March 2nd, 2022 – Second Reading Podcast

March 2nd, 2022 – Second Reading Podcast
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[00:00:00] Jim Henson: Welcome to the second reading podcast from the university of Texas at Austin, the Republicans were in the democratic party because there was only one part. So I tell people on a regular basis, there is still a land of opportunity in America. It’s called the problem is these departures from the constitution.

[00:00:22] They have become the norm at what. Must’ve female Senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over the male colleagues in the room. And welcome to the second reading podcast. I’m Jim Henson, director of the Texas politics project at the university of Texas at Austin. Did join again today by Josh blank research director of the very same Texas politics project.

[00:00:46] Josh get enough sleep last night.

[00:00:49] Josh Blank: I mean, do you have I have I have kids? Do I ever, I don’t know. I mean,

[00:00:53] Jim Henson: I’m going to take that maybe as a no, no.

[00:00:55] Josh Blank: Yeah. I mean, the thing is even when I sleep in normal light, I’m not sure if it’s enough for now.

[00:00:59] Jim Henson: Well, that’s a general health question, I guess. Yeah. Late night for a lot of people last night and, and early morning came pretty quick.

[00:01:08] I felt like, but, um, I think I was talking to somebody at box at 11. 40

[00:01:14] Josh Blank: 11 45. And then at what time in the morning,

[00:01:18] Jim Henson: and then, you know, it stayed up for a while after that, I think, but feel very bright eyed and bushy. Because it was Texas primary night. Uh, we were, we’re recording this on Wednesday morning and as we’re recording this, uh, most of the races are settled.

[00:01:34] They’re still counting some votes in Harris county and possibly a couple of other places. I didn’t care as county is kind of a, the big. So some of this is going to be very hot Taiki. I mean, I, you know, it was just talking to another reporter on the phone this morning, who, I can’t remember what the question was, but I think it was about mail-in ballots.

[00:01:53] And I was like, yeah, I just have not looked at that yet. Yeah, no. So, you know, there’s a lot yet to be digested. In terms of trying to keep track of this and get some sleep and do some semblance of our day job. But nonetheless, you know, we’re going to go through and do some first takes on this and try to start thinking about, you know, what happened last night and what some of the implications are out of the Texas primary.

[00:02:21] Well, let’s get the big one out of the way first at the top. And there’s, I w arguably there’s a couple of big ones, but you know, we’ll start at the top of the ballot. So Greg Abbott had it, you know what? I would classify as a pretty impressive victory last night, wound up with. About two thirds of the vote.

[00:02:37] I think the last number I saw with Houston still counting, who knows, but, you know, 66 point something I think was the last one I saw. And I think, I think it was high enough to round up. So we’re going to say two thirds and I actually

[00:02:49] Josh Blank: have 66.6 written down. Well, there

[00:02:51] Jim Henson: you go. So that’s the round. That’s a legitimate Roundup.

[00:02:55] It’s not even a five, you know, uh, With Western Huffines very close, but Western second place. Right. But between them, what about 25, 20 5% of the bullets in a quarter of the bat, let’s start with that because you know, I, and this is a number I should already have in front of me. I kept meaning to look up and I went to the browser three or four times.

[00:03:16] I mean, it’s probably open in three different tabs and I just didn’t find it. But, you know, I was thinking about the question that we asked. About whether the Republican party is too conservative, conservative enough or not conservative enough. Right. And it seems to me as per my recall that 25% is not too far off what we get for not conservative enough among Republicans.

[00:03:42] It’s probably a little bit higher.

[00:03:43] Josh Blank: Yeah. I would say it’s

[00:03:44] Jim Henson: somewhere in there. Maybe 30, maybe it’s in the low thirties.

[00:03:47] Josh Blank: Yeah. I don’t think it’s more than a third though. Right, right, right.

[00:03:51] Jim Henson: And. So that makes me look at this race in kind of go. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I mean, you know, been working on the joke for months about Don Huffines, which now that he’s come in third place, we’ll just, I’m just going to tell, which is, you know, you know, Greg Abbott moved so far to the right, that not even little, there wasn’t even room for a little Don Huffines to fit in there trying to run to the right of Greg Abbott and, um, You know, what can you say?

[00:04:19] I mean, I think that, as we’ve said on this podcast, numerous times, Greg, Abbott’s been preparing for this race, uh, looking like this, you know, Greg Abbott and we should say, and his team, I think, you know, the, uh, Dave Carney’s been sort of present directly and indirectly on Twitter taking some victory laps, you know, why not?

[00:04:40] You get, you know, you get what you earn know. He earned that. Um, You know, Greg Abbott’s moves steadily to the right and didn’t leave much room for people to really, you know, critique him on whether he was conservative enough.

[00:04:56] Josh Blank: Yeah. I mean, I think at this point, really, the only question is going to be, as he moved too far to the right, for some voters going to the general election.

[00:05:02] I mean, I think that the late sort of surge in attention to, you know, transgender students is probably, you know, it’s.

[00:05:11] Jim Henson: Well, cause they cause they branched out. It’s more, it’s more than transgender students now.

[00:05:16] Josh Blank: Right. It’s transgender everybody. I mean, in a lot of it was mostly

[00:05:18] Jim Henson: kids. I mean, well, it’s transgender.

[00:05:20] Yeah. Just, just so we’re not too flip about this. I mean, you know, the attorney general issued an opinion, which does not have the force of law per se, should underline, and you know, this would be a good transition to the attorney General’s race, perhaps. Um, in terms of the politics of that, um, You know, which classified parents who support and provide medical support for transgender kids as liable, open to investigations for child abuse broadly put.

