Eye of the Hurricane

It's a strange thing to be surrounded by an election that has the whole country in a lather while at home, there's no doubt about the outcome at the top of the ticket and — with exceptions for a handful of congressional races — a ballot dominated by personality clashes, professional feuds and local races.

This is not an attempt at cynicism. It's just an observation, really: Two years ago, the partisan balances in the House and, to a lesser extent, the Senate were in flux. There was a noisy, expensive, one-sided race for governor going on. An open U.S. Senate seat. Open statewide slots at lieutenant governor, attorney general, and decent bouts elsewhere. Two years from now, the much talked-about prospect of a Republican gubernatorial primary featuring the incumbent and maybe a comptroller and maybe a U.S. senator. If that comes to pass, it'll trigger other openings and ambitions, and we'll be back in the thick of elections.

This year, with a Texan at the top of the national ballot and a transplanted Texan in the number two spot, the only suspense is whether George W. Bush will get 55 percent or 60 percent of the vote. Democrats openly tell us they'd consider 55 percent or less a win for their side, and privately, Republicans concede that. The hottest statewide race is for Texas Supreme Court, and Republican Scott Brister and Democrat David Van Os have each raised about as much money — and interest — as candidates in a contested Texas House race. In fact, neither of those judicial candidates would make the top ten list in contributions if they were listed with this year's House candidates. Neither would Railroad Commissioner Victor Carrillo, a Republican running a statewide race for more time at RRC.

No state senator faces serious competition next week. Lightning could strike — heck, the stinkin' Red Sox won their last eight games in a row — but it's unlikely. In the Texas House, you can count up a dozen good contests, and with a bad bounce one way or another, maybe 20 races. But take apart the numbers — chances of a partisan change in the lower chamber are teensy. Optimistic Republicans think they'll gain two seats and hold 90 of the 150 spots in the House. Optimistic Democrats count about that number in their direction. After some back of the envelope noodling of our own, it's easy to see some culling here and there, but hard to come up with a partisan change of any significance.

A win for the Democrats would be measured in the size of the trophies they land; they dream of beating Appropriations Chairman Talmadge Heflin, R-Houston, who has raised nearly $600,000 with which to play defense against Democrat Hubert Vo. Republicans, with a majority to defend, would still like to knock off Democrats who committed what they see as twin atrocities: ditching redistricting for Oklahoma, and voting against constitutional limits on lawsuit damages. They've sent piles of late money to former Rep. Billy Clemons, who's trying to beat Rep. Jim McReynolds, and Charles "Doc" Anderson, R-Waco, who's after freshman Rep. John Mabry, D-Waco.

The biggest deals in Texas are local. Count the five congressional seats targeted in redistricting among those, and as the most significant thing Texas voters will do on Tuesday. What you get next week is probably what you'll have for some time: Democrats are only competitive on these new maps when they are incumbents. Once in Republican hands, it'll take remapping or a lot of migration to bring Democrats back into viability in any of these. That said, the Democrats are putting up better fights than some expected. Republicans still hope to sweep all five races, but Democrats think they can win two, and if Bush has an unexpectedly bad night, more. At least one Democrat is betting on Bush: U.S. Rep. Martin Frost, D-Dallas, has the Republican president in his own reelection ads.

Money, at the End....

The Texas Republican Party sent out an alert to supporters warning of the "crisis" caused by three Democratic groups funneling money to Democrats. Their targets: Texans for Insurance Reform, a political action committee that gets the majority of its money from lawyers, the Texas Trial Lawyers Association's PAC, and the House Democratic Campaign Committee.

The TIR PAC is, indeed, loaded with money from lawyers, and reported spending $600,680 in its last October report, including $10,000 to Carlos Uresti of San Antonio; $10,000 to David Leibowitz of San Antonio; $55,000 to Kelly White of Austin; and $10,000 to Scott Hochberg of Houston. Most of the rest went to consultants for work on specific campaigns. TIR paid Jeff Crosby Direct Mail $95,319 for work for Stephen Frost of Atlanta and Jim McReynolds of Lufkin. They paid Jeff Montgomery & Associates $28,998 for consulting Rex Peveto of Orange. Message Audience & Presentation was paid $45,489 to help Abel Herrero of Robstown, Yvonne Gonzales Toureilles of Alice, and Juan Escobar of Kingsville. Opinion Analysts, a polling firm, was paid $35,631 to help Mark Strama of Austin, Herrero, Peveto, White, and Jim Dunnam of Waco. Another $226,037 went to Rindy Miller Media for radio and TV work for Dunnam and for Mabry.

