Posts Tagged ‘David Alameel’

Texas Statewide Race Oddities

Wednesday, November 5th, 2014

With all the votes in, we can start analyzing some of odder aspects of the Texas statewide race results.

For those watching the race, it’s no surprise that (discounting 2006’s strange four-way race) Wendy Davis was the worst-performing Democratic gubernatorial candidate this century. The surprising thing is that, as bad as she was, Davis was the Democrat’s best statewide candidate this year. Her 38.9% was the highest statewide vote percentage by any Texas Democrat in 2014. Leticia Van de Putte’s 38.7% was the second highest. Otherwise statewide Democratic candidates ranged from a low of 34.3% for invisible Senate candidate David Alameel to a high of 38% for Attorney General candidate Sam Houston.

Possible explanations:

  • Perhaps Wendy Davis’ antics didn’t cause people to switch so much as it caused Democrats to stay home entirely.
  • Perhaps in lower-pofile races people felt free to vote for third party candidates.
  • Perhaps there is indeed a staunchly “pro-abortion Republican” segment of the Texas electorate, but evidence suggests that, if so, it ranges from 0.5% to 1% of the total…
  • And those who said Abbott would outpoll Dan Patrick were right…but only by 1.2%.

    Abbott took ten counties that Bill White won in 2010: Harris, Bexar, Brooks, Culberson, Falls, Foard, Kleberg, La Salle, Reeves and Trinity. Harris (Houston) and Bexar (San Antonio) are the 800-pound gorillas on that list. In 2012, Ted Cruz won Harris by 2% (while Romney was edged there by a thousand votes) while losing Bexar by 4%. For a while Democrats were able to stay competitive statewide by racking up big margins in those urban counties even while they were losing rural and suburban counties. If Republicans can now win those counties outright, it may be a long, long time before a Democrat can win statewide again.

    Two statewide Republican candidates got more votes than Abbott’s 2,790,227: Senator John Cornyn and Land Commissioner-elect George P. Bush. The rest of the country may suffer from Bush-fatigue (though I imagine that it’s now dwarfed by Obama-fatigue), but you’d be hard-pressed to find signs of it in Texas…

    Since Democrats failed to contest three statewide court races, both the Libertarian and Green parties reached the minimum 5% threshold to maintain ballot access in 2016.

    Shockingly, David Weigel actually brings the wood when discussing Battleground Texas:

    “These are the greatest geniuses of data in the f**king world and they can’t figure out that less people voted?” asked Carney. “Every publicly pronounced goal of Battleground, every one, has been an abject failure.”

    (snip)

    Davis only out-performed the 2010 ticket in her home base of Tarrant County (Ft. Worth).

    Oh, and it got worse. Abbott’s campaign said throughout the campaign that it would poach Latino voters, especially in the Rio Grande valley. A quick look at a Texas map might tell you that Abbott failed. Not quite true. Perry had lost Hidalgo County (McAllen) by 34 points; Abbott kept the margin down to 28 points. Perry had lost Webb County by 53 points; Abbott lost it by 39. In exit polling, Perry ended up pulling only 38 percent of the Latino vote. Abbott won 44 percent of it, about what was expected in a Texas Tribune poll that Davis allies tried to debunk. Abbott actually won Latino men, 50-49 over Davis. The Democratic wane and Republican outreach helped oust Rep. Pete Gallego, elected in 2012 in a district that sprawled across most of the border. He won 96,477 votes that year; he won only 55,436 this year, allowing black Republican Will Hurd to win, despite being out-fundraised 2-1.

    Weigel may be a partisan, but at least he can read a spreadsheet…

    Final Statewide Race Runoff Update

    Monday, May 26th, 2014

    Tomorrow is the Texas primary runoff, so now would be a good time to find your voting card and confirm your polling place.

