Despite promising to make Washington’s tax system more progressive this session, Democrats hit working families with the largest tax hike in state history. Their massive $9.5 billion tax increase will make everyday essentials like housing, gas, groceries, and health care even more expensive. Freshman Reps. Hunter Abell and Andrew Engell, who represent the largest and most rural legislative district in Washington, offer their insights on the 2025 session – including strong opposition to the Democrats’ tax increases and the $78 billion operating budget. The 7th District lawmakers also highlight several wins for their constituents.
You all did a really, really great job, so thank you very much.
Okay, with that, I think we're ready to sign this budget.
Okay.
Good afternoon, everyone.
State Representative Hunter Abel here, along with State Representative Andrew Engel,
both from the 7th District.
Want to talk to you a little bit about the session that just finished up,
and then a little bit about what we'll be focusing on the 2026 short session.
So we just finished up the long session, roughly four months in Olympia.
Difficult session, largest tax increase in state history was signed by the governor
after being passed by the majority Democrats over both our strong opposition.
We took the position, along with the Republican caucus, that we can find efficiencies in our
budget in order to help address the budget deficit.
So disappointing news with regard to the budget, but there were some wins this session.
We were able to stop the bill, which would have established bureaucratic credentialing
requirements for our state county sheriffs.
We were able to stop an 11% increase in sales tax ammunition for the purchase of ammunition.
And so there were some wins along the way.
I know I focused on a couple of bills addressing wolves, as did you, and some addressing judicial
reform.
You want to talk about some of the bills that you worked on as well?
Yeah.
I mean, I'll start with a win as far as a kill in a bill.
We were able to stop the 3% growth increase of property taxes.
That's really a win for Northeast Washington.
And then also, I had a bill that makes it easier to get a group B water system.
This is people up to nine homes who want to share a well, and there was some bureaucracy
around that that was making it hard and wasn't necessary.
So I was really happy to get that bill signed into law.
So I know a lot of things that you and I talked about quite a bit on the floor was just how
unique our district is, trying to educate the majority Democrats.
The 7th district is the largest, most rural district in the entire state.
It's larger than nine U.S. states.
So this is a massive district.
Our district is very different than the districts in the Puget Sound area.
So we would have to argue a lot of times that a bill that may make sense in Tacoma or Seattle
doesn't make sense in Colville or Republic or OMAC.
And I know you and I talked about that a lot.
We really did.
And a lot of these problems are actually more urban versus rural, different kinds of needs.
We really are here advocating for all the people in our district.
What I find is most people, regardless of how they vote, have similar interests they
want out of life.
This budget this year is going to harm people of all political persuasions, and we're out
here fighting for all the people.
So bottom line, very disappointing result because of tax increases, but some significant
accomplishments this session.
