Posts published in “Oregon”

One question people inside and outside Oregon ask about this year’s governor’s race is: Has incumbent Tina Kotek, who won four years ago, lost any of her then-successful coalition of voters and interests?

The basic answer has been no, but it has to come with an asterisk, which is the Oregon Education Association.

That’s an asterisk worth reviewing, since this year’s elections could carry implications for that large — and important in Oregon politics — organization, as well as for the governor’s race.

Facing for the second time Republican challenger Christine Drazan, Democrat Kotek’s roster of organizational support this time looks mostly similar to that of her last campaign. For a time this year, the Oregon Working Families Party, which cross-nominated her previously, didn’t appear to be doing so; but in August the party did cross-nominate and endorse her.

Labor organizations are, as usual, prominent in Kotek’s support base, including the Oregon AFL-CIO, SEIU Oregon, Oregon AFSCME, OSEA, Laborers International Union of North America Local 737, International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, the Oregon State Council, Oregon State Fire Fighters Council UA Local 290 Plumbers and Steamfitters, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 48, Ironworkers Local 29, International Association of Painters and the Allied Trades District Council 5.

On her endorsements page, Drazan lists no labor organizations (though it did include a business group based around members who have worker contracts).

The OEA, which endorsed Kotek in 2022 and donated about $389,000 to her cause, decided in March this year it would not endorse anyone in the governor’s race. That’s not completely unprecedented but it is unusual: Democratic candidates for governor typically get the group support.

The decision, as the Capital Chronicle reported at the time, came at a meeting of the group’s political action committee, where about 75% were said to have decided against an endorsement. There’s been no apparent reversal of position since.

The reasons were not made very clear, though the union and Kotek have been at odds over several issues, from school budgeting levels to rules surrounding instructional time at schools.

The Oregon Education Association is big among Oregon labor organizations, with about 41,000 members scattered all over the state. It contributes manpower and money, and has been an important part of the labor coalition helping Democrats to so many wins in recent years.

Just how great its individual impact is, though, is a question for which this election may be what sociologists would call a “natural experiment,” allowing for some clear analysis of a political factor that has been meshed with others in the past. The results could be disquieting to the teachers union.

If Kotek receives no money from the group, for example, that’s a diminishment of her campaign. But to date, according to the secretary of state’s office, Kotek’s campaign has received $10.4 million (to Drazan’s $9.9 million); outside groups also are operating in the race. The OEA contribution, while large, would be unlikely to be decisive.

While the organization formally is not involved in the campaign, many of its members may well participate or contribute on their own. The union has endorsed dozens of federal and legislative candidates in this election (nearly all Democrats), and most have backed Kotek.

How it will emerge as a power center after this election may be a more significant question.

If, for example, Kotek wins the race, it will be possible to argue that she didn’t need its backing. Not to mention that the OEA might not top her speed dial list next year.

If Kotek loses, on the other hand, the OEA’s role in the election would be much remarked on, and probably deeply criticized among its usual labor and other allies, weakening its overall position politically. That’s not to mention having to cope with a political and policy environment in which the new governor — Drazan — would be working to carry out an agenda far removed from the OEA’s.

In standing where it has in this election, the OEA made clear enough its displeasure with some of Kotek’s statements and actions. But did it think through the next steps: Where it and its members would be in 2027, once the implications, whatever the result of the election, become known.

They may have some explaining, and fast strategizing, to do.

This column first appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

 

If you’re a candidate complaining about an opponent’s stance on an issue, it helps to have a firm and visible position on it yourself.

The subject of artificial intelligence is bedeviling congressional candidates on that basis across the country, and the best example might be in Oregon’s 4th Congressional District.

Monqiue DeSpain, the Republican challenger in the Democratic-held district that includes Eugene, Corvallis and the Central and South Coast, has launched her first television ad of the campaign season on the subject of artificial intelligence, about which she fires directly at her Democratic opponent, two-term Representative Val Hoyle.

It’s an important subject, more than worthy of attention.

The risks of fast-developing generative artificial intelligence, exploding into national consciousness over just the last four years and especially in recent months, grew not just from anti-tech enthusiasts but from the industry itself. This is an extremely rare case where even industry leaders have all but begged for federal government regulation — guardrails of some sort. Congress has been essentially comatose to the subject, in the face of widespread constituent requests but in close accord with the staunchly pro-AI preferences of President Donald Trump.

