Posts Tagged ‘Don Huffines’

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Texas Election Results Analysis: The Warning Shot

Thursday, November 15th, 2018

This is going to be a “glass half empty” kind of post, so let’s start out enumerating all the positives for Texas Republicans from the 2018 midterms:

  • Ted Cruz, arguably the face of conservatism in Texas, won his race despite a zillion fawning national profiles of an opponent that not only outspent him 2-1, but actually raised more money for a Senate race than any candidate in the history of the United States. All that, and Cruz still won.
  • Every statewide Republican, both executive and judicial, won their races.
  • Despite long being a target in a swing seat, Congressmen Will Hurd won reelection.
  • Republicans still hold majorities in the their U.S. congressional delegation, the Texas House and the Texas Senate.

    • By objective standards, this was a good election for Republicans. But by subjective standards, this was a serious warning shot across the bow of the party. After years of false starts and dead ends, Democrats finally succeeded in turning Texas slightly purple.

    Next let’s list the objectively bad news:

  • Ted Cruz defeated Beto O’Rourke by less than three points, the worst showing of any topline Republican candidate since Republican Clayton Williams lost the Governor’s race to Democratic incumbent Ann Richards in 1990, and the worst senate result for a Texas Republican since Democratic incumbent Lloyd Bentsen beat Republican challenger Beau Boulter in 1988.
  • O’Rourke’s 4,024,777 votes was not only more than Hillary Clinton received in Texas in 2016, but was more than any Democrat has ever received in any statewide Texas race, ever. That’s also more than any Texas statewide candidate has received in a midterm election ever until this year. It’s also almost 2.5 times what 2014 Democratic senatorial candidate David Alameel picked up in 2014.
  • The O’Rourke campaign managed to crack long-held Republican strongholds in Tarrant (Ft. Worth), Williamson, and Hays counties, which had real down-ballot effects, and continue their recent success in Ft. Bend (Sugar Land) and Jefferson (Beaumont) counties.
  • Two Republican congressmen, Pete Sessions and John Culberson, lost to Democratic challengers. Part of that can be put down to sleepwalking incumbents toward the end of a redistricting cycle, but part is due to Betomania having raised the floor for Democrats across the state.
  • Two Republican incumbent state senators, Konni Burton of District 10 and Don Huffines of District 16, lost to Democratic challengers. Both were solid conservatives, and losing them is going to hurt.
  • Democrats picked up 12 seats in the Texas house, including two in Williamson County: John Bucy III beating Tony Dale (my representative) in a rematch of 2016’s race in House District 136, and James Talarico beating Cynthia Flores for Texas House District 52, the one being vacated by the retiring Larry Gonzalez.
  • Democratic State representative Ron Reynolds was reelected despite being in prison, because Republicans didn’t bother to run someone against him. This suggests the state Republican Party has really fallen down on the job when it comes to recruiting candidates.
  • In fact, by my count, that was 1 of 32 state house districts where Democrats faced no Republican challenger.
  • Down-ballot Republican judges were slaughtered in places like Harris and Dallas counties.
  • All of this happened with both the national and Texas economies humming along at the highest levels in recent memory.

    • There are multiple reasons for this, some that other commentators covered, and others they haven’t.

  • For years Republicans have feasted on the incompetence of the Texas Democratic Party and their failure to entice a topline candidate to enter any race since Bob Bullock retired. Instead they’ve run a long string of Victor Moraleses and Tony Sanchezes and seemed content to lose, shrug their shoulders and go “Oh well, it’s Texas!” Even candidates that should have been competative on paper, like Ron Kirk, weren’t. (And even those Democrats who haven’t forgotten about Bob Kreuger, who Ann Richards tapped to replace Democratic Senator Lloyd Bentsen when the latter resigned to become Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary, getting creamed 2-1 by Kay Baily Hutchison in the 1993 special election, would sure like to.) Fortunately for Texas Republicans, none of the non-Beto names bandied about (like the Castro brother) seem capable of putting them over the top (but see the “celebrity” caveat below).
  • Likewise, Republicans have benefited greatly from a fundraising advantage that comes from their lock on incumbency. Democrats couldn’t raise money because they weren’t competitive, and weren’t competitive in part because they couldn’t raise money. All that money the likes of Battleground Texas threw in may finally be having an effect.
  • More on how Democrats have built out their organization:

    Under the hood, the damage was significant. There are no urban counties left in the state that support Republicans, thanks to O’Rourke winning there. The down-ballot situation in neighboring Dallas County was an electoral massacre, as was the situation in Harris County.

