Judicial contest · general election November 3, 2026
Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court
Colleen Melody and Scott Edwards advanced from the August 4, 2026 primary and meet in the November 3, 2026 general election.
3
candidates on the primary ballot
write-in lines not counted
2
on the general ballot
the top two from the primary
$417K
reported contributions
3 of 3 candidates matched a PDC report
Sources Secretary of State certified primary results · Public Disclosure Commission candidate committee reports · as of 2026-09-05 · certified August 21, 2026 · key ballot name + office family + district number
01
Who is on the ballot
The two candidates with the most certified primary votes advance, whatever their party preference. The party line is what each candidate wrote on their declaration, and it is the only party fact on this page.
- NNonpartisan
- party preference
- nonpartisan office; the declaration carries no party line
- reported
- $240,125 in contributions
- NNonpartisan
- party preference
- nonpartisan office; the declaration carries no party line
- reported
- $127,031 in contributions
Source Secretary of State certified primary results · as of 2026-09-05 · n 2 · note an official page is linked where the candidate holds office; a candidate page where a PDC committee exists; otherwise the name is text
02
August 4, 2026 primary — certified results
Every named candidate, in the certified order. The two who advanced are marked. Certified August 21, 2026.
| Candidate | Party preference | Votes | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Colleen Melody Advanced | none stated | 923,965 | 52.9% |
| Scott Edwards Advanced | none stated | 513,394 | 29.4% |
| Laura Christensen Colberg | none stated | 305,110 | 17.5% |
Source Secretary of State certified primary results, statewide file · as of 2026-09-05 · rows 3 · votes 1,746,550 cast for named candidates and write-ins together · note share is of all votes in the contest, write-ins included
03
What the campaigns have reported
Contributions each candidate’s committee has reported to the Public Disclosure Commission this cycle. One bar scale across the block; the figure beside each bar is the figure. A candidate with no matching report shows no number, not a zero.
Source Public Disclosure Commission, C-3 contributions to candidate committees, this cycle · as of 2026-09-05 · scale $240,125 = full width · key ballot name + office family + district number · unmatched 0 of 3 · caveat totals change as reports are filed
04
Money spent about these candidates by others
Independent expenditures and electioneering communications — spending about a candidate by a committee that is barred by law from coordinating with them. Spending for a candidate is not money from the candidate. For and against are two facts and are shown as two figures, never one.
Colleen Melody
- Fuse Votes
- Beware the Attack on Our Courts
- Seattle Indivisible
Scott Edwards
- CONCERNED TAXPAYERS OF WASHINGTON STATE
- Beware the Attack on Our Courts
Source Public Disclosure Commission, C-6 independent expenditure and electioneering communication reports naming a candidate, this cycle · as of 2026-09-05 · scale $49,828 = full width · key ballot name + office family + district number · note a report with no stance filed is listed by spender and is in neither bar · caveat for and against are not netted
05 · component 09
How to run for this office
This is an office, not a possession. It is filled by whoever files for it and wins, and the requirements are the same for everyone. This section is on every race page, whoever is in the race.
| Seat | Term | Next regular election | Filing opens |
|---|---|---|---|
| Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court | 6 years · Wash. Const. art. IV, § 3 | 2032 | May 2032 · one week; there is no late filing |
What filing requires. A declaration of candidacy, filed online or with the county auditor during one week in May (RCW 29A.24.050); a fee of one percent of the office’s annual salary, or a petition of signatures instead (RCW 29A.24.091); and being a registered voter living in the district on the day you file (RCW 29A.24.075). No signatures, no party, no prior office.
Reporting follows money, not candidacy. Registering with the Public Disclosure Commission and filing contribution reports is triggered by raising and spending, not by putting your name in. A campaign that stays under the mini-reporting threshold files a short form and nothing more.
We cannot yet tell you what filing costs. The fee is one percent of the office’s annual salary, which makes it a specific dollar amount rather than a rule — and a page that makes you compute your own filing fee has not told you the filing fee. Salaries are not in the record we hold, so the figure is missing rather than estimated. For a seat that pays nothing, the fee is nothing.
Sources RCW 29A.24 (candidate filing) · Wash. Const. art. IV, § 3 (term) · as of 2026-09-05 · basis this cycle's general election plus the statutory term
06
What this page will not compute
A race page is where a forecast is expected, which makes it the page where computing one is most tempting. Each of these would make the page more useful and less true.
- No projection.
- The primary share is a fact about August. Carrying it to November is a model whose error is nowhere in the record. The certified result is printed; the forecast is not.
- No “competitive” label.
- Close or safe is a prediction wearing an adjective. The margin is on the page; the word is the reader’s.
- No per-candidate ranking.
- Candidates appear in the certified order of the primary. No score, no grade, no frontrunner.
- No net money.
- Spending for and spending against are two facts. Subtracting one from the other manufactures a third that nobody reported.
- No connected-records section.
- A contest is not a node in the entity graph — it has no record of its own and draws no edges. Each candidate’s own page carries theirs.
- No location.
- We do not detect where you are and never will. The contest names its county; the reader knows their own.
- No race calls.
- After the election this page carries returns as the counties release them, with the count’s own timestamp. The only “decided” state is the certifying authority’s.
07
Common questions
- Who is running for Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court in 2026?
- Colleen Melody and Scott Edwards are on the November 3, 2026 general election ballot, having advanced from the August 4, 2026 primary.
- Is Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court contested?
- Yes. Two candidates are on the November 3, 2026 general ballot.
- When will the November 3, 2026 results for Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court be here?
- On election night this page carries returns as the counties release them, with the count’s own timestamp and the share of reporting units counted. We publish returns; we do not call races. The certified result replaces them when the state certifies.
- Where does the money figure come from?
- Contributions each candidate’s committee reported to the Public Disclosure Commission this cycle, joined to the ballot name on ballot name + office family + district number. A candidate who matched no report shows no figure rather than a zero.
Answers are generated from the same payload as the sections above and emitted as FAQPage structured data, so a machine reader gets the identical text a person sees.
Cite this page
This is public-records reporting. Use it, and say where it came from.
“Justice Position #01 – Supreme Court,” WashingtonIndependents.org, data as of 2026-09-05, accessed 2026-09-20. https://washingtonindependents.org/election/2026/justice-position-01-supreme-court/
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Our tables, figures and notes on this page are released under CC BY 4.0 — reuse them, including commercially, with attribution. The underlying records are public records of the State of Washington and were never ours to license.
08
Where this page comes from
Every figure above is read from a primary source and rebuilt on a schedule. Nothing here is modelled or inferred; where a source is silent the page says so rather than filling the gap.
- The contest
- the Secretary of State’s certified August 4, 2026 primary, statewide file. A contest in the statewide file is read from that file alone; a county’s copy is a partial count and is never merged.
- Who advanced
- the two named candidates with the most certified votes, whatever their party preference. One named candidate means the seat is unopposed. Write-in lines are not candidates.
- Identity
- a candidate is linked to an official page only when exactly one official matches their name; two officials sharing a first and last name identify neither, and the name stays text. A candidate page is linked by PDC filer id.
- Money
- PDC C-3 contributions to candidate committees this cycle, joined on ballot name + office family + district number. A name matching two filers is refused.
- Outside money
- PDC C-6 independent expenditures and electioneering communications naming the candidate, split by the stance the spender filed. For and against are never netted.
- Next election
- this cycle’s general election plus the statutory term (Wash. Const. art. IV, § 3).
- Returns
- on election night the counties’ released returns appear above with the snapshot’s own timestamp. We publish returns; we do not call races.