Analysis: TX Senate Candidates Race To The Right
AUSTIN (AP) – The Republican candidates battling to replace retiring Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison appear to be on a race to see who can strike the right conservative tone: not too moderate, not too Libertarian, but someplace uniquely Texan between the two.
The candidates are trying to claim the mantel of being the "true conservative." Whoever can convince voters they deserve the title will win the nomination, and in Republican-dominated Texas, that means they will likely move to Washington at the end of 2012.
The fiercest competitor is Ted Cruz, the fiery former state solicitor general, who is doing his best to paint the front-runner, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, as a timid moderate. Dewhurst has presided over the Senate since 2003 and has hammered out many compromises over the years, and Cruz seems intent on exposing every perceived lapse in Dewhurst's conservatism.
"There is a reason why voters are fed up with a candidate who says anything to get elected," said Cruz, using his best litigator's style at a debate in Austin on Thursday night. "We need to send someone who knows what he believes in, has firm principles, has a lifetime standing and fighting for the Constitution and who has a record as a fighter."
Attorney General Greg Abbott appointed Cruz to represent Texas before the U.S. Supreme Court between 2003 and 2008, but Cruz has never held elected office or sat in a legislative conference room hammering out new law.
Nevertheless, he has won support from former U.S. Rep. Dick Armey and other tea party activists who don't trust Dewhurst. He has the support of Armey's FreedomWorks, a conservative advocacy group that can help Cruz overcome Dewhurst's fundraising advantages and give Cruz a chance to be a serious challenger.
Dewhurst has so far done his best to brush off Cruz and focus his attacks on President Barack Obama. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has formally endorsed Dewhurst and Gov. Rick Perry has informally said he hopes Dewhurst wins. And the lieutenant governor is trying to use his record as a lawmaker to his advantage.
"Over the last three years, President Obama has been trampling on (our) rights, and as a life-long businessman, as someone who loves our country ... that's unacceptable," Dewhurst said. "That's why I am running for the U.S. Senate, to take my unique background and proven conservative experience -- having balanced budgets and cut spending -- to Washington to take our country back."
Former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert also emphasizes actions over words, warning voters to only believe some or none of the soaring rhetoric coming from the other candidates. He also tries to walk the same narrow path Dewhurst must take, balancing his experience as a successful businessman with his time in elected office.
In Leppert's case, he brags about serving as the mayor of Dallas and restructuring the Police Department's budget while bringing down the crime rate, among other things.
"We all know what the problem is. We have overspent, we have overtaxed and we have over-regulated and we have a government that has gone far, far out of control," Leppert said. "For too long we have had professional politicians who love to make speeches, but won't deal with real solutions or won't make tough choices."
Leppert has promised to make those tough choices, regardless of whether they could end his political career.
On the populist, tea party-infused margins of the debate stage on Thursday stood former ESPN football analyst Craig James and Glenn Addison, a funeral home owner and school board member from Magnolia. They share a constitutional fundamentalism that would wipe out most of what the federal government does today and give responsibility for environmental protection, public education and labor law exclusively back to the states.
Neither man has experience in statewide or national politics, but they offered themselves up as the friendly athlete with family values and the every man with common sense who would do better in Washington than anyone with real political experience. They used lively metaphors and self-deprecating jokes that won over the conservative debate crowd and will do well in town hall meetings. But both men must overcome the novelty of their campaigns to convince the electorate to take them seriously.
The key question, though, remains how far right do Texas Republicans want their next U.S. senator to stand. As the state waits to hear when the primary election will take place, voters will have a full conservative spectrum to consider.
(Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
