The Final Stretch: A Look At Texas Congressional District 21

[NOTE: This is the first of several posts in the Capitol Annex series 'The Final Stretch.']

||Texas Congressional District 21||Map||John Courage (D) [bio, $$, blog, TV] vs. Lamar Smith (R)||Bexar (part) and Travis (part), Real, Bandera, Kerr, Kendall, Blanco, and Comal Counties||

Texas’ Congressional District 21 is one of several districts touched by the court-ordered redistricting plan handed down this summer which was designed to remedy unconstitutional gerrymandering proffered by the Texas Legislature in its marathon (DeLay led) redistrict-a-thon in 2003.

Congressional District 21 includes parts of Bexar (northeastern) and Travis (western) Counties and all of Real, Bandera, Kerr, Kendall, Blanco, and Comal Counties.

Currently represented by Congressman Lamar Smith (R-San Antonio), CD-21 was ironically a more ‘blue’ district prior to the court’s remap this summer, containing many Democratic strongholds in Travis County. However, the remap, which was done to remedy Congressional District 23’s unconstitutionally dilluted Latino voting strength, made CD-21 a much more safe Republican district.

Courage, however, is not the only candidate Smith faces. Because the election for CD-21 is a “special election” as a result of the court-ordered redistricting, a new filing deadline allowed a number of additional candidates to seek the seat. One, perennial candidate Gene Kelly, had already lost s statewide race this election cycle. The full list includes: Lamar Smith (R-San Antonio), John Courage (D), Gene Kelly (D), Tommy Calvert (I), James Arthur Strohm (L), Mark J. Rossano (I), and James Lyle Peterson (I).

Undoubtedly, the best chance Democrats have in this district is to force Smith into a head-to-head runoff against Courage.This seemed a near impossibility after the remap made the district more Republican and filled it with new territory, but it is now a possibility, thanks to Courage’s on-the-ground, aggressive campaign.

A poll commissioned by the Courage camp shows Smith at 45.6 percent—not enough to avoid a runoff with Courage, who held 30.5 percent—with the remainder being split between the other candidates with 12.2 percent undecided. Smith’s poor showing is no doubt due to Courage’s campaigning as well as the national trend that disfavors Republican incumbents, especially those with ties to Tom DeLay.

There are a number of ‘below the surface’ issues that political insiders will look to as important factors in this race, and all of them are considered negatives for Smith. While these issues might not sway with hard core, far right wing voters in the district, they will likely have some impact on how moderate Republicans and independents cast their votes.

Ties To Voucher Advocate James Leininger, Company That Cost Texas Employee Retirement System Millions: Smith has received thousands of dollars from Kinetic Concepts, Inc.’s political action committe. KCI is the company founded by San Antonio physician and uber-conservative school voucher advocate James Leininger. The Texas Employees Retirement System held 80,000 shares of this company’s stock and lost millions of dollars when the company lost a high-profile patent infringement lawsuit.

This is particularly interesting because three counties Courage is running in (Kendall, Comal and Bandera) overlap with Texas House District 73, the seat of State Rep. Carter Casteel (R-New Braunfels). Casteel was defeated in the March Republican Primary by Nathan Macias, a candidate backed with over three quarters of a million dollars directly from James Leininger or his associated political action committees.

Given that Macias won the primary by less than 100 votes and defeated Casteel, a pro-education, anti-voucher Republican who was respected by liberals and coservatives alike, it’s safe to consider that there are thousands of Republicans within these three counties for whom the very name and connection to Leininger is pure poison. If Courage’s camp gets this message out and is able to target pro-Casteel, anti-Leininger voters within the overlap counties, it could make a significant difference.

Failure To Debate: Republican Congressmen this year seem to have been infected with a disease that prevents them from getting up in front of crowds on the same stage as their opponents and actually talking about issues. While many assume this is simply the strategy of individual Congressmen, too many are singing the same tune for it to be anything else other than a tacit national strategy handed down from the hallowed halls of the NRCC itself.

That aside, Smith has consistently refused to debate Courage. One forum, set for last week, went on without Smith’s participation as it appeared local organizers were simply frusterated by Smith’s cut-and-run strategy when it comes to public confrontations with his opponents.
Votes & Other Negatives: There are a number of votes Smith has cast which may be called into question as well. First and foremost, Smith voted against the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act. This is especially ironic given that CD-21 was changed because of VRA violations in another district by court order. Smith voted for four amendments which would have all but destroyed the Voting Rights Act. While he may tout that he voted for the bill on final passage, it’s similar to a criminal bragging that they called 911 after the beat their victim unconsious with a shovel.
Here are a few other Smith votes and ties that can be called into question:

•Rep. Smith voted against cracking down on the oil and gas industries price gouging.
•Rep. Smith voted for the GOP energy bill that gave billions to oil, gas and nuclear industries.
•Big oil and gas industries have given Rep. Smith $290,622.
•Rep. Smith voted to strip overtime protection from millions of workers.
•Rep. Smith voted to allow federal loans to American companies that have escaped paying U.S. taxes by moving offshore.
•Big drug interests have given $57,300 to Smith over the Representative’s career. They know who their friends are.
•Rep. Smith voted for the GOP Medicare Prescription Drug Bill that will give billions to businesses and the health care industry, while forcing seniors to accept annual increases in premiums and deductibles and a growing gap in coverage for the prescription drugs they buy.
•Smith received $5,000 from GOP Whip Roy Blunt’s “Rely on Your Beliefs” PAC.
•Smith voted with President Bush 92% of the time.
•Smith voted the GOP party line 98% of the time.
•Voted with Tom DeLay 92% of the time (through 3/31/2006)
•Rep. Smith voted to continue awarding contracts to Halliburton even if the Pentagon’s own audit processes found that more than $100 million of their contractor’s costs in Iraq were unreasonable. No surprise that Halliburton gave Smith $3,000.
•1,861 water systems in 29 states have been contaminated with MTBE, exposing as many as 45 million Americans to this potential carcinogen, but Rep. Smith voted to protect the companies responsible from lawsuits by communities that need their help to clean up these systems.
•Rep. Smith sided with social conservatives against patients with debilitating diseases and voted against expanding Federal funding of stem cell research.

