Go negative or go home is the strategy the pundits have selected for him.
The Sad Dewhurst picture never gets old
Political experts have a bit of advice for Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst’s re-election campaign: go negative or go home.
The incumbent Senate president was crushed in Tuesday’s Republican primary by Houston Sen. Dan Patrick.
In all, more than 72 percent of the roughly 1.3 million Texans who cast ballots in the GOP lieutenant governor’s race voted against Dewhurst, an 11-year incumbent who out-raised and outspent his three competitors in the field.
Now Dewhurst, who pulled just 27 percent of the primary vote, faces much more than an uphill climb in the May runoff.
To even stand a chance, Dewhurst will need to convert hundreds of thousands of voters who backed Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples or Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson – no easy task in itself, and neither Staples nor Patterson has lined up behind Dewhurst yet.
Political experts say the multimillionaire Dewhurst will need to unleash a barrage of attacks aimed at loosening Patrick’s stranglehold on the base of Texas’ most conservative voters, the same group that will decide the May runoff.
The good news for Dewhurst is that there’s no shortage of negative things to say about Dan Patrick. The bad news is that for many if not most Republican primary voters, and especially Republican primary runoff voters, they tend to see those negatives as positives. The one thing Dewhurst might be able to hit him with successfully is the charge that Patrick might actually lose the election in November to Sen. Leticia Van de Putte because enough non-Republican primary voters think he’s a big scary jerk. The problem for him here is 1) the only polling data out there so far is that one Trib poll, which shows Patrick leading LVdP albeit by slightly less than Dewhurst; 2) Republican primary voters don’t think they’re in any danger of losing in November even with a huge jerk like Patrick on the ticket, and it’s hard to argue with them about that right now; and 3) nobody really likes David Dewhurst, either. But hey, what are ya gonna do? Go ahead and spend your million attacking Dan Patrick, Dew. It’ll make you feel better, if nothing else.
As the Trib noted yesterday, there’s an effort among the powers that be (i.e., big money donors) to get Dewhurst to drop out, along with Dan Branch and Harvey Hilderbran. Hilderbran has already acceded. Of the three, I think Branch has the best hope of winning in May, but the pressure on him and Dewhurst could be great. There will still be runoffs in the Ag Commissioner and Railroad Commissioner races regardless, but needless to say the turnout level would be much less if Dewhurst and Patrick aren’t slinging around millions of dollars in attack ads. We’ll see how it goes.
My hunch is that Dewhurst could prevail in May, as I think voters will move away from Patrick as his negatives are more widely known. Branch, Sitton, Merritt each have reasonable options to defeat the front-runners as well, and each would probably benefit from Dewhurst remaining in. Hildebran on the other hand could never have overcome the Hegar lead.
Participation in the first primary was a bit down, and my sense is that a May primary might bring out a broader cross-section of the party, which would be an aid to Dewhurst.
Patrick wins. It will not be close.