The race for Washington state's 3rd congressional district is on the national radar for both Democrats and Republicans. Freshman congresswoman and Democrat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is running for re-election in the district Donald Trump won by 4-percentage points in 2020.
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) -- The race for Washington state's third congressional district is on the national radar for both Democrats and Republicans. Freshman congresswoman and Democrat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is running for re-election in the district Donald Trump won by 4-percentage points in 2020.
Southwest Washington's third congressional district includes Clark, Cowlitz, Lewis, Skamania and Pacific counties, as well as a portion of Thurston County. Vancouver, Camas and Battle Ground are among the major cities.
Also an auto shop owner, Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez joined Eye on Northwest Politics to talk about the battle to keep her seat.
Before the assassination attempt against former President Trump, Perez previously stated she thought Biden would lose against him in the November election. On whether Biden should step down, Perez said this is a decision only he can make.
"I've called on him to end this crisis of confidence and put the national interest first," she stressed.
Although her ads emphasize working with Republicans and "taking on the Biden administration," Perez emphasized it is not about politics, but standing up for the interests of her district -- citing the fentanyl crisis in particular.
"There's not a political party that cares about our community the way that I do. That's that's my duty," she said. "And the experience of people fighting for sobriety and their families has taken a back seat, and that's not right. So it's not about partisan politics. It's about the interests of Southwest Washington."
MAGA Republican and military veteran Joe Kent is running against Perez this year, as is "America first" candidate Leslie Lewallen, who is on the Camas City Council. The top two finishers - regardless of party - go on to the general election in November. Although Perez stated she believes this will be a rematch between her and Kent, she said her work will speak for itself.
"My duty is to know that I am fighting as hard as I can for our agricultural producers, for our timber industry, our loggers, our truck drivers, you for people who are waiting in line to get a spot in daycare, people who are worried about their grocery costs," she said. "And the rest of it follows. You just do the job in front of you and you hope that people will see that."
As a freshman congresswoman with minimal political experience before running for Congress, Perez noted how running her independent auto shop helped prepare her for the role in certain ways.
"You have to be a good judge of character. You have to ask the right questions," she said. "You figure out what they're doing, what they need, how you can serve, and so those are actually very transferable skills to running a congressional office."
The New York Times magazine recently ran a lengthy feature about Perez titled, "The Blue Collar Democrat Who Wants to Fix the Party's Other Big Problem." The eponymous problem being Democrats perceived as out of touch with the concerns of working class people. Perez believes this to be true based on her experience thus far in D.C.
"They do not get what our problems are. There's a basic lack of respect. I feel like a lot of just football, just maneuvering to get party favors for one group or the other. I don't want party favors. I want to fix the system," she said. "I don't want to go after discrete student debt forgiveness. I want to understand why has tuition increased 481 % since I was born. These bigger systemic questions - not party favors - but a focus on the underlying problems, not band-aids."
As far as her priorities should she win re-election, Perez is putting particular emphasis on supporting family businesses, working families who need child care and encouraging overall community support structures.
This includes building literal structures that last, as she was part of the delegation that helped bring $1.5 billion dollars in for the Interstate Bridge, even bringing in Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg on to the bridge itself when he visited.
"Bringing them here, having them talk to a business roundtable, about how their businesses would be crippled if, God forbid, we have a seismic event and the I -5 goes down. Those are the ways that you make the federal government understand the human scale of what we're facing in Southwest Washington," she added. "Not emails, not partisanship."
Watch the full interview in the video above.
