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DFP: Biden 47, Trump 46

by Charles Kuffner.

6 comments

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Police cars revolving lightNew Poll – TX Police cars revolving light
Biden 47 – Trump 46
Cornyn 44 – Hegar 41
https://filesforprogress.org/memos/2020-senate-project/week-5/toplines/tx.pdf

— Data For Progress (@DataProgress) 8:21 PM – 18 October 2020

What’s interesting about this is that the full sample of 933 voters includes 180 who have already voted. That subgroup is incredibly Democratic – Biden leads Trump 57-41 (!) among those 180 voters, taking 98% of the Democratic vote (zero to Trump), winning indies 63-33, and even getting eleven percent of Republicans (!!). MJ Hegar leads with this same crowd 54-44, with a one percent Dem vote for John Cornyn and only four percent of Republicans. If Cornyn does outperform Trump, that will be the reason. The combination of these two groups gives the 47-46 topline result.

Of the other 753 respondents, Trump leads 46-44, and he does better with Republicans (93-5) than Biden does with Dems (92-7) while also winning indies 33-30. Cornyn leads Hegar with this same crowd 43-36. It’s a much bigger group, and the could suggest a gradual shift in the vote totals in the direction of the Republicans as we go forward, but then maybe some of these folks wind up not voting. In the Senate race, there’s a bigger “Don’t know” contingent among Dems (16%, compared to 7% for the GOP), which gives Hegar some room to grow, though these folks would seem to be more likely than anyone in the sample to not vote, or at least not vote in that race.

You can make of this what you will. Data For Progress, like PPP, has generally had better results for Dems than some other pollsters, which may be their house effect. I’m more interested in the split between those who have voted and those who have not yet voted.

On a related note, there was also a poll released in the CD22 race, an internal poll from the Sri Kulkarni campaign. That poll has Kulkarni up 48-43, with Biden leading Trump 52-43 in the district. I didn’t have enough to say about this to make it a standalone post, so I’m including it here as bonus content. You’re welcome.

October 2020 campaign finance reports: Congress

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

This is it, the last quarterly finance report roundup for the cycle. It’s been quite the time, hasn’t it? Let’s do this and see where we are as voting continues. The January 2019 roundup is here, which closed out the 2017-18 election cycle, the April 2019 report is here, the July 2019 report is here, the October 2019 report is here, the January 2020 report is here, the April 2020 report is here, and the July 2020 report is here. For comparison, the January 2018 report is here, the April 2018 report is here, and the July 2018 report is here. The FEC summary page for Congress is here and for the Senate is here.

MJ Hegar – Senate

Lizzie Fletcher – CD07
Colin Allred – CD32

Hank Gilbert – CD01
Sima Ladjevardian – CD02
Lulu Seikaly – CD03
Stephen Daniel – CD06
Elizabeth Hernandez – CD08
Mike Siegel – CD10
Adrienne Bell – CD14
Rick Kennedy – CD17
Wendy Davis – CD21
Sri Kulkarni – CD22
Gina Ortiz Jones – CD23
Candace Valenzuela – CD24
Julie Oliver – CD25
Carol Ianuzzi – CD26
Donna Imam – CD31


Dist  Name             Raised      Spent    Loans    On Hand
============================================================
Sen   Hegar        20,579,453 12,121,009        0  8,505,926

07    Fletcher      5,673,282  4,115,705        0  1,599,643
32    Allred        5,060,556  3,477,172        0  1,686,828  

01    Gilbert         595,890    321,193   50,000    274,697
02    Ladjevardian  3,102,882  2,373,600   50,000    729,282
03    Seikaly       1,143,345    580,360    3,000    562,985
06    Daniel          558,679    396,453        0    162,225
08    Hernandez
10    Siegel        1,994,611  1,712,734        0    285,368
14    Bell            226,601    196,623        0     35,078
17    Kennedy         190,229    161,093    8,103     30,563
21    Davis         7,917,557  6,035,908        0  1,881,649
22    Kulkarni      4,663,288  2,941,745        0  1,749,310
23    Jones         5,893,413  3,877,366        0  2,107,566
24    Valenzuela    3,589,295  2,601,580        0    987,715
25    Oliver        1,599,523  1,102,297    2,644    497,225
26    Ianuzzi         129,145     91,293   53,335     37,852
31    Imam          1,000,764    620,512        0    380,251

These totals are just off the charts. Remember how in the 2018 cycle I was freaking out as one candidate after another topped $100K? Here we have nine challengers to incumbent Republicans that have topped one million, with the tenth-place challenger still exceeding $500K. For that matter, nine out of those ten outraised their opponents in the quarter, though several still trail in total raised and/or cash on hand. I’ve run out of synonyms for “unprecedented”. All this is without accounting for DCCC and other PAC money being spent. Who could have imagined this even as recently as 2016?

The one question mark is with the incumbent Dems, as both Rep. Lizzie Fletcher and Rep. Colin Allred were outraised for the quarter. Both took in over $1.2 million apiece, so it’s not like they slacked, and they both maintain a cash on hand lead while having spent more. I don’t know what to make of that, but I’m not terribly worried about it. Republican money has to go somewhere.

MJ Hegar raised $13.5 million this quarter, and there’s some late PAC money coming in on her behalf. I wish she had been able to raise more earlier, and I wish some of the excess millions that are going to (very good!) Senate candidates in much smaller and less expensive states had come to her instead, but she’s got what she needs to compete, and she’s got a competitive race at the top of the ticket helping her, too. We don’t have a Senate race in 2022, and someone will get to run against Ted Cruz in 2024. All I can say is I hope some folks are thinking about that now, and taking some initial steps to build on what Beto and MJ have done before them.

I don’t have a whole lot to say otherwise, because these numbers speak for themselves. I mean, remember when we were a little worried about the ability of candidates like Lulu Seikaly and Julie Oliver and Donna Imam to raise enough money? Seems like a long time ago now.

Let me end with a thought about the future. Will what we saw in 2018 and 2020 carry forward? 2022 is the first post-redistricting election, so with new districts and the likelihood of some open seats, there should be plenty of action. We did see a fair amount of cash being raised in 2012, after all. If there are many more Dem incumbents, it’s for sure there will be more money flowing in. We’ll have to see how many competitive races there are beyond that. What I do know is that we have definitively proven that this can be done, that quality candidates can be found and they will be supported. We had the power, and we figured out how to use it. Hard to believe that will go away.

Still worried about the Census

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

There’s this.

The census came to an abrupt halt Thursday after a pandemic and a legal tug-of-war threw the massive survey into chaos. Officials around the country now fear they’ll lose their fair share of federal funding and political representation due to an incomplete count.

A George Washington University study indicates that a mere 1 percent undercount for Texas by the U.S. Census Bureau would amount to $290 million less per year in federal revenue. A lower-than-anticipated count in urban areas could also mean one or two less congressional seats and fewer electoral votes for the state, as well as a smaller share of free lunches, Medicaid and HUD dollars.

Houston is among a handful of gateway cities with growing immigrant populations that are most vulnerable to being undercounted, said Lloyd Potter, the state demographer for Texas. Low-income people, children, renters, people of color and immigrants are among the least counted; their communities then are underrepresented in government and must make do with less funding.

One in four Texans — more than 6 million people — live in hard-to-count communities, according to a 2019 report by the Center for Public Policy Priorities, an Austin-based nonpartisan organization. This demographic group includes people who may be difficult to contact, due to language barriers, or to locate, due to informal housing arrangements, or engage, due to fear.

By most estimates, Texas is on track to gain three congressional seats — more than any other state, said Richard Murray, a University of Houston political scientist specializing in Texas and U.S. electoral politics. But, it there is a significant undercount and the Trump administration excludes undocumented people, two of those new seats could be lost.

[…]

With the pandemic curtailing outreach and enumeration efforts and the stop-and-start of multiple deadlines, Potter, the state demographer, said, census workers have become worried about the repercussions of trying to tabulate the data on a drastically shortened timeline. “This is is just not like anything we ever would have expected.”

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee is among an array of local officials who have encouraged people all year to respond to the census, but the pandemic and confusion over deadlines hampered many efforts at outreach.

“I think it’s vital we recognize we’re in a dire condition,” Jackson Lee during a last-minute plea outside the student-free Blackshear Elementary campus on Thursday morning.

“It’s such a huge logistical problem counting every person in the country and to have all these problems thrown in the spokes, it’s been very difficult,” said Potter, the state demographer, who also runs the Institute for Demographic and Socioeconoic Research at University of Texas San Antonio. “This particular year there is a perfect storm of challenges for an undercount.”

Others who study the census agreed, saying it could yield surprisingly low totals.

“This is going to be the most problem-plagued census in modern times,” said Murray, the political scientist. On the front end, there was the obstacle of people who didn’t want to open their doors to enumerators amid a public health crisis. The next major obstacle is that once the data is collected, he said, we’re facing “a rogue political administration that’s unprecedentedly messing with the census to try to get it to give their party more power going forward.”

And there’s this.

The Supreme Court announced Friday that it will review President Donald Trump’s attempt to exclude undocumented immigrants when calculating how congressional seats are apportioned among the states.

The unprecedented proposal could have the effect of shifting both political power and billions of dollars in federal funds away from urban states with large immigrant populations and toward rural and more Republican interests.

A three-judge panel in New York said Trump’s July 21 memorandum on the matter was “an unlawful exercise of the authority granted to” him by Congress. It blocked the Commerce Department and the Census Bureau from including information about the number of undocumented immigrants — it is unclear how those numbers would be generated — in their reports to the president after this year’s census is completed.

The justices put the case on a fast track and said they will hold a hearing Nov. 30. By then, it probably will be a nine-member court again, if Judge Amy Coney Barrett is confirmed, giving the court a 6-to-3 conservative majority. The administration says timing matters because it must present the plan to Congress in January.

It is unclear whether the matter would divide the court along ideological lines, but the issue is another mark of how the once-a-decade census has been transformed from a largely bureaucratic exercise into the centerpiece of a partisan battle.

I don’t actually expect any of our state leaders to care about the loss of federal funds, because those funds just go to programs that help people, which they don’t like. I am a little surprised that they might sit back passively as the state could lose one or two Congressional seats, since that represents power. With every passing day, I am more convinced that President Biden should just say that the Census was hopelessly botched by the Trump administration, and that the data they collected is worse than useless, so we have to do it again. I see no other just and equitable path forward.

The overlooked Congressional race

by Charles Kuffner.

3 comments

There are ten Congressional races involving Republican-held seats that are seen as competitive. Nine of them have gotten a fair amount of attention. The tenth is CD06, and the Texas Signal steps in to fill the gap.

Stephen Daniel

The race in the Texas sixth congressional district between challenger attorney Stephen Daniel and incumbent Rep. Ron Wright has been chugging along, under the radar from other clashes in the state. However, many pundits have looked at the district, which includes parts of Arlington, as well as Waxahachie and Corsicana, and have proclaimed it’s a sleeper for flipping, something Daniel himself sees in the final weeks of the campaign.

In 2018, Jana Lynne Sanchez ran for the seat. It was the first time in years a serious Democratic challenger had entered into the race. In the documentary film Surge, which recently premiered in Texas at the Dallas International Film Festival and is airing on Showtime, filmmakers chronicle the battle Sanchez endured to raise money and to get people interested in a race many deemed out of reach.

Sanchez came within seven points of Wright. Two years later, several polls are showing an even tighter race between Daniel and Wright, a combative Texas conservative and the former Chief of Staff to Rep. Joe Barton, who retired from the seat after explicit photos appeared on social media. Wright was recently hospitalized after complications from lung cancer treatment.

Wright has said that women who have abortions have committed murder and should be jailed. As a former columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, he said that “white males are the only species without some form of federal protection.” Like most Republicans in Congress, he supports dismantling the Affordable Care Act. Texas currently leads the nation in the number of uninsured, and since the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 650,000 Texans have lost their health insurance.

Access to healthcare prompted Daniel to enter into the race against Wright. In an interview with the Texas Signal, he spoke about his background growing up in a small town and being the first person in his family to go to college. “There’s a lot of people who flat out can’t afford healthcare,” said Daniel.

[…]

Like every campaign, Daniel and his team had to adjust to the pandemic era. He misses the in-person experience of block walking, where he could personally connect with voters. He particularly enjoyed campaigning alongside statehouse candidates. There are five competitive races in the sixth congressional district. Now, that campaigning has moved to Zoom and other virtual settings.

Daniel is optimistic. “The path to turning Texas blue goes through Texas sixth [district],” he said. Nearly seventy percent of the voting bloc in the district is in Arlington and Tarrant county. He sees firsthand how voters in the district are changing. The DCCC recently added the race to their Texas target list.

There was one poll of this race, done by the DCCC back in June, that had Wright up by four points, 45-41. The DCCC Executive Director mentioned CD06 as a race to watch a couple of weeks ago, for whatever that means. Daniel has been a modest but decent fundraiser who would need some help to get a boost. (I have not heard anything about his Q3 report as yet.) I should note that Beto lost CD06 by a 51.2 to 48.0 margin, which made it closer than the more-touted CDs 03 (51.3 to 47.9) and 25 (52.1 to 47.0), with that pattern holding true for other races as well. I don’t know exactly why CD06 has gotten less attention than the other races – Daniel was unopposed in the primary, so there hasn’t been much to report on – but that’s the way it is sometimes. However you want to look at it, this is a race to keep an eye on.

On a side note, seven of the ten Democratic candidates in those competitive races are women. Daniel, along with Mike Siegel in CD10, is vying to join Rep. Lloyd Doggett as the white Democratic Congressmen from Texas. I believe the last time there were as many as three white male Democratic members of Congress from Texas was 2009-10, when then-Reps. Chet Edwards and Gene Green were still serving. Nick Lampson had been there in the prior session, in that election where Tom DeLay withdrew and the Republicans ran Shelley Sekula Gibbs as a write-in, but he lost to Pete Olson in 2008. Edwards was wiped out in 2010, and Green retired prior to the 2018 election.

Interview with Rep. Lizzie Fletcher

by Charles Kuffner.

