Dear friends and neighbors,

I’m thrilled to report the Senate passed the Millionaires Tax off of the Senate floor on a 27-22 vote! This is an exciting move forward for funding schools, health care, and essential services, paid for by asking households making more than $1 million per year to pay just a little bit more in taxes.

Less than 1% of households in the state would pay the Millionaires Tax. It would levy a 9.9% tax on income above $1 million – households with incomes of $1 million and below would pay nothing. The Department of Revenue says that there are only 167 people in our entire legislative district who would pay this tax.

It’s estimated the Millionaires Tax would generate $3.7 billion annually, which will fund critical services like public schools, higher education, early learning and child care, health care, and other services Washington families rely on – especially those cut by President Trump and Congressional Republicans as a part of the H.R. 1 bill. The bill also includes the biggest tax cut for small businesses in our state’s history and makes sales tax reductions that will lower costs for all Washingtonians.

I know this is an important bill and that the people are with us. More than 60% of Washingtonians, and more than 70% of the 22nd District, voted to support our capital gains tax to fund child care, early learning and school construction just two years ago. But it’s popular around the state, too – 32 out of 39 counties supported the capital gains tax, and polling shows that more than 60% of the people of the state support this new proposal.

This is the time to act, and I’m glad that the Senate passed this bill. We have tremendous momentum for progressive tax reform and doing the right thing for the students, families, and communities of Washington.

Children’s Day is an annual tradition when legislators and staff bring children to the Senate to visit and learn about the Legislature. It’s fun having a bunch of little ones join us on the floor!

Housing Committee Action

We’re back to the phase of session focused on committee action. My role as chair of the Senate Housing Committee is to review the housing legislation passed over to the Senate by the House and keep the good bills moving through our process. I’m happy to say the House joined us in some great work on housing this year!

HB 2266 helps us build permanent supportive housing and emergency shelters to prevent homelessness and get people off of the streets. Bringing people inside is an essential step for folks to get their feet back under themselves, and we need more places for homeless people to go that aren’t on the street, in parks, or on the side of the road.

HB 2418 streamlines and speeds up permitting for local housing development, cutting red tape and lowering costs to build. That means we can build housing more cheaply and have more affordable options for families.

HB 1859 supports religious organizations that want to build affordable housing for low and very low-income families on their land.

The House is doing this same process with all the Senate bills I’ve spent the last several weeks working on. Soon, we’ll reconcile any differences between the House and Senate versions and get them to the governor’s desk to be signed into law!

Rallying with Planned Parenthood

With my friend, Rep. Debra Lekanoff, at the Planned Parenthood rally

I was honored to join Planned Parenthood on a rainy Monday to rally supporters of two important bills I sponsored this year – SB 5917, to allow for the distribution of tens of thousands of state-owned mifepristone pills that are essential to medication abortions so patients who need them can get them, and SB 6182, to guarantee a permanent funding source for Planned Parenthood and other reproductive health clinics.

Here in the Washington State Legislature, we are championing the right to abortion and access to every kind of reproductive health care available. We want to ensure Washington state is a shining star for abortion rights throughout the country. Passing these bills helps make sure we don’t go backwards and Washington can continue being a leader for reproductive rights.

Next week, we’ll see the budget proposals for 2026 from both the House and the Senate – one of the key steps toward wrapping up our work this session. I’ll let you know what I see in those that impacts our district the most and the final steps we’re taking toward Sine Die, the end of the legislative session. In the meantime, you can reach me any time at Jessica.Bateman@leg.wa.gov. Thanks so much for reading and for your engagement in this process!

-Jess