[00:05:51] A move seen by many people, probably not a lot of Republican primary voters, which is kind of the point we’re making by, by many people as, um, very politically driven and lacking understanding of the actual, where we are in terms of the, the, the medical understanding of transgender kids and transgender identity.

[00:06:15] I think it’s a fair way of putting that. Sure. And so I, you know, to your point, I mean, the governor. Move to the right. Even in the very last week. Yeah. I mean,

[00:06:30] Josh Blank: the thing that’s striking to me, I guess in a way is, I mean, the, you know, it’s not, it’s not surprising that look, you know, campaigns follow an arc, they follow a timeline, you know, it’s not surprising to see the Christian.

[00:06:40] Come at the end as you’d expect it, as people are kind of going for their last gasp a challenge.

[00:06:45] Jim Henson: Yeah. Well, that’s the swirl.

[00:06:48] Josh Blank: Well, careful. Um, but you know, I mean, to the extent that, you know, it was odd. I mean, I would say this, given that Abbott had spent. The better part of the last year, shoring up his right flank and make basically creating no room for anybody.

[00:07:02] It’s amazing that even going to the final weeks, there was still the need to continue to push this to the last possible issue, right. That was still being kind of hung on to. But nonetheless, you know, I think what people are going to take away from this is, you know, Abbott still maintains his holder of the party.

[00:07:19] He still has this humongous financial advantage, which is part of that. He still got, you know, two thirds of the Republican primary electorate with, you know, you know, serious, certainly the most serious challenges he’s faced. And, you know, he’s, I think they’re all gonna feel pretty good about this. Right.

[00:07:33] And

[00:07:33] Jim Henson: it was also in the ballpark. I mean, just under what we’ve been getting for his approval. Yeah. And I think that’s, and that’s all

[00:07:39] Josh Blank: shit Republicans let’s say you’ll hire them. He was pulling it under his approval. And, and I think that’s right. And I’ve been saying to people in the last few days is I, you know, this is like, I hope that somebody else can find this somewhere else.

[00:07:47] If you actually care enough because saying it now feels disingenuous, but I expect him to over-perform his polling results live it because his job approval was so high. And even though there may be voters who are flirting with an alternative, or maybe you just weren’t entirely sure yet a lot of the Republican voters were gonna come to the booth.

[00:08:01] They’re going to see their. Who they approve of how he’s doing. They can think of some policies that he’s promoted, that they’re very happy with. And ultimately. You know, why, why change course then

[00:08:11] Jim Henson: in a sense that ultimately kind of explains the, you know, keeping your foot on the gas in the last week in terms of the conservative messaging, right?

[00:08:19] That if you’re, you’re thinking that, you know, you’ve got, you’ve got poll numbers that are showing, uh, between a quarter and a third of Republicans flirting with another candidate and the candidates they’re flirting with over the right. It makes sense to. There are some messaging out there and the, you know, very high profile message.

[00:08:39] I mean, the, the policy move on transgender kids was a, was a national story. Right. And so, uh, so I guess briefly on the Democrats, I, you know, zero surprise on the democratic side, better O’Rourke last I saw a 91 point something percent 91.3. Yeah. So, you know, Uh, there was a great thing on CNN late last night, which I, I put on Twitter.

[00:09:07] Late and probably a sign that it was late, where they came in late with a breaking news that the Texas governor’s race had been decided, you know, the candidates had been decided and they had, you know, better O’Rourke democratic side, defeats joy ideas. You know, that’s pretty good for joy Diaz who, you know, lost by 80 something precisely.

[00:09:30] That’s great. It’s a pretty good hit, um, circumstances, uh, you know, and it, it had a Abbott defeating Alan West, you know, by not 80 points. You know, 50 plenty. Right? So, you know, appreciate the context CNN, but you know, may be some numbers on there next time, not to be a stickler about labeling graphics or anything.

[00:09:54] Um, now let’s go to the AGS race, uh, Lieutenant governor’s race, uh, you know, w we’ll hit on the way just to do this, uh, in order Dan Patrick cruises to an easy victory, zero, zero surprise. There. Um, you know, not quite as, as monumental of victories, Greg Abbott’s, but still pretty good. Um, a little more complicated on the, on the democratic.

[00:10:20] Yeah. I mean,

[00:10:20] Josh Blank: we knew going into this, that the, you know, if we were to report polling is, you know, and in a really dry way, when we did our polling for the primary and Lieutenant governor ag race on the democratic side, you know, haven’t thought about it enough would have won. Right. And so what you find is, you know, kind of what we’d expect you.

[00:10:36] I mean, I think we expect a Collier to be in the lead because he’s run statewide the last two election cycles. So the very least there are a lot of Democrats who have voted for my collar before. And that is, that means something, I mean, for sure, uh, you know, It’s interesting in the sense that I do think that there is some aspect to this where when you’d send a Democrat into the voting booth and they don’t know anything about any of the candidates.

[00:10:58] I think a lot of the, you know, not to downplay the quality of the other candidates in this race, but you know, these sort of other things that voters can hang on to you matter whether the candidate sounds like. A white man versus sounds like a Hispanic woman or a woman or someone of, you know, some racial or ethnic background that is not Anglo, that can, that can help in, uh, you know, in a democratic primary that’s low, that’s low turnout.

[00:11:21] That’s kind of what, I mean, I don’t wanna say that’s what you see or, but ultimately, you know, Collier is always, you know, kind of try to punch a little bit above his weight, you know, in these races. Um, it’s been successful, pretty successful doing so, but ultimately it’s not enough to just vanquish the field obviously here and especially not in a democratic primary.

