Is it me, or are the Texas Democrats producing particularly weak candidates lately?

Politics & Elections
1

Is it just me, or does it seem like the Texas Democratic party is lacking in good young talent that they can put up against the Republicans? And that a lot of the time they’re busy picking candidates who check boxes, rather than ones who can actually win?

Looking here in Texas, our recent gubernatorial election was Beto O’Rourke, who lost for the third time for high office (senate, president, governor). Our Lieutenant Governor candidate was Mike Collier, who also lost for the third time for high state office (comptroller, Lt. Governor… twice).

I can’t remember a Democratic politician who hasn’t been either a chronic loser, or who is just totally insipid. I mean, Nathan Johnson is my representative in the Texas Senate, but he seems kind of colorless. I’m pretty sure he got elected because of that “D” after his name in 2018 in some kind of anti-Trumpian backlash. It certainly wasn’t because of his personality or forceful campaigning.

Colin Allred is about the only Democratic politician I can think of around here in a long time who’s actually been visible, outspoken, and charismatic. And he’s unlikely to trade being in Congress for state politics. Maybe he’ll run for Senate sometime soon, I don’t know.

And in one of the most absurd candidate choices in recent memory, in 2018 the Texas Democratic party actually nominated Lupe Valdez to try and unseat Greg Abbott. I mean, she was a fine county sheriff and seems like a great person, but did the party seriously think that a gay Hispanic woman was somehow going to win statewide office in 2018 Texas? They might as well have conceded the election right then.

I’m more than a little bit dismayed by the atrocious quality of the candidates I’ve had to vote for lately. It’s either crazy-ass hateful Republicans, or really, really lame Democrats who have got their asses kicked multiple times already. How does the Texas Democratic party snap out of this nonsense and get some good, charismatic, vital, and energetic candidates to run?

2

I have the nagging suspicion that any up and coming “charismatic, vital and energetic” potential Dem candidates in Texas would be quickly pigeonholed by the Republicans into one of the “crazy prog” categories. It’s something of a vicious cycle, when you want to portray yourself as the sane, reasonable side in contrast to both directions, it’s too easy to tip over into the boring low-energy mode.

3

I disagree with the premise.

There have been several good candidates. But none had a ‘R’ next to their name on the ballot, which is all that seems to matter. You mention Beto O’Rouke. He lost to Ted Cruz, who even Republicans can’t seem to stand. He only lost 51-49. That’s a shocking result and a bad sign for Cruz for 2024. He may even be primaried.

It’s just the way it goes in Texas. You have to be a good enough candidate to overcome straight ticket voting. And they’ve come close here and there. It’s already generally a conservative state, so the relatively small margins of victory over the last several statewide elections are an indicator for the GOP in the state. And true enough, the amount of advertising (yes, pretty much pigeon-holing all Dems as pro-crime socialist monsters) for this last election cycle shows they’re taking it seriously. Not enough for panic mode but a sign that races aren’t gimmes.

4

For a state as heavily controlled by (R) and gerrymandered as TX, yeah, the candidates are doing as well as can be expected. I honestly did expect some improvement after the snowmageddon, where it was hoped that the consequences of a non-stop corporate laissez faire attitude would be re-examined, but it wasn’t close enough to the election to stay in peoples minds.

Plus, just like any area, there is a huge inertia in the ‘devil you know’ category. Sure, those at the top there are cancerous, lawsuit dodging hacks, but they are seen as being a stable known issue - so why rock the boat with someone who might change something.

5

Wasn’t Beto tagged as a superstar loser just before the election by The Atlantic? How much superpac money from Democratic sides came into Texas to support him that could’ve gone elsewhere?

6

Some but more from individual donors and from micro-donors.

It’s been the story of the state for the last several years - the amount of the average GOP donation tends to be 5-10x of the average Dem donation, even if the overall fundraising is closer to 3-2 advantage.

That’s one area that may have worked out generally better for the Dems nationally actually. A lot of out of state SuperPAC money and individual donations went to Greg Abbott’s campaign (among other Texas campaigns) that could have gone elsewhere if they weren’t as concerned.

