This year’s race for Oregon attorney general might offer Republicans their best opportunity to win statewide office.

Democratic Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum is departing after three terms and 12 years in office.

Rep. Dan Rayfield, D-Corvallis, retains strong Democratic backing and achieved some statewide recognition as Oregon House speaker.

But Republican Will Lathrop, of Newberg, has been running nonstop since early 2023, campaigning in all 36 Oregon counties, sharing his political-outsider perspective and emphasizing the state’s ongoing struggles with crime, addiction, homelessness and general lawlessness.

A former deputy district attorney in Yamhill and Marion Counties, Lathrop worked in Africa with International Justice Mission to confront human trafficking. His decision to run for attorney general stemmed from his return visits to Oregon each year.

“It was like I was watching this frame-by-frame disintegration of our criminal justice system,” he said. “I felt really duty bound to come back and try to be a wave of new leadership that’s going to focus on protecting people, solving problems, working hard and rejecting fringe politics.”

Rayfield is a partner in Nelson MacNeil Rayfield Trial Attorneys, who specialize in personal injury cases. A year ago, he announced his long-speculated run for attorney general.

He remained the House’s presiding officer through this year’s short legislative session, where he shepherded the bipartisan revisions to Measure 110 that included reinstating potential criminal charges for minor drug possession.

As background for becoming attorney general, Rayfield touts his 18 years’ experience representing individual consumers in legal matters and his nine years in the Legislature. He co-chaired the state budget committee and, as speaker, co-managed the legislative branch.

“Having been able to work with people across the aisle to get solutions, and try to do that while building respect, has been a tough but meaningful challenge on some pretty important issues,” he said.

The attorney general heads the Department of Justice, which serves as the law firm for state agencies, boards and commissions. Its 10 divisions and approximately 1,300 employees also handle a broad range of other issues, including child support, consumer fraud, charitable activities and enforcement of state laws.

Rayfield’s priorities include strengthening public safety and consumer protection. “I want to expand the work in keeping communities safe where we’re tackling drug delivery, human trafficking” and other crime, he said. “That will be a point of emphasis with some of the resources that we just allocated in the short session with some additional attorneys and investigators and working with local law enforcement.”

Lathrop described the attorney general as the air traffic control for law enforcement across the state, saying his election would bring about improved results. “I think the leadership response in Oregon has repeatedly been, ‘Pass a law, allocate money. Pass a law, allocate money,’” he said. “But passing laws is useless if they’re not enforced, and allocating money does nothing if the money isn’t well spent.”

He believes the attorney general, who is elected separately from the governor, should be more of a check on state agencies to ensure they follow the law. “You’re seeing a lot of state agency overreach, and you’re seeing a lot of illegal state behavior,” he said.

From his legislative perspective, Rayfield said the current budget system can deter agencies — if they don’t want to spend the money — from seeking DOJ’s legal advice. In the long run, that can cost the state far more. Along with fixing that financial model, he wants the state’s lawyers to approach their agency work with a problem-solving mindset.

The candidates disagree on the DOJ role in national issues. Lathrop said he would be less likely than incumbent Rosenblum to join other states’ federal lawsuits.

”My focus is that we have a lot of burning fires in Oregon right now. I mean a lot, and they’re all self-inflicted wounds,” he said. “There’s a role for the attorney general engaging in federal lawsuits if people are victimizing people in the state of Oregon or they need to be protecting the state of Oregon from bad actors of the corporate world. And then there’s a role to protect the citizens of Oregon from illegal federal overreach. And I’m going to do that.”

In contrast, Rayfield commended Rosenblum taking a broad approach to serving Oregonians, tackling contemporary issues such as social media’s harmful effects on children, and defending Oregon values.

Citing potential national threats to reproductive rights and environmental laws, he said, “You need to have an attorney general that represents the values of the state that they serve in.”

Each candidate has raised more than $1 million, with Rayfield in the lead, according to the state Elections Division.

Dick Hughes has been covering the Oregon political scene since 1976. You can contact him at TheHughesisms@gmail.com, Facebook.com/Hughesisms or X.com/DickHughes.