If it moves, works, fishes, drives, advertises, or watches movies in Washington, there’s a new rule for it—probably with a form attached.

Democrats’ 2026 Rulebook Refresh: More Protections, More Paperwork, Same Old Legislature

Starting January 2026, Washington rolls out over a dozen new laws that collectively say: we noticed a problem, and the solution is more regulation.

Workers get a big slice of the action. Health care employers must investigate workplace violence (and document it annually), isolated workers get panic buttons and mandatory training paperwork, and Paid Family and Medical Leave expands again—covering more workers, more employers, and more obligations, with small-business grants offered as a consolation prize.

Hospitals can now mutually agree with staff to waive certain meal and rest breaks (because nothing says “modern labor policy” like legislating lunch), while apprenticeships get a technical tweak so electrical apprentices can work outside their programs without bureaucratic gymnastics.

Law enforcement and courts see changes too. Asset forfeiture gets tighter rules and hearings (a rare moment of restraint), while DUI laws passed earlier finally kick in—extending the felony DUI lookback to 15 years and tightening the screws on repeat offenders with more license consequences and fewer loopholes.

On the lifestyle front: anglers will need a new endorsement to fish for salmon or steelhead on the Columbia, cannabis retailers can hang a few more signs (but not too many), classic car owners face new insurance and daily-driver requirements, and movie theaters must provide both open and closed captioning—right down to how showtimes are advertised.

Health policy gets its turn with 12-month contraceptive coverage mandates, EV charger installations must now be done by certified installers, and driver’s licenses may soon list your blood type—because Olympia apparently trusts the DMV with your medical data.

Bottom line: 2026’s new laws aren’t flashy, but they’re everywhere—nudging, mandating, certifying, endorsing, documenting, and enforcing. Welcome to another year where the Legislature proves it never met a problem it didn’t think needed a compliance checklist. Read more a KING 5.

Bag Ban Brilliance: Democrats Raise the Fee, Grow the Plastic Pile

Starting January 1, Washington shoppers will pay 12 cents for a carryout bag, up from 8 cents, thanks to Democrats’ latest tweak to the state’s plastic bag law. Paper bags stay at 8 cents, because apparently that’s where environmental math stops making sense.

The policy traces back to a 2020 Democrat-passed law banning thin plastic bags and replacing them with thicker, heavier “reusable” ones—while nudging shoppers to bring their own bags through fees and mandates. On paper, it sounds green and virtuous. In practice, it’s a classic Olympia own-goal.

Yes, fewer bags are leaving stores. Retailers report a big drop in bag counts. Victory lap, right? Not so fast. A Washington State University study found that total plastic use by weight actually increased 17%, even as the number of bags dropped by about half between 2021 and 2022.

Why? Because the state required bags to be thicker and heavier so they could be “reused.” Turns out many shoppers treat them exactly like the old bags—use once, toss—except now they’re dumping more plastic per bag into landfills.

So Democrats responded to an environmental problem by mandating heavier plastic, charging people more for it, and calling it progress—then doubled down by raising the fee again.

Of course, this is peak Democratic environmental policymaking in Washington: higher costs for consumers, worse outcomes for the environment, and zero accountability—just another reminder that good intentions plus bad economics still equal bad results. Read more at Fox 13.

Democrats’ Housing “Solution”: Bulldoze the Evidence and Call It Progress

Washington Democrats have unveiled their latest idea to “solve” the housing crisis: convert empty malls, big-box stores, strip centers, and parking lots into housing—and politely ignore why those places are empty in the first place.

That’s the thrust of a new report from the lieutenant governor’s office pitching commercial-to-residential conversions as a silver bullet. On the surface, it sounds sensible. Washington needs more than a million new homes over the next 20 years, and underused commercial land might offer space to build without tearing up neighborhoods or greenspace.

But read past the glossy framing and the report quietly admits the real problem: government did this.

The document concedes—again and again—that housing projects fail because of infrastructure costs, regulatory gridlock, brutal permitting timelines, mandatory ground-floor retail requirements, and affordability mandates so aggressive that projects die and nothing gets built. That’s not market failure. That’s Democrat policymaking.

To their credit, the report briefly resists the usual urge to demonize developers. But it never seriously grapples with the core question: why are so many commercial properties vacant? It’s not because people stopped shopping. It’s because Democrat-run cities made doing business unbearable—tolerating theft, piling on taxes and labor mandates, and treating public safety like an optional add-on.

Now Olympia wants credit for proposing a workaround instead of fixing the underlying disease.

Worse, converting commercial land into housing risks locking in decline. Housing without nearby jobs isn’t revitalization—it’s just longer commutes, fewer opportunities, and communities that sleep in one place and work somewhere else (if they’re lucky). Even the report admits mixed-use projects are often better, but history suggests Democrats will rezone first and worry about consequences later.

As Jason Rantz puts it, Washington doesn’t just have a housing shortage—it has a governance problem. Until Democrats stop chasing employers out of the state, turning failed commercial spaces into apartments isn’t a solution. It’s an admission of failure dressed up as vision. Read more at Seattle Red.

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