7

I guess my main issue is that we keep putting the same people up, even after they’ve been trounced before.

Mike Collier? WTF? He already got his ass kicked by Dan Patrick for the same position in 2018.

You can’t tell me he was the very best the state’s Democrats had to offer for that position… twice in a row. That’s exactly the sort of thing that makes the party look ineffectual and weak.

8

Someone put it best about Beto: “You need to campaign to represent the people of your state, not the people you wish you had or think they ought to become.”

Beto, with his anti-gun stance, for instance, seemed to have the mindset of “Texans ought to be anti-gun like me.” When in fact the politician has to accommodate the voters, not the other way around.

9

Who would you have them put up? It is one thing to declare all the candidates to be losers after the fact, and quite another to back a particular candidate that you think might have a chance.
Unless, of course, you are of the opinion that just being a Democrat makes a candidate a loser.

10

I think you’re missing a different point - even after losing previously, they’re known voices. So, if you find that bright promising young talent, you’ll still have to generally build several election cycles, or cycles at lower levels, building them up enough to even have recognition at all beyond the (D) at the end of the name. With the prior examples, they have a spot at the starting line - even if it’s behind the obvious frontrunners.

Personally, I do somewhat agree with prior posts that the DNC probably should give TX a pass as a major investment until the political climate is good enough that the crowd that votes (R) out of habit is frustrated enough to consider change. Considering how little concern a large chunk of the voters have with the obviously criminal top cops and executive, there just isn’t enough momentum to get behind IMHO.

Now, if those individuals are finally pushed out, retire, or fall over dead, that’s the time to invest heavily, at least at the state-wide elections. Even so real change is likely to never come as long as the current legislature is entrenched behind extreme partisan gerrymandering and can override any change from the top.

11

I’m not “declaring” them losers; the election results prove that.

And that’s my point- Beto and Collier were both multiple-time losers for statewide office before they trotted them out again. I kind of feel like people were already tired of Beto before this election, and this just made it more firm. And Mike Collier is just the sort of former-GOP person who isn’t really winning a lot of friends on either side of the aisle.

I don’t know who they should run. But it seems like running the same candidates again and again, choosing ones who tick the right progressive boxes (Valdez), or totally inexperienced and very young political operatives (Luke Warford) doesn’t seem like anything close to a winning strategy to me. In fact, it almost seems like a “Well, we’ve got to run someone” kind of mentality, or maybe “Well, nobody else wants to run” kind of thing.

Granted, in a state where the voters will happily re-elect Ken Paxton as Attorney General despite his many indictments, whistleblower complaints and ethics investigations, maybe it isn’t so important until the electorate changes somehow.

12

Let’s be fair - this was the closest gubernatorial race in Texas since 1994 (with the exception of that odd 2006 4-way election) where Ann Richards was still solidly beaten by George W Bush. And that was nearly 30 years ago.

The last time the Dems won the governorship (Ann Richards in 1990), it still required a GOP candidate who made a crude joke about lying back and enjoying rape to produce a close 49%-46% squeaker.

This seems like judging the mere fact they lost. Losses happen, especially when the odds are stacked against you.

13

It’s not so much that I’m judging them for losing, it’s that at least in Collier’s case, he already lost to Patrick four years earlier. Why would this time around be any different? Does Mike Collier have something different to offer now than in 2018?

And Beto lost to Ted Cruz (Ted Cruz!) and then had a shambolic attempt at a presidential campaign. I guess he’s not quite so bad, but at this point, I feel like he’s done. And somehow I doubt we’ve heard the last of him unfortunately.

Say what you will, but losing elections tends to have a stink about it in the public perception. You either lost for a reason, or people think you’re desperate if you keep coming back again and again.

14

I don’t see it. Like I said, O’Rourke still came closer than any Dem in a generation in his runs within Texas.

If those losses stuck to him, the state’s become a lot bluer than I thought if a different candidate would have somehow come even closer.

As I noted, even Ann Richards a generation ago (nobody’s idea of a weak candidate) barely won over a disgusting human being and was solidly trounced 4 years later by a better candidate, despite incumbency.

