A red shift in votes counted after Election Day caused turnarounds in two important races affecting Whidbey Island.

In the end, the incumbents in county government and the state legislature representing the island will remain in office, despite millions of dollars being spent in campaign efforts.

Two Republicans will win the election despite being behind after the first count of ballots. Island County Commissioner Jill Johnson and state Sen. Ron Muzzall, both of Oak Harbor, benefited from a conservative trend in ballots turned in during the later days of the mail-in election period.

Johnson’s turnaround was remarkable. After being behind by 6% in the first count to Democratic challenger Christina Elliott, she admitted that she held out little hope of making a comeback.

But Johnson gained in subsequent vote counts in the Commissioner District 2 contest, though it was a long two weeks of waiting. After the count on Friday, Nov. 8, she was behind by just two votes.

After the ballot count Thursday night, Johnson was ahead by 1.6%. She has 24,763 votes, or about 50.8%, while Elliott has 24,013, or 49.2%. Only an estimated 500 ballots are left to count.

On election night, the race for Legislative District 10 was close between Muzzall and Democratic candidate Janet St. Clair, who is an Island County commissioner. St. Clair was up by 0.3%, but her lead eroded and then she fell behind as ballots continued to be counted by the Elections Office.

As of Thursday night, Muzzall was ahead by 2% in the district, which consists of all of Island County and parts of Skagit and Snohomish counties. St. Clair was ahead in Island and Skagit counties, but Muzzall’s support in Snohomish County overcame her count.

Before the election, Muzzall predicted the scenario playing out. It mirrors what happened four years ago when he faced Helen Price Johnson, a Democrat who was also a county commissioner at the time. Muzzall was even farther behind on election night but ended up winning.

Nevertheless, Muzzall said it’s a nerve-wracking experience.

“It’s incredibly frustrating because you’re sitting there waiting for the numbers and it takes days,” he said. “It drives you crazy.”

Muzzall and other politicians are unsure why conservative voters tend to turn in or mail in their ballots in the last days of the election period.

Muzzall said he’s asked Republican voters why they do this.

“I get all kinds of answers,” he said. “None of them is what I consider to be rational.”

Muzzall’s race against St. Clair is seen by leaders in both parties as a key contest in the state. He said a total of $3 million was spent on the campaign by the two candidates and independent groups, making it the most costly legislative race in the state. Much of the advertising by independent groups tended toward the negative.

Tim Hazelo, the chair of the Island County Republican Party, said that conservative voters are “a stubborn group” who tend to adhere to the tradition of voting on Election Day.

Four years ago, Donald Trump criticized mail-in voting and told his supporters to only vote on the day of the election, but he changed the strategy this year.

“I’ve been telling people to vote early,” Hazelo said.

Johnson said the large swing in her race may have been due to other factors beyond the conservative trend of voting late. She said Oak Harbor voters, who represent her stronghold, were dealing with the tragedy of the two Navy pilots dying in an accident, so voting early may not have been a priority.

“What I cared most about was winning in District 2,” she said. “It’s nice to know that your home district feels like you represent them well and they overwhelmingly supported my reelection. So that was the win that I continue to value.”

Both Johnson and Hazelo opined that many people who vote later spend more time learning about the candidates.

“Because we couldn’t tell the full extent of the votes left to be counted on election night, it was impossible to understand the probability that things could change,” she said. “When the late votes started coming through … which is typically the less impulsive more researched vote, I did much better.”

In addition, Johnson said she did late advertising.

State Rep. Dave Paul, an Oak Harbor Democrat, agreed that the trend is clear, but he can’t explain it. In his race and that of Rep. Clyde Shavers, their conservative challengers only gained about 1% in later vote counts.

Paul won nearly 54% of the vote over Republican Gary Wray. Shavers, a Democrat and Clinton resident, was reelected with 53% of the vote after facing Coupeville Republican Carrie Kennedy.

Island County Commissioner Melanie Bacon won handily over fellow Democrat challenger, Marie Shimada, with 63.5% of the votes counted. While write-in ballots haven’t been counted, write-in candidate Damian Greene, a Republican, fell behind. A total of 6,326 write-in ballots were counted.