Texas Megathread

[jimrtex]

Harvey Hilderbran has dropped out of the Comptroller race making Glenn Hegar, who sponsored the women's health bill in the Senate, the nominee.

Hegar received 49.992% of the vote with 3310 provisional votes.  About 1/2 of these are in Travis, where because of the weather the polls opened at 11 am on Tuesday.  A court order left the polls open until 9 pm, but those voting after 7 pm had to vote provisionally.  Since Hegar had more money, he may have been able to call Travis County voters encouraging them to get out to vote.  He would only need 52.8% of provisionals to receive a majority.

The Republican Party has to run the primaries.  Though it is state funded, funding is rigidly controlled, so they would be interested in holding down costs.  People with $$$ to donate would not be interested in investing in Hilderbran.   Voters for Medina are more likely to vote for Hegar.  Rural voters might be more inclined to vote for Hilderbran, but they already would have done so.  And voters aren't going to turn out to vote for comptroller.

Staples and Patterson were willing to go after Patrick because they were competing for the same voters.  An endorsement of Dewhurst probably would not be that effective.  The only folks who would want the primary fight to go on would be Dewhurst and the Democrats.  What can they offer Patterson or Staples?  And the Democrats prefer Patrick as the Republican

In 2012, Dewhurst led Cruz 44% to 34% in the primary.  Cruz picked up 150,000 votes in the runoff, Dewhurst lost 150,000 and 300,000 didn't vote (the primary had the presidential primary to push turnout).

"Hello, I am Leticia Van De Putte.  I know Wendy Davis and I are not going to win.  But I'll be back in the Senate, and I prefer David Dewhurst as presiding officer.  All that dustup about him not recognizing me at the end of Wendy's filibuster is forgiven.  So I urge Republicans to vote for David Dewhurst." simply won't work.  Taking surreptitious aid from the Democrats, is going to backfire on a Republican electorate.

An AG runoff between Branch and Paxton is not going to hurt the GOP in any way.

[jimrtex]

Here is a Texas Tribune post mortem on their own poll: http://www.texastribune.org/2014/03/06/polling-center-poll-findings-vs-election-results/

They aren't willing to address the essential flaw of their methodology.

Some folks at UT wanted to get into the polling business, and phone polling is too expensive.  But there is no way to match people who use the Internet and are willing to be part of a YouGov panel, with those who have similar demographics but don't.

[jimrtex]

Yeah, it's pretty ridiculous. Based on early vote numbers I actually think Rogers picked up votes bc of the misguided Tribune assertion that she was the frontrunner.

Democrats might have got scared and put a little effort into GOTV.  Otherwise, they probably would be saving money for November.

The senate race is top of the ballot, and the Democrats don't want voters to not straight ticket vote, or try to explain how to vote "Democratic" and then vote for Cornyn or try to un-vote for Rogers (it is possible to vote straight ticket vote and then intentionally not vote for anyone in a particular race, but it is not obvious).

Van de Putte did go after Friedman, but they might not want to have drawn attention to Rogers.

[jimrtex]

Branch will NOT drop out ever !

Who is going to contribute any money to him?

[jimrtex]

Davis pushes Abbott to clarify his position on equal pay legislation.

1) He defended the state in court against an A&M University professor suing over her pay, and in particular exploited holes in the federal Ledbetter law to win the case.

The professor was at Prairie View A&M, and she alleged discrimination on the basis of race (she is non-black) and sex.

The issue was whether Texas law automatically incorporated changes in federal law made after the claim was filed.

The SCOTUS had ruled that federal law required a claim had to be made within 180 days of the date the alleged discriminatory decision was made.  In response, federal law was changed to require a claim to be made within 180 days of an act in consequence of the alleged discrimination (ie when you last were paid).

But the SCOTUS decision, and the change to federal law was made after the claim under Texas law was made.

The bill that Governor Perry vetoed would have changed state law to match federal law.  Perry said that a state law was not needed, since the federal law was available and had not been used.

The reason the state process is cheaper is because there are alternate procedures when the pay claim is recent (ie employer paid employee for 15 hours, when they worked 20), and can be used in cases where there is not a need to hire expensive lawyers.

[jimrtex]

Davis pushes Abbott to clarify his position on equal pay legislation.

1) He defended the state in court against an A&M University professor suing over her pay, and in particular exploited holes in the federal Ledbetter law to win the case.

