Democrats Would Win 2022 Texas Election
if Garza Gives Ken Paxton the Boot as AG

Capitol Inside
August 21, 2022

After heading into January with little cause for optimism at the polls this fall, the Democrats could emerge from the Texas election in 2022 as the victor if one thing would happen.

Forget about Governor Greg Abbott and Beto O'Rourke in the most expensive and brutal political race in Texas history. Don't get too caught up in the massive hype on the GOP flipping districts in legislative and congressional races in the Democratic bastion of South Texas. After watching Democrats scoop up a dozen House seats that the Texas majority party failed to defend in 2018, GOP leaders and lawmakers in Austin bent over backwards last year to ensure that their majority in the west wing of the statehouse in Austin would be safe for years to come.

The Texas Democrats' best case scenario would be a statewide sweep that would take a victory by O'Rourke with substantial coattails for the down-ballot cast. The Democrats could pick up a half-dozen Texas House seats and break even in congressional contests in the rosiest potential outlook for them at the polls on November 8.

On the opposite side of the coin, the Democrats could end south of rock bottom in the Lone Star State if the GOP runs the table in statewide races like it's done in every election cycle for the past two dozen years. The Republicans would declare victory at the ballot box this fall, however, if they retain the statewide monopoly and wrestle multiple seats from Democrats in a handful races they're targeting in fights for the Legislature and Congress in districts that are anchored on the Texas border with Mexico.

But the Democrats will win the 2022 election if Rochelle Garza unseats Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton. Period. That would be true regardless of the results on the ballot above and below. That's the most realistic goal for the Democratic Party on the ballot here this year.

The bout featuring Abbott and O'Rourke arguably is the most competitive race for governor since Democrat Ann Richards came from behind to beat GOP nominee Clayton Williams at the finish line. Abbott-O'Rourke is ranked at the top of the Capitol Inside list of races to watch here this fall as a consequence. But the clash that pits Paxton against Garza is tied for first crowning spot as a result of its wrecking ball potential for the Republicans' plans for 2023 in Texas and beyond.

With the Labor Day weekend rapidly approaching, the 10 hottest races for state and federal offices in Texas include three that are being waged in U.S. House districts in border areas that Democrats have always dominated. The top 10 also features a pair of Texas House contests and one state Senate race in border districts that Democrats control and the GOP is targeting in 2022. An open fight for the House in a swing district in the suburbs north of Dallas is ranked among the top 10 as well.

A strong showing a Latina Democrat with Garza in the AG race could make it much harder for Republicans to fare as well in South Texas than they've been predicting that they would. A Democratic attorney general would be a nightmare for the GOP with the ability to undermine a Republican governor and the party's majorities at the Capitol most every step of the way. Garza would have the power to gum up a legislative agenda that's tailored for the far right like the one that Republicans approved at the Texas Capitol in 2021.

Instead of suing Democratic President Joe Biden on every imaginable issue like Paxton has done, Garza could focus on messing with Texas Republicans in ways that few if any of them could anticipate now. Abbott and his allies at the statehouse could every trick in the playbook to exact revenge against a Democratic attorney general who's a major obstacle for them.

But the Republicans could defund the entire attorney general's office - and it wouldn't stop Garza from exerting broad authorities that she would wield in a constitutional office if the GOP decided to go nuclear on her in retaliation for refusing to stay out of their way.

If Garza is the next Texas AG, all hell would be guaranteed to break loose under the pink granite dome after she takes the oath in January. By virtue of her status as the first Democratic statewide leader here since 1999, Garza could do more substantially more harm to the GOP in Texas than Democrat Mark White managed to do as the attorney general during Republican Governor Bill Clements' first term as the governor.

Clements had been the first Republican elected as the governor in Texas since Reconstruction when he claimed the job in an open race in 1978. While Republicans Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchison broke the Democrats' grip on down-ballot statewide positions in races for agriculture commission and state treasurer respectively in 1982, White reclaimed the Governor's Mansion for the Democrats that year.

Limited polling on the fight between Paxton and Garza has trended in a positive direction for the Democrat, who was locked in a statistical tie with the incumbent in a poll that the Dallas Morning News and the University of Texas at Tyler conducted in the first week of August.

Paxton actually led Garza by 2 points with 36 percent in the Dallas Morning News/UT Tyler survey. But the Democrat finished with a 2.8 percent margin of error en route to pulling even with the controversial incumbent who's seeking a third term in the post. Paxton was up by 3 points in a poll that was taken by the Hobby School of Government at the University of Houston in late June and early July.

A University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll in June found Paxton leading Garza by 8 points at 37 percent. Abbott led O'Rourke by a mere 6 points in the same survey. A Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation poll after the primary election in March showed Paxton with 48 percent compared to 42 percent for Garza.

Paxton is the most vulnerable Republican on the statewide ticket largely as a consequence of pending criminal charges in a security fraud case in his home base of Collin County. Paxton has been the target of an investigation by the FBI in the midst of allegations of bribery by several former assistants at the AG shop.

Paxton has burnished a lightning-rod reputation by wrapping himself in Donald Trump since a failed bid to overturn the 2020 election on his behalf at the U.S. Supreme Court. Paxton score more points with the Trump base by parroting false claims on the riot at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 being staged by radical leftists in the mythical anti-facist group that Republicans call Antifa.

more to come ...