In the days leading up to the special election held on Tuesday of this week regional and national media were happy to suggest that the State House District 28 seat would be a bellwether election. The seat would flip from R to D thus proving it wasn't just Beto in 2018, but a "blue wave" that has been in the making since Gov. Richards left office.
The pundits were pretty adamant that it was curtains for the Republicans and this race was just the beginning of what would be an electoral nightmare come November. Some suggested that Democrats might not only win the Texas House, but have a supermajority! Beto was not the cause of, but in fact the result of, a growing blue wave ready to take Texas back.
By about 9:00 PM Tuesday night nobody wanted to talk about the District 28 race. Which was funny because literally millions of dollars had been dropped into that race by left leaning entities to benefit the Democrat. Even Beto made a second home there knocking on doors and helping get folks to the polls. It went from the biggest news story in Texas to something that didn't happen and you won't hear anymore about it.
The truth is that any impartial consumer of data related to that district would see it's strongly Republican and likely to remain that way for decades. Others who impartially assess campaigns would understand that Beto's run was all about Beto and not about some bigger shift of political allegiance. The love of Democrats took a backseat to the love of Beto, which is why it can't be replicated.
Now that straight ticket voting is gone, Democrats are going to be in a major hurt down the ballot. Voters who have simply pulled the lever once for the last 30 years aren't readily going to read a ten page ballot and hunt down all the Democrats. They'll cast a vote at the top of the ballot and walk away. Democratic strategies have long relied on pushing people to the polls in large groups with instructions to do one thing. Their network of operatives aren't experienced with down ballot strategies and it might be an election cycle or two before they even get somewhat good at it.
I'm sorry, but the blue wave will remain a ripple in Texas.
I agree with you that Texas will not go blue in November, but I'm curious about why you think Beto's run was all about Beto. Personally, I'd say it was a combination of love for Beto, hatred of Cruz, and a slow shift towards Texas become more Democratic.
If it were all about Beto, I expect he would have done better during his presidential campaign. But not only did he underperform, he straight up tanked. Obviously, running for president is different than running for Senate. But I think that a lot of his flaws were ignored during the Senate race because of how much Democrats hate Cruz. If he were really so great, how do you explain his abysmal performance running for president? It's not a rhetorical question - I'm interested to hear your thoughts.
Posted by: Joe | February 12, 2020 at 10:27 AM
Cruz was disliked by both Dems and Repubs. Beto was cool, new, fresh and all the young people thought he was the young version of Bernie. There is a reason Beto did not run against Cornyn. No way he would have even come close to winning. Beto is the only one that believes he has some sort of genius when it comes to politics. Well, no he didn't. He was just another flash in the pan and will be remembered for blowing $80 million on a senate election and losing.
Posted by: Voter | February 12, 2020 at 04:04 PM