy a 9.9% tax on all Washington incomes over a million dollars.

So just to be clear, if you are lucky enough to be making your first million dollars, that will not be taxed.

It is only income above a million dollars. So if you are making, say, a million in one dollars, you would only be paying tax on that one dollar above a million.

And so you would pay about 10 cents. I think an easy way to visualize it is to say that this tax will take a dime for every dollar that you make over a million.

It will generate about three billion dollars from about 20,000 households.

Lawmakers like to mention that this is about half of a percent of all Washington households.

So it's not a very big tax base, but it won't start generating that revenue until 2029.

Well, and a really big deal, right? The state's first income tax, Sarah, really important context.

So thank you. It was a challenging process for lawmakers and more than 24 hour marathon meeting trying to thread the needle and get that bill passed.

That Ferguson would approve. What did you hear from lawmakers about the process?

We saw a lot of back and forth over this bill. It did encounter a lot of changes along the way, which is normal.

But, you know, for quite some time, I think it's worth noting that even Governor Ferguson himself was saying that he wouldn't support the bill in his current form because he felt like it didn't give enough of the revenue back to regular Washingtonians.

You know, we saw a brief fight from progressive Democrats who felt like the bill made too many concessions to big business.

And all the while we had Republicans who were staunchly opposed saying that this bill was unconstitutional and that it opens the door to more income taxes on lower incomes in the future.

When it finally encountered its final debate, which was in the house, it was a 25 hour debate, which is probably the longest in state history.

80 proposed amendments. So those are changes to the bill that the House had to work through. It was just it was a ground shifting change for Washington and Washington's tax structures.

So we obviously saw that play out in the legislature.

So the governor's stamp on that bill and expected to be challenged as well.

Yes, I think we will absolutely be expecting to see this show up in the courts as soon as the governor puts his signature on it.

And I also think that voters should likely keep an eye out for seeing a repeal of this on their ballots in November.

Also a biennial budget year, Sarah, heading into the session, the state was facing a pretty hefty shortfall.

How did the legislative body handle that?

They were facing a pretty big shortfall. They are required to balance the budget every year by law, so they had their work cut out for them.

But you know, it doesn't mean that just because the budget is balanced, there weren't some sacrifices made to get there.

Lastly, there were pretty deep cuts made to early education and childcare.

Those cuts make up about a third of the budget cuts. That's a heavy chunk.

And they say that we were in a budget shortfall this year because of a couple different issues.

There was inflation. There was the rising costs of lawsuits against the state.

And there were significant cuts from the federal government under President Trump's HR one.

So Washington legislators told me they basically had to step in to provide services like food assistance and health coverage to low income people

and non-citizens who were in the country legally.

The federal government used to cover those costs in the past. They are no longer doing that.

And I was essentially told if Washington state didn't step in to do this, we might have a humanitarian crisis on our hands.

So they saw that as necessary spending that had to be done.

Democrats essentially say that the reason why a big revenue generator like the millionaires tax is so important is to avoid a budget crisis like this in the future.

And of course, in order to close this gap, lawmakers pulled about $880 million from the state's rainy day fund.

They say it's raining right now.

Let's talk about the themes you saw lawmakers tackle this session. Sarah, just take a step back a little bit.

Yeah, I think affordability was a big theme that we saw addressed in this session.

And you know, I think whether or not it was actually addressed versus if it was just rhetoric that we heard a lot from lawmakers about, it depends on who you ask.

Democratic leaders would point to a number of different ways in which they feel they addressed affordability this session.

They say the passage of the millionaires tax is a big win for affordability with all those sales tax breaks and expansions of tax credits.

But those savings are not going to kick in until 2029.

For the more near term, there were bills like ones to increase housing availability and more affordable housing.

Like a bill that would allow converting strip malls into residential housing.

There were also a few bills passed to control pricing for generic prescription drugs, along with another to keep preventative care like vaccines free of cost.

But I also think it's fair that there will probably be a good number of people who might gripe and say we'll be dealing with the impacts of some of these very tough budget cuts before we're actually going to see any relief from that income tax.

You mentioned lawmakers have had to deal with changes at the federal government as well. How did that show up?

Yeah, so there were a few bills centered around protecting voter rights that passed.

And yes, a number that were clearly in response to what the Trump administration has been doing.

So there was a bill that banned law enforcement officers from wearing face masks that passed.

There was another addressing worker protections against immigrant enforcement.

And there was one that would create a west coast vaccine alliance to preserve vaccine access against recommendations coming down from the federal government.

Okay, a lot to tackle in 60 days a marathon session. That's why we call it marathon.

