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Michael Sorrell

Lupe and Beto

May 26th, 2018
by Charles Kuffner.
11 comments

Beto O’Rourke has a year-old, well-funded campaign for US Senate. Lupe Valdez doesn’t have anything like those advantages in her campaign for Governor. Will her lower profile effort have a negative effect on his higher profile one?

Rep. Beto O’Rourke

The race for governor is often the biggest spectacle in Texas politics, and the governor’s mansion the biggest prize.

But the contest between incumbent Republican Greg Abbott and Democratic nominee Lupe Valdez is forecast to be not much of a contest at all. Abbott, who in 2014 beat former state Sen. Wendy Davis by 20 percentage points, looms like Goliath on the political landscape, with Valdez lacking the weaponry to take him down. She needs more than five smooth stones.

Democrats have focused much of their attention on the remarkable campaign of Beto O’Rourke, the El Paso congressman who’s challenging incumbent Ted Cruz for Senate.

The Cruz-O’Rourke showdown is the marquee race of the season, and could change the fortunes of Democrats and Republicans alike.

With Abbott poised to spend more than $40 million to turn out the Republican vote and in the process help Cruz, the question becomes: does Valdez’s presence on the ticket hurt or help O’Rourke?

Lupe Valdez

“Compared to nothing, she helps,” said Mark Jones, a political scientist at Rice University.

[…]

Paul Quinn President Michael Sorrell, who Democrats recruited to run for governor, said Valdez’s presence on the ticket will have little impact on O’Rourke’s efforts.

“I don’t think Lupe makes a difference to this race,” Sorrell said. “People view Beto’s race as a separate entity from Lupe’s race.”

Veteran Republican consultant Bill Miller said Valdez could be a problem for O’Rourke and other Democrats because her campaign is so irrelevant.

“The Democrats believe she helps, but in my opinion she hurts,” Miller said. “She’s not going to be a strong candidate and her race is not a hot race. She’s going to be discounted early on and that won’t help O’Rourke.”

My inclination is to agree with Michael Sorrell. We haven’t had a situation like this in recent memory. In the recent years where we have had concurrent races for Senate and Governor:

– Wendy Davis’s gubernatorial campaign was much higher profile than David Alameel’s Senate campaign in 2014. Not that any of it made much difference.

– The four-way Governor’s race in 2006 defies comparison to anything else.

– Both Tony Sanchez and Ron Kirk had well-funded campaigns in 2002, with Kirk doing a few points better in the end.

Honestly, the real factor here is Greg Abbott and his gazillions of dollars, which would be a major concern no matter who was his opponent. Valdez has improved as a candidate after a rough start, and in the end I think she’ll raise a million or two bucks, which is a water balloon against Abbott’s fire hose but will at least allow for some kind of campaign activity. The main way Abbott can use his money to affect other races is by spending a ton on GOTV stuff, which again he’d do if he were running instead against Andrew White or Julian Castro or whoever your fantasy alternative candidate might be. He still has to contend with whatever chaos Donald Trump unleashes, whatever discontent the electorate may feel about Hurricane Harvey and gun violence, and other things that money may not be able to ameliorate. All things considered, I think Valdez’s campaign will have little effect on Beto’s. It’s unlikely to be of any help, but it probably won’t hurt, either.

(Yes, I wrote this before the property tax story came out. I still don’t think one campaign will have much effect on the other.)

Andrew White “on the brink” of announcing for Governor

Nov 29th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
6 comments

We’ll know shortly, but it seems to me that if the answer was going to be “nah, I’m outta here” we wouldn’t be hearing pre-announcement teasers.

Andrew White

Houston entrepreneur Andrew White, a conservative Democrat and son of the late former Gov. Mark White, is close to announcing he will become a candidate for Texas governor.

Supporters and allies said Tuesday they expect White, 45, has all but decided to run against Republican Greg Abbott. They said they expect an announcement on his decision in early December.