The next term could be different, especially depending on who winds up in control of Congress, but candidates nationally mostly have not been very forthcoming about what they would support or oppose. Voters should have that information before they cast their ballots.

Bringing us back to the Oregon 4th, and that DeSpain ad.

The ad says (in reference to Oregon) that “big tech sees land to develop, water to consume, power to burn” (an unusual argument for a presumably pro-business Republican). It continues, “Val Hoyle’s taken thousands from the AI companies driving the data center boom.”

Sort of, but we enter here into the foggy grays. The ad’s basis is in a May Axios article saying Hoyle is one of a group of Democrats getting support from a Super PAC called Leading the Future. Founded last year, the PAC is indeed packed with tech industry money and supports AI development and innovation, and appears to oppose limitations on it. As of Sept. 23, Think Big PAC, a subsidiary of Leading the Future, reported spending $292,419 on behalf of Hoyle.

That’s not the same, though, as actually contributing to her: This is an independent expenditure, and Hoyle doesn’t control it, and legally can’t coordinate with it.

The money may be considerable, but this doesn’t look like a full-throated alliance.

A spokesman was quoted as saying Hoyle did not seek the Leading endorsement or funding and wasn’t aware of it before it was released, and said “has one of the strongest records in Congress to regulate AI to protect people.”She has opposed federal measures to block state AI legislation (counter to Leading’s position).

On May 13, Hoyle delivered a post on X seeking to be “crystal clear:” “Leading the Future endorsed me because they are working to build a broader coalition around AI regulation and I don’t believe we can put our heads in the sand and ignore the industry. Workers need a seat at the table, because when we don’t have a seat at the table we’re on the menu. I’m glad to be a voice at the table. I believe we need to have clear federal regulation that protects consumers, ensures that workers are part of the conversation on how to move forward and that we are proactively determining the direction of AI development so that the United States doesn’t get left behind.”

From here, that still sounds like keeping one foot in both sides of the argument.

As for DeSpain, her ad does say she has taken no money from “big tech” (which, properly speaking, Hoyle may not have done either). But it also says precisely nothing about how she would address AI or data centers, limiting herself to implicit criticism of tax breaks for such work.

And though her leading ad concerns AI, her website and formal statement seem to be devoid of mentions of it or data centers. In her statement on the economy, she says, “I will support policies that rebuild American manufacturing, lower the cost of goods, and improve affordability so Americans can live and work with pride and dignity. Prosperity requires government to get out of the way.”

That does not sound consistent with regulation strongly limiting AI, which she seems not to have addressed directly at all.

And, of course, the president of DeSpain’s party is as fierce a backer of unrestricted AI development as anyone, maybe even inside the industry.

So neither candidate been super clear about AI. But then, neither have most other congressional candidates, including most of those in Oregon.

A voter’s part in this is to demand more concrete answers. Congress will be faced with a series of complex and important tech decisions in the coming term, and voters should know from all their contenders what they’ll be getting.

This column previously appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

 

Oregon’s wildfires haven’t gotten their due this year.

They’ve made some headlines and generated some discussion, but they deserve more. The condition of Oregon may depend on their getting it.

By some measures, Oregon has been the number one state this year for wildfires. While fire season won’t be over for another month or so, Oregon is likely to rank high for 2026.

As of Sept. 8, the National Interagency Fire Center reported nine active wildfires in Oregon, more than any state but Washington, covering 1.1 million acres so far, with at least two of enormous size, the Big Grass fire near Jordan Valley (578,637 acres) and the Rowe Creek Complex near Fossil (337,927 acres).

The overall state numbers are down in September. In late August KOIN-TV in Portland counted 18 fires underway burning 1.3 million acres. Those acreage counts are enormous in absolute terms: Oregon in total has 61 million acres.

A Legislative Fiscal Office report out this month noted “The start of Oregon’s 2026 wildfire season was both early and aggressive, driven by record-low snowpack, record-high temperatures, and early-season drought conditions. The unseasonably dry landscape in March and April led to dozens of early-season fires. … On July 22, 2026, Oregon’s landscape was reportedly inundated by 8,357 dry lightning strikes statewide, sparking at least eight new fires, including the Grasshopper Fire near Mount Hood. By late July, more than 150 wildfires were burning across the state.”

