Connelly: Ferguson, Franz distance runners for Inslee’s job – Seattle PI

Gov. Jay Inslee is lusting after a spot on the 2020 national stage, while back home Attorney General Bob Ferguson and Public Lands commissioner Hilary Franz display their wares nonstop in a hunt to succeed him.

The 2020 campaign is taking off already in this Washington.

Ferguson and Franz have high-profile portfolios. Fergy has sued the Trump Administration no fewer than 39 times, often laying low an administration that believes it is above the law. ‘Started when the AG blocked Trump Muslim travel ban No. 1, days into the new administration.

Franz is the state’s chief firefighter at a time when the fire season is expanding, fires are growing, and only the knuckleheads of our state Republican Party doubt our drought emergency. Olympic rain forests are part of the emergency.

Hence, Franz was preaching fire danger at City Club last week, with Smoky Bear as a prop. Ferguson was winning $9.1 million from Comcast in a consumer suit, and launching lawsuit No. 39 at Trump’s EPA for violating the Clean Water Act.

RELATED: Ferguson sues: Trump ‘conscience rule’ imperils poor, rural women

Both are doing far more consequential, attention-worthy work than, say, Sens. Murray and Cantwell. They are doing a kind of kabuki dance of legislation, introducing and heralding bills in the U.S. Senate that they know will never get a hearing or floor action with Republicans in the majority.

As well, Ferguson and Franz are doing the feeding and fundraising circuit without rest.

Franz was down in Cowlitz County for local Democrats’ Harry Truman dinner. She’s held a recent fundraiser in Spokane. Ferguson was in Benton County for Democrats’ Norm and Shirley Miller dinner. He was speaking to Democrats in the solidly Republican 39th District over Memorial Day weekend. He staged a potato feed in Seattle last weekend.

The prize? Republicans have not elected a governor in Washington since 1980. The job has been held by five Democrats since Booth Gardner beat John Spellman in 1984. It is the nation’s longest streak of one-party statehouse domination.

Inslee has not hinted at what he will do if Democratic caucus and primary voters send him packing. He has (at last) a friendly Legislature that has enacted portions of his climate agenda, notably a clean power bill that will send the coal industry packing.

SEE ALSO: The field for the 2020 presidential election, so far:

Still, in its 130-year history, Washington has given only one governor — Republican Dan Evans — three consecutive terms. Gardner, Locke and Gregoire have displayed the sense to walk away after eight years in the job.

The Republicans? They have a bench about as deep as the Seattle Mariners.

Conservative State Sen. Phil Fortunato is weighing a run, talked up mainly on talk radio. Pierce County Executive Bruce Dammeier in 2016 flipped a job that had been in Democratic hands. He cut an impressive figure at Mainstream Republicans’ recent conference in Leavenworth.

Any Republican nominee faces a daunting obstacle — Democrats’ huge majorities in King County. The Dems can win 10 or fewer of the state’s 39 counties, lose the “rust felt” in Southwest Washington, get clobbered in Eastern Washington . . . and still walk away with victory.

RELATED: Inslee: The climate crisis gains traction, his candidacy doesn’t

Not since the 1990’s “boa constrictor” strategy of Sen. Slade Gorton have Republicans found a way to win. Gorton twice lost King County, but prevailed by surrounding and squeezing the state’s largest population center. He did it by loving loggers.

King County ain’t easy to squeeze. Dr. Kim Schrier in 2018 became the first Democrat elected in Washington’s 8th Congressional District since it was established in 1980. She lost in Pierce, Kittitas, Chelan and Douglas Counties . . . but King County voters made Republican Dino Rossi a four-time loser.

A few additional 2020 previews to watch:

— A top deputy to AG Ferguson, Solicitor General Noah Purcell, has already declared for Attorney General if the boss moves up. He has raised a six figure war chest 17 months before the election.

— If Hilary Franz moves up, the Republicans do have a class candidate for Land Commissioner, 2016 gubernatorial nominee Bill Bryant. He is a conservationist in the tradition of Dan Evans, and would be difficult to demonize by Democratic operatives who staff the environmental movement.

— Seattle votes decide elections, but Seattle mayors tank when they try to move up. Wes Uhlman was defeated for Governor, Charley Royer lost big in a U.S. Senate bid, and Norm Rice didn’t make it past the gubernatorial primary.

— County executives do move up. John Spellman was King County Executive, Booth Gardner was Pierce County Executive. The current King County Executive, Dow Constantine, has long harbored gubernatorial ambitions. He is, however, overshadowed by those managing crises and confronting Trump.

It used to be that “No drama Dow” was a nickname spoken in admiration, especially when contrasted to the chaos of Mike McGinn across the street in Seattle City Hall. Now, it bespeaks a guy who hears Bob Ferguson praised at his own fundraiser.

Summer has always been a season when the Northwest tunes out politics. No more.