The Texas Observer

The main event on the floor of the Texas House this afternoon was the swearing-in ceremony for the new speaker, San Antonio Republican Joe Straus.Six representatives gave nominating speeches, seasoning their remarks with plenty of Texas flavor. More than one representative noted that Straus grew up “in the shadow of the Alamo,” and Rep. Jose Menendez, D-San Antonio, used an extended Alamo metaphor to discuss Straus’ qualifications as speaker.Rep. Jim McReynolds, D-Lufkin, used a livestock metaphor: “We in this chamber want a workhorse, not a show pony.”While everyone spoke highly of Straus’ leadership ability, only Straus himself hinted that his leadership style would be a departure from former speaker Tom Craddick’s heavy-handed approach.“We will create a place where we respect each other’s points of view,” Straus said. “Disagreements are necessary because they will result in stronger and better laws.”Straus was also the only member to recognize Craddick’s service. Craddick stayed seated as the other representatives and the rest of the audience gave him a standing ovation, rising briefly to wave as the applause died down.

Ladies and gentlemen, your new speaker of the Texas House: Joe Straus.

Or so it would appear. The mild-mannered Republican from San Antonio announced at a midday press conference in the Capitol rotunda that he had collected pledges of support from 94 of his House colleagues. That would be more than enough to elect him the new House speaker when the 81st legislative session opens on Jan. 13.

He would replace Midland’s Tom Craddick, who was seeking a fourth term in the big chair but dropped out of the speaker’s race over the weekend. (A speaker candidate, of course, needs to win a majority of the 150-member chamber — that would be 76 votes, for the mathematically challenged out there.)

Reporters, lawmakers, staffers and onlookers packed into the Capitol rotunda today, standing elbow to elbow, to hear from Straus and his supporters. Straus put himself forward as a loyal conservative, though he now has support from nearly 70 Democrats and about 20 Republicans. “I’m proud of my Republican roots,” he said. “That’s what gives me the confidence to be able to reach out to Democrats and not apologize for it.”

Straus, only 49, has served just two sessions in the Legislature and wasn’t exactly high profile. Most Texans could be forgiven today for asking, “Joe who?”

Following the national trend, Texas House members are poised to elect a fresh-faced, young moderate with an appetite for compromise.

That willingness to forge consensus is what made Straus so attractive to the group of Democrats and renegade Republicans who were looking for a compromise candidate to topple Craddick (they reportedly settled on Straus on Friday night).

And today Straus pledged to end the bitterness that dominated the past several sessions, to run the House in a bipartisan manner, to seek consensus, and to follow the will of the lower chamber no matter his personal views.

That would be a welcome change from Craddick’s highly partisan, domineering style. Straus noted today that the bitter fight to dislodge Craddick had paralyzed the House at the end of the 2007 session.

“The speaker’s role, I believe, is to help the members, all the members, do good things for the people of their districts,” Straus said during his opening statement.

The five House members who followed Straus to the microphone at today’s press conference all praised his even-handedness; four of the five used the phrase “reach across the aisle.”

Still, there are many lingering questions about the presumptive speaker. As Andrew Wheat reported in the Observer’s Dec. 12th issue, Straus’ family is deeply involved in the horse racing industry. Asked today about his stance on gambling — expected to be a major issue in the upcoming session — Straus said he would recuse himself from any issue that could benefit him financially, as he says he’s done in past sessions. While that sounds good, it’s awfully hard to recuse yourself from major issues like gambling when you’re speaker and control the legislative agenda.

Little is known about many of Straus’ policy positions. He brushed aside policy questions today by saying he would follow the will of the House on most issues. “As speaker, I’m going to be influenced greatly by the position of the Texas House.”

For House members, who have endured six years of Craddick, that must have sounded sweet indeed.

Election Day is here at last. Election officials are expecting huge turnout across the state. Texas, of course, isn’t in play in the presidential race, and U.S. Sen. John Cornyn is expected to capture a second term. But there’s a lot at stake in down-ballot state races today.

We’ll bring you updates throughout the late afternoon and evening. We have reporters covering the election in Houston, Dallas, Brownsville, and Austin.

