At long last, it’s finally over. Republican Dan Neil dropped out of the race today for the Texas House seat in District 48. Neil lost to Rep. Donna Howard, D-Austin, on Election Day by 16 votes. After a recount, Howard’s margin fell to 12 votes. Neil then exercised his right to contest the election, which [...]
Posts under ‘Election 2010’
Howard wins again
It’s fourth and long for Dan Neil. The House Election Contest Committee unanimously voted [Tuesday] to uphold Rep. Will Hartnett’s determination that Donna Howard won the long-disputed House District 48 seat. Committee members said Republican Dan Neil did not provide clear and convincing evidence to win. If Neil decides to challenge the committee’s vote, it [...]
Neil in it till the bitter end
I guess he doesn’t have anything else to do right now. After some vacillation, the Republican who is contesting his loss to incumbent state Rep. Donna Howard said [Wednesday] that he is now inclined to take his fight the distance. Last month, Republican Dan Neil said his decision to continue contesting the election might depend [...]
Howard declared the winner in HD48
At long last. Rep. Donna Howard won the House District 48 seat by four votes over Republican Dan Neil, according to state Rep. Will Hartnett, R-Dallas. Hartnett was appointed to investigate their election after Neil challenged the results. [...] Hartnett’s recommendation goes now to a select committee chaired by Rep. Todd Hunter, R-Corpus Christi, which [...]
HD48 election contest still going on
There’s still some more testimony to be heard in the election contest between Dan Neil and Rep. Donna Howard in HD48. That and closing arguments are scheduled for today. There was a key development in the contest on Thursday just before everyone headed home to hunker down for the Snowpocalypse: On Thursday morning, a Travis [...]
Update on the HD48 election contest
Patricia Kilday Hart sums up the state of things in HD48, where there’s a recount of the recount and a lot more testimony to come. I have no idea what to expect from this, but I think she’s right that it’s unlikely the House would vote in the end to seat Dan Neil, if only [...]
Howard files formal response to Neil’s election contest
Just before Christmas, Dan Neil filed an election contest that challenged the result of his race against Rep. Donna Howard in HD 48, in which Neil lost by 12 votes. Howard filed a response called “special exceptions” at that time, and now she has filed her official response to Neil’s contest. Every allegation made by [...]
Neil files for election contest in HD48
I suppose this was inevitable. Republican Dan Neil is continuing his challenge of state Rep. Donna Howard’s razor-thin election night victory with an appeal to the Texas House of Representatives. Neil, who trailed Howard by 12 votes after a recount earlier this month, filed a contest of those results with the secretary of state late [...]
Prop 1 opponents file “We think the voters are stupid” lawsuit
I’m really angry about this. Opponents of Proposition 1, Houston’s recently-passed drainage fee, filed a civil lawsuit Wednesday against Mayor Annise Parker and the City of Houston. The lawsuit calls Prop 1 “illegal” because “the ballot language does not accurately describe the object and effect of Proposition 1, causing the voters to be intentionally misled.” [...]
Kuempel wins his father’s seat
We have a full House again. John Kuempel, son of the late state Rep. Edmund Kuempel, won a special election Tuesday to fill his late father’s seat, state election officials said. With all precincts reporting, John Kuempel, 40, received 65 percent of the votes cast. Voters chose between six Republicans, two Democrats and a Libertarian. [...]
More evidence that expanded gambling is doomed
From the latest TPJ Lobby Watch: Gambling interests with stakes in the legalization of casinos or slot machines bet heavily on Democratic House candidates going into the Republican-dominated 2010 elections. Political bookies widely expected the GOP to expand its slim House majority this round, though few envisioned the extent of the sweep until late in [...]
Howard still wins after recount in HD48
Her margin is margin is a bit smaller, but still greater than zero, and that’s what counts. With the votes counted again, the Austin Democrat beat Republican challenger Dan Neil by just 12 votes, Travis County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir said Thursday night. Neil had called for the recount after Howard had been declared the winner [...]
Red light camera lawsuit
I’m trying to understand exactly what this is all about. Here’s the little sidebar summary, which captures the basic facts pretty well: The city of Houston • filed a “pre-emptive lawsuit” in U.S. District Court Nov. 15 seeking a judge’s opinion on how it should proceed after terminating its contract with red light camera company [...]
Stipeche wins HISD Trustee runoff
From School Zone: Juliet Stipeche has won the Houston ISD District VIII school board runoff election by 48 votes, according to the unofficial results. Stipeche, an attorney, beat Judith Cruz, a stay-at-home mom and former HISD teacher, with 51 percent of the vote. The total number of votes cast was 2,032, compared with nearly 15,000 [...]
Runoff Day in HISD VIII
Today is the day of the runoff election for HISD Trustee in District VIII between Judith Cruz and Juliet Stipeche. According to School Zone, only about 1000 votes were cast during early voting, so if you live in this district, your vote really matters. See here for a map of the district, here for a [...]
Recount sought in HD48
Given how close this one was, a recount was to be expected. Republican Dan Neil is seeking a recount in his challenge to state Rep. Donna Howard in the District 48 seat that represents part of Travis County. Neil has filed the paperwork with the Texas secretary of state to request another look at the [...]
Ortiz concedes
No surprise. U.S. Rep. Solomon Ortiz on Monday conceded the loss of his 27th District seat that he held for nearly three decades. A recount netted him more than 100 votes in Cameron County but left him still hundreds of votes behind Republican Blake Farenthold. Ortiz called Farenthold at 8:04 p.m. to congratulate him and [...]
