The Primary will be the 1st Tuesday in August: August 7, 2012. Candidate filing will be in mid-May: May 14 – 18, 2012.
Washington is faced with a budget deficit of $5 billion, and the Presidential Primary costs approximately $10 million. Also, unfortunately the political parties have not allocated all of their Washington delegates to the national conventions based on the results of the Presidential Primary. The state Democratic Party has always allocated Washington delegates based only on the results of the caucuses. The state Republican Party has allocated half of their Washington delegates based on the caucus results and half based on the Presidential Primary results.
Due to the election’s high cost, and the fact that delegate allocation historically has been conducted according to the caucuses, the Secretary of State’s Office, the Governor, and the Legislature decided to suspend the 2012 Presidential Primary and allow the process to be conducted entirely according to party caucuses. The Presidential Primary will resume in 2016.
The regular Primary that narrows the number of candidates for state and local offices will still occur in August. It is only the Presidential Primary scheduled for winter 2012 that is cancelled. No other races other than selecting Presidential nominees would have appeared in that election.
- April 30th: First day candidate fillings may be submitted by mail
- May 14th: First day for all candidates to file for office
- May 18th: Last day for all candidates to file for office
- July 9th: Last day for mail in and online voter registration and transfers for August Primary
- July 30th: Last day for in-person voter registration for August Primary exclusive to voters not currently registered in the state
- August 7th: Primary
- Oct. 8th: Last day for mail in and online voter registration and transfers for the General Election
- October 29th: Last day for in-person registration for voters not currently registered in the state for the November General Election
- November 6th: General election