All this was projected at a relatively early point. Governor Tina Kotek in June issued a statewide fire emergency, which set directives for how agencies and responders would cooperate.

These wildfires have been expensive, and are blowing well past previous records. They have been costly to fight (an analysis by KOIN-TV estimated a grand total figure at $842 million). The Fiscal Office report figured on a state level “gross large fire costs totaling $236.2 million and net fire costs totaling $157.4 million. For comparative purposes, this exceeds the fire season costs incurred as of August 20, 2024, by $30.2 million gross and $95.1 million net.

Beyond that, of course, they have damaged significant amounts of land and property.

And they have been responsible for a range of secondary costs. One of the biggest: The cost of electric power, rising in part due to actual and preventative costs of wildfires.

And yet in much of Oregon, the fires seem a little off to the side, peripheral. Most people in Oregon live west or south of the Cascade Mountains, and nearly all of the large fires are well to the east of those mountains.

Many of the more populous parts of Oregon have had mellow summer weather this year — moderate temperatures in much of Oregon, few very-hot days — compared to much of the country. This hasn’t felt so much like fire season in the Willamette Valley.

Too, most of those parts of Oregon also caught only occasional smoke this year. Orange suns showed up from time to time, but outside the actual and more remote burn areas, they didn’t persist for more than a few days at a time.

One good-news aspect of the lower attention may be that — to judge from a range of on-scene reports — wildfire fighters seem to have been uncommonly effective this year.

But still another reason is where the fires were located. For most Oregonians, they were somewhere over there, far away and over mountain ranges from heavily populated areas.

For all that, in some ways Oregon dodged a fire bullet this year in terms of impact on large numbers of people and stocks of property.

But that’s this year. With just a little more than half a year till the start of the next fire season, which quite possibly could be worse, time has come for more intensive planning.

Oregon — and most of the West — has had ongoing small snowpacks. This year, the National Weather Service is projecting something like more of the same, a warm and relatively dry winter, which sounds like not a lot of mountain snow. Next year’s fire season may be a more unavoidable reality than this one.

We have the larger share of a year to prepare for what may be a rough fire season in 2027. We should use it wisely.

This column originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

 

Just four years ago, after Oregon’s new congressional district map was set, the state was home to a group of strongly contested races for the U.S. House.

By any reasonable measure, the Oregon general election ballot of 2022 showed safe seats for three of the state’s six districts — northwest District 1 Democratic, eastern District 2 Republican and Portland-centered District 3 Democratic. This was no surprise; none of those areas had been seriously competitive for a few decades, and they are not today.

But in 2022, the other three were battlegrounds.

Such was the perception during the campaign, locally and nationally, and it was reflected in the 2022 election results. In southwest Oregon’s 4th Congressional District, Democrat Val Hoyle won with 50.5% of the vote, leading Republican Alex Skarlatos by 7.4 points — a modest win. In the 5th that stretches from Bend to Portland, Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer won with 50.9%, with a margin of about 1.9% — very small. And in the 6th District in the Willamette Valley, Andrea Salinas prevailed with just 50.1%, a barely larger 2.4% margin.

This reads like the setup for a decade full of tight, competitive races.

It hasn’t played out that way.

In 2024, Hoyle’s winning margin grew to 7.8%, and Salinas’ expanded to 6.8%. The 5th District was the partial exception, since it flipped to Democrat Janelle Bynum, but with a still-narrow margin of 2.7% over Chavez-DeRemer.

So far this year, indicators suggest all three seats — not to mention the other three Oregon House seats as well — are all but locked down for the incumbents. To find serious U.S. House contests, in a year when House control is swinging in the balance, means crossing the border north to Washington’s 3rd District, where Democrat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is in another serious contest, or maybe south to northern Nevada’s 2nd District, where local observers split sharply on how competitive that open seat is.

Of course, we won’t know for sure if the Oregon incumbent advantages really have solidified until we see the election returns. But we do have indications.

This year, Hoyle faces Republican Monique DeSpain, who has been running an active campaign. Her fundraising is about half of Hoyle’s, however, and the main national race raters (Cook Political Report, Decision Desk, Inside Elections and Sabato’s Crystal Ball) all rate it as “safe Democratic,” meaning they don’t consider it genuinely competitive.