The professor was at Prairie View A&M, and she alleged discrimination on the basis of race (she is non-black) and sex.

The issue was whether Texas law automatically incorporated changes in federal law made after the claim was filed.

The SCOTUS had ruled that federal law required a claim had to be made within 180 days of the date the alleged discriminatory decision was made.  In response, federal law was changed to require a claim to be made within 180 days of an act in consequence of the alleged discrimination (ie when you last were paid).

But the SCOTUS decision, and the change to federal law was made after the claim under Texas law was made.

The bill that Governor Perry vetoed would have changed state law to match federal law.  Perry said that a state law was not needed, since the federal law was available and had not been used.

The reason the state process is cheaper is because there are alternate procedures when the pay claim is recent (ie employer paid employee for 15 hours, when they worked 20), and can be used in cases where there is not a need to hire expensive lawyers.

>thinking all that makes it okay for Abbott to oppose equal pay

Could you attempt to express your thoughts in complete sentences?

[jimrtex]

Wayne Christian ... his own district voted him out of office in the primary in 2012.

More likely his district changed radically,

dropping Nacogdoches, Jasper, and San Augustine;  -110K

keeping Shelby and Sabine; 35K

and adding Panola, Harrison, Marion, and Cass.  +130K

and his opponent was the mayor of Marshall.

[jimrtex]

Ray Hutchison, former state legislator, Texas Republican Party chair, husband of Kay Bailey Hutchison, and one of Dallas's most influential attorneys, died yesterday.

He was instrumental in bringing the state GOP into relevance in the 1970s. Ultimately, his own political fortunes didn't pan out. He was defeated in the 1978 primary for governor by the more conservative and better funded Bill Clements and distanced himself from electoral politics after that.

He met Kay Bailey when they were both serving in the Texas House.   I don't think you can say that you are distanced from electoral politics when your spouse is state Treasurer, and later US Senator, and candidate for governor.

[jimrtex]

Have you guys seen this Dewhurst attack ad on Patrick?

The Ballad of Dannie Goeb

After the primary, two top people in the Dewhurst campaign quit, over what was described as a dispute over the direction of the campaign.  It was reported that persons close to Dewhurst's wife were being consulted.

So his original campaign staff said we aren't going into the gutter.   His wife insisted that he should.

[jimrtex]

Ron Paul supports David Dewhurst LMFAO.

Dewhurst is said to back legislation to repatriate the state's "university gold" from New York City.

[jimrtex]

If Patrick is the nominee, I have to wonder if Dewhurst might wage a write-in campaign or if some other Republican might launch an independent bid.

Or if the RPT doesn't just throw Patrick to the wolves and figure he'll either be dragged across the finish line with Abbott or Leticia Van de Putte will win and the Republican Senate will take away whatever ability she has to do anything.

In Texas, you have to file as an independent candidate in December (2013), and then collect your signatures after the primary.  Remember the "Save Yourself for Kinky", when voters were urged to eschew the primary so that they could sign Friedman's petition in 2006.

Maria Luisa Alvarado, the Democratic Lt.Governor candidate in 2006 indicated that she was going to run as an independent this year, but it is not clear that she filed.  Her former web site domain is now available.

Texas has a sore-loser law that prohibits a primary loser from running as a write-in candidate for the same office.   So Patterson could run for Land Commissioner and Dewhurst could run for senator, and Staples could run for Ag Commissioner, but none could run for Lieutenant Governor as a write-in candidate.

[jimrtex]

Ron Paul supports David Dewhurst LMFAO.

Dewhurst is said to back legislation to repatriate the state's "university gold" from New York City.

I thought that was after Ron Paul said he supports him

Ron Paul Supports David Dewhurst in Texas Runoff Election

This article says that Dewhurst made the claim on here:

(Youtube)Ron Paul's Revolution TV - David Dewhurst

Interestingly, the claim was made at the time (2012) that Sam Malone was dropped by KSEV because Malone supported Ted Cruz against Dewhurst in the senate race, while Patrick was supporting Dewhurst.

I checked on HB 3505.  It got a hearing in a appropriations subcommittee late in the session.  So either Dewhurst is not so effective; or Dewhurst is getting desperate.

[jimrtex]

I thought the sore loser law only applied to running as an independent candidate on the ballot. I thought anyone could declare themselves as a write-in candidate.