Perhaps the biggest prize is the Texas House. Democrats need to gain five seats today to reclaim a majority in the 150-seat chamber and end the speakership of Midland Republican Tom Craddick. A five-seat pickup would give Democrats a 76-74 advantage. A few weeks ago, that seemed a longshot, though party activists have become increasingly confident recently that they can pull it off. Democrats seem likely to gain 2-5 seats in the House (one interesting scenario would be a four-seat pickup that would result in a 75-75 tie). You can read our breakdown of the hottest Texas House races here. In our Nov. 28 print issue, reporter Patti Kilday Hart will chronicle the speaker’s race that starts, with backroom meetings and politicking, as soon as the results are in.

Republicans will retain control of the Texas Senate, though Democrats hope to pick up two or three Senate seats: in Fort Worth, Wendy Davis may topple Sen. Kim Brimer; in southeast Texas, Sen. Mike Jackson has a tough race with attorney Joe Jaworski; and in a special election to replace Sen. Kyle Janek in suburban Houston, former gubernatorial candidate Chris Bell is running against four opponents, including three Republicans.

There are four close Congressional races to keep an eye on (details here).

We’ll also be watching three contested races for the Texas Supreme Court. Republicans currently hold all nine Supreme Court seats.

And then there are the big-picture questions: How many of the nearly three million Democratic primary voters will return for the general? Will Obama supporters vote for down-ballot Democrats? Will Republicans hold on to power in Harris County?

We’ll have answers to some of these questions in a few hours.

We’ve seen some pretty lame presidential debate moderators this election cycle. But no matter how bad you think George Stephanopoulos or Gwen Ifill were, at least they could lay a claim to journalistic legitimacy. Not so Leslie Ward, an AT&T vice president and lobbyist. Ward was one of three panelists moderating Sunday’s debate between Speaker Tom Craddick and Democratic challenger Bill Dingus. The other two were local radio hosts—you know, journalists. What was Ward doing there? The debate was hosted by TV station KMID, and “sponsored” by AT&T. While it’s not unusual for corporations to underwrite debates, that doesn’t normally buy their lobbyist a seat at the table.

But there was Ward, asking Craddick and Dingus questions such as: “In the Legislature a lot of emphasis is placed on seniority and rank. Does having the Speaker come from Midland make a difference?” Rough translation: Mr. Speaker, how did you become so awesome and why is your opponent beating his wife? Texas Monthly pundit Paul Burka called the seniority question “obviously a softball pitched so that Craddick can knock it out of the park.”

Appropriately, Dingus spent much of the debate bashing Craddick for being too close to lobbyists. Close enough to reach out and touch them, you might say. Ward, who sat just a few feet from the candidates, is the treasurer of the AT&T PAC, which just four days before the debate had given Craddick $50,000. Ward had personally donated $500 to Craddick’s Stars Over Texas PAC two weeks before. The lobbyist/moderator hung around after the debate long enough to get a little defensive with the Midland newspaper.

Ward noted afterward that offering or accepting corporate political contributions is a federal offense. “Nobody in Texas is taking any corporate money,” she said.

It may not be a crime for a lobbyist with financial ties to a candidate to moderate a debate… but it should be a scandal.

In the final frantic weeks before election day, the GOP’s major donors have dropped last-minute bundles of cash to Texas Republicans. Sweet relief. In the last month, GOP donors have infused their Texas House candidates with a massive amount of money, enough to erase the Democrats’ financial advantage in many races, according to the latest campaign finance filings. Of the 12 races we profiled earlier this month that will determine which party controls the Texas House, Republican candidates have taken the fundraising lead in eight, at least for the past month. The primary reason: the Craddick machine has finally come alive.

Republican Speaker Tom Craddick, eager to avoid a run on his power, has pumped $500,000 into his Stars Over Texas PAC, which in turn has donated $900,000 in the past month to Republicans in close House races. Empower Texans PAC, another Craddick vehicle, has raised and spent about $280,000. James Leininger, the shadowy San Antonio voucher king who had previously said he would be laying low this election, gave $100,000 to the PAC. Midland oilman Tim Dunn, perhaps the most influential political player that most Texans never heard of, also gave $100,000.