The story is about the same in the 6th District, where the national raters in recent months have considered the district “safe Democratic.” One element of that may relate to funding, where as of June 30 Salinas has raised more than $1.6 million and Republican David Russ, whose campaign has been low-key so far, reported raising $12,791. The contest so far appears as quiet.

The current 5th District 5 has been home to two close elections in a row, in each case flipping partisan control, so you might expect a big battleground there this time. But, while it does seem more competitive than the 4th or 6th districts, it doesn’t look as strongly competitive this time.

This year, Bynum is facing Republican Patti Adair of Deschutes County. This district, drawn with just a slightly Democratic advantage, should hold the most potential for an exciting contest, but three of the national raters (Cook, Decision and Inside) consider it a solid or safe Democratic seat, while Sabato rates it as likely Democratic.

Campaign money may here, too, be a consideration. By June 30, Bynum reported raising almost nine times as much money as Adair, and such a heavy disparity often indicates a level of confidence in election prospects. While this is the Oregon district with the closest match of Democrats (who represent a plurality of voters) against Republicans, the sides seem to have hardened enough that a Republican crossover like the 2022 contest seems increasingly less likely this year.

Some of this political shift, in the cases of Hoyle and Salinas, may reflect incumbents in their second terms becoming more entrenched. Normally, incumbents — as a broad rule — become harder to beat after their first re-election.

All of this seems a reflection of the nation generally. Democrats appear to be building toward a wave, and Democrats in blue states seem more shored up than usual.

But it also may reflect a hardening partisanship in Oregon.

This column first appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

 

Oregon voters as a whole have not approved of Donald Trump any time he’s been on the general election ballot, handing him losses in 2016 (39.1%), in 2020 (40.4%) and 2024 (41%).

But parts of Oregon then and now have expressed different attitudes, as an election map of the state would show. Slicing the data in a different way, we now have a new report breaking the state’s current polling data into 35 geographic units, similar in number to the state’s 36 counties, but in this case each with similar populations.

This recasting shows up in a new national report in the polling analysis site Strength in Numbers, led by G. Elliot Morris (whose Substack is well worth a review), and drawing on an unusually large and detailed data set.

Nationally, it gives Trump an overall polling average of 38.2%, which if anything is a bit higher than some other polling aggregators conclude. Oregon, being a little bluer than the nation overall, gives Trump a job approval of 32.8%

Rather than using county maps, where enormous spaces may contain few people, and vice versa, distorting the voter picture, the report relies on Census Public Use Microdata Areas, or PUMAs. Each of the 35 in Oregon contains roughly 100,000 adults.

There are no massive surprises here. But we can see some sharp patterns.

First, the three — and there were only three — PUMAs where Trump polling approval topped 50%: the Klamath, Malheur, Lake and Harney four-county area (55.6%); the Union, Baker, Wallowa and southeastern Umatilla counties region (54.8%), and Douglas County (53.3%). That these areas support Trump is not surprising at all, though two years ago Trump scored 70% or more in nearly all these places.

Then there are the batch of PUMAs where Trump’s favorables have dropped below 50%, but still clearly above the national average: the Josephine, Coos and Curry counties area (49.1%); Deschutes (leaving out the city of Bend), Crook and Jefferson counties 47.7%); most of Linn County including Albany (46%), Marion County except Salem and Keizer (44.7%); the Columbia River counties from northwest Umatilla to Hood River County (44%); the cities of Medford and Central Point (43.9%); and southeastern Clackamas County (43.6%). Up to this point, the PUMAs have been essentially rural, with a few mid-sized cities thrown in (Medford, Albany, Grants Pass).

The Oregon PUMAs roughly matching Trump’s support nationwide include Jackson County minus Medford and Central Point (40.5%); Lane County except Eugene and Springfield (39.1%); Yamhill County (39%); Columbia, Clatsop, and Tillamook counties (38.2%); Northern Salem city and Keizer 37.4%; Polk and Lincoln counties (36.8%). These areas may hit close to the national average but still are more pro-Trump than Oregon overall.

Now, as the Trump numbers decline sharply, we move into urban and suburban areas, nearly all in the Willamette Valley (the big exception being the city of Bend, which is also in this group). These PUMAs include northwest Clackamas County including Oregon City (32.9%); central and southern Salem city (31.7%); the Milwaukee and Happy Valley areas in Clackamas County 31.3%; Springfield and northeast Eugene cities (29.7%); the Gresham, Troutdale and Gorge areas in Multnomah County (29.5%); Bend city (27.6%); Hillsboro area in Washington County (25.6%); Benton County and southwest Linn County (25.3%); the Wilsonville and Lake Oswego area in Clackamas County (25.9%), Forest Grove and western Washington County area (27.5%); the Tigard, Tualatin and Sherwood area in Washington County (25.5%); eastern Portland city (23.7%); and the Beaverton area (23.1%).