Election Code 162.015(b)  You can run for a different office as a write-in, so Dewhust could run for senator or governor, Patterson for land commissioner, and Staples for ag commissioner.

The law on independent candidates is even more strict.  If you voted in a primary for the office in question, you can't run as an independent.   But this is consistent with the law that you can't sign an independent petition, if you voted in a primary for that office.  In practice this doesn't matter too much since independent candidates must make a declaration of candidacy in December (2013).

[jimrtex]

The final ballots in the SD-4 special election are stuck on a ferry between Bolivar and Galveston.

[jimrtex]

Early voting for Monday in Top 15 counties:

GOP 29.6 (vs 19.6 in primary)
Dems 9.8 (vs 18.6 in primary)

Top 15 includes Travis, El Paso, Hidalgo, and Cameron, which makes it appear more balanced.

GOP vote in Harris County up 130%, where they outnumbered Dems 7 to 1.   Up 79% in Montgomery where they outnumber Dems 44:1.  GOP vote up 93% in Collin, where they outnumber Dems 16:1.

Patrick and Paxton are nominated.

[jimrtex]

Patrick's severe underperformance in Webb and Nueces counties tells you just how toxic he is to Hispanic voters. (Laredo and Corpus Christi are among the few areas of the state where Hispanics vote Republican in significant numbers.)

Patrick lost Webb 132:140.  96% of voters in Webb County voted a Democratic ballot in the March primary.  For the runoff, Democrats had 65 polling places, and the Republicans 4.

Executive summary: You don't know what you are talking about.

[jimrtex]

Patrick's severe underperformance in Webb and Nueces counties tells you just how toxic he is to Hispanic voters. (Laredo and Corpus Christi are among the few areas of the state where Hispanics vote Republican in significant numbers.)

Patrick lost Webb 132:140.  96% of voters in Webb County voted a Democratic ballot in the March primary.  For the runoff, Democrats had 65 polling places, and the Republicans 4.

Executive summary: You don't know what you are talking about.

Care to explain Nueces County, then?

What is your explanation of Webb County?

[jimrtex]

Unrelated from the recent discussions, but does anyone have a reason why Jefferson County (SE Texas - Beaumont) is still a Democratic-leaning county? Demographic-wise, it seems it should favor Republicans, although not overwhelmingly so. Could it be an anomaly left over from the heavily Democratic South days?

Beaumont and Port Arthur are heavily unionized, with refineries, port and other facilities.  They have also been losing population for decades, which is quite atypical for a city in Texas.  They are on the border with Louisiana, which has voted Democratic until quite recently, and which was true of all East Texas until quite recently.  It also has a large concentrated black population.  At the time of the 2002 redistricting, there was one Republican House member from East Texas.  Currently, one remains, which is a VRA district in Beaumont-Port Arthur.  Moreover, the Democrats only have 4 nominees in around 20 House districts.

In other parts of East Texas, it has not been uncommon for all the local government officials to become Republicans.  Rather than running in the Democratic primary, and token Republican opposition, they run in the Republican primary, with token Democratic opposition.  Over time, this works up ballot, as there are no county commissioners, etc. to run for the legislature.  In 2011 and 2012, two of the remaining House members switched parties.   One of them Allan Ritter did so between being elected as a Democrat in 2010, and being sworn in in 2011.  The other, Chuck Hopson switched parties in 2009, was the Republican nominee in 2010, but was defeated in the Republican primary in 2012 (which also included a change to his district).

Because of Beaumont and Port Arthur, Jefferson County does have a core Democratic Party, instead of some non-partisans who could run Democratic primaries and then switch to Republican primaries as happened in smaller counties.

In 1996, when Steve Stockman lost to Nick Lampson, it was because of Jefferson County.  The 1996 congressional election was conducted as a special election concurrent with the November general election, because the Supreme Court redistricting ruling had come down after the primaries.  Rather than wait until 1998, the primaries were tossed and special elections were ordered.

In Texas, special elections are all-comers, without regard to party, but with a majority required.  On election day in November, Stockman had a 46% plurality.  The runoff was in December.  While the district was one of many in the Houston area and therefore was buried beneath news of parking lots full of Christmas shoppers, in Beaumont it was the only district and actually got news coverage plus the union GOTV effort.   Since then, the Republicans have included Jefferson County in senate and congressional districts dominated by Houston suburbs.