9 comments

Rep. Lizzie Fletcher

I knew I wanted to talk to freshman Rep. Lizzie Fletcher this cycle, because there’s just so much to talk about. You know her story from 2018 – the crowded primary, the unprecedented amounts of money raised and spent, the eventual victory in a district that had been held by Republicans for over 50 years – but none of us could have known what the first two years in Congress would entail. Rep. Fletcher serves on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, and has passed multiple bills out of the House. This is my last interview for the fall, and as you may imagine, we had a lot to talk about.

cakuffner · Lizzie Fletcher Interview 100320.MP3

PREVIOUSLY:

Hank Gilbert, CD01
Rashad Lewis, CD36
Julie Oliver, CD25
Elizabeth Hernandez, CD08
Sima Ladjevardian, CD02
Rep. Christina Morales, HD145

There’s so much more money in Texas races

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

It’s the question that many, many people have raised — often as a joke — for years. But the combination of changing demographics, chaos among the state Republican ranks, and the ongoing struggles of President Donald Trump’s campaign have led some to re-examine this question. Among them are the Republicans behind the anti-Trump PAC The Lincoln Project, betting that this is the year — and they’re putting a $1 million chip on the table to start.

Tuesday, the Lincoln Project announced that they were launching a $1 million ad buy in the Lone Star State, chiefly targeting hundreds of thousands of suburban and rural Republican women and Hispanics, voters whom they believe can be persuaded to vote against Trump.

The current buy is digital only, geotargeted in areas around the state ranging from rural counties like Lubbock, urban neighborhoods in Austin, and the Dallas-Fort Worth suburbs.

“We can more easily and effectively target the specific group of individuals we are trying to target digitally than we can with TV,” Ryan Wiggins, the PAC’s senior adviser for communications, told Mediaite. Wiggins added that they were considering expanding to television and mail in the final weeks before the election, and this $1 million investment was just an initial buy, planned to cover a week’s worth of digital ad placements.

The ads will include some of the PAC’s previous videos, like the viral “Mourning in America,” as well as new Texas-specific content, including some that will be in Spanish.

Wiggins and others associated with the Lincoln Project were optimistic that not only would they be dropping more cash into Texas, but that they had a real chance to move the needle.

It’s a long story, so go give it a read. Whatever you think of the Lincoln Project, this looks like a good investment.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s campaign is set to spend millions of dollars on TV ads in Texas as polls continue to show a close race in the state.

The former vice president’s campaign announced earlier this year that it would make TV reservations this fall in Texas, and as of Tuesday, it had booked more than $6 million through Election Day, according to the media-tracking firm Advertising Analytics.

“This is historic. That shows you just how important Texas is to them and it shows that Texas is in play,” said Abhi Rahman, a spokesperson for the Texas Democratic Party. “It shows you their investment in Texas is real.” Rahman noted that Biden’s spending is the biggest investment from a Democratic presidential nominee in the last 25 years and is a drastic change from 2016, when then- nominee Hillary Clinton didn’t spend seriously in the state.

[…]

As speculation has swirled about the extent of Biden’s investment in the state, the Texas Democratic Party has been ramping up its advertising. On Tuesday, the party announced a digital, print and radio campaign aimed at Black voters in Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and East Texas. The party described the size of the effort as “high six figure(s).”

We can certainly debate about the effectiveness of this approach versus others, the need to be engaged on a more consistent basis, and so forth. All I know is, we are not used to seeing this kind of investment.

The Texas House Democratic Campaign Committee has raised over $3.6 million in just under three months, a massive cash infusion as the party pushes to take control of the lower chamber for the first time since 2002.

The $3.6 million haul, which came between July 1 and Sept. 24, is more than double the $1.6 million that the committee raised in the first six months of the year. That in itself was a committee record at the time, exceeding its total fundraising for the entire 2018 election cycle.

“Affordable healthcare, economic security, and a plan to deal with COVID-19 are on the ballot, and achieving those goals starts with flipping the Texas House,” the HDCC’s chairwoman, Rep. Celia Israel of Austin, said in an announcement of the committee’s latest fundraising that was first shared with The Texas Tribune. “That has been our mission from day one, and donors have responded in a big way.”

The HDCC said the $3.6 million came from 4,165 donors, 98% of whom donated online. Over three-quarters of contributions were less than $100, and roughly four out of five donations came from Texans.

[…]

Andrew Reagan, the committee’s executive director, said the money is going toward ensuring that battleground campaigns have “robustly funded paid communications,” including TV and digital ads, as well as direct mail. Some candidates are already running ads that are jointly funded by their campaigns and the HDCC.

The committee did not immediately disclose its cash-on-hand figure, but Reagan said it is “healthily in the seven figures.”

That’s in addition to some eye-popping numbers raised by various other candidates, including $13.5 million for MJ Hegar. The 30-day reports for state candidates is out now, I’ll be reviewing those in the coming days, and then of course I’ll have the Q3 Congressional reports. Remember when all this stuff was boring and perfunctory? Those days are gone.

And to be sure, some of that money is for the bad guys, as we see in Item four:

Outside money is flooding battleground Texas House races across the Houston area, helping Republican candidates erase fundraising advantages amassed by Democrats who are raking in money from individual donors outside Texas.

In all seven battleground districts around Houston, five of which are under GOP control, Democrats raised more cash than Republicans from early July through late September, the period covered by the latest round of campaign finance reports.

However, spending by political action committees and other groups favored Republicans by a more than 2-to-1 margin in those districts, helping three candidates — Republican Justin Ray, state Rep. Sarah Davis, R-Houston, and state Rep. Sam Harless, R-Spring — overcome their fundraising deficits.

[…]

During the 12-week period covered by the campaign finance reports filed earlier this week, the 14 candidates in Houston’s seven battleground House districts combined to raise nearly $4.7 million and spend almost $1.6 million. They collectively are heading into the stretch run of the 2020 election with about $2.4 million cash on hand, with millions more set to come from outside groups.

Two longtime political donor groups, Associated Republicans of Texas and tort reform advocacy group Texans for Lawsuit Reform, have particularly escalated their spending on House Republican candidates in 2020, combining to buy $276,000 worth of digital ads, direct mail, canvassing and other expenses to support Ray and another $272,000 on behalf of Davis.

Democrat Ann Johnson, an attorney who is challenging Davis, outpaced the incumbent in fundraising from individual donors. Committees and other groups spent about $525,000 backing Davis, however, helping her rack up more than $597,000 in contributions to Johnson’s roughly $481,000.

A similar dynamic played out last reporting period in the west Houston district where Ray, the former mayor of Jersey Village, is attempting to unseat state Rep. Jon Rosenthal, D-Houston. Though Rosenthal raised more cash than Ray, the challenger benefited from a massive lead in spending from committees and other groups, giving him a 2-to-1 edge in overall contributions.

And in northwest Harris County, groups including the Republican State Leadership Committee, a group focused on legislatures around the country, and Leading Texas Forward, a PAC run by House Republican lawmakers, helped Harless make up a fundraising deficit to Democrat Natali Hurtado.

Best way to deal with all that money is beat the candidates it was supporting, so that it was all wasted. Feels really satisfying, too.

Endorsement watch: Well, he does have a big Twitter following

by Charles Kuffner.

4 comments

I’m honestly not surprised that the Chron endorsed Dan Crenshaw for re-election. I just wonder if the editorial board ever reads what they write when they come up with this stuff.

Sima Ladjevardian

U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw has 1 million Twitter followers. His fundraising power puts him within shouting distance of high-ranking members such as Steve Scalise, R-La., and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. A former Navy SEAL, he has managed to appear both loyal and critical of President Trump, and was the only Texan elected official with a major speaking role at the Republican National Convention.

There’s no question of Crenshaw’s outsized national standing as a freshman congressman, but now his fate is in the hands of Houstonians in the 2nd Congressional District, which makes a wiggly westward arc from Kingwood to neighborhoods near Rice University.

Turn the stage lights off, though, and his race against Democrat Sima Ladjevardian, 54, looks rather conventional.

First, let’s consider what is unusual. Crenshaw, 36, has shown a penchant for standing up to party and president. He wrote a letter of support for the inclusion of Log Cabin Republicans, who represent LGBT conservatives, at the Republican Party of Texas’s state convention. He’s called for Republicans to take climate change seriously. When Trump criticized Sen. John McCain months after his death and when Trump told the liberal congresswomen in “the Squad” to “go back,” Crenshaw tweeted at the president to quit. When Trump withdrew troops from Syria, Crenshaw released a nearly 12-minute video that respectfully but emphatically rejects the president’s rationale.

We applaud Crenshaw for using his platform to take these stands. At other times, he has left us both troubled and disappointed. Like many others early in the pandemic, Crenshaw argued that masks weren’t effective against the coronavirus. While he changed his mind as evidence showed otherwise — even purchasing and then donating 50,000 masks — he continued to push misrepresentations, as he did in his more recent videos defending Trump’s coronavirus response. He was wrong to call Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo’s mask order “draconian” and was wrong to remove his mask for long enough while at a crowded fundraising party to be photographed without it.

We’re also concerned that his positions on key issues for Houston, including how to confront climate change, aren’t far-seeing enough. He’s called renewable energy “silly” and has not embraced a carbon tax, something even many major oil companies are willing to accept. His positions on the border and on prescription drugs also disappoint.

[…]

And yet, it’s impossible to ignore Crenshaw’s star power and his potential to shape the future of the Republican Party around respect, ideas and principles.

In addition, if he retains his seat, Crenshaw is likely to wield the kind of power that matters on delivering funding for dredging, roads and floodgates. We believe voters should return him to Congress.

There are two obvious problems with this. One is that in every way that the Chron cites to support the notion that Crenshaw is some kind of independent-thinking maverick it’s all talk and no action on Crenshaw’s part. Can the Chron name one bill of significance where Crenshaw is teaming up with a Democrat, or one vote he has taken where he opposed the party line? To be fair, even tweeting a mild rebuke at Trump makes him stand apart from the Louie Gohmerts, but surely the bar can be set a little higher than that. To put this another way, what exactly has he done for the greater Houston area and its residents that a replacement level member of Congress couldn’t have done?

Which gets to the second point, the belief that Crenshaw will someday be a force for getting big things for Houston. Which, sure, could happen, but for at least the foreseeable future he’s going to be in the minority, where there’s much less power to be wielded. Compare Crenshaw’s record of accomplishment to Lizzie Fletcher’s to see what I mean. Yes, Congressional majorities are fleeting, and the whole idea of getting anything done is meaningless as long as the Republicans control the Senate, but this puts an awful lot of faith into a guy who’s so far been a total show horse. Remember when the Chron endorsed Ted Cruz in 2012 with the hope that some day he’d grow up to be like Kay Bailey Hutchison? This gives me a similar vibe.

I agree that Crenshaw is a rising star in the GOP, and that the exodus of experienced (mostly Republican) members of Congress from Texas has left the state with less clout than it once had. If one believes that Crenshaw is going places, then there’s reason to hitch a wagon to him and hope that he’ll eventually use his powers for good. Alternately, you could sign on with the candidate who actually agrees with the things you say you value. Maybe Sima Ladjevardian doesn’t quite have Crenshaw’s star power, but I’d put more money on her actually doing the work to get stuff done.

In other Congressional endorsements, the Chron also recommended Rep. Al Green, and Rep. Brian Babin. They also endorsed in the other two countywide races of note. For Tax Assessor, they went with Chrin Daniel, former District Clerk, over incumbent Ann Harris Bennett. I don’t have any issues with Chris Daniel. He was perfectly competent as District Clerk. I also think Ann Harris Bennett has been fine as Tax Assessor, and think she will continue to be fine. (I’ve had this overview story of the Tax Assessor’s race on one of my tabs for a couple of weeks now because I haven’t been able to think of anything more original than that to say.) But look, in the year 2020 if you are on the same ballot as Donald Trump as a Republican, that’s an indelible mark against you. There may come a time when that isn’t the case, but that time is not today. Also, until we get some Democratic power at the statewide level and in the Legislature, we really need a unified county government, because the Republicans who wield power in this state are coming for us, and we need everyone pulling in the same direction to protect our interests as a county. and an independent entity of government As someone once said, it is what it is.

Finally, they endorsed Teneshia Hudspeth for County Clerk.

Teneshia Hudspeth

Hudspeth, 39, is the Democratic candidate running against Republican Stan Stanart, who was the clerk until 2018, when he was unseated by Diane Trautman. With Trautman resigning over health concerns earlier this year, the winner will fulfill the remainder of her term.

Usually, Stanart’s experience would give him the edge, but Hudspeth is no stranger to the clerk’s office, having worked her way up over a 15-year career from an administrative assistant in public affairs to the chief deputy position. Her climb through the ranks has given her a ground-level view of many of the office’s responsibilities, she said, from voter outreach to records preservation and archiving.

That will come in handy as she continues the office’s modernization by upgrading technology and enhancing online services to reduce wait times and improve efficiency. She also wants to make some of the clerk’s services more widely available outside the office by partnering with community centers.

While the clerk will no longer be a direct elections administrator, the position comes with a seat on the county election commission, a role where Hudspeth’s experience will also be important.

“I will be able to sit on that commission and hold the elections administrator accountable,” she said.

While Stanart is as affable as ever, it was time for new blood in the clerk’s office when we endorsed his opponent in 2018 — his pledge to “stop socialist Democrats” didn’t boost our confidence in his judgment — and that need for change continues.

At least this time, they understood who the candidates were. Good call.

Chip Roy calls on Paxton to resign

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

Best mugshot ever

U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, a former top aide to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, called on his former boss to resign from his post after top members of Paxton’s staff said the attorney general should be investigated for multiple crimes, including bribery.

“For the good of the people of Texas and the extraordinary public servants who serve at the Office of the Attorney General, Attorney General Ken Paxton must resign,” he said in a statement. “The allegations of bribery, abuse of office, and other charges levied against him by at least 7 senior leaders of the Office of the Attorney General are more than troubling on the merits.”

“But, any grace for him to resolve differences and demonstrate if the allegations are false was eliminated by his choice instead to attack the very people entrusted, by him, to lead the office – some of whom I know well and whose character are beyond reproach.”

Roy called the office of the attorney general “too critical to the state and her people to leave in chaos.”

“The Attorney General deserves his days in court, but the people of Texas deserve a fully functioning AG’s office,” he added.

Roy served as Paxton’s initial first assistant attorney general during Paxton’s first term, but resigned upon Paxton’s request in a major shake-up of senior staff in 2015. He was elected to Congress as a Republican in 2018.

