Umatilla County Primary Election Results
By Terry Murry on Tuesday, May 19th, 2026 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
UMATILLA COUNTY – Preliminary results are in from Umatilla County. As far as taxing requests, it’s a mixed bag.
The local option tax for Pendleton Fire & Ambulance is failing. Early returns show 54.95 percent of the voters have turned it down. Things are better in Echo, where that fire district’s local option tax has 63.39 percent of the voters saying yes to 36.61 percent saying no.
Amendments to the Milton-Freewater charter are passing with 72.64 percent of the vote. (Updated information shows that Athena-Weston School District (AWSD) is awaiting the final results of the May 19 election regarding the district’s General Obligation bond. As of Wednesday, May 20, the bond was passing with 532 (52.26%) YES votes and 486 (47.74%) NO votes. (Early returns had it slightly behind.)
In contested races, it appears that Hermiston City Councilmember Jackie Linton is being defeated by Krista Van Veen who has 61.38 of the vote. In Hermiston’s Ward II Roy Barron has 70.40 percent of the vote to Caleb Jacobs’ 29.01 percent. In Ward III, Barbara Martin has a comfortable lead with 64.79 percent over challenger Leeann Wornell at 34.19 percent. Ward IV has David Patrick McCarthy in the lead with 72.73 percent over Manuel Flores III with 26.78 percent.
In Pendleton, Debbie Kishpaugh has a 56.17 lead over incumbent Addison Schulberg in the at-large race. He has 43.42 percent of the vote. Russell Nicolai is leading for Ward 1 over challengers Ive Rixe (31.48 percent) and Jose Angel Perez with 11.30 percent.
There are two races for Ward 2, the first for a full term and the second for a two-year term. For the full term, Cody Jones has 56.02 percent to incumbent Ellie McBride’s 43.71 percent. For the two-year term, Joseph Hull is leading with 49.34 percent over Sean Butler (44.46 percent) and Caleb Montgomery (6.11 percent).
Ward 3 has Kristi Jeness with a healthy 77.93 percent of the vote over Marie Pratuch (12.35 percent) and Alicia Reynen (8.99 percent.)
Umatilla County voters are turning down the gas tax. The no votes have 93.71 percent of the vote while those in favor number 6.29 percent.
