Darcy Burner

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Darcy Burner

Eighth Congressional District of Washington

Darcy Gibbons Burner is a Democrat from Carnation, Washington. She was a candidate for Washington's 8th congressional district in 2006, but lost to Republican Dave Reichert. In March 2007 she filed her intention to run in the 2008 race for the same district. She worked for a dozen years in high technology including five years at Microsoft as a Lead Program Manager, working on the .NET Framework. Burner left Microsoft in 2004 to enter politics.

1 Early life, education, and family
2 2006 Congressional election
3 Views
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Early life, education, and family

Burner was born November 12, 1970, and grew up in a Republican household in Nebraska farm country. She was adopted at birth. Her father, Ralph Gibbons, spent 20 years in the Air Force, settling with his wife and five kids in Fremont, Nebraska. She was the Civil Air Patrol National Cadet of the Year in 1989.

In high school, Burner was a National Merit Scholar. She worked multiple jobs, both part time and full time, to earn her way through Harvard, graduating in 1996 with a B.A. in computer science and economics. Her jobs included working for Lotus Development, Asymetrix, and, starting in 2000, as a lead program manager for Microsoft .NET.

Burner married in 1993. She and her husband Michael have a son, Henry, born in 2003. They live outside Carnation, Washington.

[edit] 2006 Congressional election

Darcy had been a volunteer in the unsuccessful 2004 campaign of Dave Ross for Washington's 8th congressional district, an open seat, and was a local Democratic activist. She decided to run for office after attending a Camp Wellstone training and became a first-time candidate running for the same seat against freshman Republican U.S. Representative Dave Reichert.

Burner was a strong fundraiser against an incumbent congressman in a congressional district that had so far never been won by a Democratic candidate. On the other hand, in 2004, Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry won the district with 51% of the vote, making Burner one of just 17 Democratic House candidates to lose in a district that went Democratic for president. She was a top-tier netroots candidate in the progressive online community[1], and both national parties spent heavily on the race[2].

Because of her strong fundraising, Burner garnered a number of significant endorsements. In August 2006, CQPolitics wrote: "though Reichert appears to maintain at least a slight edge in the fall contest, CQPolitics.com has changed its rating on the race to its more competitive Leans Republican category from Republican Favored." [3]. On October 11, they changed their rating to "No Clear Favorite" [4]. Multiple polls showed Burner in a virtual tie with Reichert with just weeks left before the election, and in late October the two major Seattle newspapers split in their endorsements: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer endorsed Burner while the Seattle Times, which had endorsed Democrat Dave Ross in 2004, endorsed Reichert.

It took a week before enough votes had been counted to make the result clear, partly due to the flooding on Election Day that had isolated several communities in the district, and the uneven demographics of the district. Burner conceded at a press conference on November 14, 2006. The certified result showed Reichert winning with under 51.5% of the vote[5].

[edit] Views

Burner describes herself as a "practical progressive".[6][7] Her positions on various areas include:

Reproductive rights: Pro-choice, supports family planning
Education: Supports early childhood education
Environment: Against additional nuclear storage at Hanford, Washington
Foreign policy: "Supports United Nations efforts to provide essential family planning and healthcare services to poor nations." [8]
Health care: Supports stem cell research
Military benefits: Supports extending military health coverage to families of Reservists and National Guardsmen