Texas Tribune
Texas House Republican matchups take center stage of primary
by Patrick Svitek, The Texas Tribune – 2023-12-12 15:42:08
SUMMARY: The Texas primary is set for March, with Donald Trump and Joe Biden leading their parties' presidential nominations, focusing the action on down-ballot races. Governor Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton seek revenge against GOP House members, with at least 57% of House Republicans facing primary challenges. A record number of GOP candidates filed, with Paxton and Abbott endorsing various primary challengers. Democrats have at least 10 candidates for the U.S. Senate primary, led by Colin Allred in fundraising. Competitive races are expected in Dallas and Houston, with significant turnover among Democrats including a rare incumbent faceoff and multiple open seats.
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The field is set for the Texas primary — making way for a dramatic few months ahead of the March election.
At the top of the ticket, Texans will vote on who they want as their party's presidential nominee — where Donald Trump has a landslide lead for Republicans and President Joe Biden has no serious competition among Democrats.
That means the most interesting action in Texas will be down-ballot.
With both Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton out for revenge, Republican members of the Texas House are the top target on the ballot. But Democrats are also facing ample drama as political dominoes fall in Dallas and Houston, creating new opportunities for ambitious members of the party.
The candidate filing deadline for the March primary was 6 p.m. Monday. .
Republicans
On the GOP side, much of the primary drama is being driven by Abbott and Paxton.
Paxton is working to unseat the dozens of House Republicans who voted to impeach him in May, while Abbott wants to defeat a smaller group of House Republicans who thwarted his yearlong push for school vouchers. That has created a rare dynamic where two of the most powerful Republicans in the state are backing primary challengers to House Republicans, sometimes aligning behind the same challenger and sometimes not.
It has led to a marked increase in primary challengers. After 43% of House Republicans faced opposition in 2022, at least 57% have primary challengers this time.
The Texas GOP said Tuesday it had “a record-breaking 387 candidates file in Austin, plus many more in their local county offices, marking the second-highest candidate turnout in the history of the” party.
The attorney general has endorsed nearly two dozen primary challengers to state House Republicans who voted to impeach him. Those candidates, like Paxton, have positioned themselves as further right than House leadership and could prove to be antagonistic toward Speaker Dade Phelan — should he win his own primary. The Texas Senate acquitted Paxton after a trial in September.
Paxton's endorsees include Republicans like Mitch Little, a Frisco lawyer who represented Paxton at the trial and is running against Rep. Kronda Thimesch, R-Lewisville. Paxton also backed Wes Virdell, a primary challenger to Rep. Andrew Murr — the Junction Republican who chaired the House board of impeachment managers — before Murr announced his retirement last month.
Abbott is targeting a narrower group of 16 House Republicans who are seeking reelection and voted last month to strip a voucher program out of a broad education bill. Abbott has endorsed six primary challengers to those members so far.
Vouchers, which would have allowed public dollars to fund private school education, were Abbott's top legislative priority. He campaigned for reelection on the promise of passing vouchers, and threatened throughout the year to target Republican lawmakers who stood in his way.
Making good on that threat, Abbott has gotten behind challengers like Hillary Hickland, an activist mother from Belton who has taken her kids out of public schools in recent years. She is running against Rep. Hugh Shine, R-Temple.
Other notable primary challengers have emerged in recent days. Shelley Luther, the Dallas salon owner who became famous to conservatives for defying COVID-19 shutdown orders, filed for a rematch against Rep. Reggie Smith, R-Sherman. And Katrina Pierson, the North Texas activist best known as a spokesperson for Trump's 2016 campaign, joined the primary against Rep. Justin Holland, R-Rockwall.
The aggressive involvement of Abbott and Paxton means Phelan will have his hands full defending his GOP members. And Phelan has a primary of his own after running uncontested in 2022. This time he faces two challengers, led by David Covey, the former chair of the Orange County GOP.
