Challenger Joe Lombardi, a county public defender, held a commanding lead over Kitsap County Prosecuting Attorney Chad Enright in early returns Tuesday night in the race for Kitsap County prosecuting attorney.
Lombardi had 45,019 votes, or 56.7%, to Enright’s 32,935, or 41.5%, a margin of 12,084 votes, according to unofficial results posted by the Kitsap County Auditor’s Office at 8:13 p.m. Tuesday.
Countywide, 92,136 ballots had been counted, a turnout of 45.1% of Kitsap County’s 204,242 registered voters.
The Kitsap County Auditor’s Office will keep counting ballots in the coming days, including mailed ballots postmarked by Election Day, and results can change. The county is scheduled to certify the election Nov. 24.
The winner will serve a four-year term.
Both candidates list a Democratic Party preference.
Enright has been prosecutor since 2019 and joined the office in 2008, later serving as chief deputy prosecutor for the felony and juvenile division. He has pointed to the North Kitsap Recovery Resource Center, a pre-arrest diversion program, expanded therapeutic courts and plans for race-blind charging. He is endorsed by the Kitsap County Democrats and the county’s deputy prosecutors guild.
Lombardi, a Kitsap County public defender, previously worked as a deputy prosecuting attorney and an assistant attorney general for Washington. He has said turnover and management problems have hurt the office, and has pledged to personally prosecute the most serious violent cases and expand diversion for low-level and first-time offenders.
Lombardi finished first in the Aug. 4 primary with 49.7% of the vote to Enright’s 43.2%; about 7% of primary voters wrote in another name.
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