See here and here for the background. I have some speculation about this, but before I get to that let me answer a question here that was raised in the comments to the previous post. If Paxton does resign, Greg Abbott will appoint a new AG. That person will serve until the next election, which in this case is the 2022 election, when Paxton’s term would be up. Had this all happened earlier – if, say, Paxton had stepped down in January, for example – then Abbott’s appointed AG would have been on the ballot this November as well, in the same way that there’s an election for Harris County Clerk to replace Diane Trautman. Because of the timing here, if Paxton does resign then whoever is appointed in his place will serve out the rest of his term.

Now then. Chip Roy, a former top lieutenant to Paxton, is the first prominent Republican to call for him to resign; as noted before, Abbott and Dan Patrick both issued very milquetoast “wait and see” statements in that Chron story. What might be the reason for this? Three possibilities I can think of:

1. It’s a principled move by someone who has seen enough evidence of wrongdoing and believes in the office enough to want to protect it. Yes, I know, my eyes are rolling as well, but we wouldn’t be in this position if it hadn’t been for the principled action of multiple people who are – or were, anyway – closely aligned with Paxton. I think very little of Chip Roy, but he didn’t have to put out a statement at all, or if he did he could have followed in Abbott and Partick’s extremely timid footsteps. I’m about to give two much more cynical reasons for this, but even if one or both of these other reasons are true, the fact remains that Chip Roy didn’t have to do this, and will almost certainly suffer some blowback for it. Give credit where credit is due.

2. Locked in a tight race for his Congressional seat, in a year where Donald Trump is doing his best to wreck Republican political careers around the country, the last thing Chip Roy needs is for people to think of him as a onetime head honcho for the consistently corrupt Ken Paxton. Getting out ahead of that mushroom cloud of scandal and putting as much distance between himself and Paxton is just Survival 101.

3. Did I mention that part about Greg Abbott appointing a replacement AG if Paxton does step down? And that part about Chip Roy maybe losing his re-election? Now who would be a better and more obvious choice to step in for Ken Paxton than a former Top Man in the office who was the first Republican to call on him to resign, thus giving him the cred he’ll need to clean up after Paxton’s mess and restore some faith in the Attorney General? Don’t tell me Chip Roy isn’t keeping his options open.

By the way, Ken Paxton says he ain’t resigning, but that’s what you’d expect him to say, and it’s what he says now, when we have very little information about these allegations. Let’s see what happens when we all learn more.

Anyway. Speaking of appointments, Paxton has named a replacement for his departed First Assistant AG, Jeff Mateer. Good luck with that, dude. I may need to seriously rewrite this entry if more Paxton news breaks this afternoon, but in the meantime you can read this Texas Signal story that recaps what we know so far. Catch up if you need to, I have a feeling there’s a lot more to come. The Chron, Texas Monthly, and Reform Austin have more.

UPDATE: The Chron editorial board joins the “Paxton should resign” bandwagon.

Interview with Sima Ladjevardian

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Sima Ladjevardian

Texas CD02 has a fairly short history of being centered in Harris County. It was redrawn in the Tom DeLay re-redistricting of 2003 to stretch from the north end of the county to Beaumont in order to oust then-Rep. Nick Lampson, and in 2011 it became an all-Harris district, where its spiral design running from Kingwood to Tomball to the Energy Corridor and finally inside the Loop is often cited as an exemplar of gerrymandering. It was not intended to be a competitive district, but Todd Litton came within seven points in 2018. Sima Ladjevardian is the candidate seeking to close that gap this year. A lawyer and political activist who fled Iran with her family to escape that country’s revolution, she was a Senior Advisor and Finance Chair to Beto O’Rourke in 2018. She is also a breast cancer survivor, which gives her a deeply personal stake in the health care debate. Here’s the interview:

cakuffner · Sima Ladjevardian Interview 100220.MP3

PREVIOUSLY:

Hank Gilbert, CD01
Rashad Lewis, CD36
Julie Oliver, CD25
Elizabeth Hernandez, CD08

How not to be “ground zero” for voter suppression

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

It starts with winning elections. Which would be easier to do if Republicans weren’t hell-bent on making it hard to vote, but then that’s why they do what they do.

Fewer and fewer states are standing with Texas as it continues to resist calls to expand mail-in voting amid the coronavirus outbreak, with South Carolina on Wednesday becoming the latest to allow anyone to cast a ballot by mail this fall.

Texas is now one of just five states won’t accept concerns about the coronavirus as an excuse to vote by mail and state leaders have blocked attempts by local officials in Harris County to make voting by mail more accessible.

That Texas is out on the edge on an issue of voting access should come as no surprise, experts in voting laws say.

The Republicans who run state government have made Texas a national leader in voting restrictions, ground zero in a series of long-running fights over voting rights, and hotly debated allegations of potential voter fraud. It’s a battle President Donald Trump has escalated in the past week, tweeting repeatedly about mail-in voting, which he alleges will lead to “MAYHEM!!!” despite no evidence of such in the states that already have widespread voting by mail.

Democrats have poured millions into at least 18 different legal battles against Texas over mail-in voting and a host of other election issues — more than anywhere in the nation — as the state’s elections have grown more competitive. They charge that the Republicans who run state government have placed hurdles at every step of the electoral process to keep their power despite demographic changes that have diminished their public support.

Texas’ sluggish voter turnout rates are frequently cited as evidence that GOP suppression efforts are working. The state’s decision not to make it easier to vote by mail, critics say, is just the latest example.

You can read the rest for a recitation of the greatest hits in making it harder to vote, but it’s all familiar. (This was also written before the Abbott order about mail ballot dropoff locations, which shows that there will always be new frontiers in this field.) The key to this whole thing is right there in the fourth paragraph, “The Republicans who run state government”. The only way this is going to change is for the Republicans to not be running state government. We can take an important step in that direction in this election, especially if we can get an all-Democratic federal government that will pass an expansion of the Voting Rights Act and other protections. We can finish the job in 2022 and pass laws to repeal voter ID, allow for no-excuses vote by mail, enable online voter registration, and more. The courts aren’t going to save us. The Republicans have no interest in any of this – indeed, as I’ve argued before, if they maintain their trifecta after this election, they are now strongly incentivized to rein in efforts to send out vote by mail applications to those who hadn’t requested them. We win these elections and we move forward, or we don’t and we move back. The fact that it’s harder for us to win these elections is just too bad. That’s how it is. It’s all up to us.

It’s Julie Oliver week

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

Julie Oliver, the Democratic candidate in CD25, is getting a fair bit of attention this week. First, there’s this Statesman story about what her path to victory looks like.

Julie Oliver

On a recent Zoom fundraiser with Beto O’Rourke, Democratic congressional candidate Julie Oliver was asked what the campaign was doing in the vast rural stretches of a district that extends 220 miles from Hays to Tarrant counties.

“We’re doing everything we did before the pandemic except knocking on doors and having rallies, so we’re connecting with people throughout the district,” said Oliver, an Austin lawyer and former health care executive. “Y’all that live in Austin might not be able to see what is happening in rural Texas. But that’s what’s exciting. The Democrats that have been scared to be Democrats for years and years and don’t tell their neighbors are now loud and proud. And even more than that, Republicans who have lost their party are loud and proud.”

Two years ago, Oliver came within 9 points of defeating U.S. Rep. Roger Williams, R-Austin.

Williams won reelection in 2016 by nearly 21 points. In 2018, Oliver won 20,000 more votes than Kathi Thomas, the 2016 Democratic nominee, while Williams drew 18,000 fewer votes than he had two years previous.

Most of Oliver’s gains came from winning 15,500 more votes in Travis County, even as Williams’ total declined by 6,500 votes.

But, beyond Travis County, there are all or part of 12 other counties in the 25th Congressional District, and, of those, Oliver only prevailed in the small slice of Bell County by Fort Hood, and only has any chance of adding to the win column this November the western portion of Hays County that lies in the district.

The other counties are mostly rural and extraordinarily hard country for Democrats.

“I do not envision Julie Oliver being in the 20s in Hamilton County,” said Lucas Robinson, the Republican chair in the county, which provided Oliver only 509 votes in 2018, the fewest of any the districts’ counties.

That’s 15.5%, a 2% improvement from 2016.

“We are very, very, very Republican county,” said Robinson, an attorney and businessman. “And I don’t get any sense that that’s changing. In fact, it’s probably improving for Roger, this time around, simply because it’s the presidential year and people are quite fired up in my estimate for Trump.”

[…]

The 25th is the most starkly polarized of the six districts that each carve a piece out of Austin, complicating Oliver’s task as she seeks to overtake Williams.

With growth in the district factored in, Oliver probably has to claim nearly half as many more votes than she received in 2018 to win.

“I think she’s a good candidate, and by running twice, she’s in a more advantageous position than someone who no one in the district has ever cast a ballot for,” said Josh Blank, research director the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas, who lives in the 25th.

But he said, “Ultimately, Roger Williams’ task is much easier than Julie Oliver’s, because his success relies on mobilizing reliable voters, as much as he possibly can, while dinging her slightly along the way with voters who might be on the fence, of who they were going to be very few.”

Democrats, on the other hand, are “trying to become competitive by mobilizing groups of voters who are defined by their low propensity in most cases to vote. If you are a voter of low socio-economic status, working multiple jobs, and in need of health care, the Democrats definitely would be very attractive to you, but voting is not your No. 1 priority.”

Oliver cannot overlook any opportunity.

“We’re at a place in America where every election is a base election, every election is about mobilizing your core partisans, if not for you, at the very least, against the other guy,” Blank said. “And as we get closer or more competitive in any place, and Texas is an example of that, ultimately, it does come down to margins.”

That means trying to reduce the magnitude of Williams’ advantage even in places like Hamilton County, while assiduously courting and increasing the ranks of the more than 72,000 new voters in the 25th since the last election, and synchronizing efforts with overlapping state legislative campaigns that are more invigorated than in the past.

My interview with Julie Oliver is here in case you missed it. I generally agree with Josh Blank, in that CD25 has a much greater rural aspect than the other Democratic pickup opportunities. That said, the rural part of CD25 isn’t growing by nearly as much as the more Dem-friendly parts of the district:


County        2016      2018     2020
=====================================
Bosque       12,002   12,209   12,264
Burnet       29,587   31,072   32,208
Coryell      37,644   38,635   39,539
Erath        21,537   22,492   23,063
Hamilton      5,467    5,611    5,714
Hill         22,825   22,743   22,924
Johnson      91,725   97,157  102,458
Lampasas     13,786   14,099   14,728
Somervell     6,018    6,287    6,482

Bell        186,533  195,760  204,863
Hays        121,326  134,403  144,314
Travis      725,035  775,950  829,305

I skipped Tarrant County, as there’s just a tiny piece of it in CD25. Bell, Hays, and Travis are only partly in CD25, and I can’t say how much of their growth is in this district. I feel confident saying that Hamilton County, which had 66% turnout in 2016 and 61% in 2018, will not be the major contributor to a Roger Williams victory, if that is what is in the cards. It’s Johnson County (net 28K to Williams in 2018, followed by Burnet (+10K to Williams), Coryell and Hill (+6K each) that are Oliver’s biggest obstacles. If she can hold those margins down while building on the +42K net she got in Travis and the +3K in Bell (Hays was minus 3K for her, but that was an improvement on 2016; I’d say the goal is to break even here), she can win. A challenge to be sure, but it’s doable.

Meanwhile, the Texas Signal has a nice long profile on Oliver.

In the inevitable-looking saga of Republicans losing power in Texas, there would be no sweeter stroke of fate than Julie Oliver toppling Congressman Roger Williams.

A healthcare finance analyst turned Democratic candidate, Oliver is running one of the most progressive campaigns in Texas that include support for the Green New Deal, Medicare for All, abolishing private and for-profit prisons, and going after dark money in politics.

To prove the latter, Oliver is saying no to all political action committee money. Not just corporate PAC money, but PAC money from the major unions and agreeable political action groups that have endorsed her, such as the Texas AFL–CIO, Our Revolution, Working Families, Moms Demand Action and Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

Oliver’s commitment to the no PAC money pledge goes as far as sending back checks, sometimes worth only $100 or $200, to small Democratic clubs that support her.

“You don’t have to have millions of dollars in cash to win,” Oliver told the Signal, citing the elections Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush — three progressives that defeated more moderate, well-funded incumbent Democrats in safely blue districts during their primaries due to grassroots fundraising and organizing.

Oliver held the same pledge in 2018 during her first bid for Congress against Williams. She raised an impressive $644,928, but fell 9 percentage points short on Election Day — not exactly a nailbiter, but a significant improvement from her predecessor in 2016 who lost by 20 points.

“I’ve heard from some people in the Democratic Party who are like, ‘oh that’s foolish, you’ll have to take PAC money this time,’” Oliver said. “And I’m like, mm-hmm, we’ll see about that.”

Primaries are not the same as general elections, but Oliver has done very well with this approach. She’d already outraised herself from the 2018 cycle as of Q2 and appears to be on her way to topping $1 million in total receipts. That’s pretty damn impressive, especially since the large majority of her donations have come from Texas. The main thing this money, and the level of engagement that has allowed her to get contributions from so many small donors, will allow her to do is to reach out to the new voters and the likely Democrats who were there but didn’t vote in 2018. That’s the kind of thing that a campaign that has resources can do.

And she may have some more resources coming her way.

Julie Oliver, the Democrat challenging U.S. Rep. Roger Williams, R-Austin, is being named to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s Red to Blue program.

“Texans know tough, and Julie Oliver has always beat the odds,” DCCC Chairwoman Cheri Bustos says in a statement. “A homeless, pregnant teenager who dropped out of high school, Julie endured to finish high school, put herself through college and law school with a young family and build a successful career.

The Red to Blue designation comes roughly a month after the DCCC expanded its Texas target list to include Williams’ 25th Congressional District and two others. The committee has now designated 10 total seats in Texas that it’s working to flip this November, and Oliver is the seventh contender in those races who’s received the Red to Blue distinction.

See here for the background. The DCCC is of course a PAC, but it does its own spending, not in conjunction with campaigns. More likely, what this means is that they will tell their donors who are looking to put their extra dollars to good use that Julie Oliver and CD25 is worth the investment. At this point in the cycle that’s going to have a fairly limited effect, but it’s a whole lot better than nothing, and a whole lot more than what anyone might have thought possible in 2018.