Finally, we get to the areas where you have to go on an intense search to find evidence of Trump support, though some does exist if you look for it. These places include central and western Eugene (20.7%); eastern Beaverton (19%); southeast Portland (13%); west Portland (11.6%); north-central Portland (10.9%); and east-central Portland (10.4%). For the record, Trump received 17.1%% of the Multnomah County vote in 2024, which still represented higher support than current polling indicates.

Viewed as a whole, the usual patterns — more Republican and Trump support in the more rural areas, and farther from large metro areas — seems to continue in force.

But those numbers are significant. They do seem to represent, both in red and blue areas, across the board decline in support for the president. If that has an effect on votes cast for other Republicans in the state, it could have a big impact on Oregon elections in another couple of months.

This column first appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

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Enthusiasts of the Greater Idaho proposal, which proposes to shift much of eastern Oregon to jurisdiction of the state of Idaho, may have just suffered a setback.

Its nature is economic, not political.

Greater Idaho is an idea supported by significant numbers of eastern Oregonians to break away from the state of Oregon — which as a whole is led by Democrats whose policies often differ from those of the Republicans in the east of the state — and unite with Idaho, which tends to vote more the way they do.

Voters in many eastern Oregon counties have backed ballot issues supporting the idea, though the most recent such election, in Wallowa County in May, went down as a crashing loss for the Greater Idaho movement.

In the most eastern Oregon counties many people have connections to Idaho, from commercial and shopping to media links and broadcasts to social connections. Ontario in particular gets heavy shopping and service traffic from Idaho, sometimes involving buying whatever isn’t legal in Idaho (or avoiding the Idaho sales tax).

But the largest direct and firm organizational link Oregon has had to Idaho in the last century has been an investor-owned electric utility company.

Idaho Power, based in Boise since its 1915 founding, serves a large chunk of southern Idaho and about a century ago expanded into a parts of four eastern Oregon counties: Baker, Harney, Malheur and Wallowa, with about 20,000 customers.

The land area is significant, but the population and commercial and industrial base is small, amounting to only about 3% to 4% of Idaho Power’s overall reach. By around the 1950s and especially before the era of massive interconnected power grids, there was technical logic to it because much of Idaho Power’s electric generation came from the Hells Canyon dams located on the Oregon-Idaho border.

This may be the Idaho-based organization with the tightest local connection in Oregon. There are of course other Idaho-based businesses with Oregon operations, but none that reach so directly into the lives of Oregon communities, and few reach people so directly where they live.

Where it operates in Oregon, it has to abide by Oregon laws and rules and operate under its regulators. That need to work within the different rules of different states does complicate life for Idaho Power, as it does many other utilities ranging across states.

On May 21, Idaho Power and the Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative at Baker City said it filed a request with the Oregon Public Utility Commission for IPCo to sell its Oregon territory to the Baker City cooperative, for $154 million. Assuming no regulatory hangups, and none seem apparent, the agreement will be final next year.

Operationally, as Idaho Power noted, “As Idaho Power’s geographic neighbor, their teams and resources are well-positioned to serve Oregonians with quick outage response times, a new service center and customer-facing office in Ontario, and a local board of representatives made up of member-owners from across their territory.”

Geographically, the agreement also seems to make sense. The existing Idaho Power territory ranges across four counties but includes only one regional center city (Ontario) and a few smaller communities (such as Vale, Jordan Valley and Nyssa).

Oregon Trail is larger, serving four counties (Baker. Union, Grant and Harney) and cities including La Grande, John Day and Burns.

OTEC said, “Oregon represents a small portion of Idaho Power’s business, and reducing the complexity of operating in two states allows Idaho Power to focus on Idaho’s growing population and energy demand. Because OTEC’s existing service territory is adjacent to Idaho Power’s Oregon operations, OTEC is well positioned to welcome these customers as member-owners and serve them efficiently. Increasing membership also gives OTEC additional economies of scale.”

