Scott Milder, who was defeated by Dan Patrick in the Republican primary, endorses Mike Collier for the general election.
Scott Milder
Scott Milder, who lost his Republican primary challenge to incumbent Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick two days ago, says he will vote for the Democrat running against Patrick in November to curb “irrational, out-of-touch politics.”
In a Facebook post that he characterized not as a concession, “but rather an absolute victory speech,”, Milder — a longtime Republican and and well-known public education advocate — said he plans to vote “for Republican candidates in every race with one exception.
“I cannot on good conscience vote for a man who I know to be a liar, nor can I vote for a man who willfully ignores and disrespects his legislative colleagues and his constituents,” Milder said in the post. “I will be casting my vote for Mike Collier, the rational Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, and will strongly encourage all Texans who voted for me in this race to cast their votes for Mr. Collier as well.”
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Coillier told the Houston Chronicle on Thursday that he appreciates Milder’s support, after a campaign in which they agreed on many of the issues including opposition to school vouchers. He said Milder may even campaign with him in coming weeks.
“It doesn’t happen very often that a Republican endorses a Democrat, but public education groups recruited (Milder) to run against Patrick and he and I viewed proper funding of public education as very important,” said Collier, a retired Kingwood CPA and business executive.
“I’ve already had a fair number of moderate Republican donors (to Milder’s campaign) who have called and said they want to join me.”
You can read Milder’s statement here. Patrick beat him pretty handily, but Milder still got 367K votes. If his words carry weight with his supporters, that could move things a bit. I mean, I don’t expect too much from this, even if Milder does help Collier campaign. I doubt that many people will even hear about this, but to the extent that they do, this can’t hurt.
I’m in the camp that may well vote for Collier. I haven’t made up my mind yet.
Charles, have you been following Texans for Public Education (mainly on facebook). They are of the #blockvote hashtag – Milder was their guy, all the way. Depending on how much reach these grassroots teachers groups can muster may be the deciding factor – I know of several folks who say they will be voting straight ticket R EXCEPT for Collier because of #blockvote. The Empower Texas letters were directed, at least in part, against this group. The leader, Troy Reynolds, is up here in Montgomery County.
Although I hear some Republicans stating they will not vote in November for various statewide candidates, I cannot imagine there would be enough to prevent victory. I would think Paxton might have the greatest risk of running the closest contest, rather than Patrick, or Devine, or Miller, or Abbott.
Paxton’s on my poop list, too, but I’ll need to know more about the (D) candidate to make a decision. I’m certainly not going to vote for a statewide version of Kim Ogg.