[jimrtex]

Unrelated from the recent discussions, but does anyone have a reason why Jefferson County (SE Texas - Beaumont) is still a battleground county? Demographic-wise, it seems it should favor Republicans, although not overwhelmingly so. Could it be an anomaly left over from the heavily Democratic South days?

IIRC it has a very significant black population and a large university.

I understand what you and Flo are saying, although Waller County, just NW of Harris, is home to the historically black Prairie View A&M, and has roughly similar demographics to Jefferson (if not more D leaning), yet voted ~58-41 for Romney vs. 50.3-48.7 for Obama in Jefferson County.   

Checking Google there have been significant controversies over whether Prairie View A&M students can vote in Waller County; I can't find something similar for Lamar University, so it's likely the university has a more outsized impact. Jefferson also has over 5x the population of Waller, so there's that. More urban liberals.

The students tend to only vote in presidential elections.  Prairie View A&M is located in the middle of nowhere, whereas Lamar is in Beaumont.  Most of the students are local to the Golden Triangle.  If they lived further north, they'd go to SFA or Sam Houston, further west, UofH, or further east to Louiisiana-Lafayette.  Waller is also on the edge of the Houston metro area in the Waller (town) and Katy areas.

[jimrtex]

There is a longstanding controversy between Waller County and Prairie View regarding the university students' voting rights. The District Attorney has sued to prevent students from voting at their school address; election officials "accidentally" misplaced about a thousand students' registration cards, just in time to keep them from voting in that year's general; polling locations are as far out of the way as possible; student candidates for local offices routinely get ignored in the voter guides, etc

The District Attorney wrote a letter to the county election administrators regarding the student.  She told him that she was going to follow the standards from the SOS.  The governor, attorney general, and SOS told the DA he was wrong; the county commissioners who were being sued over the issue, held a closed door meeting with the DA; and he grudgingly offered an apology to settle the lawsuit.

The polling location was at the student center until a renovation, when it was moved to a county community center on the edge of the campus area, and quite near the post office.  Part of the controversy with regard to student voting is that there is no on-campus postal service, and so many students give a mail address outside the county, at the post office, or use the PO Box for the campus mail service.  Nobody thought to move it back until someone noticed they were a victim.

The civil rights organization True The Vote (TTV) prepared a report that showed that the student center would be a better location, since it was ADA compliant, had 10 times the parking (the university administration has agreed to waive the $2 poll tax parking fee during elections.  There would be more space, more voter privacy, and better control since voting would occur in a ballroom on a 2nd floor area that was not in general use on most days.  TTV also pointed out that because of the Shelby County decision, that the county could simply move the polling place and not seek the approval of Washington bureaucrats.

At the recent primary runoff election, voting was consolidated at the campus site for two precincts, the mainly on-campus 309, and 310 in the town of Prairie View (the campus is in the city limits, but there is a separate residential area),

Waller ISD, which is based in the town of Waller, which is on the Harris County/Waller Count line) and not the county school district, apparently published a voters guide one time.  One of the opponents of the students had served on the school board for a dozen years and was a professor at Prairie View.  One of the student-candidates said that she hated Waller and Texas, and couldn't wait to graduate so that she could move back to St. Louis (Missouri).  In its endorsement, the Waller newspaper noted that the two student candidates had not attended a candidate forum.  They lost 205-1098 and 160-1151.

[jimrtex]

TMF also delivered my favorite line of the night, explaining that in spanish GOP stands for Gringos y Otres Pendejos

I don't think Ferdinand Frank Fischer III speaks Spanish. 

[jimrtex]

The name of the city always makes me laugh, like Sugar Land lol what type of name is that

The name comes from a sugar refinery which was built around 1900. (Imperial Sugar)

1843. Imperial Sugar is considered to be the longest extant business in Texas.

Originally there was a Sugar Land Plantation, on the site of which developed the company town of Sugar Land.

[jimrtex]

https://twitter.com/ChazNuttycombe/status/1201999204563984385
I don't care for the rating, but the retirement is a further sign of GOP troubles the booming parts of the state.

Oddly enough he suggested that his opponents in the Republican primary were only running because they were Asian

Miller had been listed as possible appointee for Commissioner of Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, which may have drawn challengers.

[jimrtex]

Reading through past messages,

Tricia Bivins divorced David Dewhurst in 2016. In August 2019 it was reported that she was suing him over money from their divorce settlement.

Wendy Davis has filed for TX-21 listing her occupation as "community advocate".