And just as I was finishing this draft, Texas Monthly began a series it’s calling Get To Know A Swing District, with CD25 and the Oliver/Williams rematch as its first entry. All in all, a pretty good week for Julie Oliver.

Endorsement watch: Menefee and more

by Charles Kuffner.

3 comments

The Chron endorses Christian Menefee for Harris County Attorney.

Christian Menefee

Christian Menefee was still celebrating his victory in the Democratic primary over longtime incumbent Harris County Attorney Vince Ryan when the coronavirus pandemic changed everything. Lockdowns and social distancing left the 32-year-old civil litigation attorney with a lot of time on his hands.

He used those spare hours well. During the last several months, Menefee told the editorial board, he has researched the inner workings of the department he hopes to run. He studied the office’s organizational charts. He talked to more than 30 current employees. He reached out to the Dallas County district attorney and the Travis County attorney.

That helped give him a solid understanding of the office he seeks and what improvements need to be made, Menefee said.

“You can’t just come in with ideas,” said Menefee, a Houston native who is a litigator with Kirkland & Ellis. “You need to come in with stuff that you know is going to work.”

That kind of energy, attention to detail and determination to make the county attorney office as effective as possible earn Menefee our endorsement. We also recommended him in the primary, noting his commitment to expanding the office’s environmental law section, which currently has four full-time lawyers.

In addition to the bread-and-butter work of representing elected officials, local entities and county employees, Menefee said he wants the office to bring more impact litigation to “hold polluters accountable.”

Menefee also wants the office to be a strong advocate for local control — no small feat, given the control officials in Austin have sought in recent years, including Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s recent challenges to the county on vote-by-mail applications and eviction policies.

If you listen to the interview I did with Menefee for the primary, you will definitely hear all of these themes from him. He’s got a lot of potential, and I expect big things.

Next, the Chron heads a bit north to endorse Hank Gilbert in CD01 over the hottest of messes that is Louie Gohmert.

Hank Gilbert

Ever since voters in Texas’ 1st Congressional District sent U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert to Congress in 2004 by a landslide, it’s been an open question as to how extreme, how divisive and how — there’s no other way to put it — how batty their congressman can get before he’s recalled.

If his electoral successes are any guide, Gohmert is in no danger of being held accountable for his antics, which include most recently refusing to wear a mask unless he got COVID-19 — which he promptly did. His positive diagnosis drew a worried rebuke from his own daughter on Twitter: “My father ignored medical expertise and now he has Covid,” she wrote.

Still, as congressman, Gohmert has never polled less than 68 percent. Time and again, despite a mountain of cringe-worthy examples, Gohmert has emerged stronger after Election Day.

This year, his opponent swears it will be different. “He’s never had a real challenger,” says Democrat Hank Gilbert, 60, a former rancher, high school ag teacher and two-time candidate for Texas agriculture commissioner.

We hope he’s right. The district deserves better than what it’s had these past 16 years. Heck, Congress deserves better.

Here’s my interview with Hank, who is a mensch through and through. No question, Congress and the country would be a much better place with Hank subbing in for Gohmert, but that’s on the voters, and this is a tough district. If you know someone who lives in that district, make sure they know about Hank.

Finally, the Chron endorses incumbent Rep. Mike McCaul for re-election, and while the have good things to say about Mike Siegel, they argue that “trading an accomplished and pragmatic congressman would not serve the district well”. Whatevs.

Endorsement watch: A Congressional four-pack

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

Going once again in numerical order…

Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, CD07.

Rep. Lizzie Fletcher

Two years after her first-ever run for public office resulted in the defeat of a nine-term Republican incumbent, Democratic U.S. Rep. Lizzie Fletcher faces re-election with a solid record of accomplishment and a reputation for working across the aisle and serving constituents.

She has kept her promises.

We recommend that voters in Texas’ 7th Congressional District let her continue the job she has started.

[…]

Although a political novice, Fletcher, 45, hit the ground running in her first term, authoring a bill to cut federal red tape and speed disaster recovery funding that was much needed in the Houston area.

The measure passed the House with just seven votes against as Fletcher teamed with Fort Bend Republican Rep. Pete Olson and even pulled in conservative North Carolina Republican Mark Meadows as a co-sponsor. Meadows is now President Donald Trump’s chief of staff.

Fletcher also smartly sought spots on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, where she is chair of the energy subcommittee. Other panels might be more glamorous or attention-grabbing but they are not as crucial to the interests of the region NASA calls home and where the oil and gas industry and the Houston Ship Channel mean jobs, commerce and development.

Rep. Fletcher has been exactly the member of Congress I expected she would be. Smart, hard-working, very present in the district, getting stuff done. I feel good about her re-election, and I will be very interested to see what happens with CD07 in redistricting. In a world where John Culberson was still in that seat, I had figured it would continue to be moved west, to shed the blue urban-core precincts and chase red areas out in Fort Bend and Waller and wherever else. Now maybe it absorbs more blue precincts in an effort to shore up or win back any or all of CDs 02, 10, and 22. It’s going to be an exciting time. I have an interview with Rep. Fletcher coming up that will run on Monday, so look for that.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, CD18.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee

Even her opponents acknowledge that U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee has earned every bit of her reputation as “a fighter.”

In the 25 years that she has represented central Houston’s 18th Congressional District, Jackson Lee, 70, has never been shy about expressing her opinion or battling for her causes.

Whether it’s bringing billions of dollars to the region for high-speed rail, pushing for disaster relief, financing a state-of-the-art automotive training center at the Houston Community College North Forest Campus, championing the placement of COVID-19 testing sites in her district, or intervening in deportation cases, Jackson Lee has a record of getting things done.

“I take advantage of the opportunities of power,” she told the editorial board. “Not to use for myself but to use for others. That is what a congressperson does.”

That’s why district residents have sent her to Washington for 13 terms with never less than 70 percent of the vote.

And it’s a major reason we recommend Jackson Lee be returned to Congress to use her experience, seniority and determination to continue delivering for her district and the state of Texas.

Well, the fact that this is a deep blue district is a good reason why voters re-elect her every two years by fifty points or so. The fact that she has rarely faced a serious primary challenger and easily bats aside the challenges she has had is due to her hard work and good results. I’ve been her constituent for nearly all of those 25 years, and I’m happy to vote for her each time. And by the way, her Republican opponent is one of the plaintiffs in the attempted assault on Harris County early voting and mail ballot dropoff locations. I’m sure the Chron would have noted that in their endorsement editorial if they had known about it in time.

Sri Kulkarni, CD22.

Sri Kulkarni

Changing demographics and a narrow escape in the 2018 elections helped persuade longtime Republican Congressman Pete Olson not to run for reelection in U.S. House District 22 this year.

The six-term incumbent’s departure sets up a showdown that mirrors the presidential race with Sri Preston Kulkarni representing the moderate approach of Democrat Joe Biden and Fort Bend County sheriff Troy Nehls aligned with the positions of President Donald Trump and the Republican Party.

The ballot also includes Libertarian Joseph LeBlanc who is running on the party’s platform of protecting individual rights and limiting government overreach.

Kulkarni, 41, a former foreign service officer with the U.S. Department of State, made his mark two years ago by running within 5 points of Olson and establishing himself as a candidate with the intelligence and cooperative attitude necessary to build coalitions and bring people together for common goals.

That makes Kulkarni our choice in this racially diverse district, which includes most of Fort Bend County, a section of Harris County and the cities of Friendswood, Missouri City, Needville, Rosenberg, and Sugar Land.

Kulkarni is one of several repeat candidates from 2018, and like the others he’s exceeded his strong fundraising from last time. He put this district on the national map in 2018, and it was there from the beginning this cycle. He’ll make a terrific member of Congress.

Rep. Sylvia Garcia, CD29.

Rep. Sylvia Garcia

Long before Sylvia Garcia was thrust into the national spotlight as a manager in President Donald Trump’s impeachment hearings, the first-term congresswoman had carved out a big name in Houston politics.

The former social worker and legal aid lawyer served five terms as director and presiding judge of the Houston Municipal System, as Houston city controller and on Harris County Commissioner’s Court before being elected to represent District 6 in the Texas Senate.

That experience gave Garcia, 70, an understanding of how government can help people — something she carried with her to Washington D.C. when in 2018 she became one of the first two Texas Latinas elected to Congress.

Her first term has been busy, and included Garcia being tapped by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to serve as a manager in Trump’s Senate impeachment hearing. That a freshman representative was recruited to fill such a visible and critical role speaks to Garcia’s knack for forming alliances and maneuvering the halls of politics.

Those skills earn Garcia our recommendation in the 29th Congressional District race. They also help her serve her district, a mostly working class swath of Harris County that includes Pasadena, Jacinto City, Baytown, Galena Park and South Houston and is home to the Houston Ship Channel and one of the nation’s largest petrochemical complexes.

I will say the same thing about Rep. Garcia as I said about her fellow first-term colleague Rep. Fletcher: She’s exactly the member of Congress I expected her to be, and basically for the same reasons. Long may she serve.

Still to be addressed by the Chron: CDs 02, 08, 09, 10, and 36. Obviously, 02 and 10 are the ones of greatest interest.

Bexar County poll: Biden 52, Trump 35

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

From the San Antonio Report:

The new Bexar Facts/KSAT/San Antonio Report poll showed former Vice President Joe Biden with a sizable lead over President Donald Trump among registered Bexar County voters.

Poll results released Tuesday, two weeks before early voting begins, found 52 percent of Bexar County voters support Biden while 35 percent back Trump. In 2016, Bexar County voters chose Democrat Hillary Clinton over Trump by 14 percentage points.

[…]

Pollster David Metz, whose firm conducted the Bexar Facts survey of 619 registered Bexar County voters Sept. 12-21, noted that age, race, and gender – in addition to party affiliation – play roles in determining whom voters support for the presidency. Voters under 50 said they will vote for Biden at a 2-to-1 margin, while 48 percent of voters age 65 and over are voting Trump, with 8 percent of senior citizens undecided.

Sixty-three percent of local voters of color said they supported Biden, and 49 percent of whites said they would vote for Trump. Ten percent of white voters were undecided or indicated support for another candidate. Fourteen percent of voters of color were undecided or indicated another candidate.

Only 27 percent of women said they would vote for Trump and his vice president, Mike Pence. Meanwhile, 64 percent favored Biden, whose running mate is California Sen. Kamala Harris.

The Bexar Facts/KSAT/San Antonio Report poll also asked voters about other items on the November ballot, including propositions concerning use of sales tax revenue to fund Pre-K 4 SA, a workforce development initiative, and mass transit.

The latest poll surveyed individuals online and by phone (both landlines and cellphones) in English and Spanish. The margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points with a 95 percent confidence level, which is typical of large community polls.

The Bexar Facts website hosts the poll data, which they have annoyingly broken up into a million individual posts about each question, all presented as graphics with text you can see when you hover your mouse over the graph item. For the record, Biden leads Trump 52-35 in Bexar County, with 13% in the “don’t know/no answer” column. As noted, Hillary Clinton won Bexar County 54.2 to 40.8 in 2016, so Biden is ahead of that pace. On a proportional basis, Biden is leading by a bit more than 60-40, though if you allocate the independents (Biden leads 42-30 among indies) that make up nearly all of the “DK/NA” respondents, you get 59-41 for Biden. In 2018, Beto took Bexar County 59.5 to 39.6, so Biden is just a hair behind that pace in this poll. In other words, this is consistent with Biden trailing statewide by two or three points.

There was also a question about the Senate race, and in Bexar County MJ Hegar leads John Cornyn 49-38, again with 13% answering “don’t know” or “no answer”. This is consistent with Hegar lagging Biden by a couple of points statewide, though as we have often discussed, that may be a function of lower name ID, which may come out in the wash when people are presented with the basic partisan choice. I stand by my belief that Hegar probably needs Biden to carry Texas for her to have a chance at winning.

I should note that the poll has some basic demographic subtotals. Biden leads Trump 60-25 among Latino voters, and 96-3 among Black voters. White voters go for Trump by a 49-41 margin, much smaller than his lead has been statewide in other polls. For Hegar, it’s 55-27 among Latinos, 89-7 among Blacks, and 54-39 for Cornyn among whites.

Biden’s margin of victory in Bexar County will have an effect on several key races, including CD21 (Chip Roy beat Joe Kopser in Bexar County 49.9 to 48.3, less than 2000 votes, in 2018), CD23 (Will Hurd beat Gina Ortiz Jones 51.1 to 46.8, but in 2016 he had defeated Pete Gallego 53.5 to 40.9), SD19, SBOE5, and HD121. If Jones in CD23 and Wendy Davis in CD21 can break even in Bexar, I feel pretty good about their chances.

Interview with Elizabeth Hernandez

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Elizabeth Hernandez

How I proceed with doing candidate interviews can vary from election to election. The last couple of even-year cycles, I’ve focused more on the primaries than the general, because there have been so many highly competitive primaries. Even there, I can’t get to everything, and as I mentioned after the primaries I do try to get back to the candidates I couldn’t cover for March. There was a competitive primary in CD08, the Congressional district that is centered in Montgomery County but which also includes a piece of Harris and a number of rural counties. Elizabeth Hernandez emerged victorious from that primary, and has been someone I’ve wanted to talk to since. An accountant by trade, she graduated high school in Pasadena and now lives in the Woodlands, where she’s doing her part to turn Montgomery a bit more purple, if not blue. Here’s what we talked about:

cakuffner · Elizabeth Hernandez Interview 122120.MP3

PREVIOUSLY:

Hank Gilbert, CD01
Rashad Lewis, CD36
Julie Oliver, CD25

CD10 poll: McCaul 45, Siegel 43

by Charles Kuffner.

4 comments

One more Congressional district polled.

Mike Siegel

A new internal poll from the Democratic nominee for Texas’ 10th Congressional District, Mike Siegel, showed the race against Rep. Michael McCaul within just two points.

The poll found a narrowing lead for McCaul, who defeated Siegel by four points in 2018. McCaul holds a 45-43 lead over Siegel with just over two weeks remaining before early voting begins, according to the poll.

The poll was conducted Sept. 21-24 by GBAO Strategies, a progressive polling firm in Washington. The results are based on live phone calls to 400 likely voters with a margin of error of 4.9%.

GBAO Strategies conducted a poll for the Siegel campaign in August which showed McCaul leading by seven points, according to a release. That poll was not made public by the campaign.

