Jefferson County residents apparently shook off issues with the multiple-ballot primary election and soared voter turnout to nearly 57 percent.
More than half of Clallam County’s registered voters — 51 percent — also participated in the unusual, four-ballot partisan primary, placing the North Olympic Peninsula among the more participatory of counties throughout the state.
The highest county turnout was San Juan, with 59.41 percent, and the lowest was Klickitat at 31.11 percent, according to Secretary of State Sam Reed.
The most populous county, King, had a 46 percent turnout.
Both Jefferson and Clallam counties certified their Sept. 14 primary election results Friday, closing the book on the state’s most partisan primary election in seven decades.
Voters statewide were asked to select among three partisan ballots — Democrat, Republican or Libertarian — or a nonpartisan ballot, then vote only on that ballot.
The other ballots were to be tossed away.
The quad-primary stirred lots of anger statewide — Reed’s office reported an unusually high number of complaints — but the attention apparently promoted turnout, the secretary of state now says.