Reached by phone, White told the Houston Chronicle he “is moving from contemplating to executing and preparing.” He said he would discuss further details in coming days.

[…]

White would be the first Democrat with at least some street cred to run in a year when Democratic officials have, so far, failed to announce a banner-carrier to run against Abbott.

Two other Democrats have announced — Dallas gay bar owner Jeffrey Payne and San Antonio businessman Tom Wakely — but they are both considered long shots with not enough name ID or funding support to win.

White would be a “next gen” candidate, younger than Abbott and most other gubernatorial candidates, with hopes that he could coalesce support from Democrats and moderate Republicans disgusted with the GOP leadership’s push to enact a bathroom bill, a ban on sanctuary cities and other controversial proposals that have drawn widespread protests — even from the business community that traditionally supports Republicans.

See here for the background. At this point, I’ll be surprised if White doesn’t file, which probably means that the other potential candidates will fade away. But maybe not – White has the name, and likely some decent fundraising chops, but he hasn’t exactly bowled over the base. He’d be a strong favorite against the candidates who are already in, but a Lupe Valdez or a Michael Sorrell or a Dwight Boykins would be a fair fight for the nomination. I wouldn’t mind that at all – let’s have a real debate about who and what we want on the ticket. Absent that, I’d advise Andrew White to take a page from Beto O’Rourke’s playbook and get out there and meet a bunch of voters. Listen to what people are saying, especially those who have been critical of his positions on reproductive choice and immigration and other issues. Otherwise, I fear we’ll go from a narrative of “Dems don’t have anyone running for Governor” to one of “Dems don’t have anyone they like running for Governor”. We could do without that.

Add Boykins to the “mulling a run for Governor” list

Nov 22nd, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
20 comments

The line forms to the left.

CM Dwight Boykins

As Democrats look for a serious candidate to challenge Gov. Greg Abbott in 2018, another big-city official is surfacing as a potential contender: Dwight Boykins, a member of the Houston City Council.

“I have had an opportunity to travel across our great state and meet a lot of hardworking people who feel no one is listening to their concerns or fighting for their families and I am humbled and encouraged by those who have asked me if I would consider running for Governor of Texas,” Boykins said in a statement to The Texas Tribune on Tuesday. “Like most people, I have noticed that our state is deeply divided over controversial social issues, while the major problems facing our state and the people who live here continue to go unresolved.”

Boykins said he has not made “a final decision about the possibility of running for a higher office,” but the clock is ticking with less than three weeks until the candidate filing deadline for the 2018 primaries.

[…]

Boykins mentioned Abbott’s refusal to immediately tap the state’s $10 billion savings account, known as the Rainy Day Fund, to deal with the post-Harvey recovery, saying it shows the “disconnect between the current leadership of our state and the needs of the people.” Abbott has expressed openness to using the fund in the 2019 legislative session to make up for Harvey-related costs incurred between now and then.

Add his name to the list that contains Andrew White, Michael Sorrell, and Sheriff Lupe Valdez. Because Houston now has four-year terms for City Council, Boykins would have to resign in order to run, so that’s another factor for him to consider. I should note that Campos teased this in a post a couple of weeks ago; I’d since forgotten about it. Boykins would need to explain his vote against HERO in 2015 to some folks, myself included, if he were to make this official. Beyond that, as with the others, we’ll see what he has to say for himself if this becomes a thing. The Chron has more.

At some point we will be able to stop talking about who may run for Governor as a Democrat

Nov 15th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
5 comments

That day is December 11. I am looking forward to it.

Andrew White

With less than a month before the filing deadline, the most prominent declared candidate for Texas governor is probably Andrew White, the son of former governor Mark White. White, a self-described “very conservative Democrat,” has never run for elected office and holds views on abortion likely to alienate some Democratic primary voters. (He says he wants to “increase access to healthcare and make abortion rare.”) In a November 2 Facebook post, Davis — a major figure in the state’s reproductive justice scene — called White “anti-choice” and summarized her reaction to his candidacy: “Uhh — no. Just no.”