I’ve not been able to find any poll data for this, which is not unusual for an internal poll whose topline results were released. The Texas Signal reported that the poll also included a Presidential number, and it has Biden tied with Trump in the district, 47-47. Beto topped Ted Cruz by a tenth of a point in CD10 in 2018, so this is consistent with Trump having a small lead in the state. At this point I’ve seen at least one poll result from most of the targeted districts – I’d love to see one from CD02 but have not as yet – and they have tended to tell a consistent story about the state as a whole. The rest is up to us.

PPP/TDP: Trump 48, Biden 48

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

A new poll of likely voters found that President Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden are tied in Texas. The poll, commissioned by the Texas Democratic Party through Public Policy Polling, is the latest reflecting a dead heat race in the state.

Trump and Biden both received 48% support with 4% of respondents undecided.

Trump has led six of the last seven statewide polls in Texas, according to a tracker of 2020 presidential polls compiled by the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas. Before that, Biden had led five of seven polls.

[…]

The poll also found an underwater approval rating for Trump in Texas, 47-to-48. Trump and Biden will participate in the first 2020 presidential debate on Tuesday.

Polling data is here. They did not include a question about the Senate race, unfortunately. Biden wins 2016 Clinton voters 93-3 and the “Other/Did not vote” contingent 66-25, while Trump carries his voters from 2016 by an 89-8 margin. (The sample reported voting for Trump in 2016 by 50-41.) Biden wins Democrats 88-7, Trump wins Republicans 87-11, and Biden wins independents 54-41. Biden wins Black voters 88-7, Latinos 63-32, and “Other” voters 68-19, while Trump takes white voters 66-32. Voters 18 to 45 go for Biden 56-41, voters 46 to 65 go for Trump 49-47, and voters older than 65 back Trump by a 58-37 margin. None of those data points stand out as being out of whack with other polling.

I should note that the aforementioned poll tracker shows an August 22 PPP poll done for the TDP that had Biden up 48-47. I either missed that one or didn’t get around to it. I have a June 5 PPP/TDP poll that also had a 48-48 tie, which the tracker does not include. For whatever the reason, some polls get Chron/DMN/Trib coverage, while others do not. There is a lot of news out there, I get it.

Along those lines there was a Data for Progress poll from last week that was interesting in a couple of ways.

For this November’s election, Biden trails Trump by 1 point in Texas. Senator John Cornyn maintains a 2-point lead over his Democratic challenger, MJ Hegar. In the Senate race, it is notable, however, that a significant block of voters (22 percent) say they’re not yet sure for whom they will vote. In the GCB, Democrats trail by five-points.

In 2022, Texas will hold elections for governor and attorney general. These positions are held by Republicans Greg Abbott and Ken Paxton, respectively. Currently, Abbot enjoys a 12-point lead over a generic Democratic challenger. In the 2018 race for attorney general, Democrat Justin Nelson ran against Republican incumbent Ken Paxton, and when we retested this race, we found that Paxton leads Nelson by 4 points. Like with our other 2022 polling, about one in five voters remains unsure for whom they will be voting.

The numbers, which they are only showing in graphical form, are 46-45 for Trump, 40-38 for Cornyn, and 46-41 for the Generic Congressional Ballot (GCB). There was a Data for Progress poll done in early September for the HDCC that had Biden up 48-45, so this isn’t a terrific result when put next to that, but it’s in line with most other polls. DfP also polled Florida (three point lead for Biden) and Arizona (one point lead for Trump, which is better for Trump than other polls).

The 2022 polling is interesting but not worth taking too seriously. Greg Abbott may be leading a generic Democrat 46-34, but he’s very likely not going to have a generic Dem running against him, at least not if all the candles I’ve been lighting for Julian Castro have any effect. Ken Paxton’s 41-37 lead over Justin Nelson makes some sense, but as of today Paxton’s opposition comes in the form of Joe Jaworski, though as that post notes Jaworski is sure to have company in the primary, and it would shock no one if that company includes Justin Nelson. Take this all for pure entertainment value and check with me again in a year or so.

Interview with Julie Oliver

by Charles Kuffner.

3 comments

Julie Oliver

If the story of the 2018 Congressional elections in Texas was the unprecedented number of serious candidates and their equally unprecedented success at fundraising, the story of 2020 is how many of those Congressional races are seen as credibly winnable by the Democratic challenger. Democratic flips of “only” two seats would be seen as mildly disappointing, while up to ten seats could go blue in a maximal year, based on the polling data available and the interest by national groups and the DCCC. Julie Oliver has been at the forefront of both stories, as the energetic newcomer in 2018 and as the more seasoned candidate with the poll numbers that show how much her CD25 has changed in that time. Oliver is a healthcare professional who has lived the themes of her campaign, as a onetime dropout and teen mother who relied on Medicaid and Pell grants to get her through school and onto a successful career, and who has a son who was born with a pre-existing heart condition. Here’s our conversation:

cakuffner · Julie Oliver Interview 092120.MP3

PREVIOUSLY:

Hank Gilbert, CD01
Rashad Lewis, CD36

October Census deadline restored

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

Good news, though as with everything we can’t be sure just yet that it’s for real.

A federal judge in California late Thursday blocked the Trump administration from stopping the 2020 Census count next week, saying it should continue until Oct. 31, the date the Census Bureau had planned on before the administration abruptly shortened the count.

U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in the Northern District of California granted a preliminary injunction in the case brought by the National Urban League — a group of counties, cities, advocacy groups and individuals — and other groups. Koh had, earlier this month, issued a temporary restraining order to keep the count underway. The case is likely to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a hearing Tuesday, Koh had expressed irritation with Justice Department lawyers for missing a deadline she had set for them to produce internal documents connected to the case.

She referred repeatedly to documents finally released over the weekend and Monday in which career bureau officials said the data could not be properly collected and delivered to the president on the government’s new timeline.

See here and here for the background. The Chron lays out what’s at stake locally.

Natalia Cornelio, legal affairs director for [County Commissioner Rodney] Ellis, said at the point Trump yanked back the deadline in early August, only 63 percent of households nationwide and 54 percent in Houston had responded to the census.

Despite those numbers, on Aug. 3, the census director abruptly announced what the court is calling the “re-plan,” which shortened the timeline for households to respond by Sept. 30.

Cornelio said the accuracy of the census count is critical to Harris County’s future.

“Its outcome determines political representation and billions of dollars of funding for healthcare, education, disaster relief, and housing,” she said.

Right now, Harris County is looking at an estimated undercount of 600,000 households, based on data from Civis Analytics, the company the county has partnered with to track its census outreach, she said.

One area likely to suffer from an undercount is the southern portion of the county, a pie-slice-shaped region extending from downtown Houston to Bellaire to League City, according to Steven Romalewski, who maps census data for the Center for Urban Research at CUNY. In that area, 11 percent of the door-knocking has yet to be completed, a feat that would likely would have been impossible with less than a week to spare to the Sept. 30 deadline, he said.

In parts of Fort Bend and Galveston counties, nearly 18 percent of the door-knocking needs to be finished. And in Montgomery County 12 percent of homes have yet to be documented.

Romalewski said the ruling could have a major impact on areas with a relatively low “completion” rate for the door-knocking operation that’s meant to visit every household that has not responded. With more time to complete the process, census enumerators can attempt to visit households more than once and will be likelier to talk with someone in-person or determine that a unit is vacant. The fallback, which census officials consider less accurate, is to to count residents through administrative records.

I have a hard time understanding why any decent person would think this was a good state of affairs. At least we have a chance now to try and get this close to correct. That’s pending the likely appeal to SCOTUS, and who knows what they may do at this point. But at least for now, there’s a chance.

Trib overview of CD24

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

The focus of this story is mostly on Democrat Candace Valenzuela, as it should be.

Candace Valenzuela

She experienced homelessness at a young age. She worked several odd jobs throughout high school and college to make ends meet. A high school car accident left her with a chronic health condition.

Now she’s running for Congress hoping to flip a red seat blue, and Candace Valenzuela thinks her story as a political outsider who overcame hardships will win over voters.

“My story does resonate,” Valenzuela said in an interview with The Texas Tribune. “As soon as my constituents hear my story, it’s incredibly easy for them to relate.”

Seemingly overnight, Valenzuela has become a new face of Democrats’ optimism for 2020. Six months ago, she was an underdog in the Democratic primary for Congressional District 24, a mostly suburban North Texas district that straddles parts of Dallas, Denton and Tarrant counties. Now, she’s being touted as a potential future star — someone who could win a seat long held by U.S. Rep. Kenny Marchant, a retiring Tea Party Republican, and become the first Black Latina elected to Congress.

That Valenzuela is considered a viable candidate is another sign of the changes in Texas politics that have spurred a wave of Democratic optimism. Until recently, suburban areas like Congressional District 24 had been viewed as weak spots for the Texas Democratic Party. Now those sites are key to Democrats’ big plans for Texas in 2020. All 10 of the congressional districts Democrats hope to flip in the state are at least partially suburban — and the voters in suburban neighborhoods could decide whether the party can truly compete for the state’s Electoral College votes and win control of the Texas House.

“We need to make our Texas delegation look more like the Texans they’re designed to serve,” Valenzuela said. “We’re seeing record participation and engagement, and folks looking at what they want to see out of their representatives. If we see a win here, it’ll be the people stepping up and saying we want someone from our community who’s going to work for the community.”

There’s more, so go read the rest. I’ll be honest, I would have voted for Kim Olson in the CD24 primary based on her strong candidacy for Ag Commissioner in 2018 and her excellent fundraising. Valenzuela started out more slowly in that department but had caught up by the time of the July finance reports, and she prevailed by a convincing margin in the runoff. CD24 was a Beto-majority district, and the early polling is good. It seems very likely to me that Biden will carry CD24 by several points, and Valenzuela’s opponent is a major Trump shill, which should help. I have felt for a long time that not flipping CD24 would be a huge disappointment. I’m excited about the possibility of getting a Rep. Candace Valenzuela.

I should note, by the way, that Valenzuela has some company in the category of “would be the first person of this type elected to Congress from Texas”. (In her case, from the entire country as well.) Sima Ladjevardian and Lulu Seikaly would be the first people of Middle Eastern/North African descent to be elected to Congress from Texas. Sri Kulkarni and Gina Ortiz Jones would be the first Asian-Americans elected to Congress from Texas. We really do have a diverse state. This year we have a unique opportunity to better reflect that diversity in our elected leaders.

Is the GOP punting CD07?

by Charles Kuffner.

6 comments

That’s one possible interpretation of this, though probably not the most likely.

Rep. Lizzie Fletcher

The National Republican Congressional Committee has canceled about $2 million worth of advertising it had reserved for campaigning in the Houston television market, according to several Democratic and Republican sources tracking Houston media advertising who were not authorized to discuss the issue on the record.

The Houston region is home to several contested congressional elections, including the 7th Congressional District, which is represented by U.S. Rep. Lizzie Pannill Fletcher, a Democrat. Fletcher unseated Republican John Culberson in 2018, and she is one of two Democratic incumbents who Republicans have been targeting in Texas this year.

The $2 million was intended to cover advertising in the last two weeks of the election, according to the sources.

One source, a national Republican operative, said the money has been moved to the San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth media markets. The San Antonio market includes parts of Congressional District 23, where Republicans are trying to hold on to a seat held by retiring U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, R-Helotes. The Dallas-Fort Worth market includes multiple districts that Democrats are trying to flip, and one district held by U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, that Republicans are targeting.

[…]

There is other national GOP money coming to the region. A Republican leadership aligned group, the Congressional Leadership Fund, is expected to spend about $6.25 million in Houston between media advertising and a field operation. The group’s television ad campaign is set to begin on Sept. 23.

In the absence of any further evidence, it’s probably best to read this as the NRCC making a strategic decision, which was almost certainly affected by the knowledge that the CLF was still spending big bucks in the Houston area. I can imagine them pulling out of CD07 in favor of other districts, but not if that means that CD22 and CD02 and CD10 were also left on their own. I really don’t think there’s all that much to this story, at least based on what we know now, but if there are further pullbacks then we’ve got something. And it should be noted, that canceling an ad buy now doesn’t mean there can’t be a new ad buy made later, though the rates will likely be higher in that instance. We need more data, that’s the main takeaway here.

Bar owners still mad at Abbott

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Can’t blame them, but the situation is complicated.

As Gov. Greg Abbott outlined his latest reopening plan this week, bar owner Greg Barrineau watched in disbelief. Abbott, who announced that Texas restaurants could expand dine-in service to 75% capacity, said bars must remain closed.

“Some bars and their associations have offered some very helpful ideas,” Abbott said of reopening, “and we will continue to work with them on that process.”

But Barrineau, who has laid off his 12 staff members and suffered hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses at Drink Texas, a bar with locations in San Antonio and Boerne, said that assertion of collaboration is “insanity — he doesn’t care about small businesses.”

Michael Klein, the head of Texas Bar and Nightclub Alliance, which represents thousands of bars, said that Abbott’s statement about working together was “incorrect,” carefully choosing his words. The TBNA laid out a six-point plan to reopen in August, but Klein said the governor, whom he referred to strictly as “anti-business Abbott,” has not responded to the plan.

“We’ve never heard back from them,” Klein said. “We believe that he is disingenuous.”

Abbott’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

While restaurant owners applauded Abbott’s move to allow them to increase operations, Klein said Thursday’s ruling was “completely unacceptable” for many bars and other facilities where alcohol sales make up more than half of the revenue. It could leave 30% of Texas bars and 39% of distilleries permanently closed within six months, industry leaders said.

[…]

Spread from conventional bars and nightclubs has been widely documented throughout the U.S., and infectious disease experts caution going inside establishments that don’t follow social distancing protocols.

Kristin Mondy, chief of the infectious disease division in the University of Texas at Austin’s medical school, said there is increased risk in spreading the virus if strangers mingle in a tight, closed space, especially as drinking could cause bar customers to loosen their inhibitions.

Klein said the industry’s plan would reduce those issues by complying with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention requirements.

Some of the requirements in TBNA’s plan include ensuring all patrons are seated at their own tables, barring dance floors and mingling among groups, requiring face masks for all servers and customers when not at their tables, and conducting temperature checks upon entry. Mondy said these procedures could help as long as mask-wearing and social distancing are enforced.