While being against stem cell research and being anti-environment would be great for Smith in any other district in Texas, the environment is a touchstone issue in Central Texas that could turn voters away from Smith. The same goes for his votes against stem cell research.

Toll Roads: With the Trans Texas Corridor and toll roads a major issue up and down the ballot this election cycle—especially in this central Texas district—it’s a boon to Courage that he has the endorsement of the San Antonio Toll Party.

Smith has cast votes for highway bills that promote toll roads and generally sides with pro-toll road interests in Congress. While the “toll party” may seem like a nutty concept to people outside of Texas (or even outside Central Texas), it is a force to be reckoned with, and anti-toll/anti-TTC interests are strong in this district.

Lesser Known Candidates: Among the lesser known candidates in the race, Gene Kelly, by virtue of his name recognition (having appeared on ballots in primaries and general elections no less than nine times as perennial candidate over the years) and Tommy Calvert (an independent who is also a nominal Democrat) are the most dangerous.

And, they post a danger to both leading candidates, though lesser so to Courage than to Smith. In terms of forcing a runoff, whatever votes Kelly and Calvert pull are likely to pull more from Smith than Courage, as Courage’s base remains strong while Smith’s is weakened by virtue of the fact that he is a Republican incumbent Congressman in this election cycle.

Calvert, however, has negatives of his own. He’s cut four television commercials, spent lots of money on signage and has failed to file a report with the Federal Election Commission to date.

Lack Of Straight-Ticket Voting. Because this is a special election, voters who cast a straight-party ballot must also cast a separate vote on their ballot in the CD-21 race. This stands to pull some votes away from both leading contenders. However, given that there are more straight Republican voters in the district than straight Democratic voters, the pull will be more from Smith than Courage. Both camps have the hurdle of educating their straight-ticket voters that they have to cast an additional vote on their ballots in order to indicate a preference in the CD-21 race.

However, this difficulty may be mitigated somewhat by the fact that straight-ticket voting will be decreased by the number of independent candidates running for Texas Governor. While both Kinky Friedman and Carole Keeton Strayhorn (a former Republican and current state comptroller) stand no chance of winning the race for governor, conventional wisdom and various factors indicate that Central Texas will be places where both stand to pick up a number of votes. For Strayhorn, her endorsement by some anti-toll allies will boost her numbers in this area. Friedman, as a resident of the congressional district, will also count on some of his ‘base voters’ coming from this area. Whatever numbers these voters come in for both candidates, they will likely not be straight-ticket ballots in any case. Friedman supporters, however, seem less likely to vote a full ballot (especially first time voters) than Strayhorn voters, who could probably be counted on to be serious ticket-splitters. While Friedman has indicated he voted for Smith, it’s unlikely that this revalation will make much difference among his core supporters, especially first-time voters, who it would stand to reason would cast anti-incumbent votes up and down the ballot (if they bother to vote down ballot). Courage’s camp has undoubtedly realized this and done appropriate outreach.

The Courage race, however, will have a positive impact for one Texas gubernatorial candidate: Chris Bell. A fellow Democrat, Bell will no doubt benefit from Courage’s GOTV efforts and turning out of typically straight-ticket Democratic voters.

BOTTOM LINE

As for predicting this race, it could be said it is “anybody’s guess.” However, with so many factors to consider (Smith’s negatives, the number of candidates, anti-incumbent sentiment, the independent gubernatorial candidates and the fact that straight party votes won’t count in this race), it seems logical to come to a few conclusions:

•The race will result in a Smith/Courage runoff. I’d predict it as follows:

Smith: 46.5%
Courage: 29.5%
Kelly: 10%
Calvert: 8%
Remainder of candidates will split: 6%

•At least 7 percent of voters who cast straight-party ballots ballots will not remember to vote in this race.

•At least 5-7 percent of voters who cast votes for Friedman will record undervotes in every other race on the ballot.

People may disagree with this assessment; I would tend to hope Smith’s numbers would be even lower if anti-toll sentiment translates to what the anti-toll activists think it will at the ballot box. A deeper anti-Republican, andi-incumbent feel that may be present in districts elsewhere in the country, however, probably is not so deep in this district as to cut into Smith as much as we’d like.

Some may disagree with the 10% assessment for Gene Kelly. As much as I abhorr Kelly and wish he could be barred by law from ever running in an election again, that very name seems to pull votes out of the clear blue sky time and time again, so I’ll stand by that estimate.

The positive here, of course, is that candidates other than Smith pull 50 percent. This can translate into a Courage victory in the runoff. And, if there is a runoff, you can bet your bottom dollar that millions will pour into this district the likes of which Lamar Smith will have trouble defending himself against. People won’t be able to walk a block without running into a DCCC field worker. And, with a runoff, Smith goes down because he won’t be able to maintain turnout (his supporters will think he’s got it “in the bag”) while anti-Smith turnout will actually be boosted.

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