Abbott and Paxton are also playing in open seats where they believe they can replace retiring House Republicans with a better political ally. One example is House District 14, where anti-voucher Rep. John Raney, R-College Station, is not seeking reelection and Abbott has endorsed Bryan businessman Paul Dyson for the seat. Abbott said in his endorsement that he trusts Dyson to “expand school choice for all Texas families once and for all.”
In House District 87, Abbott and Paxton have aligned behind Caroline Fairly, the daughter of an Amarillo businessman, Alex Fairly, who Texas conservatives are working to cultivate as a new megadonor. Fairly is among four Republicans running to replace retiring Rep. Four Price, R-Amarillo, who opposes school vouchers.
In the Texas Senate, Republicans are looking at only one competitive primary, to replace retiring Sen. Drew Springer, R-Muenster. Four Republicans have filed for that seat, though one of them, Denton County GOP Chairman Brent Hagenbuch, is the frontrunner after getting endorsed by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the very powerful presiding officer of the Senate.
As for congressional primaries, the GOP focus is largely on two open seats — the 12th District, where U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, is retiring, and the 26th District, where U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Lewsiville, is not seeking reelection. Each primary has drawn a crush of candidates, though state Rep. Craig Goldman, R-Fort Worth, has piled up almost all the notable endorsements for Granger's seat and conservative media executive Brandon Gill recently got the backing of former President Donald Trump for Burgess' seat.
The closest thing to a competitive primary involving a congressional incumbent is probably in the 23rd Congressional District. U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, is facing four primary challengers after splitting with his party on issues like guns and the border.
Democrats
At the top of the ticket, Democrats have a primary for U.S. Senate that has drawn at least 10 candidates. U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, has crushed the pack in fundraising, and his competitors include state Sen. Roland Gutierrez, D-San Antonio; state Rep. Carl Sherman, D-DeSoto; and Mark Gonzalez, former district attorney for Nueces County.
But Democrats' most spirited fights could be farther down the ballot, especially in Dallas and Houston.
Democrats saw a major late development Monday, when state Rep. Victoria Neave launched a primary challenge to state Sen. Nathan Johnson, an uncommon faceoff between two Dallas Democrats.
At least nine Democrats filed to succeed Allred in the 32nd Congressional District, a group that includes state Rep. Julie Johnson, D-Carrollton; Brian Williams, a prominent Dallas trauma surgeon; and Callie Butcher, whose campaign says she is the first transgender Texan to run for Congress in a major-party primary in Texas.
In Houston, at least six Democrats have filed for Whitmire's seat in Senate District 15, which has not been open since 1982. The field includes state Rep. Jarvis Johnson, D-Houston; Molly Cook, Whitmire's 2022 primary challenger; Karthik Soora, a Houston renewable energy developer; Todd Litton, the 2018 Democratic nominee for a nearby congressional seat; Michelle Anderson Bonton, executive director of the Anderson Center for the Arts; and Alberto “Beto” Cardenas Jr., a prominent Houston attorney who filed at the last minute Monday.
Whitmire defeated U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee in the mayoral runoff, and she quickly decided to seek reelection afterward. But she will face a primary challenge from at least one fellow Democrat, former Houston City Council member Amanda Edwards.
In both Houston and Dallas, the big open-seat primaries have triggered other vacancies, providing for significant turnover among Democrats in the state's two biggest metropolitan areas. Julie Johnson's run for Congress left her state House seat open, Jarvis Johnson's campaign for state Senate created a vacancy in his state House seat — and Neave's late primary challenge to Johnson left her state House seat open.
In other late developments, a Democratic member of the State Board of Education, Melissa Ortega, announced Monday morning she would not seek reelection. That left Democrats without a candidate for the seat with hours left until the filing deadline — a Republican had already filed — though it had become clear by Tuesday afternoon that at least one Democrat had managed to file at the last minute.