[…]

Cord Switzer, who has helped run Fredericksburg Winery for almost 25 years with his family, said he has been able to technically and legally become a food server — but no one that comes is actually eating the food. That’s not why they go to a winery, he said.

“It makes no sense to me,” Switzer said. “We have never been interested in being in the food service business. We have no intent of doing that in the future, but it was our only choice.”

Switzer started wine tastings on Saturday for the first time in two months and hopes to begin recouping his losses after making 30% of last year’s revenue. But he doesn’t understand the governor’s categorization, and industry advocates share Switzer’s confusion.

“Texas winery owners continue to be perplexed by Governor Abbott’s steadfast refusal to recognize that the lion’s share of Texas alcohol manufacturer’s tasting rooms have little, if anything, in common with bars and nightclubs,” said Patrick Whitehead, the president of the Texas Wine and Grape Growers Association, in an email. “Governor Abbott’s arbitrary, and frankly unfair, act of lumping our tasting rooms into the category of bars is like a surgeon operating with a chainsaw rather [than] a scalpel.”

Switzer’s money troubles are not unique; nearly half of distilleries surveyed by the Texas Whiskey Association have experienced revenue losses greater than 60%. Spence Whelan, the head of the association, which represents distilleries across Texas, said continued restrictions could be disastrous for the industry, which normally relies on a big fourth quarter in holiday sales to stay afloat. This fall, with little or no visitors, that could be wiped out. Under Texas law, whiskey distilleries cannot ship or deliver whiskey directly to customers, nor can they sell more than two bottles of whiskey per person.

At the very least, Whelan said, those rules should be relaxed. Many places don’t want to open yet anyway, and there are other ways to bring in money. He said the industry has sent more than 15,000 letters to the governor’s office asking to waive those restrictions and has received no response.

Let’s acknowledge that bars are a high-risk environment for COVID-19, and the reopening of bars in May was a significant contributor to the subsequent outbreaks that swept the state in June and July. We should also acknowledge that there’s evidence that the reopening of restaurants, even at lower capacities, is also a risk factor in spreading COVID-19. The bar owners’ complaint – and wineries’, and distilleries’, and craft breweries’ – is that Abbott has been particularly rigid about how these risks are categorized, and has been unresponsive to any input that would allow these entities to operate in a lower-risk fashion.

I have a lot of sympathy for these complaints. Some bars have been able to reopen by creative interpretation of the 51% rule, by incorporating to-go service, and by a recent rule change that lets them have food trucks on their premises. But this doesn’t work for every bar, it imposes extra costs on them, and it doesn’t change the fundamental nature of their business. The only good thing that may come out of it is the expanded allowance for to-go service, and maybe if we’re very lucky a broader rethinking of our antiquated regulatory scheme for alcohol. I don’t know how effective the risk-mitigation strategies that have been proposed by the various industry groups would be, but we could study them and try the ones that comply with known best practices. We could surely let the places that have ample outdoor space like wineries and craft breweries with beer gardens take advantage of those spaces (to some extent we already are permitting this), and we could make allowances for those that have large and well-ventilated indoor spaces where social distancing would work. And, you know, Abbott and Dan Patrick could put a little pressure on the two Republican Senators to support a relief bill in Congress that included funds for bars and other places that rely heavily on alcohol sales (such as music halls) that just can’t be allowed to reopen right now. Abbott has done none of this, and as noted in the story has been repeatedly unwilling to engage in any discussion about it.

So this is both a legitimate set of concerns by members of a significant sector of the Texas economy, and a real opportunity for Democrats going forward. Dems don’t need to pander or reverse course on their properly-held principles about minimizing COVID risk. They just need to be willing to consider the various risk-mitigation strategies that have been proposed, and to continue to push for a response from Congress that truly addresses the broad economic pain that much of the country is still experiencing. Good policy is so often good politics, and the opportunity to do both here is enormous.

Interview with Rashad Lewis

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Rashad Lewis

Moving closer to my home base but staying in mostly rural territory, we visit CD36 where Rashad Lewis is running on the Democratic ticket. Lewis is a former city council member in Jasper, where he won as a write-in candidate in 2017 – this Beaumont Enterprise story recounts that tale and provides some background on Lewis. He recently helped organize the Black Lives Matter protest in Jasper following the death of George Floyd. CD36 is a challenging district where Dayna Steele gave a strong effort in 2018, and now Rashad Lewis will try to build on that. Here’s the interview:

cakuffner · Rashad Lewis Interview 091820.MP3

PREVIOUSLY: Hank Gilbert, CD01

Interview with Hank Gilbert

by Charles Kuffner.

7 comments

Hank Gilbert

I will have a few interviews to present for the November election. Nearly all of the people I wanted to talk to in the greater Houston area were in contested primaries, and thus I have already interviewed them, but there are several more I’ll be trying to get. Beyond that, I’m reaching out to various Congressional candidates, and will hope to have as many of those as I can. We’ll start today with an old friend, Hank Gilbert, whom I interviewed before in 2006 and 2010 when he ran for Ag Commissioner. Hank is a rancher and high school agriculture teacher who grew up near Tyler, and he’s trying to do the world a favor by sending Louie Gohmert off to retirement in CD01. It’s a tough challenge in a red district, but if anyone is up to it, it’s Hank. If you’d like to close your eyes and imagine what it would be like to have a normal, rational, compassionate human being representing this Congressional district, go ahead and give this interview a listen:

cakuffner · Hank Gilbert Interview 091620.MP3

I will be presenting further interviews as I can. Please let me know what you think.

A matter of timing

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

That’s the stated reason why SCOTX overturned the earlier decision that booted three Green Party candidates off the ballot.

The Texas Supreme Court in a new opinion Friday explained its decision to reinstate to the November ballot Green Party candidates who did not pay their filing fees, saying lower courts denied them the chance to resolve the issue while there was still time under the law.

[…]

Justices acknowledged the strain that adding last-minute candidates may put on county elections officials, who were just days away from sending out their first rounds of ballots before the court’s order was announced on Tuesday. The high court did not publish its opinion in the matter until Friday.

“We recognize that changes to the ballot at this late point in the process will require extra time and resources to be expended by our local election officials,” the opinion read. “But a candidate’s access to the ballot is an important value to our democracy.”

[…]

In the unsigned opinion handed down Friday, justices said Democrats challenging the validity of Green Party candidates failed to prove that the election law requires party chairs to declare candidates ineligible when they don’t pay filing fees, and that the 2019 law doesn’t include a deadline for paying them.

Justices also say the Third Court of Appeals should have given Green Party candidates a chance to pay their fees before declaring ineligible and tossed from the ballot.

See here and here for the background. The opinion is here, and Michael Hurta continues his Twitter thread on this here, with some replies from me at the end. We’re going to need to delve into the opinion, because it’s more nuanced than what this story gives, and also clarifies something else that I hadn’t realized I was confused about.

First, in stating that RRC candidate Chrysta Castañeda “failed to prove the Election Code clearly spelled out the duty of the co-chairs to declare the Green Party candidates ineligible for their failure to pay the filing fee”, SCOTX clears up something from the legal challenge to the filing fees that I had missed.

The court explained that section 141.041 does not set a deadline for compliance but that the requirements apply only to the candidates actually nominated at a party’s nominating convention generally held in March or April of the election year. Id. at ___. Candidates who intend to seek a nomination at a convention must file a notarized application in December before the convention. Id. at ___ (citing TEX. ELEC. CODE §§ 141.031, 172.023(a), 181.031–.033). The advisory, by requiring payment of the filing fee before the nominating convention, expanded the requirements in 141.041 from all nominated candidates to all candidates seeking nomination. Id. at ___. The court ultimately held that payment of the filing fee under section 141.041 was still required, but the court affirmed the trial court’s order temporarily enjoining the Secretary of State from refusing to certify third-party nominees on the grounds that the nominees did not pay a filing fee at the time of filing. Id. at ___.

We agree with the Fourteenth Court of Appeals that under section 141.041 only a convention-nominated candidate is required to pay the filing fee. See TEX. ELEC. CODE §141.041(a) (“[A] candidate who is nominated by convention . . . must pay a filing fee . . . .”). Therefore, we also agree that the Secretary of State’s advisory requiring payment of the filing fee at the time of filing an application is not required by, and indeed conflicts with, the Election Code. See id. Section 141.041 does not include a deadline for compliance, but as we explained in In re Francis, when an Election Code provision does not provide explicit guidance, we apply a presumption against removing parties from the ballot. 186 S.W.3d at 542.

I had not understood the distinction between mandating that all candidates who compete for the nomination must pay the fee and just mandating that the candidates who actually receive the nomination must pay it. I’m fine with that. The key to the decision here is the question about deadlines, and how much time the Green Party and its candidates were supposed to have to fix their failure to pay these fees (which as we know they claim are unconstitutional).

Castañeda presented a public record to the co-chairs showing that as of August 17, the Green Party candidates had not paid the filing fee. As previously noted, section 141.041 requires the filing fee but contains no deadline for its payment, see TEX. ELEC. CODE § 141.041, and the only potential applicable deadline in the Secretary of State’s election advisory conflicts with that provision. Hughs, ___ S.W.3d at ___. Strictly construing these sections against ineligibility, we disagree that the public document demonstrating that the Green Party candidates had not paid the filing fee as of August 17 conclusively established that they were ineligible. To be “eligible to be placed on the ballot,” the Green Party Candidates were required to pay the filing fee or file signature petitions. TEX. ELEC. CODE § 141.041 (emphasis added). The co-chairs did not have a ministerial statutory duty to declare the candidates ineligible, as the law did not clearly spell out their duty on August 17 when the candidates had not yet paid the filing fee such that nothing was left to the exercise of their discretion. See In re Williams, 470 S.W.3d at 821.

The court of appeals ordered the co-chairs to declare the Green Party candidates ineligible and take necessary steps to ensure their names did not appear on the ballot. ___ S.W.3d at ___. But the court did not address a deadline for payment, nor did it otherwise allow for payment of the fee. And under In re Francis, an opportunity to cure should be provided when a candidate could still comply with Election Code requirements. 186 S.W.3d at 541–42 (noting that an opportunity to cure complies with the purposes of the Election Code and avoids potential constitutional problems that “might be implicated if access to the ballot was unnecessarily restricted”). “The public interest is best served when public offices are decided by fair and vigorous elections, not technicalities leading to default.” Id. at 542. In the absence of recognizing a deadline for paying the filing fee or giving the candidates an opportunity to comply, the court of appeals erred in ordering the Green Party candidates removed from the ballot on August 19.

Emphasis in the original. The opinion cited an earlier case of a candidate who had turned in petition signatures to be on a ballot but failed to correctly fill out all the petition pages with information about the office he sought, and was tossed from the ballot as a result. On appeal, he was restored on the grounds that he should have been given the chance to fix the error before having the axe fall on him. Much as I dislike this opinion, I agree with that principle, and I don’t have a problem with it being applied here, though of course we can argue about what a reasonable amount of time should be to allow for such a fix to be applied. SCOTX left that question open, so if the filing fees are still in place in 2022 and the Libertarians and Greens are still resisting it, look for some judges to have to determine what sort of schedule should be applied to non-fee-payers, in an attempt to follow this precedent.

As I said, I don’t like this decision, but I can accept it. It didn’t immediately make me want to crawl through the Internet and slap someone. But let’s be clear about something, if SCOTX is going to appeal to higher principles in cases like this, which just happen to also align with the desires of the Republican Party, then I’d like to see some evidence that they will err on the side of the voters in a case that doesn’t align with the GOP. Like, say, the Harris County mail ballot applications case. What are you going to do with that one, folks? And please note, the clock is ticking. A decision rendered for Chris Hollins in late October doesn’t exactly mean anything. Let’s see where the SCOTX justices really stand.

CD03 poll: Taylor 44, Seikaly 43

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

From Nate Cohn:

If there’s any single competitive district you could look at on Election Night to know whether Texas went blue, this might be the pick

— Nate Cohn (@Nate_Cohn) 8:47 AM – 17 September 2020

All we get is Twitter for this one, any other info about the poll is behind the National Journal paywall. It’s in line with an earlier poll that had Taylor leading 43-37 and Biden up by two in the district. Seikaly’s improved performance is likely due to greater name recognition at this stage of the campaign.

I can’t analyze the poll in any meaningful way, but I can add some context to Nate Cohn’s assertion that if Biden carries CD03 he’s likely to have won Texas. Here’s a review of recent elections:

In 2012, Mitt Romney carried CD03 by a 64.2-34.1 margin, as he won the state 57.2 to 41.2.

In 2016, Donald Trump carried CD03 by a 53.8 to 39.9 margin, as he won the state 52.2 to 43.2.

In 2018, Ted Cruz carried CD03 by a 51.3 to 47.9 margin, as he won the state 50.9 to 48.3.

As you can see, CD03 was more Republican than the state as a whole, though that margin had narrowed by 2018. But if the pattern of CD03 being more Republican than the state overall holds, then it’s trivial to see that a Democrat winning in CD03 would also win statewide.

That comes with a raft of assumptions, of course. Maybe CD03 will be less Republican than the state this year. It’s been trending in that direction, and as a heavily suburban and college-educated district, that trend should continue. Perhaps this year the lines will intersect, and a Dem running in CD03 will have to win it by a certain margin in order to be able to win the state. If Biden really is winning CD03 by three points, you’d think that would be enough slack for him.

There’s one more piece of objective evidence that both this district, and by implication the state as a whole, is perhaps doing better for the Democrats than people realize:

In a DCCC news conference, Chairwoman Cheri Bustos and executive director Lucinda Guinn are running thru some of the regular suspect TX races but Guinn also specifically point to #TX25, #TX6 and #TX3 as races to watch. This was completely unthinkable three years ago.

— Abby Livingston (@TexasTribAbby) 10:51 AM – 16 September 2020

Those are the three districts most recently added by the DCCC to their target list. You might say, the DCCC is in the business of talking up opportunities, so why should we take this as anything more than hype? Mostly because the DCCC already had its hands full in Texas – those three districts came after seven others currently held by Republicans, plus the two where Dems are playing defense. The DCCC is going to prioritize the districts where it thinks it can win, both to maximize its resources and keep its donors (and members) happy. They’re not going to go off on flights of fancy. It may be on the optimistic end of their spectrum, but if they believe there’s action there, you can expect there is.