    “This election was clearly about work and not the wave,” [Democratic donor Amber] Mostyn said. “We have been doing intense work in Harris County for five cycles and you can see the results. Texas is headed in the right direction and Beto outperformed and proved that we are on the right trajectory to flip the state.”

  • “Last night we saw the culmination of several years of concentrated effort by the left — and the impact of over $100 million spent — in their dream to turn Texas blue again. Thankfully, they failed to win a single statewide elected office,” Texas Republican Party chair James Dickey said in a statement. “While we recognize our victories, we know we have much work to do — particularly in the urban and suburban areas of the state.”
  • The idea that Trump has weakened Republican support in the suburbs seems to have some currency, based on the Sessions and Culberson losses.
  • That effect is especially magnified in Williamson and Hayes counties, given that they host bedroom communities for the ever-more-liberal Austin.
  • Rick Perry vs. The World ended a year-long hibernation to pin the closeness of the race on Cruz’s presidential race. He overstates the case, but he has a point. Other observations:

    3. What if Beto had spent his money more wisely? All that money on yard signs and on poorly targeted online ads (Beto spent lots of money on impressions that I saw and it wasn’t all remnant ads) wasn’t cheap. If I recall correctly, Cruz actually spent more on TV in the final weeks, despite Beto raising multiples of Cruz’s money. Odd.

    4. Getting crazy amounts of money from people who dislike Ted Cruz was never going to be the hard part. Getting crazy good coverage from the media who all dislike Ted Cruz was never going to be hard part.

    Getting those things and then not believing your own hype…well if you are effing Beto O’Rourke, then that is the hard part.

    5. Beto is probably the reason that some Dems won their elections. But let’s not forget that this is late in the redistricting cycle where districts are not demographically what they were when they were drawn nearly a decade ago.

  • For all the fawning profiles of O’Rourke, he was nothing special. He was younger than average, theoretically handsomer than average (not a high bar in American politics), and willing to do the hard work of statewide campaigning. He was not a bonafide superstar, the sort of personality like Jesse Ventura, Arnold Schwarzenegger or Donald Trump that can come in from the outside and completely reorder the political system. If one of those ran as a Democrat statewide in Texas, with the backing and resources O’Rourke had, they probably win.
  • A lack of Green Party candidates, due to them failing to meet the 5% vote threshold in 2016, may have also had a small positive effect on Democrat vote totals in the .5% to 1% range.
  • None of the controversies surrounding three statewide Republican candidates (Ken Paxton’s lingering securities indictment, Sid Miller’s BBQ controversy, or George P. Bush’s Alamo controversy) seemed to hurt them much. Paxton’s may have weighed him down the most, since he only won by 3.6%, while George P. Bush won with the second highest margin of victory behind Abbott. Hopefully this doesn’t set up a nightmare O’Rourke vs. Bush Senate race in 2020.

    • Texas Republicans just went through a near-death experience, but managed to survive. Is this level of voting the new norm for Democrats, or an aberration born of Beto-mania? My guess is probably somewhere in-between. It remains to be seen how it all shakes out during the sound and fury of a Presidential year. And the biggest factor is out of the Texas Republican Party’s control: a cyclical recession is inevitable at some point, the only question is when and how deep.

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    Posted in Austin, Democrats, Elections, Republicans, Texas | 1 Comment »

    A Magic Bus Full of Fraud

    Thursday, August 9th, 2018

    Here’s a story with a staggering amount of government fraud that may have flown under your radar if you’re not in the DFW area:

    A Dallas County bureaucracy brought down by official corruption, mismanagement, and debilitating debt has finally been dissolved. July 31 marked the end of Dallas County Schools, the school bus agency one state lawmaker called “the worst government bureaucracy in our state.”

    But millions in debt piled up by corrupt officials, under the noses of inept bureaucrats, remains.

    A years-long criminal money laundering conspiracy that went seemingly unnoticed by most DCS officials until the agency was on the verge of collapse left Dallas County taxpayers on the hook for over $125 million.

    Dallas County residents voted to shut down the scandal-plagued bus bureaucracy last November. Since then, a dissolution committee has been working to wind down the agency, transfer buses and other assets to area school districts, and figure out how to pay off the mountain of debt left behind.

    County taxpayers will continue to pay the one-cent ad valorem property tax dedicated to subsidizing the now-defunct agency until all its obligations are settled.