In addtion, homebuilder and perennial donor Bob Perry alone has spent more than $450,000 on House and Senate candidates in the past month, the vast majority Republican.

Here’s where some of that ocean of money has come ashore in the past 30 days:

• Bryan Daniel, the Republican hoping to keep Williamson County in the red, had been severely lagging behind Democrat Diana Maldonado in fundraising. But in the last month he took in more than $517,000, a huge sum of money for a House race. Almost half that amount - $236,089 - came from Texans for Lawsuit Reform. Also, Bob Perry gave him $50,000. Craddick’s Stars Over Texas PAC, $55,000. Maldonado still did pretty well, pulling in $304,649, including almost $50,000 from the trial lawyer-backed Texans for Insurance Reform
• Bill Zedler, the weak Republican incumbent who represents a district in suburban Tarrant County, socked away almost $600,000 the past 30 days, compared to opponent Chris Turner’s $274,000. Who in this crappy economy has that sort of money? Craddick’s Stars Over Texas PAC gave Zedler $200,000. Texans for Lawsuit Reform spent $129,000. In the small-donation department, the Texas Funeral Directors Associations PAC, in lieu of flowers, donated $500 to save Zedler from political death.
• Until now, Republican Ken Legler had anemic fundraising numbers. But today he posted a cool $338,839 in the past month to Democratic opponent Joel Redmond’s $278,652. James Leininger pumped in $25,000. Bob Perry, $18,000. Craddick’s Stars Over Texas PAC chipped in $45,000. Texans for Lawsuit Reform spent $90,000. Empower Texans PAC unloaded almost $81,000 to buy Legler TV ads and direct mail pieces, the latter of which are arguably racist.
• Republican Tim Kleinschmidt posts some big numbers against Democrat Donnie Dippel in the District 17 race. Kleinschmidt hauled in $513,580 this month vs. Dippel’s $323,462. Bob Perry gave $60,000. Stars Over Texas PAC donated an eye-popping $110,000.

Bottom-line: With one week to go, big money is coming to the Republicans’ rescue. Democrats had fund-raising bragging rights for most of this year, exceeding the Republicans in many key races. That lead is evaporating. Whether that will make the ultimate difference is impossible to know. Money doesn’t win campaigns by itself, but it sure helps.

As we pointed out last week, Texas Democrats have done a hell of a job raising money this year. Harvey Kronberg of Quorum Report (subscription only) does the math: In 32 key races, Democrats have raised $3,425,132.45; Republicans, $2,735,865.64. But Dems shouldn’t break out the champagne just yet. Kronberg checks in with sober GOP insiders.

The conventional wisdom, of course, is that the big money guys on the GOP side will eventually ride to the rescue. Craddick can always put his thumb on the scale by dispatching some of his nearly $3 million campaign war chest to his Stars Over Texas PAC. Texans for Lawsuit Reform, which gives money to both sides but tends to lean toward GOP candidates, has more than $2.5 million in the bank for a final stretch run. And Bob Perry has shown he has an almost unlimited willingness to put money into Republican races and causes.

As one GOP consultant put it, the 30-day report doesn’t tell the story. The 8-day report is where the story is. He acknowledged that Democrats have put up strong candidates, singling out Diana Maldonado in HD 52, but “I’m not crying in my beer over the reports.”

Translation: The GOP — as in previous elections — will drop a lot of last-minute money and advertising into key races. Those efforts won’t be publicly known until the last round of campaign finance reports, due eight days before the election.

The campaign finance reports for Texas candidates are rolling in today. There’s some bad news for Republicans, at least in the races we’ve looked at so far. Here’s our snap analysis (for background on the races, go here):

House District 52, Diana Maldonado-Bryan Daniel

Democrat Diana Maldonado, who’s running for an open seat in Republican-leaning Williamson County, is absolutely killing her opponent Bryan Daniel. The “kid bloggers” at the Burnt Orange Report are psyched. Between July and October, she pulled in a little over $227,000. Daniel raised only about $85,000. But here’s the really interesting part: Maldonado has about $278,000 left in the bank; Daniel has a paltry $19,000.