As goes Harris, so goes CC2
Just as HD133 was a microcosm of Harris County in 2008, Sylvia Garcia’s County Commissioner precinct was a miniature version of the county as a whole in 2010. Take a look at how Democratic candidates did in County Commissioner Precinct 2 (CC2) versus how they did countywide and see for yourself: Candidate CC2 Harris ========================= [...]
Endorsement watch: Runoff reiteration
The Chron reiterates its endorsement of Judith Cruz in the HISD Trustee runoff. To a large degree, the solution to the United States’ education problems is being worked out here in Houston. We’re the birthplace of some of the nation’s most successful charter schools – schools like KIPP and YES, which have shown long-term, measurable [...]
Lineup set for HD44 special election
Here are your candidates for the special election to replace the late Rep. Edmund Kuempel of Seguin. Tony Gergely, a Seguin business owner, is the Libertarian in the race. The Democrats are Daniel Rodriguez Andrade of Seguin, who lists his occupation as “real estate/business owner,” and Cheryl Dees Patterson, a Seguin realtor. The Republican list [...]
Who cares about the will of the voters?
Prop 1 opponents don’t. Opponents of Proposition 1 are planning to lobby the state legislature to strike down the controversial drainage fee, even after voters narrowly approved it earlier this month. Don Hooper, who organized a political action committee blasting Prop 1, said the effort is underway. Last week, a group that included real estate [...]
Early voting information for the HISD VIII runoff
One more election to go this year, the runoff for the open HISD Trustee seat in District VIII. Because of the Thanksgiving holiday, early voting begins tomorrow and runs through next Wednesday. Here’s what you need to know from the County Clerk: HOUSTON INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT (HISD) TRUSTEE – DISTRICT VIII RUN-OFF ELECTION The HISD [...]
Thibaut versus Murphy, third time around
We know that the story of HD133, which has now been won twice by Jim Murphy and once by Kristi Thibaut, is one of turnout. With sufficient turnout in the Democratic part of the district – that is, the precincts in Rep. Al Green’s CD09 – it’s a Democratic district. With dominant turnout in the [...]
What’s next for Bill White?
Not a campaign. In the nearly two weeks since his decisive loss to Gov. Rick Perry, he’s had time to begin planning a family Christmas trip to a yet-to-be-decided Spanish-speaking country, to indulge his penchant for exploring new and interesting businesses and to begin thinking about what he wants to do next. He also has [...]
Partisan breakdown for the city propositions
Now that I have addressed the question of the effect of straight ticket voting on the city propositions, the next question is to figure out how they did in Republican and Democratic areas. To try and get a handle on this, I sorted the precincts into strong and weak partisan groups, based on the straight [...]
Straight ticket voting and the city propositions
As you know, the Chron recently wrote an editorial decrying the rise in straight ticket voting. Among other things, they said: In two highly publicized Houston propositions on the ballot last Tuesday, nearly 56,000 voters did not register a choice on the Proposition 1 drainage fee issue and nearly 46,000 bypassed Proposition 3 on red-light [...]
Red light cameras to be turned off Monday
This was unexpected. This week, officials with American Traffic Solutions Inc., of Scottsdale, Ariz., received a letter dated Nov. 10 from city attorney David Feldman, who reversed his previous opinion that the contract requires Houston to give ATS a 120-day notice before the cameras are switched off. Now, Feldman informed ATS it must shut down [...]
Special election to succeed Rep. Kuempel set
Not surprisingly, Gov. Perry has set it for as soon as possible. The election for the term beginning in 2011 will be held Dec. 14, the governor’s office said. Candidates for District 44 in Texas House of Representatives must file applications with the Secretary of State no later than 5 p.m. on Nov. 15. The [...]
On Latino turnout
I don’t know how to make more Latinos vote. But I do know these things: 1. Whatever it is that Texas Democrats have been doing, assuming there is something that qualifies as some kind of action in this area, it ain’t working; to be slightly more charitable, it ain’t working as well as it should [...]
Rep. Donna Howard wins re-election
The closest election of this cycle has been decided, for now. State Rep. Donna Howard, D-Austin, has defeated Republican challenger Dan Neil for state representative in District 48 by 16 votes. The count came after Travis County officials tallied all provisional and overseas ballots, which were due to the county clerk’s office [Monday] evening. On [...]
So was this a one-time thing or not?
So was the Republican showing in this year’s election an aberration or not? I’m going to limit this discussion to Harris County here. It’s clear by now that what we saw here was an unprecedented spike in Republican turnout. A significant number of people who normally don’t vote in off year elections did so this [...]
On straight ticket voting
After Democrats made big gains in 2008 in Harris County thanks in part to straight ticket voting, I defended the practice from the Republican concern trolls that came out to wring their hands about it now that they were no longer its primary beneficiary. I’m not going to change my mind after this election just [...]
They picked a good year to have a scandal
Reps. Joe Driver and Linda Harper Brown made it through the election and now just have to worry about what a prosecutor might think. The Travis County district attorney’s office is looking into Driver’s travel reimbursements. An official there last week said he couldn’t comment on whether Harper-Brown’s use of a 2010 Mercedes-Benz E550 was [...]
How many votes did we think we’d need?
We’ve already established that this election saw an historically high level of turnout in the county, and an historically high level of vote support for Republican candidates. It’s clear that Republican candidates rode a wave of voters who don’t normally participate in the off year elections to across the board victory. But would Democratic levels [...]