    The dissolution committee also filed a civil racketeering lawsuit seeking to recoup taxpayer money that was illegally funneled to corrupt officials and others involved in the conspiracy. Under federal racketeering statutes, plaintiffs can recover triple damages.

    “I’m hopeful that we will get some money back,” said Alan King, chief executive officer of the dissolution committee. “The amount of money that they’ve lost is just staggering.”

    “It was a conspiracy of a number of defendants and individuals that involved bribes, kickbacks, real estate fees and commissions paid,” added Stephanie Curtis, an attorney for the DCS dissolution committee.

    The lawsuit’s targets include former DCS Superintendent Rick Sorrells, former DCS President Larry Duncan, and current Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway, along with Louisiana-based school bus camera company Force Multiplier Solutions and its CEO Robert Leonard. A failed stop-arm camera ticketing scheme hatched by Leonard and then-Superintendent Sorrells back in 2010 precipitated the agency’s financial collapse.

    Dwaine Caraway is a Democrat who also served as interim Mayor of Dallas after Tom Leppert resigned to launch his unsuccessful U.S. Senate race. Larry Duncan is a Democrat who was also on the Dallas City Council. A look at his January 19, 2016 campaign finance report shows that Leonard was his only campaign contributor (to the tune of a hefty $25,000). Evidently no one was paying attention then, or this should have set off some alarm bells…

    Leonard’s associate Slater Swartwood, Sr. is also named in the suit. He was the first to be indicted on criminal charges in the DCS case, late last year. He pleaded guilty to federal money laundering conspiracy charges and gave federal prosecutors details of the multi-year conspiracy. Swartwood was the middle man who helped funnel millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks from Leonard and Force Multiplier to Sorrells “in return for further agreements and camera-equipment orders.”

    Sorrells repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, but once Swartwood confessed, Sorrells admitted he abused his position to swindle taxpayers out of millions of dollars. As superintendent, Sorrells awarded $70 million in contracts to Force Multiplier in exchange for $3 million in bribes and kickbacks. He used the money to fund a lavish lifestyle that featured luxury vacations, expensive sports cars, and fancy jewelry. Sorrells pleaded guilty in April to wire fraud and is set to be sentenced soon. He faces up to 20 years in prison.

    Duncan, who was president of the DCS board when then-Superintendent Sorrells and Leonard launched the stop-arm camera scheme, also denied wrongdoing. From 2012 to 2016, Duncan received nearly $250,000 in campaign contributions from Leonard and others connected with Force Multiplier that coincided with DCS board approvals of agreements with the company. Duncan claims the donations were legitimate, but it’s unclear why Louisiana residents would contribute to the campaign of a Dallas bureaucrat running unopposed. Duncan later gave some of that money to campaigns of other DCS board candidates, including Omar Narvaez, who’s now a Dallas City Council member.

    Caraway is connected to DCS through Swartwood, who also brokered questionable real estate deals for DCS that cost taxpayers millions. Financial disclosures filed by Caraway in 2013 and 2014 show he was paid at least $50,000 to serve as a real estate “consultant” for Swartwood. Caraway also admits the money-launderer gave his family at least $20,000 in “loans” he was never asked to repay. In 2015, Caraway “passionately convinced the rest of city council” to vote in favor of DCS’s stop-arm camera ticketing scheme. Caraway is rumored to be eyeing a run for mayor in 2019, but his connection to the DCS scandal could derail those plans.

    State Sen. Don Huffines (R–Dallas) led the legislative effort last year to abolish DCS.

    More background here.

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Texas, Waste and Fraud | No Comments »

    Dear Texas State Congressional District 114 Voters: Please Retire Jason Villalba

    Sunday, February 28th, 2016

    Remember state Rep. Jason Villalba, the supergenius who tried to make it illegal for bloggers and gun owners to photograph the police? There’s just enough news on him to warrant a separate post (and plea to his Republican constituents that he be replaced).

  • First there’s the fact that Villalba opposes police pension reform. Because California is such a great model to follow there.
  • A group associated with State Sen. Don Huffines has laid down a whole bunch of attack mailers over Villalba’s enthusiasm over Texas expanding ObamaCare. Because Villalba evidently had a brain freeze and forgot he was supposed to pretend he was a Republican.
  • No wonder Villalba received an F rating on fiscal responsibility.
  • Language, Villalba, language! (Hat tip: Push Junction.)

