Graham’s family tragedies and her own childhood abuse inspired her to get into politics. She said she didn’t feel as though victims had any sort of voice and she wanted to change that. What started as almost daily round-trip drives between Spokane and Olympia to urge lawmakers to change the statute of limitations on reporting childhood sexual abuse eventually led Graham to run for office. In 2018, she was elected to represent the 6th District in Spokane.

Now, a bill to retire Washington’s death penalty is causing Graham to revisit and share her own lived experience.

The legislation would eliminate the death penalty from the books completely, opting instead for life imprisonment without the possibility of release or parole. The measure did not move out of the House last year after it passed the Senate. It is uncertain whether it will clear the last legislative hurdle this year, as it moves again from the Senate to a vote by the House. Sponsored by state Sen. Reuven Carlyle, D-Seattle, the bill was brought forward at the request of the Office of the Attorney General.

In 2018, the Washington Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional because of the “arbitrary manner” in which it was used in the state. The court decision said the death penalty was “unequally applied — sometimes by where the crime took place, or the county of residence, or the available budgetary resources at any given point in time, or the race of the defendant." Still, the ruling left open the possibility that if some of those operational issues could be fixed, then the death penalty could be used in Washington state again. The 2018 decision was the fourth time the state Supreme Court ruled the death penalty unconstitutional. Lawmakers’ attempts to address problems with the death penalty have led to its revival each time.

Prior to the 2018 ruling, Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee signed a moratorium on the death penalty in 2014. The last execution in Washington was in 2010.

During a Jan. 31 Senate floor debate on the bill, Carlyle said keeping the death penalty on the books despite the moratorium and court ruling only contributes to confusion about the death penalty’s status. He urged other lawmakers to vote yes on the measure in order to provide more clarity in state statute.

“Now that we have firm resolution from both the executive branch and the judiciary branch, it is time for the legislative branch that sets the laws of our state to make a final determination on this particular legislation,” Carlyle said.

He noted the bill has taken a few years of work and that other states in the meantime have passed similar legislation. Additionally, removing it only modernizes the state statute, which is the responsible thing to do, according to Carlyle.

Graham, however, has been vocal about her opposition to removing the death penalty from statute. For one, she said that such a move would only embolden people like Ridgway to commit more crimes.

“My focus is not about wanting someone to die,” Graham said. “My focus is recognizing there are dangerous people out there who are predators that won’t stop killing.”