SEATTLE — Among the nation’s most closely watched races is a rematch in southwest Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, where first-term Democratic Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is defending her seat against Republican Joe Kent, a former Green Beret who called for the president’s impeachment. Joe Biden.

Other notable campaigns in the state include the 8th Congressional District, where Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier is seeking a fourth term, and the 4th Congressional District in central Washington. There is no danger of this seat flipping parties, but the incumbent is Rep. Dan Newhouse, one of two remaining Republicans in the House who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump. He faces a challenge from the right in Jerrod Sessler, a Navy veteran.

Here’s a look at Washington’s hottest congressional races:

3rd Congressional District

Gluesenkamp Perez, who owns an auto repair shop with her husband, came out of nowhere two years ago to win a seat that had not been in Democratic hands for more than a decade. She beat Trump-backed Kent by fewer than 3,000 votes out of nearly 320,000 votes cast.

His predecessor, moderate Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler, served six terms but failed to survive the 2022 primaries after voting to impeach Trump following the Jan. 6 insurrection. The district narrowly voted for Trump in 2020, making it a crucial target for both parties this year.

The race gained more attention last week when an arson attack on a ballot box in Vancouver – the district’s largest city – burned hundreds of ballots. Another ballot box was hit across the Columbia River in Portland, Oregon. People who voted in Vancouver’s targeted drop box were asked to contact the county auditor’s office to receive replacement ballots.

During her tenure, Gluesenkamp Perez has balanced progressive policies with some measures popular with Republicans, including securing the U.S.-Mexico border — something she blames Biden for failing to do — and introducing ‘a constitutional amendment to force presidents to balance the budget.

She supports abortion access and hammered Kent, who previously said he supported a national abortion ban, for changing his position after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Kent now says abortion laws should be left to the states.

Gluesenkamp Perez supports policies to combat climate change, but also speaks openly about being a gun owner. A top priority is promoting a “right to repair” bill that would help people get their equipment repaired without having to pay exorbitant prices to the original manufacturer.

Kent is a former Green Beret who served 11 combat deployments before joining the CIA. His wife, Shannon, a Navy cryptologist, was killed by a suicide bomber in 2019 while fighting the Islamic State group in Syria, leaving him to raise their two young sons alone. Kent remarried last year.

His latest campaign raised questions about his ties to white nationalists after he hired a Proud Boy as a consultant and, at a fundraiser, praised Joey Gibson, the founder of the Christian nationalist group Patriot Prayer. Kent has said he disavows white nationalism.

He cited inflation and illegal immigration as main concerns.

Kent and Gluesenkamp Perez disagree on a major local issue: replacing a major bridge across the Columbia River between Portland, Oregon, and Vancouver, Washington. Gluesenkamp Perez supports the project to replace the existing bridge. Kent argued that a new, separate bridge should be built while the old one was maintained. Plans for the bridge replacement would include “light rail that would spill the problems of downtown Portland into downtown Vancouver,” Kent said.

4th Congressional District

Newhouse’s bid for a sixth term comes up against Sessler, who was one of two candidates supported by Trump in the August primary. Together, Sessler and Tiffany Smiley won more than 52 percent of the vote, causing problems for the incumbent president.

Newhouse is endorsed by the NRA and Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, and he has mostly avoided the topic of Trump. Instead, he focuses on agriculture and border security in a state with millions of acres of pasture, orchards and grain lands where immigrant labor is extremely important.

Sessler’s positions are in line with those of Trump. He says he will fight for tough national security measures, including “an impenetrable border”; work to dismantle regulations imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency and other administrative agencies; and encouraging tariffs and other sanctions against China.

“China’s obsession with global power, combined with its atheistic mentality, which removes any moral component, makes it a dangerous adversary,” Sessler said in one of several video statements posted on his campaign website.

8th Congressional District

The 8th District, a mix of wealthy Seattle suburbs and central Washington farmland, was historically held by the Republican Party before Democratic incumbent Rep. Kim Schrier, a pediatrician, took office in 2019. She survived a series of somewhat close races since then, getting about 52 or 53 percent of the vote.

Schrier combines progressive positions, such as protecting abortion rights, with an emphasis on securing road funds or funding specialty crop research facilities. The Washington Farm Bureau approved it this year.

Schrier’s opponent is Carmen Goers, a commercial banker who says she is running to curb inflation, end increased regulation of U.S. businesses, support law enforcement and reduce crime. She also promised to “wage war on the Department of Education,” saying that instead of learning reading, writing and math, children are “caught up in the culture wars of the progressive left.”

Supporters received 45 percent of the vote in the two August primaries, compared to about 50 percent for Schrier. Two other Democrats combined for almost 5%.