Dem
52
Ties
2
GOP
46
As we noted yesterday, Bo French (R) is running for Texas Railroad Commissioner right now, and is fueling his campaign with significant amounts of out-and-out bigotry. He hit the jackpot this weekend with an eX-Twitter post carping about all the brown University of Texas students attending this weekend's Ohio State game. It's now been viewed close to 50 million times.
French, not surprisingly, is not sorry. All of this attention is exactly what he wanted. Confronted by reporters yesterday, he said, "I think that the bigger conversation is, are we going to have policies to prioritize Americans... or are we going to have policies that prioritize foreigners? And I think most people in the America First movement think we ought to be prioritizing Americans." He has correctly summarized one of the core tenets of MAGA/America First, which is "prioritizing Americans." You just have to remember that by "Americans," French and the other MAGA zealots mean "white Americans."
French, of course, has no idea if the students in the photo he posted are American citizens; all he knows is that most of them are not white. That said, if someone had to guess, the smart guess would be that most or all of them are U.S. citizens. Here's reader R.T. in Arlington, TX, to explain:
I am not surprised at the demographics of the UT student body. A long-standing law, which used to be called the 10% rule, now the 8% rule, guarantees admission to either UT or Texas A&M for any public school student who graduates in the top 8% of their high school class. It is actually a problem for the universities, as they have to admit more freshman than their carrying capacity and then chase the excess off with extreme academic rigor in lower-division classes. Accentuated by white flight from public schools, that means that the UT student body cannot be lily-white because of a law that was designed to give opportunity to bright but economically poor students. True meritocracy inevitably leads to diversity.
Again, French doesn't really care whether or not these folks are Americans; he only cares whether or not they are white.
Our sense is that French is not helping his cause, or his party's cause, with that kind of garbage. Now, we do recognize that it's possible we are Pollyannas who fail to appreciate how well racism sells in Texas and/or the South. However, not long before we made today's posting live, Politico published a piece headlined "'Profoundly unhelpful': Texas Republicans worry Bo French's xenophobic posts make a tough year worse." The first bit of that headline is based on a quote in the article that comes from Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak, who said "His post on social media is profoundly unhelpful if his goal is to see Republicans win statewide races in a tough political environment in 50 days." So, we might just be right that this is bad for Republicans, even in Texas, and that the best thing for them to do would be to disavow French and his bigotry.
Another Republican strategist who is on board with us is the most famous GOP strategist in all of Texas, namely Karl Rove. He is so aggravated by French that he told a group of folks at a Republican luncheon yesterday that he's going to vote for a Democrat for the first time in 30 years—for French's opponent, state Rep. Jon Rosenthal. Rove joins Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) as to two highest-profile members of the Party to disavow French.
That said, neither Rove nor Cornyn carries anywhere near as much weight as they used to. If French really is hurting the GOP, then the very best thing would be for the guy who leads the party to denounce him. But that, as you might guess, is not what happened. Instead, Donald Trump got on his social media platform for the members of the white-sheet brigade to attack Rove:
Karl Rove is so bad for the Republican Party, and completely wrong so often. He suffers from a major case of Trump Derangement Syndrome primarily because, for almost 10 years, I beat back and won against so many of the people and things that he wanted and espoused. Why does FoxNews and the WSJ keep his RINO Voice alive. The guy is a stone cold loser!
So, if Texas Democrats want to make the case that the GOP is a racist party, from the head of the party on down, Trump and French are certainly doing their part to facilitate that argument.
Incidentally, the Democrat Rosenthal is a mechanical engineer with expertise in extraction. French comes from a family who is in the oil business, but he has spent his professional career largely in private equity. That probably means that Rosenthal is more qualified for the office to which they both aspire. Yesterday, we made a joke about how French has a 19th-century mindset, and so it makes sense that he aspires to a 19th-century job. We got plenty of e-mails asking us to clarify that. Here's the one from P.S. in Plano, TX:
Railroads are indeed a 19th century innovation, albeit one which remains an important part of present day cargo transportation. However, the Railroad Commission of Texas no longer has anything to do with regulating railroads and has not since 2005. Railroad regulation is handled by the Texas Department of Transportation.
What the Railroad Commission of Texas does regulate is oil, coal, and some uranium extraction. The most economically significant of those domains is oil extraction. The Texas oil boom began in 1901, and production has continued to climb through the present day, meaning that the Railroad Commission of Texas is regulating an industry that contributes approximately 10% of the state's entire GDP.
It would be good of you to publish this for the benefit of your readers in Texas. The Texas Railroad Commissioner is an elected official, and I'm sure the only reason the title of his position hasn't been changed is because he benefits from the lack of accountability that comes from voters being confused about his duties. Most voters probably just shrug and vote for Railroad Commissioner based on incumbency or party identification rather than what they think about how Texas regulates oil drilling. If the position were named more honestly, these elections would be higher profile and more politically competitive.
Thanks for the assist, P.S.
Anyhow, if French is not as qualified as his opponent, and if he's also an angry white guy, it may explain why his campaign is all about culture wars stuff, and he rarely actually mentions the issues that are relevant to the post of Texas Railroad Commissioner. Meanwhile, if James Talarico (D) somehow pulls out the win in the Senate race and French gives away his race to Rosenthal, then Katie bar the door. Two statewide wins for Democrats, after having been shut out in Texas for 32 years? Rightly or wrongly, everyone will be talking about how maybe the blue-ing of Texas has finally arrived. (Z)