[00:11:38] Um, so you know, that there’s as quickly democratic ag side, it’s kind of a similar situation. I think of this, this case, this race had even less knowledge of who the candidates are and you know, here, Rochelle Garza again, good story. You know, I think there’ll be, or, you know, if she ends up claiming the nomination of the runoff would be a formidable candidate, but ultimately, you know, she was the one.

[00:11:58] Identifiable non-male non, uh, or let’s say clearly Hispanic non-Anglo person in the race. And I think that really helped her in addition to the F you know, whatever,

[00:12:08] Jim Henson: you know, clearly helped her a lot. I mean, the numbers in that race, I would say are, are interesting in. You know, I think your explanation is kind of what we get is what we have to go with.

[00:12:19] Say

[00:12:19] Josh Blank: we see directly in the poll and just to be honest. So when we

[00:12:21] Jim Henson: asked you was at the top of the pack in our poll and pretty

[00:12:23] Josh Blank: much every, but it was, and it was the way that she was though. So when we asked in our poll, we asked people first to give us a choice. And basically in the first round they could say, I don’t know.

[00:12:30] And we did that. Most people didn’t know,

[00:12:32] Jim Henson: just reminder our poll was. Very a couple of days at the end of January and the first, first week or so. A little more than that of February.

[00:12:40] Josh Blank: Yeah. So just before, early voting kicked off and, you know, and we asked basically about the AGSM race, essentially you get about, you know, 10 to 15% said Garza 10 to 15% of the Georgia ski, 10 to 15% said merit.

[00:12:51] And then he said, yeah, but if you had to make a choice and then Garza jumped to 41%, right. And George ski goes only to 24 heat gains about. 10 points, merit gains a couple and that’s where you, that’s why. So when we make that claim, you know, this is what this looks like. Well, this is kinda what it looks like is when the voters who had nothing to go on really went in on Garza, which is perfectly fine in a democratic primary, but that’s kind of why, I think we’re sort of anyone who wants to handicap what happens next

[00:13:15] Jim Henson: and she didn’t have like a huge

[00:13:17] Josh Blank: bank role.

[00:13:17] No, it wasn’t like she was

[00:13:18] Jim Henson: spending a bunch of money or there’s not a big external explanation for that. Top supplement that. Okay. That’s enough

[00:13:24] Josh Blank: Democrats. Let’s go. Let’s come back to the attorney. General’s race on the Republican side was really what everybody.

[00:13:29] Jim Henson: Yeah. The, you know, the arguably the more key race, you know, in a lot of ways, I mean, obviously below the governor, cause it’s so consequential, but you know, so on the Republican side, um, the, the, the, the question that everybody has been going back and forth on answered Ken Paxton in a runoff.

[00:13:46] Uh, finished with, you know, just under 43% of the boat. 42.7. Last number I saw George P. Bush at 20 in second at 22.8, Evan Guzman at 17 and a half. And then Louie Gohmert at 17. I am guessing Louie Gohmert will not be getting Christmas cards from the Paxton family this year

[00:14:08] Josh Blank: now. Well, you know, Gilbert was the only other, I think I don’t, I’m not sure.

[00:14:10] I think. Every district besides, or every county besides maybe wa Guzman may have won one, but, but Gomer one, most of the counties around his congressional. Yeah. There was a band in east

[00:14:21] Jim Henson: Texas counties there that really stick out on the map, which makes sure and, and, and, you know, underlines, you know, the big story in this race three weeks ago, or so was the Paxton campaign focusing attack ads on Gohmert in his district.

[00:14:35] And in that region, that strategy was. Apparently well conceived, but also equally, apparently did not work.

[00:14:47] Josh Blank: You know, this is like one of these things we have to at least drop one social science term. Every podcast. I think so the one I’m in Jesus’ time is overdetermined. Right. You know, I think Paxton’s position in this race was sort of overdetermined.

[00:14:59] I mean, he was fighting front. You had fights on multiple fronts here, and you could say that, I think, you know, we could go, we were talking about PAX and really going after Gohmert and, and it was obvious, I think in some ways that Gomer wasn’t going to make it into the runoff, but government was going to siphon votes away from PACS in a way that’s not going to force him into a run off.

[00:15:13] Later in the race, kind of in the, really in the Latin, the dine hours, you saw almost, you saw a lot of the candidates pilot on Guzman, all of a sudden. And my, my sort of explanation of this, I think is that, you know, Paxton certainly has a lot of vantages. He has a great connection with the Republican primary electorate that basically cultivated this.

[00:15:28] However, he has a lot of legal problems, the reason they’re three cans and race, and ultimately all the criticisms he is facing eventually are going to break through, at least to some of these people. Now, if you’re one of these people, who’s super conservative, even alternative. And Gohmert right. If you’re one of the people who basically is.

[00:15:43] I like to say a modal Republican voter here, and you’re not necessarily looking to go to a Gohmert and then you’re thinking, well, Bush or Guzman, as we’ve already talked on this podcast before bushes legacy and Brandon Hogan party, it’s kind of, it’s mixed at this point has a lot of baggage and Guzman was starting to look pretty good to a lot of people.

[00:15:59] I think given her, her background, her resume, her credentials,

[00:16:02] Jim Henson: she had money and she was raising a lot of money. She’d get endorsed

[00:16:06] Josh Blank: advertising. It should tell our behind her. Yeah. And so ultimately I think, you know, what was probably happening the leaning days that some of these voters were struggling finally hearing the, the loud noise about why you should be concerned about Paxton and they were looking for alternatives.

[00:16:18] I think that’s where Guzman was starting to maybe getting some traction at which point, then everybody kind of piled on her because I was including PACS. And because ultimately I’m passing, I’d rather face Bush than Guzman, I

[00:16:27] Jim Henson: think. Yeah. No, I think that was, I mean, They seem to be preparing for this race.

