It was a busy 2024 for Washington State Attorney General and incoming Governor Bob Ferguson (D) winning more than $550.4 million for Washington residents in the first half of that year alone.
Ferguson is Washington’s 18th Attorney General. Since becoming Attorney General in 2012 he has been praised by Democrats and Progressives for suing the Trump Administration 97 times and blocked his executive order to ban travel to Muslim countries and stood up for the rights of same-sex couples in Washington when he filed a consumer protection lawsuit against a Richland florist for refusing to provide flowers for a same-sex wedding.
Ferguson launched an Organized Retail Crime Theft Task Force, formed the Wing Luke Civil Rights Division, filed multiple legal actions regarding the cleanup of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation site, created the Counsel for Environmental Protection and the Office of Military and Veteran Legal Assistance, and stood up for victims of sexual abuse by leading the effort to put an end to Washington’s rape kit backlog.
The Attorney General announced back in August that his office’s civil law enforcement division won more than $2.6 billion in the last decade through 800 cases, as a result of lawsuits and its handling of consumer complaints. That includes nearly $800 million for Washingtonians in the form of direct payments, debt relief and consumer credits. The office won another $1.8 billion for increased government and non-profit services, including $1.1 billion to combat the fentanyl epidemic.
These lawsuits include Starkist and Bumble Bee Foods for a price-fixing conspiracy that drove up the cost of packaged tuna for more than a decade, costing Washingtonians at least $6 million, according to an Attorney General’s Office press release.
Ferguson’s office began distributing approximately $40.6 million out of these funds to hundreds of thousands of low-income families across Washington for financial restitution.
Ferguson’s Office also won more than $1.29 billion in opioid settlement dollars resulting from lawsuits against major pharmaceutical companies Attorney General Ferguson claimed were fueling the distribution of opioids, namely fentanyl, across the region.
Of those dollars, Snohomish County alone will receive $61,189,456.22 which it plans to use to bolster substance abuse programs across the county.
The funds will be divvied up as follows:
- Snohomish County government will receive $35,743,946.61
- Arlington will receive $1,356,435.67
- Bothell will receive $1,374,052.62 (this includes both the King County and Snohomish County sides of the city)
- Edmonds will receive $1,583,366.46
- Everett will receive $9,968,513.98
- Lake Stevens will receive $717,008.72
- Lynnwood will receive $3,988,070.17
- Marysville will receive $2,042,046.01
- Mill Creek will receive $635,606.07
- Monroe will receive $917,026.93
- Mountlake Terrace will receive $1,091,627.35
- Mukilteo will receive $1,326,034.10
- The City of Snohomish will receive $445,721.53
Ferguson’s Office also blocked a $25 billion mega-merger between Albertson’s and Kroger, last month, arguing that the merger violates antitrust laws.
Some Washington State Republicans also claim that Ferguson is to blame for a majority of the Let’s Go Washington initiatives failing to pass, after he utilized a 2022 state law which requires the Attorney General to draft public investment impact disclosures for initiatives that could have fiscal impact. However, GOP members argued that Ferguson’s language was partisan and misleading.
Initiative 2109, which would have repealed the Capital Gains Tax, 2117, prohibiting state agencies to impose cap and trade programs, and 2124, opting out of state-run long term care coverage act, all failed last General Election.
In the 2024 General Election, Bob Ferguson won against Dave Reichert to become Washington’s next Governor with 55.6% of the vote.
Author: Kienan Briscoe