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
Texas Tribune
These Texans aren’t taking buyouts despite repeated floods
by By Emily Foxhall, The Texas Tribune – 2024-05-20 05:00:00
SUMMARY: Recent floods in Harris County, Texas, have devastated homes along the San Jacinto River. Tom Madigan, who owns multiple properties, quickly started repairs without knowing the Harris County Flood Control District aims to buy out such flood-prone properties. The region has a longstanding buyout program to remove homes from high-risk flood areas, with about 800 out of 2,400 targeted properties purchased. However, buyouts are voluntary and often insufficient for low-income residents. Despite the program, many choose to stay due to affordability and community ties, while others like Madigan remain skeptical of receiving a fair offer.
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HARRIS COUNTY — After the floodwaters earlier this month just about swallowed two of the six homes that 60-year-old Tom Madigan owns on the San Jacinto River, he didn't think twice about whether to fix them. He hired people to help, and they got to work stripping the walls, pulling up flooring and throwing out water-logged furniture.
What Madigan didn't know: The Harris County Flood Control District wants to buy his properties as part of an effort to get people out of dangerously flood-prone areas.
Back-to-back storms drenched southeast Texas in late April and early May, causing flash flooding and pushing rivers out of their banks and into low-lying neighborhoods. Officials across the region urged people in vulnerable areas to evacuate.
Like Madigan's, some places that were inundated along the San Jacinto in Harris County have flooded repeatedly. And for nearly 30 years, the flood control district has been trying to clear out homes around the river by paying property owners to move, then returning the lots to nature.
The recent floods show why buyout programs can be important. These spots typically flood first and worse. Gov. Greg Abbott reported that hundreds of rescues took place in the state while the floods destroyed homes. A man drowned and a child was swept away into the floods. One Harris County resident described climbing on top of his motor home as the water rose before first responders rescued him.
But the disaster and its aftermath also illustrate why buyouts are complicated to carry out even in Harris County, home to Houston, which has one of the most robust buyout programs in the country. The flood control district has identified roughly 2,400 properties as current buyout candidates around the San Jacinto; the district and county have bought about 800 of them.
Nearly all of the district's buyouts are voluntary. If an owner doesn't want to sell, the district can't force them out.
Buyouts make sense for some people who can't be protected from floods, said Alessandra Jerolleman, director of research for the Center on Environment, Land and Law at Loyola University New Orleans College of Law.
But buyouts might not provide lower-income people enough money to get somewhere safer, she said, and they could lose important support like child care from nearby family or neighbors.
“It's not as though it's a guarantee of reducing risks to that family,” Jerolleman said.
People who live near the river and who have endured repeated floods explained that they've stayed because it's affordable and, most of the time, peaceful. Where else would they be able to buy anything like it? Some said they didn't think the government would offer them what they consider a fair price to sell their land. Some didn't know the buyout program existed.
Madigan started buying homes more than 15 years ago in the unincorporated River Terrace neighborhood because they were cheap. On Tuesday, the Houston firefighter drank a Heineken and grilled hamburgers for his work crew outside his most damaged house, which he rents to his brother. Sodden rugs baked in the sun on the driveway.
Madigan said he might have taken a buyout if it was a reasonable offer — but he doubted it would be. He said he needed to get the properties ready again for his renters. “I can't wait,” he said.
Two blocks away, water had swept through a yellow house Madigan rents to a family with a teenage son. One of the workers fixing the property, 21-year-old Omar Reyna, watched the family throw out pretty much everything they had. Piecing together new laminate flooring with his dad, Reyna kept thinking about a trash bag of Teddy bears and stuffed toys he tossed out for them.
He wondered if the parents had been saving the toys for another kid they might have in the future.
“The faster we get it done, the faster they can come back in here,” Reyna said.
Some people choose to live with the risk of flooding
The San Jacinto is the largest river in the state's most populous county. For years before Harris County's first floodplain maps were drawn up in the mid-1980s, people built homes near its banks. Even today, people can still build in the vast floodplain if the houses are high enough and have enough stormwater detention.
The flood control district tries to buy out homes in pockets of the floodplain that are deepest, said James Wade, manager for the district's property acquisition department. Those are places where engineers can't easily fix flooding problems.