For lieutenant governor, mild-mannered accountant Mike Collier — who lost a run for comptroller last cycle by 21 percentage points — is challenging Dan Patrick, one of the state’s most effective and well-funded conservative firebrands. Attorney General Ken Paxton, who will be fighting his securities fraud indictment during campaign season, drew a largely unheard-of Democratic opponent last week in attorney Justin Nelson, a former clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.

Candidate filing officially opened Saturday and ends December 11, but candidates who haven’t declared are missing opportunities for fundraising, building name recognition and organizing a campaign.

“Texas Democrats have quite clearly thrown in the towel for 2018,” said Mark P. Jones, a Rice University political scientist. “People truly committed to running would already be running; [the party] may be able to cajole, coerce or convince some higher-profile candidates to run, but with every passing day that’s less likely.”

Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez announced last week that she’s considering a gubernatorial run, but her staff refused further comment and Valdez has yet to file. Whoever faces off with Governor Greg Abbott will be staring down a $41 million war chest.

Democratic party officials insist more candidates are forthcoming: “We’ve taken our punches for withholding the names of who we’re talking to,” said Manny Garcia, deputy director with the Texas Democratic Party. “It’s been personally frustrating to me because I know who we’re talking to and I know they’re exciting people.”

Castro agreed with Garcia: “I do believe that before the filing deadline you’re going to see people stepping up to run,” he told the Observer.

The lone bright spot on the statewide slate, said Jones, is Beto O’Rourke, the El Paso congressman taking on Ted Cruz. Highlighting the value of announcing early, O’Rourke has raised an impressive $4 million since March off mostly individual donations.

“Like in Battlestar Galactica, O’Rourke is Battlestar Galactica and then there’s this ragtag fleet of garbage ships and transports accompanying him,” Jones said of the current Democratic lineup, noting that even O’Rourke was a second-string option to Congressman Joaquín Castro.

Look, either Manny Garcia is right and we’ll be pleasantly surprised come December 12, or he’s being irrationally exuberant and we’ll all enjoy some gallows humor at his expense. Yeah, it would be nice to have a brand-name candidate out there raising money and his or her profile right now, but how much does two or three months really matter? Bill White was still running for a Senate seat that turned out not to be available at this time in 2009; he didn’t officially shift to Governor until the first week of December. If there is a candidate out there that will broadly satisfy people we’ll know soon enough; if not, we’ll need to get to work for the candidates we do have. Such is life.

In other filing news, you can see the 2018 Harris County GOP lineup to date here. For reasons I don’t quite understand, the HCDP has no such publicly available list at this time. You can see some pictures of candidates who have filed on the HCDP Facebook page, but most of those pictures have no captions and I have no idea who some of those people are. The SOS primary filings page is useless, and the TDP webpage has nothing, too. As for the Harris County GOP, a few notes:

– State Rep. Kevin Roberts is indeed in for CD02. He’s alone in that so far, and there isn’t a candidate for HD126 yet.

– Marc Cowart is their candidate for HCDE Trustee Position 3 At Large, the seat being vacated by Diane Trautman.

– So far, Sarah Davis is the only incumbent lucky enough to have drawn a primary challenger, but I expect that will change.

That’s about it for anything interesting. There really aren’t any good targets for them beyond that At Large HCDE seat, as the second edge of the redistricting sword is really safe seats for the other party, since you have to pack them in somewhere. Feel free to leave any good speculation or innuendo in the comments.

Filing season has begun

Nov 13th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
4 comments

Candidate filing season is now open, and it will run for a month, concluding at 6 PM on Monday, December 11. There will be a lot of activity this year – we are already aware of so many candidates – and I’m sure there will be a few surprises. You can find candidate filings on the Secretary of State webpage, though I expect that will lag a day or so behind what county parties have. Here are a few things I can say so far:

– The first candidates to file for Governor are Tom Wakely and sign Grady Yarbrough. Is it written somewhere that in every generation there must be an annoying perennial candidate? Jeffrey Payne and Garry Brown are still to file, and then we have the being wooed/thinking about it trio of Andrew White, Michael Sorrell, and Lupe Valdez. I figure when/if one of them files, the other two will step aside. I will be surprised if more than one of them jumps in.

