Alvarado off the ballot

The rumor reported last night is true: Gubernatorial candidate Felix Alvarado is off the ballot for the Democratic primary because his filing fee check bounced.

The name of Felix Alvarado, a middle school administrator, will not appear on the March 7 party primary ballot, said Charles Soechting, the party's state chairman.

"The position I would have to take is, the filing fee wasn't paid," Soechting said. "It's sad. I hate to see that happen to anybody."

Thursday evening, Alvarado, 63, confirmed submitting his check for the filing fee without sufficient funds available.

"I take full responsibility for that. That's my mea culpa. I overplayed my hand," he said. "I'm disappointed."

In his campaign's contribution and expenditure report covering July through December, Alvarado reported no money in his treasury as of Dec. 31. The report shows that he's taken two campaign loans: $1,000 from a brother and $300 on a credit card.

More from the Star Telegram:

Late Thursday, Irma Mathis, Alvarado's campaign manager, said Alvarado went to Democratic Party headquarters in Austin a few days after filing to notify officials that he was withdrawing from the race. Raising money to pay the fee without support from the party had proved too difficult, she said.

"He said he wasn't going to be able to cover the fee, so he was going to do the right thing," Mathis said.

But, she said, Alvarado was told that his name would remain on the ballot. So she was surprised Thursday to receive a copy of Soechting's memo, she said.

A call to a Fort Worth telephone number listed under the name Felix Alvarado was not returned Thursday night. Mathis would not provide his number.

"He's not going to do anything until he talks to the Democratic Party tomorrow," she said.

So it's down to Chris Bell, Bob Gammage, and Rashad Jafer. I agree with Karl-T in the comments here in that this almost guarantees no runoff in the Dem primary, which will be a boost for the Strayhorn and Friedman campaigns, since they will be able to start collecting signatures most places on March 8.

Other reactions: from PDiddie, South Texas Chisme, and Dos Centavos. Other related stuff from Aaron Pena, Common Sense, Just Another Blog, South Texas Chisme, and The Red State. There's some new Zogby Interactive poll numbers at Greg's place. The good news is that either Democratic candidate for Governor has plenty of room to gain ground on Rick "38%" Perry by getting Democrats to, you know, vote Democratic. The bad news is that this means the're currently in third place, and as noted before, neither is in a particularly strong financial position. If Strayhorn continues to make inroads into traditional Democratic support groups by fooling them into thinking she's the de facto Democratic nominee, regaining that ground could be awfully tough. Of course, even Rick Perry isn't calling himself a Republican these days, so it's no wonder everyone is confused.

And to think everyone once thought that the only statewide race of interest would be the GOP primary for Governor. We live in strange times indeed.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on January 20, 2006 to Election 2006 | TrackBack