Buyouts are meant to get people out of flood zones before their property floods again, not to help in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. The process is slow: In some cases, it can take 18 months or longer to approve a buyout application, Wade said. The district pays owners the market value or pre-flood value for their house, determined by a third-party appraiser, plus moving expenses and a supplement to help them get into a house out of the floodplain, Wade said.
“It's a very equitable, fair program,” Wade said — but still some people don't want to leave.
Those who stay learn to adapt. They build homes on stilts. They monitor the river level and watch for releases of water from the Lake Conroe dam upstream. Some know intimately the routine of rebuilding: gut the house, clean it, put it back together.
The floor of 49-year-old Sean Vincent's house in the Forest Cove neighborhood in northeast Houston is 15 feet above the ground. Three feet of water flooded it when Hurricane Harvey hit in 2017. This month, the floods reached five feet high on Vincent's property. He cleaned out his waterlogged ground-level shed with help from church members. On Tuesday, he was building new shelves for it.
But most of the time Vincent, who works in railroad traffic control, said he enjoys the space surrounded by tall trees with room for his three kids.
“It's just really not a major part of our life,” Vincent said of the flooding. “Yes, it's inconvenient. Yes, it's now happened to us twice in seven years … It's sort of a trade-off for us. And it is lovely out here.”
“Where are you going to go?”
Then there are those who stay because they don't see anywhere else to go.
Jack St. John, 67, a retired long-haul truck driver, moved to Northshore 43 years ago and has had to clean up after two floods. He worries any time flooding threatens, but the neighborhood's advantages keep him there: He has no water bill because he has a well. His taxes are reasonable. The neighborhood has a fish fry in the spring and a barbecue in the fall.
“You know, when you leave, where are you going to go?” he said. “What's it going to cost to buy into another place?”
Farther northeast, in the Idle Wild and Idle Glen neighborhoods, the floods forced some residents to sleep under tarps. On one largely forested street, boats were turned sideways or flipped upside down. A small building was lodged in the trees. A car was in the ditch.
For several years, Elvia Bethea, 68, has driven from her home in Humble to check on people and pets here, and pick up stray animals. On Tuesday, she and other volunteers gave John Gray, 50, bamboo yard torches to fight the many mosquitoes, plus two trays of chocolate-covered strawberries.
Gray said he couldn't afford to fix up his destroyed house. He earns a living printing labor law posters for businesses. His printers at home were destroyed.
Gray said he had never heard of the buyout program but would consider taking one.
“Who do I call?” Gray asked. “I don't have a clue.”
From the back of a white SUV, Bethea handed some hot dogs to Jose Tabores, 68, who lives on Gray's land in a trailer now filled with mud.
“I'm coming for dinner, remember!” Bethea teased him.
Nearby, 51-year-old Veronika Scheid had been sleeping in a wet tent. The flood washed the shipping crate she lived in down the road and into the trees — along with her and her neighbors' belongings.
At a low point, when Scheid was crying over all she lost, she found a pink-and-white beaded necklace with stitching in the shape of a “V,” like her name. At the end was a charm shaped like a house.
She was grateful the person who owned the land where she stayed hadn't taken a buyout. Otherwise she would have nowhere to go.
“At least we have this,” Scheid said.
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The post These Texans aren't taking buyouts despite repeated floods appeared first on TexasTribune.org.
The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
Texas Tribune
Trump, Abbott speak at Dallas NRA convention
by By Annie Xia, The Texas Tribune – 2024-05-18 19:24:41
SUMMARY:
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DALLAS— At the National Rifle Association's annual convention on Saturday, Donald Trump and Gov. Greg Abbott encouraged the thousands gathered to vote for Trump in the 2024 presidential election as a way to ensure their Second Amendment rights.
“The NRA has stood with me from the very beginning, and with your vote, I will stand strong for your rights and liberties,” Trump said. “I heard it a few weeks ago that if gun owners voted, we would swamp them at levels that nobody's ever seen before. I think you're a rebellious bunch, but let's be rebellious and vote this time.”