[00:16:33] I mean, I guess I kind of parsed it a little, I mean, not. Yeah, it seemed to me, most of the piling on, on Guzman was coming from George P. Bush. And I, you know, I kind of said this briefly to somebody I’m some media hit recently and I didn’t get to elaborate it. So now I can, which is in some ways there were like two races going on here.

[00:16:51] Right? There’s the Paxton Gohmert dynamic in which, you know, the Paxson campaign has to be figuring that any votes they can drive away from GeMar will probably. More likely to come back to them in terms of the logic of the voter that says, okay, I maybe Ken Paxton, isn’t the guy anymore because of these problems.

[00:17:13] If I, if you want to go to the right, you’re going to go to Louie, Gohmert the obvious default, but then there was a secondary race within that race between Bush and Guzman. Now. Make this to stark. I mean, yeah, but clearly, you know, and you saw it in the numbers and particularly in the, you know, in the early hours of the returns, you know, that Guzman, Bush race in the middle for the race for second was, was very close for much of that.

[00:17:40] That was

[00:17:40] Josh Blank: like the best part about last night. In some ways there were a number of races where you were watching two things at the same time, you’re saying as a person, you know, in first place currently get over the threshold, but then you look below that and it wasn’t like, because if they don’t, they’re facing this person, like no, if you look below that there are two people sitting here fighting it out for a second place is actually made the night a little bit more interesting than I think it normally

[00:17:58] Jim Henson: would have been.

[00:17:59] And I, and I have to say, I, you know, I have a feeling. I know what you’re going to say, but we’ll see. I’m a little surprised that it was the bushes that did so well on this race. Um, I was pretty skeptical, you know, a year ago. Yeah. I mean, I’ll just admit it. I mean, I was giving a talk somewhere at the very, very beginning of all this and was talking about how this race it was shaping up.

[00:18:24] And I, I couldn’t remember for a minute. I couldn’t remember bushes name now. That was just a cognitive tell. But I, you know, I mean, I think, and I’m not sure this is definitive yet, but certainly the. The Bush brand may not have been quite as expired as I thought it was, but I mean, 22.8%, isn’t running the table here, but I think this is it’s going to be a very interesting runoff.

[00:18:54] I mean, obviously, but in this narrow sense of. It’s one thing for George P. Bush to criticize Paxton, but be kind of running against Guzman with Paxton and for a lot of the race, most of the race, trying to lay low. And then when he kind of pops his head up, they’re focused on Gomer. So, you know, the rubber is gonna meet the road in this race.

[00:19:18] And I, to me, it’s a lot of people. I mean, it’s obviously very fascinating because you’ve got a couple of really big tests going on in terms of each of these candidate. I mean, a real heat test for Paxton. How many of these people will come, will come home? I mean, you know, and I, you know, I don’t know what you think.

[00:19:36] I mean, what did you think of Bush going into this? I mean,

[00:19:41] Josh Blank: um, I thought it was, I don’t want to say it was presumptuous on his part, you know, in the sense that.

[00:19:49] Jim Henson: It’s a relatively free country. You can do what he wants. He

[00:19:51] Josh Blank: can do what he wants. He has a lot of advantages. I mean, I think, you know, always the reason people run for office has always kind of idiosyncratic other than the fact that there are people telling them that they should definitely do it.

[00:20:00] Yeah. So that’s always the case. I mean, you know, the point that we saw, I really laid bare, you know, I think how complicated his standing is in Texas, you know, we look among, you know, there there’s says he was well much more well-known than. Most other candidates have a similar profile, save the Bush name right in the Bush bushes.

[00:20:18] That’s really what pushed him there. I think for the most part, but that didn’t, you know, lead to like overwhelmingly positive response. If anything, they were like notably mixed. And if anything, actually, you know, net negative amongst the most conservative elements of the party. Um, so, you know, I’m not necessarily certain.

[00:20:38] I mean, I think, you know, it’s easy to kind of look at this and say, okay, well now if we look at it this way, you’d say you’ve got the Bush and the Guzman vote. And then you’ve kind of got like some of the Paxton and the Gomer goat. And there’s some kind of like moving there, you’d say that advantage has passed and going forward.

[00:20:50] I’m not even really sure that Bush picks up the Guzman vote because again, because of that kind of, sort of, you know, the, the presence of sort of negative attitudes towards him of the party. And again, I want to say, like, it’s not his whole, but like, you know, he’s had a tough time, right? In terms of, you know, the hurricane Harvey recovery in terms of, you know, the Alamo, I mean, there’s just these issues.

[00:21:08] And if you don’t know what I mean, anyone who’s listening, this probably knows what I’m talking about, but if you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s say people in Republican primaries probably know what I’m

[00:21:15] Jim Henson: talking about. I don’t think. And I don’t, you know, and I think, you know, in Harris county where, you know, there are still a lot of Republican.

[00:21:24] Josh Blank: Yeah. And probably Republicans should be maybe a little bit more inclined towards a book. Maybe,

[00:21:29] Jim Henson: but for the Harvey thing, and I, you know, I think he’s pretty radioactive down there and you know, he’s got, you know, can he men fences down there? We’ll see what happens with the Paxton in the interim. I mean, the whole thing, you know, the, the sort of Damocles is still kind of hanging over Paxton.

[00:21:45] Josh Blank: Well, that’s the thing that’s funny about this. I mean, if you were to kind of like forget about the fact that it was George P. Bush and S you know, whatever, and just say, okay, you know, Paxton only got just under 43% of the vote of the primary game. He’s got a securities, you know, the securities, you know, fraud, indict, or the security indictment still hanging over him.

