Looks like May will be busier than expected around here.
Governor Greg Abbott today issued a proclamation announcing Saturday, May 7, 2022 as the special election date for the Texas State House of Representatives District 147 seat recently vacated by Representative Garnet F. Coleman.
Candidates who wish to have their names placed on the special election ballot must file their applications with the Secretary of State no later than 5:00 PM on Monday, March 7, 2022. Early voting will begin on Monday, April 25, 2022.
Rep. Coleman had announced his retirement from the Legislature in November. We’re familiar with the cast of candidates seeking to succeed him. More recently, Coleman announced that he would formally leave his seat at the end of February, which is to say today. The timing of his announcement made it just in time for a special election to be called for May, with March 7 the statutory deadline for candidate filings. Note that this election, much like the 2016 special elections for HDs 120 and 139, as well as the more contentious November 2015 special election for HD118, is only to fill the remainder of Rep. Coleman’s term. Whoever wins this election only gets to serve through the end of this year. As such, the most likely candidates will be whoever the top two finishers are in the primary, since they would also be competing for the chance to get an edge in seniority on other incoming House members next year. If the winner of the special is someone other than the November nominee, that person gets little more than a participation trophy.
While this election is unlikely to be of great interest locally, it does join with the HCC special election and the statewide special election to put more action on the local calendar than we usually get. There will also be a special election in HD38 to fill out the remaining term of State Rep. Eddie Lucio III, which might have been interesting in a “are the Republicans really making progress in South Texas” kind of way, except that no Republicans filed for HD38 in the primary, so this one doesn’t even have symbolic value. It’s either some extra seniority for the primary winner, or nothing more than an asterisk. But it is on the calendar, and now you know.
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