The Disappointed Noob, Part 1
Right off the top, I want to say that I’ve vented about this to two people with extensive experience with politics particularly in Washington DC. Both of those people, literally within thirty seconds of starting to speak, immediately started dismissing and minimizing my concerns. It’s either that they are jaded and cynical about these processes, or I am the classic noob that just showed up and has all sorts of bushy and bright-eyed questions that are the same BS questions everyone has 48 hours into any new industry. Rookie thoughts. I don’t know which it is. I am out of my depth. All I have is my own experiences and perceptions.
So, here’s the basics of it: Republican Ron Wright was elected to the House of Representatives in Texas District #6 (covering Fort Worth and Arlington) in 2018. In 2020, he was re-elected. On February 7, 2021, he died of COVID. So for the open seat, there was what’s called a “jungle primary”… any candidates with any party affiliation could run. If any candidate got 50% of the vote, they win the open seat. If not, the top two candidates proceed to a run-off (most likely this July).
A few months ago I was looking to get more involved with politics, and to do more in the real world and not just advocate and argue on social media. November elections are far away and also there aren’t that many in California that are close (although I’ll see what I can do to help prevent a Newsom recall I suppose). Texas was holding its special election to fill the TX06 seat on May 1; perfect timing, I’d be fully vaccinated and wanted to go to Houston to visit family anyway. So I looked for a Democrat to support.
The most promising candidate to actually have a chance to win was Jana Lynne Sanchez. She lost to wright by 9 points in 2018. Biden lost the district by only 3 points in 2016. Sanchez was running again, and was polling #2 in internal polls from both parties for the seat. So… a good chance she would make the run-off.
Would she win? Probably not. Ron Wright’s widow Susan was running to take the open seat and would probably get the most votes. But I thought a couple of things:
It’s possible the district is getting more blue, and after the amazing flip in Georgia, maybe parts of Texas are worth paying attention to for the Democrats
Maybe a Democrat doesn’t win but gets some name recognition for a run in the future
Surely it wouldn’t hurt to put some groundwork in to reaching out to Democrats and getting them out to vote… I imagine Stacey Abrams’ work was not done in a year but over a long period of time, particularly in years where there weren’t easy wins available for the Democrats
So I reached out to Sanchez’s campaign to offer my help. I told them I’d fly to Fort Worth and do whatever they needed me to do. I did the important things… I packed comfortable shoes, I reached out to Dallas/Fort Worth friends to see if anyone wanted to help, I flew to Love Field, rented a car, drove to Fort Worth, and immediately ate Tex-Mex.
In the effort to not write a novel-length email, I’m going to leave it here for now, young Chris checked in to a La Quinta with the world at his feet and fajitas in his stomach. No amount of cynicism could stop his crusade to flip TX06 blue.. maybe not now, but at some point in the future.
It is here where my troubles began…
Continued next week.