[00:22:00] He’s got the FBI investigation hanging over him. You know, what do you think is gonna happen? I say, you know, I don’t think going against George P. Bush at this point, given the fact that Gohmert got 17% of that vote, he’s in as much danger as maybe someone in a similar

[00:22:14] Jim Henson: though, I’m going to set this up and I just kinda, we just kinda went on, but there, you know, there’s kind of like on one hand you would look at this and kind of, you know, when.

[00:22:23] When an incumbent like Ken Paxton gets in a runoff, even setting aside his problems. You know, you take that as trouble. I mean, you know, most of the time incumbent, you know, not all of the time, but most of the time, if an incumbent gets in a runoff, you know, the, the incumbent loses. You know, it’s a sign of weakness, even if they start out ahead.

[00:22:41] Um, but as you lay out nicely, I think, but then on the other side, you know, there’s, uh, there’s the potential for a kind of, you know, emperor has no clothes moment for George P. Bush, given that, you know, there’s a lot of, I mean, the inside baseball on this race is that, you know, the Guzman in the.

[00:23:00] Candidacies in many ways. And not that it was all planned by six guys in the Exxon building or something, but that there was a certain sense of conscious disruption and in a sense, the derail packs that he drive them into a, into a runoff. Right. Um, you know, on the other hand, you know, on Paxton side, I mean, you know, setting aside for the moment, the reduction in turnout for a runoff, you know, which will probably be substantial.

[00:23:28] Um, if history is any guide, which had pretty good one in this, probably, uh, you know, how many of those Louie Gohmert vote voters are going to vote for George? Uh,

[00:23:40] Josh Blank: not many,

[00:23:42] Jim Henson: let’s say I let, let me get out my slide rule nanny.

[00:23:47] Josh Blank: Well, okay. It’s not zero, right?

[00:23:51] Jim Henson: How many of them will stay home? I mean, there’s a lot, you know, we don’t want to be overly simple, but there are two kind of big dynamics and that’s, you know, one of the reasons, obviously this race, uh, is so interesting, you know, I want to do something a little bit weird or not weird, but I want to.

[00:24:08] Go back a second. You know, you kind of ushered us on from the Democrats, but no, no, it’s okay. I, you know, fair enough. I mean, we do it all the time and you know, there is fair, but I do want to go back to the, to the democratic Lieutenant governor race for a second. Um, and to the Michelle Beckley factor in Michelle Beck Lee getting almost 300,000 votes in this primary 30.3%.

[00:24:37] And open it up, you know, without us having to dig into data that we probably haven’t looked at super closely at in terms of congressional and, and house races. And maybe that’s what we’ll do next week. You know, we’ll, we’ll do some more counting between now and then. Um, but we’re going to touch on it, you know, but I mean, So I want to do is, um, hold Michelle Beckley, like right out here and I’m in a, we’re in a podcast, we’re in an audio video.

[00:25:04] What I’m doing is I’m dangling my arm out. Like I’m dangling something out here between Josh and I. I’m going to dangle, just hold them. Michelle Beckley within view here. And then talk about what happened in the congressional races involving Greg Casar and Eddie Rodriguez and the queer Cisneros race.

[00:25:25] Right. So you know where I’m going here. I mean, and, and I’ve already been asked about this and it’s going to be one of the major sub themes coming out of this election, which is, you know, how do we understand. The progressive, the, you know, I think in an email to you or something or some notes or something, I said barbaric as, as a PA, as a, as a professor once wrote on my paper a long time, long time ago, it’s a barbaric neologism, but we’ll call it like the Neo progressives versus the progressives in the democratic party.

[00:26:00] Right. Um, cause I think you ha I, I, to me, I just can’t help, but think of Beckley in that. In that overall frame, because that’s certainly the, you know, the faction she’s associated with in the Texas house, she was very progressive member younger. And in that kind of left end of the democratic legislative delegation.

[00:26:27] You know, obviously Greg Casar, uh, there’s no other way to, to, you know, to say it, he crushed Eddie Rodriguez in that congressional race and

[00:26:36] Josh Blank: I’ll, and I’ll just, just, you know, at Eddie Rodriguez C you know, big open primary, he got the replacement, was the person endorsed by the AFL CIO. Yeah. So he just, you know, it was like, and again, yeah,

[00:26:45] Jim Henson: it’s, it’s complicated and that’s kinda where I’m going.

[00:26:47] That’s kinda where I’m going. And then, you know, in, in probably the more key congressional race, um, Henry Clay are, and Jessica Cisneros are going into a runoff, it looks like,

[00:27:00] Josh Blank: I mean, I think the last time I checked the site, no, it keeps queers at like 49.9, 8%

[00:27:06] Jim Henson: looking behind file cabinets. Whoa,

[00:27:07] Josh Blank: buddy. Take it away, make it easier

[00:27:11] Jim Henson: to initiate.

[00:27:14] You know, there’s a Ross Ramsey reminded me of a funny story that literally in an earlier quasar, when many years ago involved votes being found, at least the story is behind a file cabinet. So I’m not making that up out of whole cloth. I’m blaming now. I’m, I’m totally blame it on Ross. Um, perfect. But nonetheless, I mean, You know that race, there was a lot of talk about watching things on election night.

[00:27:36] There was a lot of movement in that race, you know, Cisneros was over 50% for awhile, barely. Um, and then, you know, the, the counties that were likely, you know, on the Southern end of that district were likely to be, you know, favorable, declare reported very late. Um, you know, there were no votes from Starr county, like 11 o’clock, you

[00:27:58] Josh Blank: know, there’s a couple, there’s a couple of different things going on here at once and trying to disentangle them as difficult.

