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Nov 4, 2008 8:53 pm US/Central
Democrats See Possibilities In Tuesday's Vote
AUSTIN (AP) ―
Texas Democrats are banking on high voter turnout today to help break the GOP's dominance in statewide offices and the Legislature.
The last Democratic presidential candidate to win Texas was Jimmy Carter in 1976. However, the Associated Press reports Republican John McCain is expected to carry the state again. Neither presidential candidate spent any substantive time in Texas after the March 4 primary.
Texas election officials predict more than nine million Texans -- a record turnout -- would cast ballots, representing about 68 percent of the state's 13.5 million voters.
On one side, the Democrats hope that Barack Obama will bring out enough voters to swing key races down the ballot. On the other, Republicans hope that a strong GOP surge could beat back Democratic challenges to the Texas Supreme Court, the Court of Criminal Appeals and the Railroad Commission and the GOP majority in congressional and legislative seats.
In the Texas House, Democrats have their best chance in more than a decade to make gains and perhaps even reclaim the gavel from GOP House Speaker Tom Craddick. Currently, Republicans have a 79-71 majority in the Texas House.
The Associated Press reports Texas Democrats, staying unusually competitive in the money game, have been running strong.
That's endangered incumbents like Craddick lieutenant and 19-year House veteran Rep. Tony Goolsby of Dallas and Rep. Bill Zedler of Arlington.
Sen. Kim Brimer, a Fort Worth Republican, is struggling to hang on.
AP reports that in the Texas Senate, where Republicans hold a 20-11 edge, a partisan shift is not in the works.
The story is the same for other races across the state.
Dallas County Democrats are hoping to maintain their momentum from 2006, when they swept 42 judicial races and six other countywide offices. Democrats are looking to win six judicial races and two countywide offices.
Harris County has been firmly Republican since 1994, when the party's candidates came into office as part of a nationwide GOP sweep. But an e-mail scandal forced District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal to resign this year.
Rice University political science professor Bob Stein says the faltering economy and presidential candidate Barack Obama have given Democrats their best chance in years to win in Harris County.
Harris County GOP chairman Jared Woodfill says Republicans are preparing as if they are behind but are not preparing for defeat.
Democrats also hope to end a decade-long Republican stranglehold on the top two statewide courts. Three seats are up for grabs with the Texas Supreme Court. Three more could be decided for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.
No Democrat has held even one of the nine seats on the Texas Supreme Court or one of the nine on the Court of Criminal Appeals since late 1998. That's when George W. Bush's 69 percent landslide victory in November year gave him a second term as governor and swept fellow Republicans with him throughout the ballot.
Democrat Linda Yanez, a regional appellate justice from Edinburg who ran unsuccessfully for the Supreme Court in 2002, faces Republican Phil Johnson, a former appellate chief justice from the Panhandle and a Supreme Court justice for three years.
If elected, Yanez would be the first Latina on the state's highest civil court.
Democratic lawyer Sam Houston opposes incumbent Republican Justice Dale Wainwright, who was looking for a second six-year term.
Six years ago Wainwright became the first black to make it to the court through an election without having first been appointed.
In the third Supreme Court race, Democratic state District Judge Jim Jordan of Dallas is trying to keep Republican Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson from a second full term.
Jefferson became the first black on the court when Gov. Rick Perry appointed him in 2001. He was elected the following year and became chief justice in 2004.
In the Court of Criminal Appeals races, Houston lawyer and former federal prosecutor Susan Strawn opposes incumbent Republican Tom Price.
Price is a former criminal court and state district judge in Dallas County who's been on the bench since 1997.
Judge Paul Womack, a former assistant prosecutor in Travis and Williamson counties, looks for a third six-year term on the state's highest criminal appeals court against Democrat J.R. Molina.
Molina is a Fort Worth lawyer and former prosecutor making his fourth attempt for a seat on the bench.
GOP incumbent Cathy Cochran, on the court since 2001, does not have a Democratic opponent.
She's facing Libertarian William Strange of Dallas.
Cochran is a former defense lawyer in Houston who also worked as an assistant district attorney in Harris and Fort Bend counties.
(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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