Almost half the money the TTLA PAC reported spending in their latest report — $70,851 — went to a loan payment. Some of the rest went to candidates, but several of them are Republicans or members of the Republican House leadership team, and most of them aren't in election trouble this year: Reps. Tony Goolsby, R-Dallas; Vilma Luna, D-Corpus Christi; Toby Goodman, R-Arlington; Jim Keffer, R-Eastland; and Chris Harris, R-Arlington, all got contributions.

The HDCC gave $40,000 to Dan Ellis of Livingston; $15,000 to David Farabee of Wichita Falls; $50,000 to John Mabry of Waco; $10,000 to Mark Homer of Paris; $5,000 to Patrick Rose of Dripping Springs; $50,000 to Robby Cook of Eagle Lake; $20,000 to Hochberg; and $10,000 to a company buying TV time for McReynolds.

Lest you think the Republicans are slackers, look here. The Texas GOP's last report of the month includes $571,098 in expenditures (thanks in large measure to a breathtaking $360,000 in contributions from Houston homebuilder Bob Perry). They gave (in cash and in-kind contributions): $33,019 to Alan Askew of Wimberly, $19,054 to Eric Opiela of Karnes City, $28,974 to Shirley Craft of Wichita Falls, $24,679 to Bryan Hughes of Mineola, $10,413 to Jack Stick of Austin, $21,364 to Ken Mercer of San Antonio, $7,059 to Kirby Hollingsworth of Mount Vernon, $9,465 to Mike Alberts of Troup, $29,906 to Charles "Doc" Anderson of Waco, $10,803 to Todd Baxter of Austin, $28,580 to Billy Clemons of Groveton, and $25,994 to Ann Witt of Houston.

The Stars Over Texas PAC, set up by Republican leaders in the House trying to protect their party's incumbents and thus, their majority in the lower chamber, spent $597,972 in the final month of the campaign. The lion's share of that — $577,500 — went to ten candidates: $50,000 to Ray Allen of Grand Prairie; $105,000 to Baxter; $10,000 to Roy Blake Jr. of Nacogdoches; $5,000 to Scott Campbell of San Angelo; $60,000 to Mike "Tuffy" Hamilton of Mauriceville; $60,000 to Hughes; $50,000 to Mercer; $25,000 to Sid Miller of Stephenville; $85,000 to Pete Snow of Texarkana; and $127,500 to Stick.

House races in Texas have become terrifically expensive. Three contests this cycle — in and around Austin — have topped the $1 million mark. Five candidates have crossed the $500,000 mark (not counting those who've borrowed their way into that bracket), and 14 have raised more than a quarter of a million dollars during the general election cycle (with some time left to raise and spend money). And that's only in the hot races, which are listed on the chart you'll find by clicking right here. The numbers include contributions and expenditures reported after the primaries in March.

Spending Habits

In years with lots of races, downballot candidates often complain they can't cut through the noise. This year, they're making plenty of noise of their own.

U.S. Reps. Pete Sessions and Martin Frost, R&D-Dallas, crossed the $8 million mark with their most recent campaign finance reports. You can't escape that contest in Dallas; it's the most expensive race in Texas and they're using their money on TV, radio, signs, and in the mailboxes. Frost has raised $4.3 million and spent $3.9 million this election cycle, according to tabulations (based on campaign reports to the Federal Election Commission) by Political MoneyLine (www.fecinfo.com). Unlike most candidates, Sessions still had some political gunpowder stowed away, in the form of $1.8 million cash on hand at the reporting date in mid-October. So far, he has raised $4.1 million and spent $2.7 million.

The West Texas race between U.S. Reps. Randy Neugebauer, R-Lubbock, and Charlie Stenholm, D-Abilene, is right at the $5 million mark. The Republican has raised $2.7 and spent about that much this cycle (which includes part of the special election money that got him this far); Stenholm raised $2.2 million and spent $2.1 million so far. The Central Texas race between U.S. Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, and state Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, R-Burleson, ranks third in spending. He's raised $2.2 million and spent $1.9 million; she's pulled $2 million in and spent $1.9 million. These things aren't exactly relative: It's cheaper to run in rural areas than in Dallas or Houston or Austin, where TV is expensive. Though the candidates are spending less, it's possible that voters in both of those races are seeing as much advertising as voters in the Frost-Session contest.

U.S. Rep. Nick Lampson, D-Beaumont, raised $2.1 million and spent $2 million in his race so far. Republican Ted Poe, a Houston former judge, hasn't achieved parity: He raised $1.2 million and spent $1 million through mid-October. Finally, there's the CD-1 race in Northeast Texas, where U.S. Rep. Max Sandlin, D-Marshall, brought in $1.5 million and spent $1.4 million, while Republican Louis Gohmert, a former Tyler judge, raised $1.5 million and spent $1.3 million. That's mostly rural, and that's a lot of money for a race out there.

