Concerned Citizens

Houston Mayor Bill White did yesterday what everyone expected and announced his candidacy for the Texas governor’s race. Speculation for this has been quietly on everyone’s mind for several months with a few publicly stating. But it took a few events to occur to galvanize the move – Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison’s resignation delay until after the March primaries and Tom Schieffer’s exit of the race and endorsement of White as a candidate. Yesterday before an enthusiastic crowd in Houston Mayor White made it official. You can watch the announcement video here courtesy of the Burnt Orange Report. So what does this really mean to Texas Democrats and does White stand a chance of beating Gov. Rick Perry?

White’s entry into the race energizes a Democratic ticket that was lacking in star power going into March. Probably the most notable of the ticket were Schieffer, humorist Kinky Friedman, Hank Gilbert and Farouk Shami. There were others on the ticket but with a lot less name recognition than the list above. Schieffer probably had the best chance of emerging as the winner in March but his candidacy had problems even after that victory. He was a relative unknown to Texans and had too many ties to the Bush administration. During Thanksgiving week Schieffer pulled an unexpected move and exited the race and endorsing White as a potential candidate.

White tried to settle things down during the holidays and said he would make an announcement on the following Friday. During the week several, including myself, speculated on a White candidacy and what it could mean to the race. As the week progressed several things continued to line up to a White announcement for the race. Yesterday White answered the questions by switching to the governor’s race. What I found interesting, as Elise Hu of the Texas Tribune points out, is that my Bill White bumper sticker turned out to be multipurpose. It simply states “Bill White for Texas.” I don’t need a new bumper sticker at all.

White’s entry does set up for a strong gubernatorial race in Texas with possibly some down ballot impact as well. White is a candidate Texas Democrats can rally around going into the primary and on to the general election in November. His credentials in public service are very notable and line up nicely for the office of governor. Having served as Houston’s mayor for the past six years he has excellent executive skills in managing a large government. Houston, unlike San Antonio, has a strong mayoral form of government which means White has been at the forefront of managing Houston.

Those skills along with experience as Deputy Secretary of Energy under Clinton give him a public record that can be leveraged during the campaign as a candidate that can drive progress in Texas. It also means that he will stand strong on a debate platform with Perry going into November, should Perry chose to engage with him. The last debate Perry had for the general election was pretty boring as related by the late Molly Ivins. Maybe now we’ll have one that people can take good information from but I doubt it knowing Perry’s shallow positions.

What does make this race more interesting is that Hutchison is not expected to pull out of the Republican primary in the race for governor. Many people are encouraging her to including governors from other Republican states. If she does not pull out the Republican primary will be a battle of moderates and conservatives with Perry rallying the later. Perry has been courting that group for some time now, including his now infamous statement at a Tea Party rally in Austin about Texas secession. He has to stay with this camp going through the primary to avoid losing the race in March. This will help further define Perry as a strong conservative.

Add to that the fact he plans to bring former Alaska governor Sarah Palin into the state to stump for him along with other conservatives and he will have cast his mold going into November. The trouble is that whereas other Democratic candidates might have had a hard time grabbing the moderates and independents White will seem very likable to this group. That means White will grab the Democrats and a good chunk of the independents unless Perry changes his tone. Doing so will infuriate the conservatives who got him to that point. In other words, Perry is making the bed he must lie going into November.

I’m sure the Perry camp knows this and will probably be having schizophrenic moments from now until November. From now forward Perry must always be looking at November as well as March. Up until this point he only had to deal with March in terms of definition. This is the stuff that separates the good campaign teams from the best. It’s a balancing act Perry must follow that could backfire on him if he steps the wrong way at the wrong time. With the current split climate in the Republican Party I’m sure some people are going to have to make some tough choices when it comes to support.

During that entire time the White campaign will just be sitting back taking notes. Every time Perry makes a bold conservative statement or position point the White campaign will keep it for future reference. Hutchison will be forcing him to hold the hard conservative line to keep his base intact. In the coming months we are truly going to see the real Rick Perry, one that is very beholding to conservative positions and special interests. There will definitely be more to point out as the race progresses.

Democrats still have a lot of work to do in the coming month. During the filing period the party needs to fill in the rest of the ballot with semi-strong candidates. This would be a good building year for the party to groom and grow some new candidates for the future in lesser races. By doing so Democrats will be able to field stronger candidates for bigger races in the future. That will require some coordinated efforts at the state and local level. I’m not sure the party is situated for this type of maneuvering but it must happen. Some are going to view this as back room dealing but it is what it is and it must be done if Democrats are going to ever build strength in the state.

For now we can rally around White as the frontrunner going into March. If you are interested in seeing the candidate you can attend a rally on Monday at Main Plaza at 11:30. I plan to be there supporting my candidate as the next governor for the state of Texas.