[00:28:03] I mean, I think the going, you know, I know we’re hanging Beckley out here for a second. I mean, you know, I’d say, well,

[00:28:08] Jim Henson: we can bring her back Saturday. Let’s hang there for so long. You

[00:28:11] Josh Blank: know, it’s one of those, just say I started. You know, in the sense that having that kind of profile clearly helps in a democratic primary Texas.

[00:28:18] I mean, that’s the broad point here in some ways, it certainly is not, it’s not clear that it’s, it hurts. And I would say, and you can say that in some ways, because you’re seeing it in a couple, you know, different parts of the state, certainly around the earth, except for, I mean, the queer Cisneros. And I just think that’s the one I want to dangle out and set aside, actually,

[00:28:34] Jim Henson: you know, I mean, I’ll, I’ll say this.

[00:28:35] I mean, I’ve been admonishing reporters all week, so I don’t want to do I do what they were doing, what I’m telling them not to do, which is if you look, I think, yeah, Building on what you’re saying, you know, the, those two congressional races had very strong dynamics, all their own having to do with the regional geographic specifics of those districts, the way those districts were drawing on the demographics of the different of the district.

[00:28:57] So you don’t want to go too far, but I think the Beckley success actually does add a different,

[00:29:07] Josh Blank: the only thing I would, I would handicap that on is I think, you know, with Beckley, you also see some of the similar. Dynamics, we were talking about the age race. So again, when we asked again, you know, who do you support in this race?

[00:29:17] Among the democratic primary voters Collier was way out in front of the initial question, 26%, 57%. They had said, I don’t know, call your 26, Beckley seven, Braylee seven. And then when we said, okay, but if you had to make a choice, Kali or almost, you know, gets another 20 points and goes up to 46, Beckley gets another 20 points and goes up to 27 and Braylee ends up adding, you know, 16 points.

[00:29:39] So there’s, I know this is not to say that it’s one or the. But it’s a mixture of factors going on here. Um, you know, it’s tough because on the one hand, I mean, we’ve been looking at the, you know, we look at the electorates, I’m pretty confident that, you know, the data that we have that looks at sort of the pride of the different primary electorates and their composition.

[00:29:55] You know, one of the main kind of takeaways from that is that the Republican primary electorate in Texas is not that different from the overall Republican electorate, especially ideologically the democratic electorate in text primary electric. I would say significantly more liberal than the democratic electorate overall.

[00:30:10] Right. And it’s also significantly wider and those things are related in

[00:30:13] Jim Henson: ways that are kind of a bunch of that data podcasts last

[00:30:16] Josh Blank: week. So that’s all up. And so, you know, on the one hand, I don’t want to over-interpret it, because I think th th th the outside story looking it is, oh, you know, the, the Neo progressive, progressive ascendance something.

[00:30:27] Right. And it’s like, yeah, but the Texas squad, but I, but I’d say, you know, okay, fine. But like, let’s wait and see. I mean, ultimately, you know, you can kind of look around and say, yeah, I mean, but like where our progress is really on the March and also like, what is it like produced not to say, and I’m not trying to do like a whole, you know, Hillary Clinton, Martin Luther, king LBJ kind of like weirdo, like, you know, who’s doing what and who gets credit for what kind of thing.

[00:30:51] But I mean, to the extent that like there’s has been this desire to look for where progressives are knocking off incumbents, You know, I don’t know that Texas is really the best example. And then we go to the quasar Cisneros race is sort of the, yeah, but what about this? And I say, yeah, but choir is also one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress.

[00:31:08] He himself is actually kind of the outlier

[00:31:10] Jim Henson: here. Yeah. That race is almost, you know, I mean, it’s a caricature of, I mean, people want to take it as the epitome of the conflict, but it’s actually almost a caricature of the conflict because, you know, as we both said to people over and over again, queers, not only like the.

[00:31:24] Conservative or least liberal, if you will. I’m a member of the Texas delegation. He’s one of the most conservative of the entire democratic democratic delegation in the whole

[00:31:36] Josh Blank: Congress. Right. So, you know, and the thing about the mid, maybe what makes us us narrows challenge powerful in some ways it’s not even so much for progressivism, but that it creates a clear contrast.

[00:31:45] I mean, in essence, you know, how would you run in that district and say, no, you’d be better off. You know, it’s sort of a more modal Democrat to require, even though like the park is named after him and you know, all this stuff that

[00:31:56] Jim Henson: he brings back to the we’ll be fair that, you know, I mean, he has been a good member for that district.

[00:32:00] I mean, I don’t want that to be lost at all. No. And I think,

[00:32:03] Josh Blank: and I think that’s the thing, I mean, so on the one hand you look at Cisneros and you say like, oh man. But like, you know, she’s been running for three years. Like, I mean, she should, and she should do well, but also the fact that are with his organization, with his name ID, Presence at the district, but the fact that there are other quasars and other elected position that has been, you know, throughout, and he still could not get over the line.

[00:32:24] It shows to some degree, you know, just his vulnerability and the fact that, you know, it’s not so much,

[00:32:28] Jim Henson: you know, he had a pretty rough couple of weeks were pretty cut,

[00:32:30] Josh Blank: rough, couple of. But that’s exactly,

[00:32:32] Jim Henson: that’d be, I rated his house investigation. He, you know, I think he’s not under invested or nobody said he was under investigation, but an investigation that did entail going to his house and getting some

[00:32:43] Josh Blank: files you were to say to me, list your reasons in order of why quasars and a runoff, right.

[00:32:49] Number one would probably be, you know, well, he’s a pretty idiosyncratic Democrat number two would probably be, well, there’s an FBI investigation. And June the Canada came late in the campaign. Number three would be he’s facing a challenge or who’s actually been running consistently has a good number organization.