    A final roundup of runoff tidbits:

  • The Dallas Morning News says that Dan Patrick is poised to win due to his staunch opposition to illegal immigration. Oversimplified, but not entirely wrong. They also say Patrick has done a good job connecting with Ted Cruz supporters.
  • The end for Dewhurst draws nigh.
  • Dan Branch would have raised more money for the Attorney General race than Ken Paxton…were it not for the $1 million loan from Midland oilman Tim Dunn via Empower Texans PAC. Now you see why so many liberal reporters call Michael Quinn Sullivan the most powerful figure in Texas politics.
  • Talk show host Dana Loesch endorses Paxton. Less a move-the-needle endorsement than a reminder that conservatives are united on Paxton’s side.
  • Hey, that union Branch lobbied for totally wasn’t a member of the AFL-CIO…at least when he lobbied for it.
  • Governor Rick Perry took the unusual step of endorsing Sid Miller for Agriculture Commissioner over Tommy Merritt.
  • Some controversy over Miller’s campaign loan repayments.
  • On the Democrat side of the Ag Commissioner runoff, Kinky Friedman is running against an invisible opponent. “In the May 27 runoff the choice for the party’s faithful is either Friedman or Jim Hogan, a former dairy farmer who hasn’t campaigned for the office or even has a campaign website…Hogan could not be reached for comment because a phone number listed under his name was out of service and the Democratic Party of Texas did not respond to a request for other contact information.” Also, win or lose, Kinky said this is his last race.
  • Hogan seems to be taking a very Zen approach to campaigning.
  • One website has tried to fill the Jim Hogan void.
  • Here’s a Texas Tribune piece on the runoff between rich guy David Alameel and Larouchite Kesha Rogers for the Democratic Senate nomination. Fun as it would be to see Rogers upset Alameel, I don’t see it in the cards.
  • Finally, just in case you were unclear, Texas Monthly‘s Paul Burka is very upset that Republican primary voters continue to prefer actual Republicans over Republicans who act like Democrats once in office.
  • Here is who I will be voting for tomorrow (all of whom I expect to win):

  • Dan Patrick for Lt. Governor
  • Ken Paxton for Attorney General
  • Sid Miller for Agriculture Commissioner
  • Wayne Christian for Railroad Commissioner
  • A Quick Overview of Primary Results

    Wednesday, March 5th, 2014

    A very brief look at last night’s primary results:

  • John Cornyn won, but couldn’t break 60% against a field of underfunded challengers.
  • The Democratic Senate runoff is going to be between the big-spender David Alameel and the LaRouche candidate Kesha Rogers.
  • As expected, both Greg Abbott and Wendy Davis won their gubernatorial primaries. But Abbott garnered 91% and over 1.2 million votes, the most of any candidate for any office. By contrast, Davis got 432,000 votes and won 79% of the vote against underfunded challenger Ray Madrigal, indicating a distinct enthusiasm gap despite Davis’ nationwide MSM cheer-leading corps.
  • Dan Patrick’s early lead over incumbent David Dewhurst in the Lt. Governor’s race held up. Patrick pulled in 550,742 votes for 41.5% of the vote, while Dewhurst got 376,164 votes for 28.3%. Maybe Dewhurst can carpet-bomb the runoff with money, but that’s an awful big gap to make up. We knew that Dewhurst losing to Cruz in 2012 hurt him; now we know how much.
  • Ken Paxton takes the lead into the runoff with 566,080 votes over Dan Branch’s 426,561.
  • Glenn Hegar is hovering right at the threshold of beating Harvey Hildebran outright in the Comptroller race.
  • George P. Bush garnered 934,501 to win the Land Commissioner primary…or over twice as many votes as Wendy Davis.
  • Sid Miller (410,273) and Tommy Merritt (248,568) are heading for a runoff for Agricultural Commissioner, leaving Joe Straus ally Eric Opiela out in the cold.
  • All the Ted Cruz-endorsed Supreme Court incumbents won their races.
  • Super-tight runoff in U.S. House District 23 between Francisco “Quico” Canseco and Will Hurd to face Democratic incumbent Pete Gallego. Canseco held the seat before Gallego, and whoever wins the runoff has a good chance of taking the swing seat back.
  • Katrina Pierson was unable to unseat Pete Sessions in U.S. House District 32, garnering 36.4% of the vote. As I feared, Sarah Palin’s endorsement came to late to truly capitalize on it in fundraising.
  • Matt McCall did even better, where he and another challenger kept Lamar Smith at 60.4% in U.S. House District 21. Though they won their primaries, Sessions and Smith might be vulnerable to further challenges in 2016.
  • As far as I can tell, every U.S. or statewide incumbent Republican either won or is leading their race. Except David Dewhurst.
  • 2014 Texas Senate Race Field Set