The underlying assumption seems to be that both major parties have an equal shot at winning these offices. That’s clearly not the case. The scummiest human being on earth would still have at least a 50/50 shot at winning against anybody as long as they had that R next to their name. Ted Cruz and Clayton Williams prove that. The strength of candidates is important but the expectations seem unreasonably high that this somehow translates to actual wins.

15

As someone active in Texas Democratic politics, I believe that the problem is that we don’t have a bench. Republicans didn’t just suddenly arrive on the scene. They started with school boards, county commissioners courts (the representative body at the county level in Texas), city councils, etc. Beto was a congressman and, after only one term, leapfrogged over to senator and then governor. We’ve got to build from the bottom up. And that takes lots of time.

16

Exactly! They’re just sort of rolling out random candidates who may have had a (D) after their name at some past point in their political career.

Where are the Dallas, San Antonio, Houston, Corpus, etc… city councilmen who want to run for the state legislature? Where are the other state legislators and senators who are trying to run for statewide office? Lieutenant Governor shouldn’t be a position where the best a party can do is a totally inexperienced party functionary. It should be someone with experience in the Legislature, preferably Senate experience.

Beto at least had some legislative experience. Few of the other Democratic statewide office candidates did. Janet Dudding had some experience in public finance prior to running for Comptroller, but the rest seem to be along the lines of “I was a lawyer, so I’m qualified for being Attorney General” or “I’m a farmer and weed lawyer, so I’m qualified for Agriculture Commissioner” or worst of all, “I’m a party functionary, so I’m qualified for Railroad Commissioner, which is a lot more powerful than the name implies, being in charge of regulating the oil and gas industry in Texas”

17

There’s multiple problems, all of which contribute. Some are things Democrats have no control over. The sheer size of the state means that overcoming an 11% difference (the margin in this year’s governor’s race) represents almost a million people rather than a few hundred thousand that such a number would represent in a state like Georgia, Pennsylvania, or Arizona. Gerrymandering is also a big problem, both for the state House and Senate and the US House.

It also seems like Texas urban areas are not as liberal as urban areas in other states. Look at a county by county map of Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, or Wisconsin. The counties with the main urban areas (Atlanta, Philadelphia, Detroit, Madison, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Savanah, etc.) are all deep blue and surrounded by light blue suburbs. Here in Texas the city centers (Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio) are light blue and surrounded by pink suburbs, with only Austin being deep blue. In other words, the problem isn’t the oceans of sparsely populated crimson red rural counties out in west Texas and the Panhandle (no matter how impressive they may look on a map), it’s that our cities and suburbs are just less liberal than big cities in the rest of the country.

18

Apparently 49% of Texans DO like anti-gun him, and I’m glad someone is at least trying to represent them

19

Beto only got 43.4% this time. That 5 plus % is likely to include a large contingent of people who are pro-gun and who hold various other conservative positions, but couldn’t bring themselves to vote for someone like Ted Cruz despite agreeing with him on the issues. All the Republicans have to do is run a generic conservative like Abbott or Cornyn, and those voters wouldn’t even consider voting D.

20

Part of the problem is that Beto is no longer the fresh young Kennedyesque face that the Texas Monthly gushed over, but a perennial candidate with shifting views who desperately wants to get elected. In other words, a typical politician.

There have been calls for him to step back and focus on organizing and helping other candidates, which he might do for a short time, but the lure of running for big-time public office will probably be too strong. Beto might well have a good chance to be elected to Congress a second time, but that would be a big comedown for him.

It may be unfair to the Democratic Party to blame it for not generating good candidates. Such people have to decide to run in the first place. As Lord Salisbury said (rather snootily) back in 1861: "First-rate men will not canvass mobs; and if they did, the mobs would not elect the first-rate men.“

At least Texas Democrats to my knowledge didn’t nominate anyone as horrendously bad as Geoff Young (another perennial candidate) in my Kentucky congressional district. To the despair of party leaders, this guy won the nomination to face the incumbent, Andy Barr, running on a platform that included impeaching President Biden for warlike behavior. He lost 65-35%, and the wonder is that he wasn’t trampled even more convincingly.
Of course, Republicans had their own problems this past cycle in having weak candidates nominated…