[00:33:03] I don’t think on that list. Yeah. I don’t think, you know, I’m not sure if even at number four, I would say well, because you know, progressivism is on the rise in Texas, right. That’s kind of down the list for me at least. Yeah. I mean,

[00:33:17] Jim Henson: I, you know, I mean, and I think this kind of speaks to conversation we were having before we came on about one of the Republican races.

[00:33:25] You know, as I stepped back and kind of, you know, begin to think about the big picture of this, I need to look closer and see, you have a couple more things settle, you know, you gotta. Active environments within both of these parties. Yeah. In terms, you know, that there was evidence in this, you know, and part of this is, I think I said, saw an exchange you were having on Twitter, a comment you made on Twitter.

[00:33:50] You know, part of this is, you know, inevitable after a reset in redistricting, right. People kind of line. You know, there’s a, there’s a clarity that came from this kind of a redistrict, this kind of map

[00:34:00] Josh Blank: drawing reorients, you know, candidates right. To the district and to the voters.

[00:34:05] Jim Henson: And that’s going to be every, you know, there are, there are a lot of runoffs, you know, there’s a lot of Republican runoffs, there’s fewer, but still, you know, a decent amount of democratic runoffs.

[00:34:15] Um, certainly at the top of the ticket, but also in legislative seats and, and in congressional seats. And we’ll dig more into that next week, but, um, You know, this was, this was a very active primary and in the end, and I, you know, it’s funny because going into this, you know, it looked kind of boring. It

[00:34:37] Josh Blank: did I’m

[00:34:38] Jim Henson: really.

[00:34:38] And then it was kind of, you know, it was kind of, you know, there was some drama last night now, you know, it wasn’t a political, I mean, you don’t look at this and go, wow, what a political earthquake. But, you know, there is a narrative about, you know, both parties are kind of working out their issues and, and they look, and, and they’re looking differently.

[00:34:55] And I think you kinda, you know, you kind of hit at it when you, you talked about the, um, You know, the different kind of ideological profiles in each party and the narratives in each part of your kind of interesting. So in the democratic party where, you know, progressivism may not be on the March per se.

[00:35:17] And I w I would be careful about that, but the democratic party in Texas is definitely. Internalizing the conflict and the direction of the national party. And it’s having an effect. Now, Texas is different as we well know in among Democrats than the national party always has been, you know, but it does raise the question of, well, will it always be, you know, uh, how, how far is this kind of.

[00:35:47] You know, incorporation of, or, you know, this, this kind of engagement of the, of the state party with the national dynamics. How far will that go? What are the, you know, and that’s a question for another time, whereas as you and I were talking earlier, you know, before we got on here and the Republican party, That’s already kind of happened.

[00:36:07] Right. And so, you know, in, in, in, in empirical terms, you know, we’ve seen that in what we talked, we see that in what we’ve talked about in here, that, you know, the number of, of, of Republicans that identify as conservative, the share of Republicans that identify as conservative. Much higher than the share of, of Democrats to identify as liberal and much lower number of, you know, much, fewer or a much lower share of Republicans identifies moderate than do Democrats different.

[00:36:35] You know, the sorting process looks different in each of those parties. And I think one of the things that we’re seeing, and one of the explanations that you know, is a different way of like saying what we were saying about the Abbott thing earlier is that, you know, the Republican. Party and particularly, you know, Greg Abbott at the top is the most visible Republican is meeting the market in a very conservative, you know, out, you know, in some cases, frankly, reactionary Republican party.

[00:37:02] And that’s why. You know, you’re not no one, you know, we’re not saying, Hey, are the reactionaries on the March? Like, no, they marched in years ago. And they kind of, you know, they’ve, they’ve had their influence and they’re having their influence and that’s kind of done there’s no to March, right? I mean, you know, other than behind Greg Abbott, right at this point and the dynamic of the democratic party is different.

[00:37:25] Josh Blank: And should we talk about some, just, are there any, like, you know, down-ballot races, we just want to throw a hand wave that because it was interesting or a surprise. Do you want to

[00:37:33] Jim Henson: save that for another time? Well, we can save it. I mean, I, you know, very insider kind of stuff, I guess. I mean, Um, you know, I kept going on about this and he won, but the Stuckey race, I think that was one of the things that was on nobody’s list.

[00:37:47] I agree with that. Right. I mean, it wasn’t on our list and I, you know, I, you know, I don’t think anybody was going, Hey, you know, represent. And that was very close. It looks like I last, I saw, what did we say he won was just barely over 50% in that house race. Um, You know, I think that for the most part, and I, you know, this is quarter of Caribbean and we started this a little bit.

[00:38:09] This is not so much race, but I mean, I think Dan Patrick pretty much got what he wanted. You know, Dan Patrick comes out of this with a Senate that will continue the trend of being relatively subservient, uh, to Dan Patrick, and even more so, given who we saw winning the race in those races as expected.

[00:38:28] You know, the other race, obviously that we talked about here, everybody was talking about that, you know, was significant as it, Ryan Guian avoided a runoff. Uh, again, changed parties to the Republican party, heavily invested in by Greg Abbott and, and Dade felon and you know, a lot of Republican establishment figures, um, but faced a lot of opponents, including some, some.

[00:38:52] Spawn, you know, funded by the what, what is the Stickland thing called us? There’s something from Texas Liberty, Texas Liberty pack, the, uh, you know, next gen empower taxes, the rebranded empower Texan thing. Um, you know, So, I mean, I think those things we noticed, I think, you know, GN avoiding a runoff is big.