    • Villalba has a primary challenger in Dan Morenoff, a Federalist Society member who would be a vast improvement over Jason Villalba. Then again, “X would be a better state representative than Jason Villalba” is an exceptionally target-rich environment…

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    Posted in Elections, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

    2015 Texas Constitutional Amendments

    Thursday, October 29th, 2015

    Did you know that there’s a Texas constitutional amendment election November 3rd? Indeed there is, and early voting extends through tomorrow. Someone, I kept thinking, should do a roundup of what’s on the ballot.

    It turns out that I am, in fact, someone.

  • Proposition 1 – SJR 1

    The constitutional amendment increasing the amount of the residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation for public school purposes from $15,000 to $25,000, providing for a reduction of the limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that may be imposed for those purposes on the homestead of an elderly or disabled person to reflect the increased exemption amount, authorizing the legislature to prohibit a political subdivision that has adopted an optional residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation from reducing the amount of or repealing the exemption, and prohibiting the enactment of a law that imposes a transfer tax on a transaction that conveys fee simple title to real property.

    Recommendation: For. It’s a Republican amendment that lets homeowners keep more of their own money.

  • Proposition 2 – HJR 75

    The constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of all or part of the market value of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of a 100 percent or totally disabled veteran who died before the law authorizing a residence homestead exemption for such a veteran took effect.

    Recommendation: For. This passed the House unanimously and has garnered no real opposition.

  • Proposition 3 – SJR 52

    The constitutional amendment repealing the requirement that state officers elected by voters statewide reside in the state capital.

    Ballotpedia:

    The offices that would be affected by the repeal are the Attorney General, Comptroller of Public Accounts, Land Commissioner and ‘any statutory State officer who is elected by the electorate of Texas at large.’ The Texas Governor, Texas Lieutenant Governor, Texas Supreme Court and Texas Court of Criminal Appeals would still be required to live in the capital as mandated by other constitutional provisions.

    Recommendation: For. This Amendment recognizes that it’s the 21st century and not the 19th. There’s no reason state officials can’t serve effectively even while living elsewhere. And anything that gets them away from capitol groupthink is a good thing.

  • Proposition 4 – HJR 73

    The constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to permit professional sports team charitable foundations to conduct charitable raffles.

    Ballotpedia:

    Under current law, only nonprofit organizations can hold raffles, which took effect after voters passed Proposition 15 in 1989.[1]

    The amendment would apply to teams in the National Football League, the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer and the National Hockey League. Raffles would only be allowed at home games of the sports teams associated with the foundations.[2][3][4][1]

    House Joint Resolution 73, the enabling legislation for the amendment, outlines who could hold a raffle, how a raffle could be conducted and penalties for breaking the rules. The measure also mandates how the raffle revenue would be allocated:[5]

    • 50 percent or less would be awarded to the raffle winner
    • 40 percent or more would be donated to charity
    • 10 percent or less could be used for raffle operating expenses

    No Recommendation. The fact that the convoluted nature of the Texas constitution even requires a constitutional amendment concerning professional sports teams is somewhat irksome. On the plus side: More money for charities, less government prohibitions, and the scope for abuse seems small. On the minus side, it may open the door for gambling industry interests down the road, and a significant number of very conservative legislators (including Konni Burton and Don Huffines) voted against it.

  • Proposition 5 – SJR 17

    The constitutional amendment to authorize counties with a population of 7,500 or less to perform private road construction and maintenance.

    Recommendation: For. While I’m always suspicious of using public money on private ventures, the Texas Constitution already allows counties with 5,000 or fewer residents to perform such construction, it’s usually for safety reasons, and the law requires both land owner permission and for them to reimburse the county for the work, so the scope for possible abuse seems small.

  • Proposition 6 – SJR 22

    The constitutional amendment recognizing the right of the people to hunt, fish, and harvest wildlife subject to laws that promote wildlife conservation.

    Recommendation: For. The NRA is fully behind this amendment, it provides a bit of a legal bulwark against overreaching federal regulators, and it’s driving the the usual urban gun grabbers buggy. What’s not to like?

  • Proposition 7 – SJR 5

    The constitutional amendment dedicating certain sales and use tax revenue and motor vehicle sales, use, and rental tax revenue to the state highway fund to provide funding for nontolled roads and the reduction of certain transportation-related debt.

    Recommendation: For. I’m always suspicious when industry sources flood my mailbox with pro-proposition flyers, which has been the case this year for Props 1 (realtors love it) and 7 (looks like the road construction industry). However, this is a case where the money does actually need to be spent to keep up with road infrastructure growth and maintenance needs, it limits discretionary (read: pork) spending by future legislatures, and is a better funding mechanism than drawing from the rainy day fund (which was authorized by a 2014 amendment).

