Washington

State Highlights

Gov. Christine Gregoire, a Washington Democrat, was headed to a decisive victory in her closely fought bid for re-election against her Republican challenger, Dino Rossi. Her victory came four years after she survived her first matchup with Mr. Rossi, a former state senator, by only 133 votes.

With more than half of all ballots counted, Ms. Gregoire held a clear lead, about 54 percent to 46 percent. Many ballots in heavily Democratic areas, including King County, had yet to be counted.

Washington votes almost entirely by mail and ballots must be postmarked by Election Day. That means about half of the ballots cast were unlikely to be received as of Tuesday, elections officials said.

In 2004, it took until Dec. 30 for Ms. Gregoire to be declared the winner over Mr. Rossi. That race was one of the closest gubernatorial contests in American history. This year, Mr. Rossi painted Ms. Gregoire as a tax-and-spend liberal who led the state to a projected multibillion-dollar deficit. Ms. Gregoire ran ads linking Mr. Rossi to President Bush; in one, Mr. Rossi’s face morphed into that of Mr. Bush. The governor benefited from widespread enthusiasm for Senator Barack Obama, who easily won the presidential contest in this increasingly Democratic state.

Washington voters overwhelmingly approved Initiative 1000, a ballot measure that makes Washington the second state, after Oregon, to legalize physician-assisted suicide. The Washington law, modeled closely on the measure enacted in Oregon in 1997, gives terminally ill patients determined to be within six months of death and mentally competent the right to request a lethal dose of barbiturates from a doctor.

A close congressional race in a suburb of Seattle between Representative Dave Reichert, a Republican, and his Democratic challenger, Darcy Burner, remained too close to call. WILLIAM YARDLEY

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