Where’s Tom Craddick? Where are the fat-cat donors and Big Business PACs?

Daniel’s only sizable donations come from Bob Perry, the check-writing homebuilder and swift boater, and Texans for Lawsuit Reform, the corporate-backed organization that pushes tort reform. Perry and his wife gave Daniel $30,000 while TLR chipped in about $17,000. Daniel is also getting some money from ag interests (he is an agricultural insurance executive) but overall his fundraising is weak. Not a good sign for him.

Maldonado has twice as many donors, and some big checks. Annie’s List, a PAC that supports women candidates, has spent more than $31,000 on Maldonado. Blue Texas PAC, $50,000. Oh, and here’s a sign that Maldonado has reach beyond her district: Don Henley - yes, that Don Henley - gave her $15,000. Austin filmmaker Richard Linklater (Slacker, Dazed and Confused, Waking Life) offered up $500.

House District 32, Juan Garcia-Todd Hunter

This is probably the most-watched, most expensive House race in the state. Freshman Democrat Garcia faces a tough re-election challenge from Democrat-turned-lobbyist-turned-Republican Todd Hunter. At least on the money front, Garcia is starting to pull away from Hunter. Between July and October, Garcia hauled in almost $354,000 while Hunter took in about $187,00. If you take Bob Perry out of the equation — he gave $80,000 — Hunter had a pretty bad run of it. The key figure, though, is this: Garcia spent more than $554,000 to Hunter’s $173,000.

For a lobbyist, Hunter hasn’t done a great job of calling on his friends it seems. There’s a smattering of uranium mining, banking, and oil donations in the report, but not a whole lot of four- and five-figure sums. After all, Hunter has been sticking his neck out defending their profession.

Garcia, on the other hand, is benefiting from the largess of some very generous PACs: Parent PAC ($75,000); Texas 2020 PAC ($60,000); Vote Texas PAC ($10,434); Blue Texas PAC ($50,000); and Border Health PAC ($5,000). Garcia campaign manager Christian Archer said another big fundraiser is planned at the home of grocery magnate Charles Butt (of the HEB stores) on October 15th.

Presumably, this is a race that Craddick and the boys would like to win. Unseating Garcia would give them a net two seat gain in the House. Archer says the other side has been strangely low-key. “We’ve been prepared for a gunfight,” he said. “We showed up with a howitzer ready to go but we haven’t seen much coming back yet.”

Maybe the calvalry is on its way.

House District 85, Isaac Castro-Joe Heflin

The Republican candidate in 2006 raised $800,000 (three times more than Joe Heflin) but still got beat in what should be a GOP district. So far it looks like the big money is shying away from Castro. He raised just $34,000 between July and October, and 60 percent of that amount came from Texans for Lawsuit Reform. (You can understand why TLR would have a crush on Castro — he’s calling for an end to “frivolous lawsuits,” including the two pending against him.) Heflin raised about $66,000 and three times as much money on hand as Castro. Again, not a good scenario for the Republican 30 days from the election.

House District 144, Joel Redmond-Ken Legler

File this one in the possible sleeper department. The district, vacated by Republican Robert Talton who ran unsuccessfully for Congress, is 58 percent Republican, according to Dana Chiodo’s Texas Candidates. That makes for a steep climb, but Democrat Joel Redmond, who comes from a prominent family of Baptist preachers, is besting Legler on the finance front. Redmond reports raising $137,000 with $90,000 still in the bank. Legler took in only $45,000 and has $14,000 on hand.This is the second reporting cycle in which Redmond has done far better than his opponent. In May, Redmond said he expected to be outspent 2-1.

One final thought: where’s the good doctor,  James Leininger, the right-wing multimillionaire who would finance a ferret if it supported private school vouchers? He was active in the primaries but seems to be AWOL so far in the general. Could Leininger be sitting this “change” election out? A Leininger spokesman told the Lubbock paper that he would “be more modest this cycle.”

Of course, there’s still time for large last-minute contributions to make a difference. And in recent elections, major donors have funneled money into PACs with generic sounding names — like the Texas Opportunity PAC — that dropped last-minute attack ads in key districts. Stay tuned.