So how does all this relate to the Greater Idaho project, which would carve away most of Oregon east of the Cascades and make it part of the state of Idaho?

One way to look at it: A large chunk of the pro-Greater Idaho area,which was divided between Idaho-based and Oregon-based utilities, now will be united under the Oregon operations.

Another way to look at it: Idaho is not terribly interested in eastern Oregon — at least to the point of concluding that, at least financially, it doesn’t pencil out as a long-range investment.

Meanwhile, the Oregon Trail cooperative saw enough value to spend what in its terms were a lot of money for the new service territory and physical operations.

For Greater Idaho, this may be another bit of air escaping from the balloon.

This column originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

 

Democrat Tina Kotek’s second television spot of her gubernatorial re-election campaign focused most directly on the unlikely subject of food banks. But the unsubtle subtext of the ad was the president.

After noting that she had once worked at the Oregon Food Bank, the rest of her narration said this: “that’s why President Trump’s cuts to food assistance were so cruel, and why I fought back so hard. … I will always stand up to Trump and anyone else to protect Oregonians.”

Gubernatorial races usually concern the personalities (or at least images) of the candidates and the issues arising in the state. Those aren’t irrelevant this year, and I wrote about them in an earlier column.

But this year, those considerations are matched by something else: The president of the United States, Donald Trump, who has become such a forceful figure in the country that many political contests beyond the federal are impacted by him. Oregon may be among the states where that is especially true.

But the dynamics are a long shot from places like Idaho or Wyoming. Oregon gave Trump in 2016 about 39.1% of the vote, in 2020 about 40.4% of the vote and in 2024 about 41% — a thin upward climb, perhaps, but each time far behind the Democratic nominee (by about 11%, 16% and 14% respectively).

Trump is in a clear minority position in Oregon when it comes to voting popularity. He appears to have support among most Oregon Republicans, but most Oregon voters are not Republicans: Non-aligned and Democrats both have larger shares.

But it’s more than that. Oregon appears to have been targeted in a number of ways by the Trump administration, and Oregonians are well aware of it. Trump’s comments about Oregon and Portland (which he described as “war ravaged”) have been highly negative.

Proposals to install ICE facilities, such as at Newport, have been heavily protested, as have been the ICE center and activities in the Portland area. Policies such as tariffs and crimped trade relations have hit Oregon as they have elsewhere. Points for criticism are at times indirect, such as the president’s close relationship with tech business executives pressing AI and data centers, both evidently unpopular in Oregon.

And the Republican candidates for governor this year, not only nominee Christine Drazan but also her former rivals for the party nod, appear to know that well. Their collective websites scarcely mention the name “Trump.” When the leading contenders gathered for an April 16 debate at Hillsboro, the name of their incumbent president of their party was never spoken.

Nor will you easily find the word “Trump” on the Drazan website, or in press releases.

The Democratic Party of Oregon wasted no time making the connection, saying on the day she announced for governor last year, “Christine Drazan’s announcement makes one thing clear: Donald Trump is officially on the Oregon ballot. Drazan has sided with Donald Trump on deploying the National Guard onto Oregon streets instead of standing with local law enforcement and Oregon business leaders. She supported a dangerous abortion ban, pushed to cut funding for Medicaid, and opposes vote-by-mail.”

On the day Drazan won her nomination this year, state Democrats said, “Trump is on the ballot in Oregon.”

Even Drazan has implicitly acknowledged as much, saying July 24 at the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association, “She’s gonna talk for the next 100-plus days about the president of the United States, because that is all she has to point to.”

Knute Buehler, the 2018 Republican nominee for governor, opined: “This election is going to come down to Kotek running against Trump. And Drazan is going to run from Trump.”

This isn’t just a matter of partisan alignment. The relationship of presidents and governors can matter.

One one hand, Trump has shown a distinct willingness to withhold funds and other federal support from states led by elected Democrats. Presumably, Drazan could make a point of that, though she seems not to have.

The counter side is that a Republican governor of Oregon might well be inclined to relate smoothly with a Trump White House, and that could mean major shifts in direction which no one in this campaign has yet addressed.

That’s not all this race is about: See my previous column. But the Trump factor is likely to occupy a lot of the thought process of Oregonians this fall. Maybe about half of it.

This column originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

The Oregon governor’s race this year may hinge on two factors. One is the record of incumbent Democrat Tina Kotek and Republican Christine Drazan’s critique of it and issues on the ground. The other is the Trump administration.

