Davis Campaign Marked by Failed Tactics, Muddled Messages
On the day last year when state Sen. Wendy Davis launched her bid for the Texas Governor’s Mansion, something she failed to mention got almost as much attention as the speech itself: her filibuster of a bill creating new abortion regulations.
After all, it was that June 2013 stand against the legislation that propelled Davis into instant celebrity and made her a rare Texas Democratic fundraising phenom, so leaving it out was noticeable.
In the Haltom City auditorium where Davis made her announcement, senior adviser Matt Angle, mingling with reporters at the press table, explained why the dramatic event ...
Comments (8)
donald baker
Muddled message? Not hardly. Texans knew exactly what the anti gun abortion barbie stands for and that is why we gave her a Texas sized boot in her liberal lying butt.
WUSRPH
The sad reality is that Davis never had a chance. Only major screw-ups by Abbott could have defeated Abbott and he ran a nearly perfect campaign......that started out with a $20 million advantage. Davis might have been able to run a better campaign....that will certainly be a subject of debate for some time...but the best she should have reasonably expected was to run closer than the most recent Democratic candidates. She did not.
T D
Could we stop with the "abortion Barbie" now?
The state's got real business, and problems, ahead of it.
Kevin BULLARD
She didn't run from the fact that she killed her unborn baby - so I don't get the fuss. She was a weak candidate and they missed that fact. Abbot is a bit of a fiend, but he is bought and paid for by the powers that be here in TX, so he was a shoe-in. No surprises here to me.
melanie scruggs
The failed tactics conversation is so far only talking about facts and messages, but what about the mechanics of their grassroots strategy and management of these supposedly wonderful volunteers? WHERE were they canvassing for months and what were their canvassers talking about, what information were they collecting and how was it being used? The total failure to boost turnout is not just a result of the messages and messengers, I think, but also probably related to the fact that they had absolutely no idea how to hold volunteers or voters accountable...
Mike in Texas
Thorough analysis of the failed Davis Campaign. thanks Jay!
James Davidson
This is a great observation article on the race. What I would have liked to see though, was your take on how low voter turnout nationwide as well as the 18-29 demographic locally played into the election night results.
There were a lot of mishaps in regards to her campaign & Battleground Texas. Maybe they will heed the ideas coming from outside their silos sooner than later.
B L Zebubba
This article by Jay Root consists almost entirely of inside-baseball bloviation by losing campaign hacks desperately groping to salvage their careers; it's only trenchant point came when he said,
"Davis probably never had a modicum of a chance to win the race. The 2014 campaign turned out to be another wave election that cost Democrats the U.S. Senate, governor’s races in heavily Democratic states and competitive legislative races across the land, including here".
In a tiresome attempt to come up with something - anything - trenchant to say in the eternally dubious effort to justify the unquestionable and infinite wisdom of Texas voters, Mr. Root's essay ends up being a overreaching and trite exercise in tautology: the blame for losing an election race lies with the loser. Having achieved that minimal objective, Mr. Root spends the rest of his allotted, demanding space contradicting the quoted remarks. A blank page requires filling with text of some sort.
According to Mr. Root, Ms. Davis's campaign was an exercise in "failed tactics, unmet goals and muddled messages that helped doom Davis to an embarrassing defeat long before voters rendered their verdict Tuesday night" according to Mr. Root. Really? Did you bother to look at any election results before reaching this conclusion?
Preliminary election-night results (per the Texas Secretary of State) have Ms. Davis pulling in just under 39% of the vote; the percentage of voters garnered by fellow Democrats running in 2014 statewide races were: David Alameel (U. S. Senate), a little over 34%; Leticia Van de Putte (Lt. Gov.), like Ms. Davis a little under 39%; Sam Houston (Texas Atty. General), 38%; the eminently qualified Mike Collier (Texas Comptroller), under 38%; John Cook (General Land Office Commissioner), well under 36%; anti-candidate Jim Hogan (Commissioner of Agriculture), under 37%; Steve Brown (Railroad Commissioner), under 37%; William Moody (Chief Justice of the Texas Supreme Court), over 37%; Laurence Edward Myers (Texas Supreme Court Justice - Place 6), 36.5%; Gina Benavides (Texas Supreme Court Justice - Place 7), under 38%; and lastly, John Granberg (Court of Criminal Appeals Judge - Place 3), under 37%.
These results are quite consistent, with Ms. Davis and Ms. Van de Putte actually doing slightly better than the rest of the (mostly male) statewide Democratic candidates. So what are we to believe - that all of the other statewide Democratic candidates also ran campaigns comprising "failed tactics, unmet goals and muddled messages"? What tosh. What these other candidates did and said benefitted them even less than what Ms. Davis's activities did for her.
The truth is the results reflect straight-ticket voting, and nothing Ms. Davis did or said was going to change her political fate; her die was cast the moment she announced her candidacy as a Democrat, Mr. Root's blather notwithstanding. Ms. Davis erroneously placed her faith in the ability of Texas voters to perceive which policy positions and track records were most likely to result in the greatest good for the most people. How foolish of a Harvard Law School graduate.