Matt Glazer: To see boon, clean energy needs Congress

by Charles Kuffner.

Comments are off for this post

(Note: The following is a guest post that was submitted to me. I occasionally solicit guest posts, and also occasionally accept them from people I trust.)

I’m a bit of an Austin-area expert when it comes to weird homes. So, when I bought my own home last year—going in a more traditional route—I was surprised when I was left no less transfixed. Our builder had prioritized solar panel installations and, in the weeks, after settling in, I made a routine of watching the monitor tick up as our 12 panels fed energy back into the grid. Truth is I’m not the only one mesmerized. Watching the green bar climb and doing what we can to be a net producer of clean, affordable energy is a fun little game. Luckily, clean energy has caught the attention of Texans just as easily as the panels on my roof catch rays.

For more than a century, Texas has asserted itself as a national and global energy leader. Much of this legacy is owed to our wells of oil, but more so it is owed to our ability to build an economy around those prospects. Clean energy can continue to expand them beyond the subterranean. We were the first state to codify an energy efficiency resource standard after all and already Texas is top five in the nation for solar, and first in the nation for wind capacity. If you have ever driven through Texas, you can see evidence of this across the horizon from the panhandle to the coast.

All told—from renewables to clean vehicles, energy efficiency, clean fuels, and grid and storage—nearly a quarter of a million jobs were held in Texas’ clean energy industry last year. COVID-19 has detracted from those numbers depressing the state’s clean energy workforce by 10%—at least temporarily. Despite the setback, a growing commitment to reduce carbon emissions means clean energy is no longer being considered an alternative and instead as a necessary and growing component of diversified portfolios.

This will assure its subsistence, but while consistent demand could pull the industry back bit-by-bit, a major federal investment just might sweep the Lone Star State into this millennia’s energy boon. What the country needs now is a post-pandemic economic plan that spurs energy innovation, builds out 21^st century infrastructure and continues driving down carbon emissions while creating 21^st century jobs.

Though we often consider clean energy at scale, like in the case of utility companies, small businesses have played a significant role in clean energy’s early trajectory. In 2019, nearly two out of every three clean energy workers—of which there were 3.3 million in 2019—were employed by a small business. But, with manufacturing advancements driving down costs, the popularity of reduced carbon emissions rising and a steady churn of state-of-the-art tech reaching the market, clean energy’s entrepreneurial scene is far from saturated. One can even still imagine the potential for a new generation of Texas energy titans eventually adding to an already storied energy tradition.

To get there, however, requires a commitment not just from dedicated contractors like my own or local officials or even from Fortune 100 corporations, but from national leadership representing us in Congress. This issue is not a partisan one but an economic one, given the country’s current straits, we cannot afford to let the clean energy wallow in its COVID depression.

To truly capitalize on the economic and environmental potential of the vast prairies, strong wind gusts and access to persistent sun that outfit Texas, not to mention an intrepid workforce, we need our representatives and senators to put into action plans that bolster clean energy development and job creation while continuing to build on America’s leadership driving down carbon emissions.

I am grateful to have low cost, high production solar cells on my home. I am grateful for the incentives that made it possible to do something good and lower my total costs. I look at the energy I am creating for my city and know that an install team, builder, designer, electrician, and manufacturing company all created jobs. Jobs with an eye towards the future of Texas. Congress has an opportunity to continue to foster this innovation so we can be leaders in this established clean energy economy.

Matt Glazer is the past Executive Director of Progress Texas and co-founder of Blue Sky Partners.

The Green Party owes Ken Paxton a thank-you note

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

He did them a solid, that’s for sure.

Turns out it is easy being Green

In the legal fight to exclude minor party candidates from the November ballot, Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton took a flexible view of time and deadlines.

After the Texas GOP filed suit Aug. 21 to remove 44 Libertarians from the ballot for failure to pay a required candidate filing fee, Paxton told the Texas Supreme Court that there was plenty of time to pursue the challenge.

This week, however, Paxton told the same court that a Democratic bid to oust three Green Party candidates — filed four days before the unsuccessful GOP challenge — was begun much too late and needed to be overturned.

“The (Democrats’) dilatory conduct and unjustified delay in seeking relief imposed an undue burden on the Green Party officials,” Paxton told the court in a brief filed Monday.

[…]

[F]acing an Aug. 21 deadline to declare candidates ineligible, Democrats sued Aug. 17 to strike three Greens running for U.S. Senate, U.S. House and Railroad Commission.

The Austin-based 3rd Court of Appeals gave the Greens less than 48 hours to respond, then issued an Aug. 19 order declaring the three Green Party candidates ineligible for failure to pay the filing fee. The 2-1 ruling had two Democrats in the majority and one Republican dissenting.

The ruling drew the notice of Republican Party leaders, who quickly demanded that Libertarian leaders drop a long list of candidates for the same reason.

When those demands were rejected, Republican organizations and candidates asked the 3rd Court of Appeals to follow the precedent set in the Democratic challenge and order the Libertarians removed from the ballot.

But the GOP filed its challenge on Aug. 21, the deadline to declare candidates ineligible, and the appeals court tossed it out, ruling that there wasn’t time to hear from all parties and gather the necessary information before the deadline expired.

The GOP turned to the Texas Supreme Court, arguing that instead of challenging candidate eligibility under an expired deadline, it was challenging the Libertarians’ candidate applications as improper — giving them until Sept. 18 to seek court intervention.

Paxton, in a letter brief to the Supreme Court, agreed with the GOP interpretation of state election law.

“Under Texas law, there is still time for this Court to compel compliance,” Paxton told the court on Sept. 4.

The all-Republican Supreme Court disagreed, ruling Sept. 5 that the GOP and Paxton were looking at the wrong section of the Election Code on deadlines. The court concluded that the Libertarians could not be removed from the ballot because the GOP challenge was filed too late.

[…]

Then on Friday, the Green Party asked the Supreme Court to reinstate its three candidates, arguing that like the GOP, the Democrats relied on the wrong part of the Election Code, rendering their challenge void as well.

The court asked Paxton’s office for its opinion.

In Monday’s response, filed 10 days after arguing that the GOP had not acted too late in challenging Libertarian opponents, Paxton urged the court to reinstate the Green candidates because the Democrats waited too long to act and because the 3rd Court of Appeals engaged in a rushed process that didn’t give the Greens, other political parties and other candidates time to weigh in.

“The 3rd Court abused its discretion,” Paxton wrote.

The Supreme Court’s one-paragraph order to reinstate the Green candidates did not explain the court’s rationale.

See here for the background. We expect SCOTX to publish its opinion on this ruling today, so we may get some idea if it’s all a bunch of sophistry or if they can make a principled argument that the Greens were deprived of their right to respond to the Dems’ legal action in a timely manner, which was a part of the ruling against the GOP in the Libertarian purge attempt. That Ken Paxton was willing to be morally and conveniently flexible on the subject should come as no surprise, given everything we know about him and his character. The Republican Party of Texas has a longstanding willingness to help the Greens whenever they think it might benefit them. This time that support came from an elected official instead of a deep-pocketed donor. Whatever works.

There was a debate in the comments of the last post about ranked choice voting (RCV) being a solution to this kind of legal gamesmanship. The theory is that since the people who voted Green or Libertarian (or independent, or whatever else may have been on the ballot) would still be able to express their electoral support for whichever major party candidate they like as their backup selection, which in turn would reduce the incentive for the major parties to bump them off the ballot. The logic has merit, though the lack of RCV around the country means there’s no data to test that hypothesis.

In this case, the argument that had been made by both the Ds and the Rs is that the other parties’ candidates had violated the law by not paying the newly-mandated filing fees – you may note, the Dems did not challenge the three Greens who did pay their filing fees, just the three candidates who had not – and there is a long history of candidates being challenged because they failed to meet eligibility requirements. If the filing fee law continues to survive the lawsuits against it, and there are Greens and Libertarians who refuse to comply with it in 2022, I would fully expect them to be taken to court again, surely in a more expeditious fashion, and I would expect that even in an RCV-enabled world. This is a basic tool in the political toolbox, one that I would not expect to go away if the method of determining the winner of an election changes. That too is a testable question, and perhaps one day we’ll have an answer for it. For now, that’s how I see it.

CD25: Williams 45, Oliver 43

by Charles Kuffner.

2 comments

The Congressional polls, they keep coming.

Julie Oliver

Progressive Democratic candidate Julie Oliver is in a close race with her GOP incumbent opponent Rep. Roger Williams, a new internal poll finds.

The poll of 400 likely voters by EMC Research shows Oliver only two percentage points behind Williams, 45 to 43, with a 5-point margin of error.

The same poll shows Williams has higher name ID recognition compared to Oliver (53 to 42 percent) but the incumbent lawmaker suffers from favorable-unfavorable ratings that are almost equal (23-20).

[…]

Monday’s poll is the second survey this cycle showing the competitiveness of Texas’ 25th congressional district, held by Republicans since 2013.

A DCCC in-house poll in July showed the same margin between William and Oliver, 45 to 43.

See here for more on that previous poll, and here for the polling memo. The main difference between these two polls is that Biden led Trump 47-46 in the July poll, and Trump leads Biden 49-45 in this one. The latter seems like a more realistic result – as noted, Trump won this district 55-40 in 2016, and Beto got 47% in 2018. He lost by five to Ted Cruz, so I can buy Trump beating Biden by four here. That would also bode pretty well for Biden’s statewide ambitions, even if it means Julie Oliver will likely lose, albeit by a smaller margin this time. But she’s running a strong race, she’s got the DCCC on her side, and she’ll almost certainly do better with the resources to make her case to the voters than without them.

I should note that Roger Williams’ campaign released a poll of its own last week, which showed the incumbent leading 52-40. That was a rare Republican poll release for this cycle, and it’s a pretty decent result for Rep. Williams. My guess is that this understates Oliver’s level of support – we have no details about this poll, so we really are just guessing – but it’s not completely out of the question. Hugely disappointing if accurate, but not impossible. That poll, which of course came via Patrick Svitek on Twitter, did not include a Biden/Trump matchup, or at least the public information released about that poll did not include such a question. Make of it what you will.

SCOTX puts Greens back on the ballot

by Charles Kuffner.

23 comments

That sound you hear is my head spinning.

The Texas Supreme Court has ordered three Green Party candidates to be restored to the November ballot after Democrats successfully sued to remove them.

Last month, a state appeals court sided with the Democrats, who were seeking to kick the candidates off the ballot because they had not paid filing fees. The three candidates are David Collins for U.S. Senate, Katija “Kat” Gruene for Railroad Commission and Tom Wakely for the 21st Congressional District.

The Texas Green Party appealed the decision to the state Supreme Court, which ruled Tuesday that the secretary of state “shall immediately take all necessary actions to ensure these candidates appear on the” November ballot. The Supreme Court did not give its rationale, but said a full opinion was forthcoming.

It is the latest development in a spate of legal battles over third parties on the November ballot. At issue is a new requirement that third parties pay filing fees like Democrats and Republicans do. The law, passed last year by the Legislature, is the subject of multiple legal challenges, and many third-party candidates had not paid filing fees amid the pending litigation.

A state appeals court upheld the 2019 law last week.

While the Democrats were initially successful in booting the three Green Party candidates off the ballot, Republicans more recently failed in their bid to remove 44 Libertarians from the ticket for a similar reason. In rejecting the GOP effort earlier this month, the Supreme Court said the party waited too long to raise the issue.

[…]

It is crunch time for finalizing ballots across the state, with a Saturday deadline for counties to mail overseas and military ballots. The state’s most populous county, Harris County, wrote to the Supreme Court on Monday saying that “it is too late to make changes,” even if the court acted that day.

In an email sent to county election officials shortly after the Supreme Court’s ruling, the Texas secretary of state indicated that counties that had already sent out mail ballots would need to send a corrected version “as soon as possible.”

“The Supreme Court’s ruling and ballot change will not be an acceptable excuse for missing the [Sept. 19] deadline,” wrote Keith Ingram, the state’s director of elections. “That deadline must still be met.”

State law requires corrected ballots to include both a written notice explaining the change and instructions to destroy “defective” ballots that have not yet been returned to a county. A defective ballot returned to the county will be counted if a corrected ballot is not returned in time.

See here and here for the background on the Dems’ effort to boot those three Green candidates, and see here and here for more on the Republicans’ failed effort to boot the Libertarians. A fourth Green candidate had withdrawn from the ballot before all this started because he had voted in the Democratic primary this year.

My first reaction on seeing this news was that it was awfully late in the game for further changes to the ballot. Looking at the case filings, the writ was filed by the Greens on September 11, the Dems had till the 14th to respond, and the ruling came down on the 15th. I’ll have an opinion on the ruling when it is available, but until then all I can do is shrug. It is what it is. You can read this Twitter thread, which began with the original rulings in the two cases, for some more context. The Chron has more.

The case for voting in person

by Charles Kuffner.

10 comments

From Wired, an argument for worrying less about voting by mail because voting in person is still a fine way to do it.

Casting a ballot in person, it turns out, isn’t so dangerous after all. Early in the pandemic, this might have seemed a crazy thing to suggest. The Wisconsin primary, back in March, was widely described in apocalyptic tones. The New York Times called it “a dangerous spectacle that forced voters to choose between participating in an important election and protecting their health.” After state Democrats fought unsuccessfully to extend the deadline for mailing back absentee ballots, the ensuing photos of long lines at Milwaukee polling places seemed to presage an explosion of Covid-19 cases.

But the bomb never blew. As I observed in May, there was no noticeable rise in coronavirus cases thanks to the Wisconsin primary. A follow-up study by researchers at the City of Milwaukee Health Department and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concluded, “No clear increase in cases, hospitalizations, or deaths was observed after the election.” In fact, case numbers in Milwaukee were lower in the weeks after the election than in the weeks before it. There are caveats: In-person turnout was low overall thanks to broad use of mail-in ballots, and we don’t know how coronavirus prevalence in March will compare with November. Still, it’s telling that there have been no credible reports of virus spikes attributable to any other election this year, even though ill-considered polling place closures have led to further instances of Milwaukee-style overcrowding.

