Republican state Sen. Keith Wagoner of Sedro-Woolley said Tuesday that he plans to challenge newly appointed Secretary of State Steve Hobbs in next year’s election.<\/p>\n
“I don’t feel like I am running against anybody. I am running for the office,” Wagoner told The Daily Herald. “I think I can do some good if I get there.”<\/p>\n
Hobbs, a Democrat from Lake Stevens, was appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee to replace Kim <\/a>Wyman<\/a>, a Republican, who resigned to take a job in the Biden administration. Hobbs, who had been a state senator since 2007, began work Nov. 22. <\/a><\/p>\n Hobbs’ appointment lasts through next year’s general election. He has said he will run for a full four-year term. He is the first Democrat in the job since 1965.<\/p>\n Wagoner said voters have long shown a preference for a Republican secretary of state and Inslee failed to recognize that by naming Hobbs.<\/p>\n “I am looking to provide balance and accountability. I don’t think you get that when one one party runs everything,” Wagoner said.<\/p>\n Wagoner was appointed to his Senate seat in January <\/a>2018<\/a>. Later that year he won a four-year term representing the 39th Legislative District which encompasses swaths of rural Snohomish and Skagit counties and a sliver of King County. The portion of the district in Snohomish County includes the cities of Arlington, Monroe, Sultan, Gold Bar and Index.<\/p>\n In the Senate, Wagoner serves on the Ways and Means and the Law and Justice committees. He is the ranking Republican on the Behavioral Health subcommittee.<\/p>\n Wagoner, a retired U.S. Navy commander, was mayor of Sedro-Woolley prior to entering the Legislature. He also served five years on the City Council.<\/p>\n He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1984 with a degree in physical oceanography, according to his official biography. He also holds a master’s degree in global leadership from the University of San Diego.<\/p>\n Wagoner retired in 2007 after 23 years as a naval officer piloting helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. He and his wife have three children. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sen. Keith Wagoner will challenge Democrat Steve Hobbs, who was appointed to the statewide post in November <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":53137,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,4,24],"tags":[161],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-53136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home2","category-news","category-northwest","tag-election-2022"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53136"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53136"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=53136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}