Sue Lovell
Former Houston city councilwoman Sue Lovell announced Monday she is running for mayor, becoming the fourth major candidate aiming to deny Mayor Sylvester Turner a second term in November.
Lovell made the announcement in a news release posted on her campaign website. She joins a field that includes District D Councilman Dwight Boykins, trial lawyer Tony Buzbee, businessman Bill King and at least five lesser-known candidates.
In her announcement, Lovell emphasized her tenure as chair of the city council transportation committee and advocacy for LGBTQ rights. She served three terms on council from 2006 to 2012, including a stint as vice mayor pro-tem.
“Now, more than ever, our citizens trust that public safety will be a priority, that the services they pay for will be delivered efficiently and on time, and that there will be an investment in the city’s infrastructure and their quality of life,” Lovell said in a statement. “I will honor that trust and deliver on those commitments.”
Speculation had abounded for months that Lovell would join the race, representing a challenge to Turner from his left. Lovell also has established herself as an ally to the Houston Professional Fire Fighters Association, working for a political action committee that supported Proposition B during last year’s midterm election.
That’s what this is about. It makes me wonder if the firefighters, who had previously endorsed Dwight Boykins before he stepped in it over the weekend, might reconsider their options. Or maybe the two of them will split the pool of pro-firefighter/anti-Turner Democrat voters. I don’t know.
Though Lovell’s name last appeared on the city ballot in 2009, she has remained visible in the community for the last decade and likely maintains some recognition among voters, said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston.
“She’s been out office for awhile, but there are still a lot of people that know and respect her,” Rottinghaus said.
Lovell is likely to cut into the mayor’s progressive base, said Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University. Before Lovell joined the race, Jones said, “Turner was going to be the preferred choice of most liberal Anglos.” Those voters are more likely to support Lovell than King, Buzbee or Boykins, Jones said.
Yeah, but she was always an underperformer at the ballot box. In 2007, running for her first re-election, she failed to crack 53% against perennial candidate Griff Griffin. In 2009, she was forced into a runoff against perennial candidate Andrew Burks. I happen to think Lovell was a fine Council member and a master of policy details, but she tends to burn bridges and accumulate enemies. I’ll be very interested to see what kind of endorsements she gets, and what her fundraising is; we won’t know that till the 30 day reports, as that is the advantage of announcing one’s candidacy on July 1.
I have doubts that she will get any traction. The young voters in my area of the Heights have never heard of her, and the older voters never supported her. I presume the firefighters are concerned that some number of white or glbt voters will not support Boykins, and are funding her to be a spoiler and help ensure that Turner is forced into a run-off. I have a westside GOP friend who thinks she will poll well based on gender alone however.
Demetria Smith is also running again, and this time, I don’t think she has any recent hot check charges against her, so there’s that. It’s going to be a tough call for ‘Emily’s List’ to choose their girl power candidate to support for Houston mayor this go round.
https://www.click2houston.com/news/who-is-demetria-smith-the-woman-running-for-houston-mayor
SJW women and the men who love ’em will have to choose one of the two women, so which will it be? The white lesbian, or the black? Who has the most oppression points? Obviously, either one beats out Boykins, a man, especially given his racist, misogynist, program of telling young girls not to get knocked up. So patriarchal!
Lovell pissed off everyone who was against the historic preservation ordinance by initially championing it, then was seen as a “sell out” by preservationists when she got on the payroll of Heights builder(s) to try to oppose what she had helped implement. There have been other incidents of her taking questionable positions, but they always have the common thread that her positions are those of the highest bidder.
I would love to know what Mark Jones means by “Anglos.” In my dictionary Anglo is a group that invaded England along with the Saxons late in the 5th century. I guess today that it can be used to describe Anglophone persons of European descent. And I suppose that it fits with the notion of the three races, which is the facile notion of diversity in Houston today. Because, even though my great grand parents all came from Europe, and my parents’ generation grew up speaking only English, I would not, for example, due to my ethnicity, be accepted by White Nationalists.
@Jason, the invaders were Angles, not anglos. My Hispanic in laws call any non-Hispanic white person anglo.
I agree with Jason that the term “Anglo” is an artificial term, much like “people of color” which lumps Americans of Japanese or Vietnamese, Filipino or Chinese ancestry with Latinos and blacks when useful for the interests of advocates for certain voting rights or political purposes. Anglo really does not include all Anglophone persons (especially Latino ones who are monolingual in English), and I think Lebanese- or Moroccan-Americans would be considered Anglo since they are not Latino, but also not African-American as that term is usually defined.
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