Can, Too

The Texas Supreme Court took less than a week to undo an order preventing a political action committee from using corporate money. The Associated Republicans of Texas were ordered — as we wrote last week — to stop soliciting, collecting or spending corporate money. Democratic lawyers sued them on behalf of two House candidates, saying the law bars PACs like ART from using corporate money, since they're not "connected" to corporations by affiliation or by corporate membership. The court ordered the PAC to kill the corporate stuff until after a post-election hearing.

ART went to the Supremes to get that restraining order lifted, and the Supremes unanimously voted to lift it. There's still a trial ahead, probably, but it won't affect this election. The opinion, written by Justice Nathan Hecht for the seven remaining members of the court (Tom Phillips retired, and Michael Schneider was appointed to a federal judgeship), said the trial judge in the case had made his ruling without hearing all of the evidence. "... plaintiffs' allegations raise important and difficult issues that have not been resolved by trial on the merits... there may well be no violation at all."

ART officials said they only had about $3,000 in their corporate accounts, and that the ruling wouldn't have any effect on this year's election efforts either way. They don't use corporate money for campaigns anyhow, they say. But ART spent thousands raised from corporations to pay lawyers who represented Republicans in redistricting battles over the last two years.

If further hearings turn out the way the Democrats are hoping, ART and other groups could be exposed (including some on the other side: the House Democratic Campaign Committee, for instance, isn't connected to a corporation or a union, but noted contributions from both in finance reports this month). Hector DeLeon, ART's attorney, says the group is relying on opinions from the Texas Ethics Commission and on its reading of the statutes. If the Democrats keep going, he says, he'll ask the court to make them pay his fees.

Turnout

It always surprises us that anybody ever gets close with voter turnout projections, and this year seems particularly weird. Voter registration seemed to surge — at least the hype surged — but nothing unusual came of it. More Texans are registered to vote, but a smaller percentage of the voting age population registered to vote. That's another way to say population growth accounted for a small drop in interest.

Or did interest drop?

Early turnout numbers are still strong, and it's impossible to tell whether that indicates a higher voter turnout or just a change in the habits of people who were going to vote anyhow. The number of registered voters in hit 13.1 million, up 873,666 from the number registered before March's party primaries. Based on sheer numbers, the increases were in the populous places: Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Travis and Bexar counties led the list.

In percentage terms (and we're leaving out dinky counties, since the 13 new voters in Loving County represented a 12 percent gain), the interesting numbers were in suburban counties. The statewide gain, for reference, was 6.7 percent. Gains topped 10 percent in Collin, Denton, Williamson, Brazos and Hays counties. Hays, the smallest, added 9,172 new voters. On the high end, Collin added 37,399 and Denton added 33,365.

• With two days of early voting left, 21.9 percent of the state's registered voters in the 15 largest counties had voted. Four years ago, with two days left, 15.4 percent had voted. The numbers are more dramatic, in part because of growth (there were 7.2 million registered voters in those counties then, as against 8.1 million now): 1,781,462 Texans had voted in those counties with two days to go, compared with 1,108,803 four years ago. The numbers are updated daily by the Texas Secretary of State, at www.sos.state.tx.us.

Flotsam & Jetsam

Texas Libertarians recorded their best ballot showing in the 2000 elections, when Lance Smith got 18.7 percent of the vote running for Texas Supreme Court. They have 70 candidates this time and need to hit a certain mark to win automatic ballot access again. They either have to have a statewide candidate win 5 percent or more (the presidential race, with Texas Libertarian Michael Badnarik in it, doesn't count), or they have to get 2 percent of the vote in a gubernatorial election. This year, they're looking to Anthony Garcia, who's running for Texas Railroad Commission, and Tom Oxford and Quanah Parker, who are running for different spots on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Their best "recent" presidential showing in Texas was in 1980, when Harry Browne got 0.8 percent.

• It's unusual for a political candidate to go negative on a relative pipsqueak, or even to mention one, but U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Sugar Land, is taking Democrat Richard Morrison seriously. Seriously enough, anyway, to campaign door-to-door his own self and to blast Morrison by name in mailers and in television commercials. In both media, he's trying to tie Morrison to John Kerry, Howard Dean and filmmaker Michael Moore. In TV ads, he says Morrison is trying to "hide his plan to raise your taxes" and the tie to Moore is that he "supports radical Michael Moore's campaign to defeat President Bush." Morrison isn't that well known, but DeLay is, and pollsters say his negative numbers are up, what with Austin indictments of three of his associates. Morrison is the alternative on the ballot, and the potential risk is that voters get upset enough with DeLay to try an unknown. He's apparently decided to run up Morrison's bad numbers to lessen that risk.

