Louie Gohmert
U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Tyler, announced Monday he is running for attorney general, challenging fellow Republican Ken Paxton, in the already crowded primary.
“Texas I am officially running to be your next Attorney General and will enforce the rule of law,” Gohmert tweeted after announcing his campaign on Newsmax.
Gohmert announced earlier this month that he would join the GOP lineup against Paxton if he could raise $1 million in 10 days. The 10th day was Friday. Gohmert said in an announcement video that he has “reached our initial goal of raising $1 million in order to start a run for” attorney general, though he did not confirm whether he was able to collect it in 10 days.
Gohmert is at least the fourth primary opponent that Paxton has drawn. The others include Land Commissioner George P. Bush, former Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman and state Rep. Matt Krause of Fort Worth. At least three Democrats are also running for the job.
See here for the background. It must be noted that this means that Gohmert will no longer be in Congress after next year. I’m going to need some time to fully absorb that. Of course, there’s a zero percent chance that whoever survives the Republican primary for CD01 will be any better than Gohmert. That does temper things a bit.
Gohmert was originally scheduled to announce his decision Friday on Mark Davis’ radio show in Dallas, but he never called in and the show went off air without hearing from him.
Louie’s gotta Louie. If you look up the word “shitshow” in the dictionary, it will simply say “The 2022 Republican primary for Attorney General in Texas”. God help us all.
UPDATE: Per the Chron and Taylor Goldenstein on Twitter, State Rep. Matt Krause, the chief of the library police, will drop out of the AG race to run for Tarrant County DA, and he will endorse Gohmert. Of course he will. Reform Austin has more.
The sad thing is that there’s a non-zero chance he’d be an improvement on Paxton.
If Gohmert is an example of the quality of students that earn a law degree at Baylor, then Baylor needs to become far more selective in their admissions.
Gohmert’s entry makes it even more likely that this GOP primary contest will be determined in a runoff primary with light participation, and unpredictable results. Imagine a Paxton v. Gohmert runoff. Beam me up, Scotty.