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Fightin’ Flake
August 28, 2012 | 6 comments
With the Tea Partiers
Texas in Turmoil
Ted Cruz may be the Tea Party choice, but can he overcome David Dewhurst’s connections?
By conservative acclamation, Ted Cruz should be headed to the U.S. Senate.
The Harvard law grad has been deemed “the next great conservative hope” by National Review. As the son of a Cuban exile, he has at times been compared to fellow Tea Party darling Marco Rubio. During Cruz’s tenure as Texas solicitor general, he argued cases defending the Ten Commandments monument, the Pledge of Allegiance, and the Second Amendment before the Supreme Court.
But whether Texas voters will heed the talk-radio consensus is another question.
After the Tea Party’s rise in 2010, a surge of grassroots candidates began challenging the GOP establishment from the right. No race exemplifies that trend more profoundly right now than the battle between Cruz and Texas Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst. Because the May 29 Republican primary failed to produce a majority winner — Dewhurst fell shy of the threshold with 45 percent of the vote; Cruz trailed with 34 percent — the two front-runners will now face off in a July 31 runoff.
Cruz told TAS that he remains confident of victory. In the last weeks of the primary race, Cruz’s campaign secured endorsements from Rick Santorum, Sarah Palin, and Sean Hannity, among other notable conservatives, and — surely it was no accident — closed in on Dewhurst’s lead. Cruz said he’s positive that this was “a demonstration of the strong momentum of the campaign.”
Indeed, though Cruz still trailed in the primary by 11 points, a September poll showed him down by as many as 29 points. It’s clear he has made up some of that ground. But he has run most of the race against the wind.
Dewhurst, the state’s three-time lieutenant governor and a self-made energy mogul, has to his advantage extensive political experience, connections, and personal wealth — in this race alone, he has spent a staggering $9 million of his own fortune. He also has the endorsement of longtime Texas Governor Rick Perry, with whom he claims to share “one of the most fiscally and socially conservative records in America.”
Perry’s backing has made a difference. William Lutz, managing editor of the Lone Star Report, pointed out that “just about everything that Rick Perry is taking credit for was through Dewhurst…if you like Perry, you have to like Dewhurst because, to some extent, they have the same record.”
For some, that record demonstrates Dewhurst’s conservative bona fides. Joe Pojman, founder of Texas Alliance for Life, which endorsed Dewhurst, said his tenure has been “a litany of one pro-life success after another.”
But there’s also no denying that the lieutenant governor has made plenty of friends and built up substantial political capital over his 14 years in state elected office — first as land commissioner, then, starting in 2003, as lieutenant governor under Perry. Lutz said that “part of the reason the pro-life groups are all endorsing Dewhurst — even though Ted Cruz is also pro-life — is because they’ve worked with him for 10 years.”
A look at each candidate’s endorsement page is instructive. Cruz’s reads like a who’s who of conservatism. Sarah Palin. Rick Santorum. Jim DeMint. Ron Paul. Rand Paul. Mark Levin.
Dewhurst’s reads like a list of those whose backs he’s scratched. Texas Credit Union League. Texas Oil and Gas PAC. Texas Restaurant Association. Texas Municipal Police Association.
WITH JUST OVER A MONTH remaining before the runoff, Cruz’s chances remain uncertain.
Not only has the level of spending, at more than $31.6 million so far, been “Texas-sized,” the campaigns have been less than civil. Dewhurst has targeted Cruz’s involvement with two Hispanic organizations to paint his opponent as a proponent for amnesty for illegal immigrants. (Both organizations say they support no such thing.) The allegations have been widely condemned by conservative media and figures like George P. Bush, who said that “[this] is the type of divisive racial politics used by President Obama and the Democrats. It has no place in the Republican Party.”
But Dewhurst’s campaign stands by the charge.
About the Author
Vivien Chang is an editorial intern at The American Spectator. She is currently a rising senior at the University of British Columbia. Email her at changv@spectator.org or follow her on Twitter @vivienlchang.
Aristocat| 6.27.12 @ 7:41AM
Ted Crus is the Tea Party choice and will make a great Senator...Dewhurst is a wealthy establishment type trying to buy the election...
TLP| 6.27.12 @ 9:29AM
I think I recall these kinds of stories, about Dick Lugar, and His Connections.
And Hillary, back in 2007, an Her Connections.
And we all know how those turned out.
"We surround them."
And, it's high time "Them" were REMINDED of that fact.
Ken (Old Texican)| 6.27.12 @ 7:55AM
Both fine men. Would that every State had such fine candidates.