    • Huh. It’s rare I support all the Constitutional Amendments on a ballot. I may have to cast a No vote on Prop 4, just on general principle…

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    Posted in Austin, Guns, Texas | 3 Comments »

    Dan Patrick Sends Three Second Amendment Bills On To Committee

    Tuesday, February 3rd, 2015

    Lt. Governor Dan Patrick announced that he’s sending three pro-Second Amendment bills to the Senate State Affairs Committee:

  • Senate Bill 11 (SB 11), An act relating to the carrying of concealed handguns on the campuses of and certain other locations associated with institutions of higher education, by Sen. Brian Birdwell (SD22).
  • Senate Bill 342 (SB 342), Relating to providing for the open and concealed carrying of handguns without a license and to related offenses and penalties, by Sen. Don Huffines (SD16).
  • Senate Bill 346 (SB 346), Relating to the authority of a person who is licensed to carry a handgun to openly carry a holstered handgun, by Sen. Craig Estes (SD30).

    • Except for the effectivity date, the campus carry bill is essentially identical to Birdwell’s SB 182 in the 83rd legislative session, which was killed in 2013.

    SB342 provides for essentially unlimited constitutional carry, while SB346 would authorize open carry only for CHL holders. I think it’s canny of Patrick to advance both at the same time. Some squishy republicans may balk at universal carry, but voting for SB 346 will allow them to split the difference and still appear pro-gun.

    One possible snag for any pro Second Amendment bill: the Senate Criminal Justice Committee is still headed by Democrat John Whitmire. However, since Whitmire is considerably more pro-gun than the average Democrat this may not be a problem.

    Will Speaker Joe Straus kill pro-Second Amendment bills in the House? He’s killed some in the past, but he’s also been very careful not to leave his fingerprints on the knife. Given how Straus has crowed about endorsements from the NRA and the Texas State Rifle Association, I’m guessing he won’t go to the mat to kill popular Second Amendment bills supported by a clear majority of senators. Straus is another reason I think SB 346 is more likely to pass than SB 342.

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    Posted in Guns, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

    Reports of the Tea Party’s Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

    Tuesday, March 11th, 2014

    There have been a lot of wishful thinking thumbsucker pieces from liberal media outlets proclaiming that the Tea Party is done, finished, a spent force. (Here’s an example.)

    And indeed, those looking only at some top-line races in Texas (like Katrina Pierson’s failed attempt to take down Pete Sessions) might find tend to agree.

    However, a look at all the races (including many down-ballot) shows that the Tea Party is alive and well.

    Start at Lt. Governor. Dan Patrick says he followed the Ted Cruz blueprint and leaned heavily on the Tea Party. “If you have a candidate who will work and at least enough resources to fund a statewide race then and you have the credentials, the tea party will bring you to victory.”

    Texans for Fiscal Responsibility’s Michael Quinn Sullivan sees conservative victories up and down the ballot:

  • The most liberal Republican in the Texas Senate lost.
  • Conservative ranks in the Senate are swelling.
  • Every House conservative won re-election (with re-enforcements coming from the open-seat races).
  • House incumbents affiliated with Speaker Joe Straus lost big.
  • Statewide races saw the TFR-backed candidates earning commanding leads going into run-offs.

    • Sullivan goes on to cite Don Huffines defeating John Carona, Brooks Landgraf defeating Austin Keith, and the defeats of Straus allies Bennett Ratliff, Ralph Sheffield, Linda Harper-Brown, Diane Patrick and Lance Gooden.

    This AP piece touts Tea Party success in Texas, but is lamentably short on details.

    Even liberal fossil Paul Burka says that “If there was a clear winner in last night’s election, it was the tea party,” noting the defeats of Joe Straus allies Harper-Brown and Ratliff.

    So too at the national level. The enthusiastic response to Sarah Palin’s speech and other Tea Party favorites shows that the movement is far from dead.

    Which is not to say huge obstacles don’t remain. The Tea Party still hasn’t built up their financial networks enough to reliably take on big-money incumbents, and even in Texas, previous Tea Party gains were insufficient to wrest the Speakership from Straus (who just spent $2,578,942.72 to retain a job that pays $7,200 a year). But the Tea Party movement is still very much alive and kicking, much to the chagrin of RINOS, democrats and the media…

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    Posted in Elections, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

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