TX-06: Dems in Disarray!

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/ChadPergram/status/1358803319540572161

Sad to hear.

[Calthrina950]

The unfortunate list of members of Congress who have died in office grows yet longer. And it appears that he may be the first member to have died from coronavirus, which underscores again how serious the pandemic has become. Rep.-elect Luke Letlow, of course, died from it at the end of December, the first Representative-Elect to die in almost 40 years.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

Sad news, surprising number of deaths so early into congress. It's a swing district that just barley voted for trump. will be interesting to see if there's a Biden midterm effect/capitol hill insurrection.

https://twitter.com/AlexIp718/status/1358805214401163270

[Calthrina950]

Sad news, surprising number of deaths so early into congress. It's a swing district that just barley voted for trump. will be interesting to see if there's a Biden midterm effect/capitol hill insurrection.

https://twitter.com/AlexIp718/status/1358805214401163270

Governor Abbott will have to call a special election to fill the seat. And Letlow, as I noted above, was never a member of Congress, as he died before being sworn in. But congressional deaths do seem to have picked up pace in recent years. Obviously, thanks to advancements in medicine and ever-increasing life expectancy, far fewer members of Congress have died in this century thus far than died during the nineteenth or twentieth centuries. 2007 by far has had the most congressional deaths of any year of the 21st century; six members of Congress (five Representatives and one Senator) died that year.

[Nyvin]

Chances are he got COVID from his maskless colleagues

[Rookie Yinzer]

Yikes.

[Pollster]

Very sad news. Best wishes to his family.

On the flip side of the coin, I'm looking forward to the Democrat who loses this special election unseating Ted Cruz in 2024.

[VAR]

Turnout in the exurban Ellis County and rural Navarro County could give us some clues as to what R turnout will be like in 2022/2024.

But I doubt this'll be particularly competitive.

[JoeInator]

Sad news. RIP Ron Wright.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Had he been vaccinated?

[WavesAreRad]

Very sad news, my condolences to his friends and family. Anyways, I actually live in this district and I have a feeling the special election shouldn't be overly competitive even though the district is trending D. I don't think enough D's will turnout to flip the district imo.

First post btw! 

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Turnout in the exurban Ellis County and rural Navarro County could give us some clues as to what R turnout will be like in 2022/2024.

But I doubt this'll be particularly competitive.

Depends on who gets nominated. If a wingnut gets the GOP nomination, it might be an easy Dem pickup unless they too nominate a wingnut.

[Xing]

Very sad news, RIP.

[Nyvin]

The bulk of this district is in Tarrant County (580k roughly).    It swung pretty hard to Biden in 2020.

[The Mikado]

Turnout in the exurban Ellis County and rural Navarro County could give us some clues as to what R turnout will be like in 2022/2024.

But I doubt this'll be particularly competitive.

GOP's definitely favored but not overwhelmingly. My gut starting assumption is a 6-8 point GOP win as a baseline (right in the middle between Trump 16 winning by 12 and Trump 20 winning by 3), but definitely reserving the right to edit that down.

[NewYorkExpress]

Wonder who's going to run in the special election?

Would this be a good seat for MJ Hegar to carpetbag over to?

[It’s so Joever]

I will also use the super accurate YouTube comment method^TM for this one.

[AGA]

Likely R. Downballot trends are behind presidential trends.

[Brittain33]

Share of population with a BA is significantly lower than any of the northern Metroplex districts which swung to Biden recently. Not likely to flip.

[The Mikado]

Share of population with a BA is significantly lower than any of the northern Metroplex districts which swung to Biden recently. Not likely to flip.

Not likely, but not impossible, either. Wright won by 8 in 2018 and 9 in 2020, but it's not like Congressional numbers are lagging THAT far behind Presidential numbers.

Dems' best shot is to only run one candidate and hope they win outright in the presumably lower turnout first round (it's a top two runoff style, but a majority prevents the runoff). I wouldn't say that's likely, and I expect the Dem to end up losing by 6 or 7 in the second round, but it's a feasible strategy.

Either way, this isn't a race the GOP can skate on. They'll probably win, but have to put real effort in to do it. And the results will definitely be examined by a fine tooth comb by the people doing redistricting.

[Tender Branson]

RIP.

56-43 R in a normal special election.

53-46 with a strong Dem. candidate.

[Oryxslayer]

[brucejoel99]

At best, I'd call it a possible, but nonetheless unlikely flip. The district looks pretty diverse & it's been getting more (non-Atlas) blue with each subsequent election, but the gap might still be a bit too big to overcome in a special. We'd probably have a better shot at it in '22 or '24, depending on what redistricting does to it.

[Tekken_Guy]

Lean R.

Here are some possible GOP candidates
-Jake Ellzey
-Jeff Williams
-Tony Tinderholt
-Andy Nguyen
-David Cook

[Flyersfan232]

The unfortunate list of members of Congress who have died in office grows yet longer. And it appears that he may be the first member to have died from coronavirus, which underscores again how serious the pandemic has become. Rep.-elect Luke Letlow, of course, died from it at the end of December, the first Representative-Elect to die in almost 40 years.

Yet pelosi had to feed her ego by bring COVID positive members on the floor to ensure she hits 218