There’s a lot of news coming out of Austin.
First, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), a 78-year-old, 16-term House member announced he wouldn’t seek reelection if Texas Republicans go ahead with their mid-decade redistricting plan.
This is huge news. Doggett was barrelling toward a member-on-member clash with Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), the 36-year-old Congressional Progressive Caucus chair drawn by Republicans into the same Austin-based district as Doggett.
Doggett had been urging Casar to run in the new 35th District, a newly created seat closer to San Antonio that President Donald Trump would have carried by 10 points and that contains roughly 10% of Casar’s current voters.
Doggett took a very pointed shot at Casar in a statement announcing his retirement:
“I had hoped that my commitment to reelection under any circumstances would encourage Congressman Casar to not surrender his winnable district to Trump. While his apparent decision is most unfortunate, I prefer to devote the coming months to fighting Trump tyranny and serving Austin rather than waging a struggle with fellow Democrats.”
Some local Texas Democrats had been urging Doggett to step aside, noting that he was the first House Democrat to call on then-President Joe Biden to exit the 2024 presidential race and make way for a different candidate.
But Doggett was dug in — until Thursday.
This is a big boost for Casar, whose allies waged a seemingly successful pressure campaign to ensure his congressional career could continue.
A GOP retirement. The news that Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) will run for attorney general in the Lone Star State has added another wrinkle to the fast-moving political landscape in Texas.
Several hopefuls are now looking at Roy’s Hill Country seat, which stretches from Austin to San Antonio.
Marc Whyte, a GOP San Antonio city council member, is said to be interested.
Aaron Reitz, who left the Trump administration to run for Texas attorney general, could also switch gears to run for Roy’s seat. Like Roy, Reitz served as chief of staff to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).
One of the new red House seats in Texas borders Roy’s new 21st District, leaving multiple seats for interested Republican candidates in the greater San Antonio area.
The Texas Senate is on track to pass the House version of the proposed new congressional map that creates five new red districts. The measure then heads to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk and he is certain to sign it.
At that point, the sprint to Texas’ March primaries begins. We’ll be keeping a close eye on recruitment in those new seats — and potential primary challenges for existing GOP incumbents whose district boundaries changed significantly.
One GOP recruit filed Thursday with the FEC in anticipation of the new maps. Texas state Rep. Briscoe Cain plans to run in the new 9th District, which is safely Republican and located near Houston.
As this map becomes final, one thing worth watching is what Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas) does now that the Fort Worth portion of his district is gone. Could Veasey bow out and give fellow Democratic Rep. Julie Johnson (Texas) a chance to run in his new district since her seat is now deep red?
