Rep. Maxwell wins her House primary; view the official results

State Rep. Marcie Maxwell of Renton cruised to victory in her primary election with Peter Dunbar of Mercer Island for her 41st District House seat.

Maxwell, running for her second term, led after the initial vote tally in the Aug. 17 primary. Her lead continued to grow, with about four percentage points separating the two candidates in the final results released today (Wednesday).

Maxwell, a Democrat, received 17,411 votes, or 51.99 percent, to Dunbar’s 16,029 votes or 47.86 percent. That’s a difference of 1,382 votes.

They were the only two candidates in their primary race and both will advance to the Nov. 2 general election.

King County Elections Wednesday morning certified the results of the 2010 Primary Election, which had a total voter turnout of 39 percent, according to a King County press release.

The results of Precinct Committee Officer races will be reported on Sept. 13 at 4:30 p.m.

This election experienced the highest voter turnout for a primary since 2004, with 421,157 ballots returned.

“We saw a respectable rate of participation considering this was not a Presidential election year,” said Sherril Huff, King County Elections director. “We were able to process ballots very efficiently and got some great support from many voters who returned their ballots early.”

As with any election, some ballots could not be counted because they were postmarked after Election Day or had issues with the voter signature. Voters can use the online Ballot Tracker to make sure their ballot was received and sent on to be counted. Voters who may have experienced problems with their signatures or mailing address should be sure to update their registration information now so that they are ready for the upcoming November General Election.

Ballots for the general election will be mailed on Oct. 13. The deadline to update voter registration information for the election is Oct. 4. New Washington voters can register in person through Oct. 25

In this election, 8,800 ballots were returned after Election Day. Voters are reminded that ballots must be returned to a Ballot Drop Box before 8 p.m. or postmarked by Election Day.