• Hit him again, Br'er Rabbit: state Rep. Jack Stick, R-Austin, sent out mailers blasting his opponent for hanging banners on the side of a rented Austin ISD school bus. His message, spelled out in the words in those mailers, is that the Democrat misused public property — the school bus — to promote his candidacy. Voters who just glance get a different message. They see a big picture of a yellow school bus with a red-and-white-banner on the side that says: "Teachers for Mark Strama for State Representative."

• U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, is the only Texan on Harper Magazine's list of female politicians who might someday be president of the U.S. of A. Granger, a potential candidate for Senate if Kay Bailey Hutchison decides to leave or run for something else, is one of nine Republicans listed.

Political People and Their Moves

Lobbyist Elton Bomer is moving into the Gardere Wynne Sewell law firm's Austin offices and will be working the Pink Building for that firm's clients. He's a former state representative, insurance commissioner and Secretary of State (under George W. Bush), and has been lobbying since he left government...

We wrote last week about James Jonas III leaving the law firm that bears his name. Its new name was voted out by the partners after we went to press: Loeffler Tuggey Pauerstein Rosenthal LLP...

Austin homebuilder Ray Tonjes is the new president of the Texas Association of Builders, the trade group for his industry...

Lauren Whelan is leaving the Association of Texas Professional Educators to go back to work for Sen. Kip Averitt, R-Waco. She'll work on education issues there. Whelan worked for Averitt when he was a House member before going to law school and landing at ATPE...

Pat Hogan, formerly the business operations director at the state's Department of Information Resources, signed on with Strategic Partnerships, Inc., an Austin consulting firm...

Houston businessman Bill McMinn is the new chairman of the board at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think-tank based in Austin. Wendy Gramm had been in that post for five years, and will remain on the board...

Appointments: Gov. Rick Perry named four new directors for the Trinity River Authority: Ana Laura Saucedo of Dallas, a real estate research analyst and a former radio news reporter, Andrew Martinez, a former Huntsville city councilman and school board trustee, K.C. Wyatt, president of the Corsicana National Bank and Trust, and Katrina Keyes of Dallas, president of K Strategies and vice president of the Black Contractors Association...

Perry named Bill Wachel to the Texas Department of Information Resources. Wachel works at Sourcecorp in Dallas...

The governor named Texas Railroad Commissioner Victor Carrillo to the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, where he'll be the Texas representative. Carrillo, chairman of the RRC, is on the ballot next week....

Quotes of the Week

Texas Secretary of State Geoff Connor on the science underlying voter turnout predictions: "We look at the alignment of the planets, we study entrails, we do experiments with wind smoke directional candles and we're able to come up with what the projections should be."

Dallas County Democratic Party Chairman Susan Hays, quoted in The Dallas Morning News after actor Chuck Norris, a Republican, withdrew his support for Democratic Sheriff candidate Lupe Valdez after recording radio commercials endorsing her: "I'm restraining myself from calling him a weenie."

U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Sugar Land, talking about prosecutors and grand juries in an interview with the Pasadena Citizen: "The Democrats are using the courts and the legal system to criminalize politics, for their political gain and character assassination."

Former President George H.W. Bush, quoted in The Dallas Morning News on how political attacks on the current president are received by his spouse: "If Barbara gets her hands on John Kerry, he might get another Purple Heart."

Former Rep. Billy Clemons, quoted in a Lufkin Daily News story about the sudden surge in political contributions for his race against Rep. Jim McReynolds: "What happened was the folks in Austin that want to beat Mr. McReynolds came to the conclusion that we could win this race, and they didn't want miss a chance to defeat him if it was just a matter of money."

A line from a mailer attacking Rep. Talmadge Heflin, R-Houston, for a sales tax proposal he once promoted in the Legislature: "Who would tax a banana?"

State Rep. Sid Miller, R-Stephenville, quoted in the Copperas Cove Leader Press after a server for a city court testified that he tried to serve Miller a court notice for an illegal campaign sign only to be told repeatedly by the candidate that if he came on Miller's property, Miller would shoot him: "I didn't threaten to shoot him three times. I only threatened to shoot him once."

Texas Weekly: Volume 21, Issue 20, 1 November 2004. Ross Ramsey, Editor. George Phenix, Publisher. Copyright 2004 by Printing Production Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher is prohibited. One-year online subscription: $250. For information about your subscription, call (800) 611-4980 or email biz@ texasweekly.com. For news, email ramsey@ texasweekly.com, or call (512) 288-6598.