Let’s not eff this up, shall we?
Ray Lopez
The day after Ray Lopez advanced to the special election runoff for House District 125 last month, he called his three former Democratic opponents and asked for their support against Republican Fred Rangel.
It was not an unusual request for a runoff qualifier, but Lopez was not taking any chances — and neither are Texas Democrats.
In the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s runoff for HD-125, the party has worked feverishly to avoid a repeat of last fall’s race for another seat based in Bexar County, Senate District 19. Democrats lost that election under similar conditions: a special election runoff in a traditionally blue district where the Republican, aided by top party leaders, benefited from a fractured Democratic field in the first round. And it mattered greatly in the Senate, giving Republicans enough of a cushion so that they held on to their supermajority even after losing two seats in the November general election.
“For us at the [House Democratic Campaign Committee], the most important thing was to not allow what happened in SD-19 to happen in HD-125,” said state Rep. Cesar Blanco of El Paso, who chairs the committee, acknowledging that Democrats “learned a hard lesson” in SD-19. “We wanted to make sure that right out of the gate, going into the runoff, there was a unified message.”
The HDCC has helped Lopez, a former San Antonio City Council member, with fundraising, mail and polling. Meanwhile, the Texas Democratic Party has spent several thousand dollars on digital ads, assisted the Lopez campaign with voter targeting, placed party staff in the district, spearheaded a vote-by-mail program and sent get-out-the-vote texts.
In an interview, Lopez jokingly said that he has gotten “probably more guidance than anyone has ever needed.”
Perhaps most notably, there has been a bigger outward display of Democratic unity in the HD-125 runoff than there was in the SD-19 runoff. In the first round of the SD-19 race, there was a bitter rift between two Democratic competitors, Pete Gallego and Roland Gutierrez, and Gutierrez did not endorse Gallego when he made it to the runoff.
This time around, Lopez entered the runoff with the backing of his former Democratic rivals, as well as every Democrat who represents Bexar County in Austin. They have made appearances at multiple events for him, and Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa also has visited the district to stump for Lopez.
See here for some background. The story notes that four days’ worth of early voting for the runoff (out of five total) was higher than it was for the February race. That suggests a higher level of engagement than in round one, which just goes to my point about runoff turnout in general, even if that’s not what we got in HD145. Of course, such a boost can be coming from Republicans as well, but in a district that’s basically 60-40 Democrat, I’ll take my chances. In any event, if you live in HD125, make sure you vote for Ray Lopez so we can finally get all 67 of those Democratic seats we won in November.
We’ll see if San Antonio dems can break their special elecion losing streak.
As far as being at full strength, Eric Johnsons seat might technically be filled but as he is running for Dallas mayor I highly doubt even a manority of his attention is on session. De facto dems are still going to be down one seat as he is busy with seeking higher office.
Ray Lopez wins with about a 17 point margin. San Antonio dems finally break their spexial election losing streak.
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