Voice of the Mid-Columbia | Kennewick, Pasco and Richland, Wash. |
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Chris Mulick has worked for the Herald since 1998 and has served as the statehouse correspondent covering state government and politics since 2000. He works year-round out of the Herald's Olympia bureau on the state Capitol campus. Have a question? Send Chris an e-mail and he'll answer the best questions regularly. |
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Vancouver Republican Rep. Jim Dunn has told The Columbian newspaper he intends to seek re-election.
Dunn made headlines last year when he made an inappropriate remark to a female staffer in a Kennewick bar. That got him stripped of his committee assignments and limits were put on the kinds of costs he could expense.
But Dunn, who previously lost his 17th District House seat in 2002 before being elected to the district's other seat in 2004, has apparently decided to press on.
“I’m going to run,” he told The Columbian. “I have to get on the ball and start raising money.”
He’s got some catching up to do. Vancouver Republican Joseph James has jumped into the race and already had raised almost $74,000 through the end of March.
Democrat Tim Probst also is running for the seat and had raised $29,000 through the end of March.
UPDATE: Thanks to a tip from a careful reader we've been able to gain a better understanding of just how it is James has come to raise $74,000. Since January he's counted about $3,000 a month as an in-kind donation from himself for use of personal space for a campaign office and another $700 a month for use of a personal vehicle.
He's also listed lots of other in-kind contributions from himself for things such as gas and meals. The Public Disclosure Commission database doesn't appear to be quite caught up with incoming reports yet but it appears only a bit more than half of James' total contributions have been cash donations.
James has filed two summary reports recently and I can't tell which one is current. But either way it appears he has less than $10,000 on hand.
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