Trump and Abbott spoke to a room packed with NRA members, some of which sported supportive attire from the standard-fare red caps to a dress covered with photos of the former president.
During the convention, the NRA released its endorsement for the 45th president, and the Trump political campaign announced the launch for the “Gun Owners for Trump” coalition.
Abbott touted his track record on gun rights by pointing to Texas laws passed last year, such as House Bill 3137 which prohibits local governments from requiring firearm owners to buy liability insurance. To energetic applause, he said the law ensured people would not be forced to pay to exercise their Second Amendment rights.
Abbott also described the state's successful crackdown on the recent pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses, in which protesters are demanding the schools divest from from companies tied to Israel or weapons manufacturing amid the Israel-Hamas War.
“When they tried to pull that stunt in Texas, our Department of Public Safety cleared the area, arrested the protesters and put them in jail,” Abbott said. “Unlike some of these radical leftist universities like Columbia, UCLA and far too many others, in Texas we don't tolerate paid protesters who tried to hijack our college campuses.”
Almost to the day, the NRA convention takes place two years after the Uvalde school shooting, where an 18-year-old gunned down an elementary school with a legally purchased assault rifle. The shooter killed 19 fourth-graders and two teachers with an AR-15 style rifle.
During the 2023 legislative session, Uvalde families unsuccessfully pressed Texas policymakers to pass a raise-the-age law, which would have upped the minimum age for buying semi-automatic weapons from 18 to 21.
“Donald Trump and Texas Republicans made the gun violence epidemic worse, especially in our state, where we have seen nine mass shootings just in the last 15 years,” said a statement by Gilberto Hinojosa, the Texas Democratic Party Chair, on Friday. “Even after Uvalde parents pleaded with Greg Abbott and Ted Cruz for commonsense gun safety laws, they decided, like Trump “ that the NRA and gun lobby was more important.”
Instead the legislature approved a school safety bill that established preventative measures toward school shootings. The law included a mandate that every school must hire an armed security officer and the creation of a department within the Texas Education Agency that can compel districts to adhere to active-shooter protocols.
During his speech, Trump endorsed four Republican candidates who are fighting in late May runoffs to be their party's nominee: Alan Schoolcraft, David Covey, Helen Kerwin and Brett Hagenbuch. Each of them has already received endorsements by Abbott, Attorney General Ken Paxton or both. Schoolcraft, Covey and Kerwin are running against Republican incumbents in the Texas House who impeded Abbott's signature school voucher bill or voted for Paxton's impeachment based on accusations of corruption.
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
Texas Tribune
Photos: Texas storms cause widespread damage in Houston area
by By Marie D. De Jesús and Antranik Tavitian, Houston Landing, The Texas Tribune – 2024-05-17 14:45:42
SUMMARY: Severe storms hit the Houston area on Thursday evening, resulting in widespread damage, four fatalities, and power outages affecting nearly 900,000 homes and businesses. The Houston Office of Emergency Management is beginning recovery efforts, while officials discourage unnecessary travel. Reports from Houston Landing detail the extent of the destruction, which includes knocked-down power lines and damaged buildings, such as the Wells Fargo Plaza and the CenterPoint Energy Plaza. Photos provided by Antranik Tavitian and Marie D. De Jesús illustrate the damage seen across the region.
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Severe storms tore through the Houston area Thursday evening, causing widespread damage, killing at least four people and leaving hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses without power.
Gale force winds up to 100 mph knocked over power lines, blew out windows and toppled trees throughout the region. Houston Office of Emergency Management spokesperson Brent Taylor said officials will begin the recovery process once debris and damage are cleared. In the meantime, Houston Mayor John Whitmire and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo urged residents to avoid all unnecessary travel.
The storm ravaged Harris County — from transmission towers crushed in suburban Cypress to stricken oak trees blockading traffic to high-rise windows shattered throughout downtown Houston.
Here's a look at some of the damage wrought, reported by Houston Landing:
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
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