What else managed to break through in such a short time frame?

Yeah, so I think there were a few other items that garnered attention that don't fall neatly into those buckets that we mentioned.

There was a big sheriff's reform bill that would set stricter eligibility standards for sheriffs and other law enforcement officers running positions like police chief.

A candidate would have to submit a background check now. That's something that hadn't previously been required.

Police leadership in the state were firmly opposed along with state Republicans who really fought this bill saying that the bill undermines the will of the people and the voters who have elected a sheriff.

There was also a trio of bills related to addressing food deserts. Only one of these bills was ultimately passed.

But that would look to ease zoning laws around where a new grocery store can open up.

That kind of falls within our affordability bucket.

And there was another bill that would protect Washingtonians from having to disclose their sex designation changes in government records.

So things like driver's license. It's a protection for folks who identify as trans.

Lastly, a bill was passed to establish a pre-cate promise account to accept private donations that would go directly towards early childhood education.

It's not a direct one-to-one with the child care cuts that we saw, but it is something in that realm.

So depending on how old your kids are, maybe you'll feel the effect of that.

Okay, all right. Definitely thinking about those food deserts and affordability and housing density, Sarah.

Are there bills that when they take effect might show up in the three-foot zone of Seattleites that you want to talk about?

Sure. Yeah. So I think the vaccine access bill is a big one that average Seattleites are going to see the direct impact of.

This will mandate that insurance companies continue to cover vaccines recommended by the states of Washington, California, and Oregon as opposed to vaccines that are recommended by the federal government, which has rolled back their recommendations on vaccines like COVID, flu, and RSV.

So Washingtonians will still be able to get those free of cost.

There's also a bill that Governor Ferguson signed this week that will round up or down cash transactions to the nearest five cents.

That's in reaction to the federal government's move to stop making pennies.

Sometimes lawmaking is about resilience, Sarah. Not everything made the cut. What might show up again next year?

Of course, bills that will live to fight another day, a bill that would keep people from being able to pay for signatures to put ballot initiatives forward is likely one that I think we're going to see return next year as the conversation around ballot initiatives continues.

That was a pretty contentious one.

There is a bill that would have created a mosquito fleet passenger ferry system in the Puget Sound region. I know that's a perennial one that comes up.

It died in the very last hours of sessions this year, just because lawmakers could not agree to some changes.

So I do think that'll likely be back as well. It was a bit of a pet bill of the governors. He mentioned it in his closing remarks. So I think we'll probably see that one as well.

A bill looking to limit AI and another looking to limit addictive social media for children are also two more that didn't quite make the cut, but could come back next year.

And you know, big picture. I think lawmakers told me they're going to be looking forward creating more legislation around AI and social media along with potentially creating a jobs package in response to the Trump administration's tariffs, which they say are hampering Washington's economy.

All right, pretty serious topics. Anything lighthearted? Make it onto the floor.

Of course, yes. I'm always appreciative of a question like this. The state cactus designation.

Yes.

The basalt cactus, also known as the Columbia Plateau cactus, grows in dry locations in central Washington and is quite charming looking for a cactus.

If you can qualify looking it up. Yeah, it's kind of I guess they designated a ball cactus. So it's kind of little circles.

Ultimately, though, the house speaker told me that lawmakers were worried about the optics of passing a bill about the state cactus while they struggled to resolve bigger problems like say a budget deficit or the state's first income tax.

So it got shelved for now.

Sarah, are you trying to say there were more prickly problems they needed to tackle?

Excellent, excellent point. Yes.

Sarah rises 10 covers the state government who KUW and K and KX Sarah really appreciate it. Welcome to the beat.

Of course, thanks for having me.

Appreciate you listening to Seattle now and thanks to our generous donors for your financial support.

No need to debate. Take a few minutes to rate and review the show on your favorite podcast app.

Today's episode was produced by Vaughn Jones. It was edited by Caroline Chamberlain Gomez.

Our production team also includes Andy Hurst, Brooklyn Jamers and Flowers and Paige Browning.

Greg Kramer does our theme music. Seattle now and KUW public radio are members of the NPR network.

I'm Patricia Murphy back tonight with evening headlines.

Seattle's economy is complicated. Inflation, tariffs, AI, layoffs, it's a lot to keep track of.

That's where we come in. I'm Joshua McNichols and I'm Monica Nicholsburg.

We host Booming, a podcast about the economic forces shaping our lives here in the Pacific Northwest.

Every week we dig into the big questions about our economy and where you fit in.

Find Booming on the KUW app or wherever you listen to podcasts.