| The University Democrats (UDems) and the Central Austin Democrats (CAD) got together today for their endorsement meeting. Most of the candidates in contested Democratic races showed up, along with some other Democrats without contested primaries. Together, they form the Austin Progressive Coalition (APC), which endorses candidates when the two groups concur on a particular race.
Disclosure: I am an officer with the University Democrats.
The following are the endorsements, with a few comments below.
Governor
UDems: Bill White
CAD: Bill White
**Bill White wins the APC endorsement.**
Lieutenant Governor
UDems: Linda Chavez Thompson
CAD: Ronnie Earle
Land Commissioner
UDems: Hector Uribe
CAD: Hector Uribe
**Hector Uribe wins the APC endorsement.**
Agriculture Commissioner
UDems: Hank Gilbert
CAD: Hank Gilbert
**Hank Gilbert wins the APC endorsement.**
State Board of Education District 5
UDems: Rebecca Bell-Metereau
CAD: Rebecca Bell-Metereau
**Rebecca Bell-Metereau wins the APC endorsement.**
147th District Court
UDems: Cliff Brown
CAD: Cliff Brown
**Cliff Brown wins the APC endorsement.**
201st District Court
UDems: Amy Clark Meachum
CAD: Amy Clark Meachum
**Amy Clark Meachum wins the APC endorsement.**
299th District Court
UDems: Karen Sage
CAD: Mindy Montford
331st District Court
UDems; David Crain
CAD: David Crain
**David Crain wins the APC endorsement.**
County Court at Law #3
UDems: John Lipscombe
CAD:John Lipscombe
**John Lipscombe wins the APC endorsement.**
County Commissioner, Pct. 4
UDems: Raul Alvarez
CAD: Raul Alvarez
**Raul Alvarez wins the APC endorsement.**
Justice of the Peace, Pct. 1
UDems: Daniel Bradford
CAD: Yvonne Williams
Justice of the Peace, Pct. 2
UDems: Karin Crump
CAD: Karin Crump
**Karin Crump wins the APC endorsement.**
Justice of the Peace, Pct. 5
UDems: Herb Evans (no website found)
CAD: Herb Evans
**Herb Evans wins the APC endorsement.**
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The Austin Progressive Coalition will combine efforts to make door hangers for the candidates the two groups endorsed. Block walks are scheduled for each of the three Saturdays after today. So, the APC endorsements could make a significant difference in the close races, such as the County Commissioner's race.
In that race, actually, Raul Alvarez continues to pull out close victories in club endorsements. I can count today's combined margin of victories for him on one hand. But now he has many clubs putting out his name, and that will make it one of the races to watch on primary night.
Beyond that, there really were no surprises. Last week, KT noted that the Austin Democratic Machine is still figuring out where it stands in the 299th District Court race. She's become a pretty good friend of the University Democrats, though, and I imagine my group will be out block walking for her in the likely event of a runoff.
KT mentioned that the Machine doesn't seem to care about the Lieutenant Governor's race but in reality there just seemed to be a lot of strong support for both Ronnie Earle and Linda Chavez-Thompson in both groups, resulting in this split endorsement. (It makes sense, too, that the college club is the one to break away from Earle, as many of us weren't in Travis County to watch Earle's District Attorney leadership.)
For Justice of the Peace, Pct. 1, Yvonne Williams is still winning a majority of endorsements, but Daniel Bradford is picking up the young crowd.
And Farouk Shami had virtually no support. Bill White received every single vote with the University Democrats, and Shami may be able to say he had one with the Central Austin Democrats. Paraphrasing what someone said after the endorsements, even with some folks that may have felt sympathetic to Shami, "We can be realists from time to time." |