Why might voting be safer than expected? We now know that the coronavirus spreads mostly when people are in sustained indoor contact—settings like a restaurant, a bar, or a shared home or office. The risk of transmission in fleeting encounters, by contrast, is small. Outdoors, it is vanishingly so. Even the massive protests following the killing of George Floyd, which even sympathizers feared would seed outbreaks, did not, according to several large studies. The pandemic is really an indoor problem. Even the defining image of the danger of voting during a pandemic—lines around the block—serves to illustrate why there’s little to fear. For most people, standing in a spaced-out line, outdoors, while wearing masks, entails at most a paltry risk.

“I think if carefully done, according to the guidelines, there’s no reason I can see why that’d not be the case,” said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, at a recent National Geographic event. “If you go and wear a mask, if you observe the physical distancing, and don’t have a crowded situation, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to do that.” Likewise, a recent report from the Brennan Center for Justice advises, “In-person voting can be conducted safely if jurisdictions take the necessary steps to minimize the risk of transmission of Covid-19 to voters and election workers.”

This assumes that any lines one may have to wait on will be primarily outside. That’s not been my experience in past elections, but I feel reasonably confident that outdoor lines will be the norm this time around. In Harris and Bexar and Dallas and hopefully other counties, there will be some larger venues, like convention centers and sports arenas, being used as voting locations, which will also help. Point being, I tend to agree with the assessment that the risk of in person voting, assuming widespread mask usage, is fairly minimal.

There are also practical considerations about voting by mail. Jamelle Bouie wrote in the Times that a key piece of Trump’s Election Day strategy is to delegitimize any votes that are not counted on Election Day. Remember how many elections Democrats won in 2018 due to mail ballots that weren’t counted until after Election Day? That’s been called the “blue shift”, and Donald Trump will scream from the rooftops that those mail ballots don’t count and amount to stealing the election if he’s in any position to claim a win on the evening of November 3, regardless of the lie of his statement. The best way to prevent that is to have as many votes counted by the time the news people start giving us numbers from around the country. That means voting in person. Note that in some states, even if your mail ballot is received way early, it may be the case that it won’t be officially tallied until Election Day, which could still lead to this situation. Voting in person will not have that problem.

Other concerns include the unknown potential for mail delivery delays, which G. Elliott Morris tried to quantify, and problems with mail ballots being rejected due to alleged signature mismatches or other issues, which is something that of course happens at a higher rate to Black and Latino voters. (Black voters are, understandably, more dubious about voting by mail.) The recent court order helps in this regard, but it’s still a factor, and we don’t know yet if there will be an appeal. I know it sounds ridiculous, but younger voters are just simply not used to using the postal service, and may have problems with mail ballots as a result. All of this may turn out to be minor, but maybe it won’t. We just don’t know. Again, the remedy here is to vote in person if that is a reasonable option for you.

Of course, to some extent in Texas, this is an academic point. The large majority of us cannot vote by mail, something the state leadership has done everything in its power to ensure will still be the case. I have said and will continue to say, if you do qualify for a mail ballot, by all means apply for it and use it. Having more people vote by mail not only keeps them safe, it also means shorter lines and faster processing times at voting locations, which is something we all want. Just be very prompt about it, and track your ballot to make sure it is received. Use a dropoff location if practical. The real point here is that we all actually do need to make a plan to vote, and that plan needs to encompass the when, the where, and the how. Be part of the solution to ensure that everyone can vote as easily and safely as possible. I don’t need to say how much is riding on that.

CD31 poll: Carter 43, Imam 37

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Another interesting Congressional race poll.

Donna Imam

With less than two months to go until Election Day, an increasing number of eyes are looking toward Texas, where Republicans are fighting to keep their grip on the once-reliably conservative state.

There is perhaps no better sign of Texas’ shift toward Democrats than what’s happening in the state’s 31st Congressional District. The previously deep red district north of Austin has shifted dramatically in recent years, and a new poll obtained exclusively by COURIER shows incumbent Rep. John Carter (R-Texas) is vulnerable.

The poll, conducted by Public Policy Polling (PPP), found Carter leading challenger Donna Imam by only six points, 43-37 among 831 voters in the district. Libertarian Clark Patterson and Independent Jeremy Bravo tallied 10% of the vote combined, while 11% of voters remained undecided.

Imam performs particularly well with independent voters, leading Carter 44-28. She also appears to have significant room to grow, as 53% of voters said they were unsure whether or not they had a favorable opinion about her.

The poll also surveyed voters on the presidential race and found that President Donald Trump holds a narrow one-point lead (48-47) over Democratic nominee Joe Biden, a substantial shift from 2016 when Trump won the district 54-41.

[…]

While Democrats have set their eyes on several prizes across the state, the recent blue shift in the 31st has been particularly notable. Between 2002 and 2016, Carter won each of his elections by at least 20 points. But in 2018, Carter faced the fight of his career and narrowly edged out his Democratic challenger, MJ Hegar, by only three points. Hegar is now challenging Cornyn and finds herself down only 2 points in the district (48-46), according to the PPP poll.

You can see the poll data here. It’s a solid result in a district where Beto got 48.4% of the vote. Hegar ran just a shade behind Beto – he lost to Ted Cruz 50.5 to 48.4, while Hegar lost 47.6 to 50.6 – and this district has been on the radar for the DCCC (and for the Republicans, and for the national race-raters) from the beginning of the cycle. The problem has been finding a standout candidate, as there was a rotating cast of players in the primary, with nobody raising any money or making much noise until the runoff, when Imam finally started to edge forward. She still has to establish herself as a fundraiser – the DCCC is in town, but they’ve got plenty of fish to fry. I’ll be very interested in Imam’s Q3 finance report.

This poll is reminiscent of the polling in CD21, another near-miss district from 2018 with a similar demographic profile. In 2018, Joe Kopser lost to Chip Roy 50.2 to 47.6, Beto lost the district by a tenth of a point, and in 2016 Hillary Clinton lost it to Donald Trump 52-42. These latest polls have Biden up by one in CD21 and down by one in CD31, consistent with statewide polling that has Texas as a real tossup.

They key here has been the shift in voter preferences in Williamson County, which comprises a bit more than two-thirds of the district. Here’s how the Williamson County vote has gone in recent elections:


2012       Votes    Pct
=======================
Romney    97,006  59.4%
Obama     61,875  37.9%

Cruz      92,034  57.3%
Sadler    60,279  37.5%

Carter    96,842  60.9%
Wyman     55,111  34.6%


2016       Votes    Pct
=======================
Trump    104,175  51.3%
Clinton   84,468  41.6%

Carter   112,841  56.8%
Clark     74,914  37.7%


2018       Votes    Pct
=======================
Cruz      99,857  48.0%
Beto     105,850  50.8%

Abbott   112,214  54.1%
Valdez    90,002  43.4%

Patrick  101,545  49.2%
Collier   98,375  47.6%

Paxton    98,175  47.7%
Nelson   100,345  48.7%

Carter    99,648  48.2%
Hegar    103,155  49.9%

The story of 2018 was of the huge gains Democrats made in suburban areas like Williamson, but the thing here is that Dems gained about as many votes from 2012 to 2016 as they did from 2016 to 2018, with Republicans barely growing their vote at all outside of a couple of races. It wasn’t so much a shift as an acceleration, and it took WilCo from being on the fringes of competitiveness, where you could see it off in the distance from the vantage point of 2016 but figured it was still a few cycles away, to being a true swing district just two years later. If Dems can even come close to replicating that kind of growth in 2020, then CD31 is likely being undersold as a pickup opportunity. Obviously, the pandemic and the ambient chaos and pretty much everything else is a variable we can’t easily quantify. But the numbers are right there, so if CD31 does go Dem, we can’t say we didn’t see it coming.

One more thing: That 10% total for the Libertarian and independent candidates combined is almost certainly way too high. Libertarian candidates actually do pretty well overall in this district. The Lib Congressional candidate in 2012 got 3.7%, while a couple of statewide judicial candidates in races that also had a Democrat topped five percent. In 2016, the Libertarian in CD31 got 5.2%, with Mark Miller getting 7.1% in the Railroad Commissioner’s race. They didn’t do quite as well in 2018, however, with the Congressional candidate getting 1.9%, and the high water mark of 4.1% being hit in the Land Commissioner’s race. I’d contend that’s a combination of better Democratic candidates, with more nominal Republicans moving from casting a “none of the above” protest vote to actually going Dem. My guess is 2020 will be more like 2018 than 2016 or 2012, but we’ll see. In any event, I’d put the over/under for the two “other” candidates at five, not at ten. The Texas Signal has more.

CD21 poll: Davis 48, Roy 47

by Charles Kuffner.

1 comment

Second poll in this district.

Wendy Davis

Between August 31 and September 4, Garin-Hart-Yang interviewed a representative sample of 401 likely general election voters in Texas-21st CD. The survey, which was conducted on both landlines and cell phones, was fully representative of an expected November 2020 general election by key factors such as gender, age, geography, and race. The survey’s margin of error is +5%. The following are the key findings:

1. Joe Biden slight advantage in the presidential race is basically unchanged since our mid-July poll. The Vice President leads Donald Trump by 49% to 47%, compared to the 50% to 47% margin in the last survey.

2. The mid-July survey had the congressional candidates virtually tied, with Congressman Chip Roy ahead by one point. In the latest poll we find Wendy Davis with a one-point lead. Realistically, the Davis-Roy match-up continues to be extremely competitive and likely to remain a dead-heat.

One important finding is that despite several weeks of Club for Growth negative TV ads, Wendy’s initial TV ads emphasizing her inspiring personal story and bipartisan work in the Texas Senate are resonating with voters. Since our last survey, we find an increase in voters attributing positive sentiment to Wendy, including sizable gains for her among Independent voters.

See here for some background, and here for the Patrick Svitek tweet that you knew would be the source. CD21 has been a pretty good bellwether for the state as a whole these last couple of elections:


2016      District    State
===========================
Smith        57.1%
Wakely       36.5%

Trump        51.9%    52.2%
Clinton      42.1%    43.2%

Christian    53.9%    53.1%
Yarbrough    34.6%    38.4%

Keasler      56.7%    55.0%
Burns        38.1%    40.9%


2018      District    State
===========================
Roy          50.2%
Kopser       47.6%

Cruz         49.6%    50.9%
O'Rourke     49.5%    48.3%

Abbott       55.0%    55.8%
Valdez       42.8%    42.5%

Patrick      50.6%    51.3%
Collier      46.8%    46.5%

Craddick     53.3%    53.2%
McAllen      43.4%    43.9%

Hervey       54.3%    54.2%
Franklin     45.7%    45.8%

Closer correlations in 2018 than 2016, but they’re both in the ballpark. Ted Cruz underperformed relative to his peers. Lamar Smith ran ahead of the typical Republican, both in the district and statewide, while Chip Roy ran a little behind them. Don’t know if any of this means anything for 2020, but I’ll venture that CD21 will resemble the state as a whole fairly well. I don’t think Wendy Davis needs Joe Biden to carry the state to win, but as with any of the other hot races, the better he does, the better her odds are likely to be.

No, seriously, what are we going to do to prepare for the next Hurricane Laura?

by Charles Kuffner.

10 comments

I mean, the next one is coming whether we’re ready or not. We just don’t know when it will be here.

Though the storm ultimately tracked east, sparing Houston, the problem remains: The region is disastrously unready to handle any of the three main threats of an intense hurricane: a high surge, damaging winds and — even three years after Hurricane Harvey — flooding.

While Harvey’s devastating stall over the Houston area has resulted in billions of dollars of investment in flood control infrastructure and new regulations, Laura reminded the region of what a different kind of storm could do.

In its wake, leaders have made impassioned pleas about preparing for when — not if — that storm does arrive. Most notably, they have ramped up calls for federal funding on a so-called “coastal spine,” a system of levees, gates and dunes first proposed after Hurricane Ike in 2008, to protect the region from a storm surge.

Those plans, though, remain mired in the slog of the federal approval process. The kind of political will and cohesion needed to fast-track such infrastructure typically only forms after disasters, not before.

[…]

There are signs the region has reached an inflection point on the need to protect against that threat. A growing consensus among local officials around the effects of climate change has shifted the public policy debate to figuring out which infrastructure projects will help stave off its worst effects, and at what cost.

The proposed coastal spine, a 71-mile-long barrier system to protect the southeast Texas coast, has received the most attention since it was taken up by the Army Corps of Engineers in October 2018.

The plan is an outgrowth of the “Ike Dike” concept first pitched more than a decade ago by William Merrell, a professor of marine sciences at Texas A&M University at Galveston. It includes a series of gates that stretch the two-mile length of Bolivar Road, twin rows of 14-foot-high sand dunes across Galveston Island and Bolivar Peninsula, a ring levee around Galveston’s city center and investments in ecosystem restoration.

The price tag has been put at $23 billion to $32 billion, with the dunes and sea gate at the ship channel alone costing up to $18 billion of that. It is in the midst of a five-year design and study process and is on track to be sent to Congress for final approval in May 2021.

“Quite frankly, we need it yesterday,” Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said last week. “We’re running out of lives, so to speak.”

Even on the most optimistic timeline, the coastal barrier is 10 to 15 years from becoming a reality. With the Houston-Galveston region a perennial target during the Atlantic hurricane season, there is a growing urgency to find a more expedient, cheaper solution.

The Galveston Bay Park Plan, first proposed by the Rice University’s Severe Storm Prediction, Education & Evacuation from Disasters (SSPEED) Center in 2015, includes similar protection features as the coastal spine, but adds a mid-bay barrier island system with a 25-foot wall that would protect the industrial complexes and densely populated areas in the west and northwest sections of Galveston Bay.

Jim Blackburn, an environmental attorney and co-director of the SSPEED Center, says the plan could provide vital protection a lot sooner than the coastal spine, but that it also could complement that barrier. He estimates that if allowed to use dredging spoils from the planned widening of the Houston Ship Channel to build the barrier islands, the project could be completed by 2027 at a fraction of the cost of the coastal spine — an estimated $5 billion to $7 billion.

“You have a coastal defense and that’s your first line of defense and then you come in with your in-bay defense, that is really the one that can protect against your bigger storms,” Blackburn said. “It’s very much almost like thinking in a military sense of how do you defend against an enemy invasion?”

See here and here for some background. I’m of the opinion that we just need to start building something, and that the price tag is a mirage, because the federal government can absolutely afford this. What we can’t afford is to sit around on our asses until the devastating storm we’ve been warned about for years comes and wipes our unprepared selves right off the map.