Woodward, Sauter, Rasor win LD1 seats
A trio of familiar faces will be sworn into office in Idaho Legislative District 1.
For state Senate Legislative District 1, Republican Jim Woodward handily defeated independent candidate Daniel “Dan” Rose to return to the seat. Districtwide, Woodward received 23,402 votes, or 76.3%, with 4,976 votes, or 72.49%, in Boundary County; compared to Rose's 7,286 votes, or 23.7%, with 1,888 votes, or 27.51% in Boundary County.
Woodward had held the seat for several terms before losing the seat to Scott Herndon in 2022. Woodward defeated Herndon in the party's May primary to win the right to represent the party in Tuesday's general election.
In the Idaho House of Representatives 1A race, Republican incumbent Mark Sauter defeated Democrat Karen Matthee trailed to win a return to the seat. Districtwide, Sauter received 24,189 votes, or 77.7%, with 5,742, or 85.68%, in Boundary County; compared to Matthee's 6,923 votes, or 22.3%, with 960 votes, or 14.32% in Boundary County.
In the 1B race, Republican Cornel Rasor defeated Democratic challenger Kathryn Larson to win the seat. Districtwide, Rasor received 22,565 votes, or 71.3%, with 5,512 or 80.79%, in Boundary County; compared to Larson's 9,067 votes, or 28.7%, with 1,311 votes, or 19.21% in Boundary County.
In the Idaho District 1 U.S. congressional race, Republican incumbent Russ Fulcher received 325,771 votes or 71.2% districtwide and 20,515 votes or 71.65 in Bonner County. Trailing him were Democrat challenger Kaylee Peterson with 115,293 votes districtwide, or 25.2%, and 7,217 votes, or 25.21% in Bonner County; Libertarian Matt Loesby, who received 9,454 votes districtwide, or 2.1%, and 522 votes, or 1.82%, in Bonner County; and Brendan J. Gomez with the Constitution party had 6,841 votes, or 1.5%, districtwide with 374 votes, or 1.31% in Bonner County.
A pair of statewide measures had mixed results at the polls with a measure to amend the Idaho Constitution to prohibit anyone not a citizen of the United States from voting in any Idaho election being approved by voters.
The measure received 565,303 "yes" votes, or 64.9%, and 305,156 no votes, or 35.1%, statewide. Bonner County voters also supported the measure with 20,590 "yes" votes, or 71.41%, compared to 8,242 "no" votes, or 28.59%.
However, Prop. 1, a measure to revamp Idaho's closed primaries to an open primary with ranked choice voting, found little support among voters with the measure falling statewide, 611,854, or 69.8%, to 265,151, or 30.2%. The measure also failed to win support in Bonner County, receiving 20,970 "no" votes, or 72.33% compared to 8,022 "yes" votes, or 27.67%.