– Michael Cooper, who has been doing some tandem campaigning with Wakely, has filed for Lt. Governor. Mike Collier has been running for months and should be filing soon.

– Justin Nelson was late in announcing but prompt in filing for Attorney General.

– We have a candidate for Railroad Commissioner: Roman McAllen, who has a preference for bow ties and wordy biographies. He’s on the board of Preservation Texas, which would make him a welcome alternate perspective to the shills and know-nothings that currently serve on the RRC.

– I don’t have a link to point you to for activity in Harris County at this time. I do know from talking to people that Lina Hidalgo (County Judge), Diane Trautman (County Clerk), and Dylan Osborne (County Treasurer) have filed. I also know that we may get a contested primary for County Judge as Mike Nichols is taking the filing period to explore a candidacy. Nichols has worked with the Houston Food Bank, the Houston Long Range Financial Management Task Force, Planned Parenthood, and the Houston Parks Board. We’ll see what he decides.

– At the state level, we still need someone to run for Comptroller and Land Commissioner; Kim Olson is running for Ag Commissioner. We know of two Supreme Court candidates, but we still need one more of those plus three for the Court of Criminal Appeals. We could use someone for CD22. In Harris County, we’re still looking for a candidate for County Commissioner in Precinct 2, a candidate for HCDE Position 4, Precinct 3, and State Rep in HDs 126, 132, and 135.

– Again, I think there will be some surprises. People get in and drop out at the last minute. I think we’re going to have a lot more contested primaries than we’re used to seeing. And of course I have no idea what may happen on the Republican side. It’s going to be an exciting four weeks. What are you looking for?

Garry Brown

Nov 2nd, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
4 comments

We now have at least two officially declared Democratic candidates for Governor.

Garry Brown

On a beautiful Sunday afternoon, Garry Brown of Austin announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for governor in 2018.

It was a simple affair on Brown’s front lawn in Milwood. A podium. About 30 folding chairs and as many people.

[…]

Brown called for better funding education, Medicaid expansion and preserving local control.

Of Abbott, he said, “He dislikes Big Government when it involves the Fed, but he himself practices it eery day. And now he’s begging the Feds to send us money for the Harvey recovery work. This isn’t just irony, folks, it’s hypocritical bullcrap.”

“I didn’t make the decision to run for governor lightly,” Brown said.

Brown said he will keep his day job, that he can’t afford not to. He is a renter and he is also supporting his mother, sister and nephew.

“I moved them all in with me to take care of them,” he said.

Then he offered what I thought was his most arresting image.

“Texas GOP leaders have been in power so long they believe we all have Stockholm Syndrome.”

Brown’s webpage is here and his Facebook page is here. There’s more about him in the story, so read the whole thing. Brown joins Jeffrey Payne, and they may or may not be joined by Andrew White and Michael Sorrell. I’ve not seen an official announcement from Tom Wakely, but he is campaigning, so he’s in as well. He’s also now being accompanied by a gentleman from Beaumont named Michael Cooper who is running for Lite Guv and who Wakley calls his running mate. Looks like we’ll have a contested primary in that race, too. As for Governor, I’ll say again, I look forward to hearing what everyone has to say. There’s plenty of time to decide who to support.

McRaven not running for Governor

Nov 1st, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

In case you were wondering.

William McRaven

Count out University of Texas Chancellor William McRaven as a potential challenger to Gov. Greg Abbott in 2018.

The retired Navy admiral said Monday in a statement that he has “no interest in running for governor or any other public office” after some speculation in Texas and nationally over his potential political future.