I'm gonna' vote for Cruz. Even if he doesn't win, his showing will remind Dewhurst every day in office that he better watch after Texans.
Bob Grant| 6.27.12 @ 8:49AM
My thoughts as well.
We might not have term limits in this country but the next best thing is to put up strong challengers in the primary and support them. From now on this will be my strategy for electing presidents, congressmen/women, governors, or local dog catchers.
The lasting effect of the 2009 town hall showdowns was exposing our "leaders" as mediocre operators who don't read bills, don't keep their promises, and who work the system for their own personal benefit.
In other words, THEY ARE ALL EXPENDABLE!
Dewhurst might win but will be on a short 6 year leash.
Al Adab| 6.27.12 @ 12:13PM
I was hoping you both would weigh in here. While it is not my State so I cannot vote in this one, I concur with Ken and would make the same comment about the national ticket. We Conservatives (like Texans) will need to be ever watchful and hold a president Romney accountable every day. Remember Harriet Myers? ...and Romney is to the left of Bush43.
Stkman| 6.27.12 @ 2:45PM
Sorry to dis-agree with you Bob. Once elcted we all know how hard it can be to get an incumbent out of office. Dewhurst needs to go home and Cruz needs to be elected and sent to Washington. We must stop the RHINO's at all cost. They are to elitism as Obama is to socialism. America is heading towards a serfdom system. The rich and powerful feel they can have us subsidize every business move and protect them from themselves when they make bad decisions or even when they embezzle from their own companies. It's time to put a stop to it and elect someone who doesn't represent the "establishment". No more Bush's or their kind, no more Clintons, no more Kennedy's. They are all self serving and serve only their powerful friends.
Vote for Cruz!
Bob Grant| 6.27.12 @ 4:16PM
I'm not sure if we disagree. I agreed with Ken when he stated he preferred Cruz over Dewhurst but would support Dewhurst in the general.
Now, you WILL do the same? Won't you?
I'm not sure what the point would be to sit out an election and risk the chance of unnecessarily handing over a seat to a democrat.
Gary B| 6.28.12 @ 5:50AM
I'm doing the same thing, Ken, and feel the same about the situation.
Von Mises Jr| 6.27.12 @ 8:10AM
While both men seem like good conservatives, I am routing for Cruz since he is the TEA Party favorite. But the issue is not whether the establishment beats the grassroots, or vice-versa. The point is that conservatives are holding the party accountable and driving it to conservative policies and platform.
In New Jersey, Governor Christie is about to be presented a Foreclosure Bill that will set up a $1 billion dollar bond sale to create our own version of Freddie Mac. It will buy foreclosed homes across the state that will bailout banks while at the same time destroying home values and creating "affordable housing." But "affordable housing" is what caused the Sub-prime crash in 2008, and the properties will be rented to ex-convicts, sex offenders, drug addicts and mentally ill.
He is also pushing an Executive Order to establish Agenda21 in New Jersey as a "Development and Redevelopment Plan."
The TEA Party groups across the state are fighting back. We hope to save New Jersey from total socialism, and we will not relent until we save the nation.
Maxwell| 6.27.12 @ 10:26AM
Von Mises Jr, you forgot to mention the latest Transportation Trust Fund Bill that takes money from Peter to pay Paul and the bonding of new debt. As it now stands Jersey is 47th in GDP and has the 5th highest unemployment. Yup, Chris Christie is doing a really bang up job! I STILL wish Lonegan got elected. Much more conservative than Christie ever will be.
Von Mises Jr| 6.27.12 @ 11:01AM
Steve put out an email today announcing a conference call to discuss the ObaMaoCare decision tomorrow night. I am sure you can find it on the AFP website.
RJ| 6.27.12 @ 12:01PM
I met Ted Cruz at a candidate conference last month and am very impressed by him. He clerked for Michael Luttig and Chief Justice William Rehnquist, in addition to winning cases before the US Supreme Court as Solicitor General of Texas. He would make a great US Senator and I look forward to him serving on the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Casey Abell| 6.27.12 @ 2:46PM
Cruz more or less flopped in the first debate, which Dewhurst managed to keep a dull non-event. Basically, Dewhurst wants nothing much to happen in the runoff election, and so far he's getting his wish.
Cruz has to cut through somehow to overcome Dewhurst's lead. After all, Dewhurst just has to pick up most of Leppert's voters from the first round to win comfortably, and those folks seem more inclined toward Dewhurst already.
After the debate non-event, Cruz tried a weird charge that Perry was only supporting Dewhurst to get him out of the state. Perry laughed that one off. We'll see if Cruz can get any more traction as the campaign continues.