    Tuesday, December 10th, 2013

    Finally, John Cornyn has a real challenger. Steve Stockman has Tea Party support, impeccable conservative credentials, experience in high profile races (he knocked off Democratic fossil Jack Brooks for a U.S. congressional seat in the Gingrich wave of 1994), and a Southeast Texas base that might (might) let him tap into Houston’s rich Republican fundraising base. But he has gotten into the race very, very late, against a well-funded opponent whose deviations into RINO-Land have been far less severe those of Arlen Specter, DIck Luger or David Dewhurst (and that role-call of names is probably slightly unfair to Dewhurst). Ted Cruz had about fifteen months to knock off Dewhurst, while Stockman has three to take down Cornyn. Further, while Cruz’s race against Dewhurst was one of the top Tea Party vs. RINO races nationwide, I get the impression the Stockman/Cornyn fight will take a distinct backseat to Matt Bevin’s attempt to take down Mitch McConnell, and possibly several other races.

    It’s certainly possible that Stockman can take out Cornyn, but it’s going to be very difficult, especially while still carrying out his congressional duties.

    For the sake of completeness, here’s a look at the other candidates.

    Republicans

  • Curt Cleaver: A retread longshot from the 2012 Senate Race.
  • Ken Cope: The Midlothian Enigma, about which The Google has precious little to say. This year’s Grady Yarbrough?
  • Chris Mapp: Boat dealership owner. Seems like a solid Tea Party Republican but the man desperately needs to learn how to use indenting and/or paragraph breaks.
  • Dwayne Stover: A bridge-builder. I don’t mean that metaphorically, I mean that his company actually builds bridges.
  • Read Reasor: Good: Former F-15 pilot. Bad: His platform (if you can call it such, being a Facebook post, since his website doesn’t currently work) is a strange mashup of WPA works program, workfare and local autarky. I would like to see his “let welfare recipients build their own home” idea run as a small pilot project somewhere, but his plan has more than a whiff of late-night college bull sessions to it.
  • Linda Vega: A Houston-area lawyer. She has a good resume…for someone running for a county judge position. U.S. Senate? Not so much.
  • Democrats:

  • David Alameel: Former dental chain owner, and worth a reported $50 million dollars. With that big money, he should be a shoe-in for the Democratic nomination, right? Not so fast. “This will be Alameel’s second run for office in as many cycles. Last cycle, he ran for Congress in the newly-drawn 33rd District and finished fourth out of 11 candidates in the Democratic primary. Alameel received 2,064 votes (10 percent)…[he] actually spent $4,485,086 million in the 2012 race, which comes out to $2,173 per vote.” That almost makes John Connally’s 1980 run for President look like a model of model of prudent campaign financing…
  • Michael Fjetland: Ran as a Republican in the primary against Tom Delay in 2006. Proclaims “I am the ‘Anti-Cruz'” in an all-capital letters font. (Pro-tip: When you use ALL CAPS more often than Time Cube Guy, you’re doing it wrong…)
  • HyeTae “Harry” Kim: Odessa physician. Sorry, that’s all I’ve got for you.
  • Lakesha Rogers: The LaRouche Candidate.
  • Maxey Scheer: El Paso attorney who’s also running as the anti-Cruz candidate, complete with towing a crashed-car prop behind her to protest Cornyn’s “Cruz Control.” (Get it? Get? Cruz control? It’s a concrete metaphor and a pun! Get it? Get it? Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more!) Given the Statesman‘s polite attention, I’m going to guess she’s the designated “Democratic faithful” candidate if Alameel’s wealth can’t get him across the finish line, though her gas costs may prove prohibitive. Also seems intensely race-conscious.