Coos County moves to the right on Election Day

Nov. 17—While the red wave many predicted during the midterm election did not occur, in Oregon or elsewhere in the nation, Coos County moved even further to the right during the election.

In Oregon, Democrats have won or appear to be winning races for governor, U.S. senator and U.S. representative for the Fourth Congressional District, but in Coos County things were quite different.

In the race for U.S. senator, incumbent Ron Wyden easily won another six-year term with 55.86% of the vote. But in Coos County, the results were reversed as Republican Jo Rae Perkins collected 56.74% of the votes cast to only 40.28% for Wyden.

In the congressional race to replace Peter DaFazio, Val Hoyle looks to have won the seat with 51.11% of the vote, compared to 42.73% for Republican Alek Skarlatos. Again, Coos County voted the exact opposite with Skarlatos receiving 58.82% of the vote and Hoyle only 34.65%.

The race for Oregon governor showed an even greater disparity as Tina Kotek appears to be winning the seat statewide with 46.66% of the vote compared to 43.81% for Christine Drazan and 8.69% for Betsy Johnson. But not in Coos County. Voters here overwhelmingly chose Drazan, with the Republican receiving 59.46% of the vote. Kotek received 29.96% and Johnson had 9.22%.

The disparity was also seen in the statewide measures as voters in Coos County voted against three of the four, all that are now passing in the statewide ballot. In Coos County, voters only voted in favor of Measure 113, which would ban legislators who have 10 unexcused absences from running for another term.