Natural gas initiative ruled unconstitutional by Washington state Supreme Court

It’s a loss for Let’s Go Washington, a conservative-backed funder of a flurry of initiatives in the last few years intended to provide a check on Democrat-dominated Olympia. The group managed to get some initiatives through the legislature in 2024, but has only been able to pass this one initiative at the ballot box. The group has three more initiatives up for a vote statewide in November.

Washington’s homebuilders’ association, which originated and defended the initiative, expressed disappointment at the ruling, but said they have no plans to appeal.

"Today's decision represents a direct rejection of the clearly expressed will of Washington voters," Greg Lane, executive vice president of the Building Industry Association of Washington, said in a statement. "Nearly 2 million citizens voted in favor of Initiative 2066 because they believed families and businesses should retain the freedom to choose the energy source that best meets their needs. The Court has now taken that choice away from them. This is government telling the people, ‘Your opinion doesn’t matter.’"

Climate advocacy groups and Seattle and King County sued to throw out the legislation after it passed, saying it deceptively bundled too many subjects under one initiative, limiting local authority over air quality standards and amending statewide building codes as well as repealing a part of the Decarbonization Act.

“You're presenting to voters a choice where you have to vote for something that is put out there as seemingly popular, and then you're bundling it with other provisions that are not popular in order to get those passed,” said Kai Smith, a partner at Pacifica Law who argued against the initiative in King County Superior Court last year. “That is deceptive, and that's why it's prohibited. The legislature can't do it, and we can't do it through initiatives to voters either.”