Here, let’s look at the first of those, the ideas and topics more specific to the candidates and Oregon. (The Trump factor will come later.)

A good shorthand comparison of what the candidates generally seem to want to emphasize, and how they address those subjects, can be found on the issues pages on the respective websites of Drazan and Kotek.

These pages aren’t all that the candidates have, can or will say about various issues. But they do offer useful core messages. The first Drazan television spot this season, for example, plays like a short summary of her website’s issues page.

The two candidates talk about many of the same things, especially toward the top of their lists.

Both lead with the rising cost of living, described as a major problem.

From there, they diverge. Kotek says she has addressed high costs through attacking “corporate price gouging,” seeking to pause new taxes in the Portland area, blocking freeway tolls and utility rate increases and signing “bills that protect credit from medical debt, ban hidden online fees.” Drazan calls for lowering taxes, “repeal(ing) regulations that drive up gas, utilities and food prices,” and ending “Oregon’s unique death tax” (though how that would cut costs broadly is unclear).

Both also talk about affordable housing as a top priority, though again differently. Kotek mentioned her efforts to increase housing stock through legislation and otherwise. Drazan proposed regulatory reduction, property tax cuts and programs to help first-time home buyers.

After affordability matters, education was the hottest topic for both candidates — again, in different ways.

Kotek noted funds for early literacy, child care programs, expanding access to books and requiring reports from local districts on student learning. Drazan talked about increases in special education funding but also efforts to “restore teachers’ ability to remove disruptive kids from the classroom …  Defend and protect women’s sports (evidently a reference to transgender students) … Stop indoctrination from the Department of Education … End social promotion and ensure kids can read by 3rd grade … Ensure curriculum transparency and the right for parents to opt out.”

Both had plenty to say too about the economy, where Kotek referred to “strengthening” it and Drazan to “unleashing” it.

Kotek spoke of business partnerships and projects and focused on efforts to develop clean and renewable energy; elsewhere, she spoke favorably of a moratorium on new data centers.

Drazan’s bullet points were painted with a broader brush: “Fire anti-business bureaucrats. Freeze new rules and regulations. Clear barriers to trade. Tear up anti-business executive orders. Get government out of the way. Invest in Oregon’s infrastructure. Prioritize access to affordable, reliable energy. Unleash our natural resource economy. … Roll back Oregon’s hidden sales tax.”

Kotek spoke more about public safety, environmental concerns (except for wildfires, which Drazan simply said should be prevented so people could “get our woods working again”).

In her review of Kotak’s term, Drazan appeared to bear down on the governor’s case four years ago that she would be a tough and effective administrator, suggesting she has not been. The headlines on the Republican’s issues page says, “Oregon deserves better. Christine Drazan will deliver.”

Drazan devoted a major issue section to this theme: “Root out fraud and corruption. Fire ineffective agency heads. Issue a moratorium on new rules and regulations. Eliminate three rules and regulations for any new one. Undo Tina Kotek’s legacy by tearing up her  executive orders. … Veto special interest giveaways, special interest and pork projects.”

Drazan’s website, however, offers few specifics to go with the rhetoric. Maybe she could document fraud, waste, inefficiency and so on, but she hasn’t brought the receipts yet.

Oddly missing from both candidate’s major specific talking points: Transportation funding, on which the two clashed repeatedly in the last couple of years, and in which voters strongly rejected a Kotek-signed plan. Maybe that’s coming later.

Let’s pull back. From a campaign perspective, what do these messages tell Oregon voters?

Both contenders are doing what you might reasonably expect of them. Kotek is making the case that her administration has been active and productive on key issues, and cites programs, funding and legislation to support that. Drazan characterizes the term as ineffective and incompetent, and proposes mainly time-tested Republican answers (lower taxes, less regulation) in response.

She would, of course, have to deal with an (almost certainly) Democratic legislature. Of course, the popularity (ahem) of the Legislature isn’t something Kotek has emphasized, either.

That brings us to an unknown: how Oregonians perceive these arguments. The answer seems likely to be a jumble, since Kotek’s polling popularity has not been high (raising the question of how well her message will sell), but Republican policies haven’t been scoring well at least in Oregon either.

The decisive outlying factor could be summed up in one word: Trump.

This column originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.