[00:39:13] And I think he was worried about 53 60 there. So, you know, that’s, that’s a, that’s a big one for them. It’s a, it’s a big win, you know, a lot of times, you know, we go, ah, big win and what it really is a huge sigh of relief. It would have been a huge loss. How about you? Anything else? I mean, I took, I took some low-hanging fruit there.

[00:39:30] Josh Blank: I mean a couple of things, you know, I think a lot of people were, at least were talking to me before. About, you know, how, how Ken Paxton’s performance is, or is not a reflection of Trump’s endorsement or what it says about it. And to me, that’s always a bad comparison. It’s too much. We already discussed there’s too much other stuff going on in that race.

[00:39:47] I think a better race was, uh, uh, the van Taylor, uh, Race and C3. He wasn’t able to get, uh, north of 50%. And I think for, you know, look it’s in the house in the Senate, remember that originally had a good amount of money under normal circumstances. There’s no reason this guy should be in a runoff, but he was one of the few Republicans not to receive an, a Trump endorsement after basically acknowledging the Joe Biden had won the election.

[00:40:10] And so I think that’s where you see, you know, Some of the axes of conflict. You see someone who’s really should probably be safe,

[00:40:16] Jim Henson: not, yeah, there’s a funky irony in that race. And that, you know, that district went from was something like, you know, Trump plus three or two or three or something like that to Trump 12 or Trump 14.

[00:40:28] And

[00:40:28] then

[00:40:28] Josh Blank: you just, you know, it was basically a split district, 2020, and now it’s harder for them. And now it’s yeah. Now it’s plus 15 and then the other one, I’d say, you know, I’m, I’m a little surprised about, uh, Pete flora. I mean, as far as I can tell, like that district was drawn for him to get in the race, he had the endorsement of everybody, he had everybody’s resources and he still is in a runoff.

[00:40:47] I mean that, again, there’s the game is kind of the big version of that. I mean, I think for Republicans, you have to show like, Hey, look, if you’re a democratic, uh, Hispanic Democrat in the valley and you feel like the party’s moving, you have a home with us and we just show you that we’re going to support you.

[00:40:58] That’s why that race was so important before, as, I mean, it almost seems like a foregone conclusion. This guy was running back in. Remember, I mean, someone else was going to run that seat. She got out because it was drawn for him. And then it still didn’t kind of work out. So that’s just sort of one of those that I just thought was kind of curious, funny, and I’m sure somebody could tell me why, who knows more about the specifics?

[00:41:16] Jim Henson: Well, speaking of somebody getting, you know, the person that got out of that, that would be another race that I’d point to in the local is the Ellen truck’s Claire, Justin Berry race.

[00:41:24] Josh Blank: That runoff is going to be tasting

[00:41:27] Jim Henson: as we, uh, you know, Ellen trochlear has been trying very, very, very hard to get back in the legislature.

[00:41:33] She was a staffer before she was a city council person has. Moved around some in her focus, shall we say? She said she was the person that was looking at that district and wound up, you know, sort of having to step aside because of, you know, not to put too sharp, a point on it, the Lieutenant governor’s commitment to Pete Flores.

[00:41:52] Um, but as we were, I think we were communicating about this last night via chat or something. I mean, you know, The most interesting question out of that is, you know, Justin Berry, who’s going to be, he was going to make the runoff, you know, was indicted over the ride over the, the, the protests. It, it’s funny.

[00:42:13] I had that like conversation with my head before we talked about this. Over the protests in Austin. One of the, uh, the, the, the Austin police officers who, um, has been indicted for excessive use of force. I think, I don’t know if that’s the exact indictment, but over the response. Um, and you can, I guess we’ll never know, but, uh, you know, it seems likely that the indictment.

[00:42:41] Josh Blank: Again, you know, like all things, the world’s complicated, the fact that look, you know, I mean, I say he did run last time against Vicki Goodwin. Uh, and so he does have some, and those districts were pretty weak redrawn. So I would think, I, I’m pretty sure

[00:42:52] Jim Henson: he’s a known guy and nothing politics.

[00:42:54] Josh Blank: Well, and I think, especially in that area, he probably, you know, profile as a profile.

[00:42:59] I mean, is it significantly, let’s say more expansive than Ellen trucks or I’m not sure. Probably not, but that’s why I think the indictment late. Probably helped him. I got his name in the news. I mean, Abbott’s thrown around the possibility for pardons. I mean, there’s all kinds of stuff there. I mean, he

[00:43:14] Jim Henson: definitely,

[00:43:16] Josh Blank: it reinforced something that he was already strong on in that race.

[00:43:19] And there was

[00:43:22] Jim Henson: not only, you know, he, he had not only a support the blue factor, but also then a kind of. Martyrdom to the left and in particular, you know, the Austin left that I, you know, I mean, I think you have to, I can already I’d have to really be in denial, I think, to not at least consider that that was helpful

[00:43:39] Josh Blank: to him.

[00:43:40] You can already imagine the ads of, you know, you know, who doesn’t want me at the legislature.

[00:43:45] Jim Henson: Right. Exactly. You know, Austin liberals tried to get me, but they I’m still standing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

[00:43:53] Josh Blank: He needs a.

[00:43:55] Jim Henson: On that note. Thanks Josh for being here. Thanks to our as ever excellent crew in the liberal arts development studio here at the university of Texas at Austin, we’ll have more on these races and we posted a lot of stuff going into this that I think is still useful@texaspoliticsdotutexas.edu.

[00:44:13] Just go to the blog area. You’ll see it. Um, I’m Jim Henson and we’ll you. Thank you for listening and we will be back next week.

[00:44:24] The second reading podcast is a production of the Texas politics project at the university of Texas at Austin. .