Abbott-O’Rourke Race Update: There Isn’t One

If you’re wondering about the 2022 Texas Gubernatorial Race between Republican incumbent Greg Abbott and Democratic challenger Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke, there isn’t one.

Gov. Greg Abbott’s lead is widening over Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke, according to two polls this week that show Republicans gaining ground ahead of the November midterm election.

This comes months after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade sent shock waves through the country and inspired a wave of left-leaning activism. The latest data indicates that energy around that ruling may be overshadowed by Republicans’ intense focus on border security, including their more recent efforts to bus migrants to Democratic-led cities.

The Spectrum News/Siena College poll showed Abbott with a 50-43 lead over O’Rourke, and other statewide candidates had similar gaps: Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick was up 49-40 over Democrat Mike Collier, and Attorney General Ken Paxton had a 47-42 lead over Democrat Rochelle Garza.

For context, a poll in November of 2014 said that Abbott only had a five point lead over Wendy Davis (the last Democratic gubernatorial candidate to make abortion the centerpiece of her campaign). Abbott ended up winning by 20 points.

The poll also found that Texas voters consider immigration a more important issue than abortion. About 31 percent of respondents said immigration was their first- or second-highest concern ahead of the midterms, while 22 percent said the same for abortion.

Overall, Texans overwhelmingly consider the economy and inflation their highest priorities.

The Siena poll was conducted Sept. 14 through 18 as Abbott continues to draw national attention for busing thousands of migrants out of Texas and dropping them off in Washington, D.C., New York City and Chicago, in what he has described as an attempt to show President Joe Biden how grave the situation is at the border. The governor’s critics have characterized the program as a stunt that uses human beings as political pawns.

“The Biden-Harris administration continues ignoring and denying the historic crisis at our southern border, which has endangered and overwhelmed Texas communities for almost two years,” Abbott said last week.

About 52 percent of likely voters support the busing initiative, according to the Siena poll. Another 40 percent oppose the effort.

O’Rourke’s gubernatorial candidacy was always going to be a longshot in an off-year election that was going to favor Republicans. But the disasterous incompetence of the Biden Administration, spiraling inflation, the Biden Recession, resentment of wokeness, and deeply unpopular open borders policies that have pushed more and more Hispanics to switch to the Republican Party have turned the basic headwinds of an off-year election into a howling gale that’s going to blow O’Rourke to his third high profile defeat in five years. His three point loss to Ted Cruz in 2018, in a Trump mid-year election favoring Democrats, against a lightning-rod incumbent wounded by his own high profile defeat at the hands of Trump in the 2016 Republican presidential primary, looks like his best possible showing under any circumstances.

I expect O’Rourke to do better than Wendy Davis did in 2014, simply because he’s a better candidate (he’s too leftwing for Texas, but he does the hard work of campaigning, for which Davis showed little inclination) and because Democrats have poured a lot of money into building election infrastructure. But like Davis, he seems to have made the foolish decision to run as the Unlimited Abortion Candidate, expecting the overturning of Roe vs. Wade to sweep him into office. The problem with that theory is that everyone who was a single-issue voter on Unlimited Abortion was already voting for Democrats, and the people who aren’t seem to care more about such trivia as “paying for food for their children.”

O’Rourke may not even equal the 42.5% a sleepwalking Lupe Valdez garnered in 2018. My guess is that he’s going to end up with somewhere like 40-45% of the vote, another high profile flameout, and another giant bucket of Democratic donor money wasted on his campaign rather than being sent to candidates that might actually win.

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11 Responses to “Abbott-O’Rourke Race Update: There Isn’t One”

  1. Earth Pig says:

    Beta the Fake Mexican should look for a non-political job.

  2. T Migratorious says:

    Yeah, they were running Beto commercials during the UT football game on Saturday and they were all abortion, all the time. Husband I were discussing it and scratching our heads because we came to the conclusion that you did: “everyone who was a single-issue voter on Unlimited Abortion was already voting for Democrats.”

    Plus Beto is now criticizing Biden on the border because he’s worried about losing Hispanic votes. Dude, I don’t think going all in on abortion is much of a winner with that group. Even if they are not devoutly Catholic, many Hispanic voters are uncomfortable with abortion. Beto’s stance is certainly not going to bring them back into his fold.

  3. John H says:

    He will carry Travis County of course but I see no enthusiasm anywhere else in Texas. There are a couple of huge billboards in Bastrop County touting “fixing the electric grid” but he has no chance there and is simply wasting money.

  4. Anonymouse says:

    Beto campaigns are where Democrat money goes to die.

  5. BigFire says:

    Robert Francis married the daughter of the richest man in El Paso and became Hispanic by the virtue of his marriage. He’s very good at wasting contributor’s money though.

  6. I was thinking about Beto this morning (shouldn’t have wasted the time really) and realized he should be very thankful that there’s at least one white male Democrat presidential aspirant who makes him look less ridiculous by comparison. Pete Bootyboy, of course…

  7. Denton Salle says:

    Huge billboard in Carrollton on I35 paid for by the local Ds. Tons of signs for him in Denton.

  8. Lawrence Person says:

    Remember, when they ran against at each other in the 2020 Democratic Presidential Primary, O’Rourke dropped out before any votes were cast while Buttigieg racked up actual delegates.

    To be fair, this was not really due to any of Buttigieg’s political talents (such as they were), but the fact that the insiders cabal backing Biden had Buttigieg as the backup in case Biden’s brain went completely kablooey on the campaign trail, and/or to jam Bernie in Iowa and drop out just in time to give Biden a boost for Super Tuesday.

    Not that Buttigieg is remotely impressive (though, unlike Biden, he can string together coherent sentences). But that primary offered up both of them, and Buttigieg did far better than O’Rourke on the national stage.

    By the way, you did know that Buttigieg is the son of America’s leading Gramsci scholar, didn’t you?

  9. Howard says:

    He came within a few % of Ted Cruz in 2018.

    That shouldn’t have happened.

  10. BonHagar says:

    Even a casual look at the social experiments in Houston and Austin, mirroring the disasters of Seattle, Minneapolis, LA, SanFrancisco, NYC, Detroit, and several blue zones demonstrate that democrats only wield power and treat campaign promises like their sexual affairs; kept quiet, and don’t call.

    Most democrats are media maintained creatures anyway. Sadly, that hype is often effective. With very few exceptions, results are NOT any politician’s strong suit.

    Illegal immigration worked well for democrats when it involved a photogenic family ensconced in a leftist church’s basement in a blue city. When it involves a border INVASION that vandalizes, destroys, and lays waste to Americans lives and property, it doesn’t photograph so well. The media can try and hide it, but it’s getting harder as they lose their grip on that message.

  11. Deoxy says:

    “Beta the Fake Mexican should look for a non-political job.”

    I hope he doesn’t. It’s great watching the Democrats waste so much money.

    And they seem as incapable of giving up on him as he is of learning anything.

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