Most recently, Brent Budowsky, a former Democratic aide in the House of Representatives, penned a long column in The Hill urging Texas Democrats to “draft” McRaven, who oversaw the Navy Seal raid that killed Osama bin Laden, for governor.

“Texas Democrats should rise to the occasion and draft the best man for the mission, the best candidate for the post, the best leader who can lift the state and nation by serving in government as he served in uniform — with character, integrity and valor,” he wrote.

I missed Budowsky’s piece, as well as a behind the paywall column by Peggy Fikac about this, so it’s all news to me. Seems mostly like a case of wishcasting to me. Nothing wrong with that, but it’s highly unlikely to be anything more than a bit of publicity for whoever is being longed for. We’ve got Jeffrey Payne, and we may get one or more of Andrew White and Michael Sorrell. Barring any late surprises, that will have to do.

Michael Sorrell

Oct 29th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
1 comment

Gromer Jeffers of the DMN floats a name for Governor.

Michael Sorrell

On the rugged campus of Paul Quinn College, Michael Sorrell, the school’s president, could be the last hope for Democrats to field a credible candidate to face incumbent Greg Abbott in next year’s governor’s race.

Operatives in the Texas Democratic Party have been trying to persuade Sorrell to be the party’s standard-bearer against Abbott. The talks intensified Oct. 13, the Friday before the Texas-Oklahoma football showdown, when Democrats had another meeting with Sorrell in Dallas. They are hoping that he will agree to submit his paperwork for a campaign when the filing period for the 2018 election opens next month.

“I’m not going to comment on that,” Sorrell said recently, realizing that I knew about his talks with Democrats.

Sorrell, 50, is largely unknown throughout Texas and has never run for statewide office. At times, he’s been considered a potential candidate for Dallas mayor and Dallas County judge. He’s managed political campaigns and been a part of various bond efforts in the city of Dallas.

[…]

Many big-name Democrats have said “no” or given the party the “I’ll get back to you” brushoff. They include former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio (Julian’s twin), former state Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer of San Antonio , Rep. Rafael Anchia of Dallas and Hill+Knowlton Strategies CEO Jack Martin.

The would-be contenders don’t believe Democrats can beat Abbott next year, and the pessimism could hurt the rest of the ticket. Democrats did get some positive news on Tuesday. Andrew White, the son of the late Gov. Mark White, is exploring a run for governor. The Houston investor told Texas Monthly that he would campaign as a Democrat, but try to appeal to moderate Republican voters.

With White on a listening tour, the only Democrats who have announced bids to challenge Abbott are Dallas businessman Jeffrey Payne, former congressional candidate Tom Wakely of San Antonio and former Balch Springs Mayor Cedric Davis. They are all candidates not recruited by party leaders and have little chance of beating Abbott.

Enter Sorrell, a native Chicagoan who has been a part of several successful underdog campaigns, including the 2008 election of former President Barack Obama.

Sorrell is not afraid of Abbott, and because he doesn’t have a political office to forfeit, he has nothing to lose but valuable time away from Paul Quinn College and his family. Education would surely be part of his platform, as Democrats want to pound Abbott and Republicans for not putting enough resources into improving public schools. Known as an innovative leader, Sorrell has improved the facilities, fundraising and curriculum at the historically black private college. Paul Quinn is accredited, and he famously turned the football field into an urban farm. Sorrell would be acceptable to the base of the Democratic Party, though it remains to be seen how much he’ll be able to fire up the electorate.

My reaction right now is that I feel the same way about Sorrell as I do about Andrew White, and for that matter Jeffrey Payne and anyone else: I’d like to hear more about who they are, what they stand for, and what they would like to do as Governor. And, you know, that they actually want to run and are committed to winning, however unlikely that is. Payne has crossed that bridge; we’ll see about Sorrell and White and the others. At first glance Sorrell looks mighty impressive, so I hope he is giving this serious consideration. HBCU Digest has more.