​Wednesday evening, with 5 pm second count by Auditor.

An additional 5,000 votes were counted today but no contests changed - and none will change in the days ahead. Last evening Jean Layton trailed Eric Bostrom in the Bellingham council At-Large race by 381 votes and tonight she trails by 379. So that will hold.

While the Auditor says there are 20 ballots left to count, Thursday’s mail will probably bring hundreds or even more of those who mailed ballots on Tuesday, election day. At present the voter turnout is 30% - which is not that unusual for a August local only primary election. We will know by mid August what the final numbers are..The next ballot count is Thursday afternoon, tomorrow, and I will update this just for the exercise. Here is a link to the Auditor page with the full primary election results.

Below posted Tuesday evening, election night, Aug 2.

First, Amy Glasser is in the general election campaign for the new District 2, North Bellingham, county council seat. There was a concerted, organized, and large effort by local Democrats to eliminate her in this primary and help the Republican candidate, Daniel Collick, gain the victory. It was calculated that Todd Donovan could more easily win against Collick than against liberal Bernie supporter Glasser in November. But Amy came through the primary by hard, clean campaigning and now has an excellent chance to be elected to the County Council. The irony is Todd Donovan has over two and a half years left in his term on the council and will be on the council even if he loses to Amy in November. We need them both.

Young Tyler Byrd bested Cliff Langley in the new District 3, Foothills, and will face Rebecca Boonstra in the general election. This new district encompasses the Chuckanut Drive area, south Lake Whatcom, all the foothills, and prime farmland stretching from the hills west to the Guide Meridian south of Pole Road. A goofy compromise district from our redistricting commission of a year ago. Byrd is conservative and will have a strong advantage in the general election, with strong support from the Republicans.

New politician and uber enviro Michael Sheppard is now the front runner to upset incumbent Dan Robbins for the Port District 1 - the east one-third of our county. Dan is a retired business owner and has served the past four years on the Port Commission. We can expect a very spirited campaign after Labor Day between these two. Nicholas Kunkel finished a distant 3rd.

In Port District 2, Ken Bell came in first and will compete with Barry Wenger for the port seat being vacated by Michael McAuley. Fisher Doug Karlberg, a candidate in past elections, finished 3rd. Bell is considered the conservative candidate and Wenger the liberal - and that is how the endorsements run. But as the campaign gets going, that perspective may well be tested. This will be an interesting and important contest. Both are savvy candidates.

A note on McAuley - he has announced for the state senate seat held by Doug Ericksen in the 2018 November election. We do not know if Doug will run. We do know that Pinky Vargas, who is this year running for the Bellingham City Council, plans to run next year for the same state senate seat as McAuley - the 42nd Legislative District. One year on the City Council with much of it devoted to campaigning in the rural county.

There was one primary race for the Bellingham council of the four seats up for election this year. Indeed, two seats have only the incumbents running with no opposition. The At Large seat for a 2 year term has the incumbent Roxanne Murphy winning the primary by a huge margin. Jean Layton is 3rd and is probably out of the race. Unfortunately, that means Eric Bostrom will have a soap box for the general election campaign. He will be handily defeated in November by Roxanne. Sadly, the local Republicans endorsed Eric. They should know better. Bostrom will be entertaining, if not nauseating.

The auditor will be counting several thousand more ballots over the next week, but the margins are all enough that they will probably not change. If any change, it could be that Layton edges out Bostrom in the At Large Bellingham council race. That would be nice.