Burnt Orange Report

More on the Special Election in SD 1

By Byron LaMasters

Paul Sadler led the field yesterday in the special election in State Senate District 1 despite being the target of $400,000 in negative attack ads. The Dallas Morning News reports:

In Senate District 1, Mr. Sadler attributed his showing to his experience in the Legislature, where as chairman of the House Public Education Committee he authored major school reform measures and passed the first teacher health insurance program in Texas.

"There are only 31 state senators, and the Senate is no place for a novice," Mr. Sadler said in a reference to Mr. Eltife, who has not served in the Legislature.

Mr. Sadler also said many voters rejected negative ads run against him by Texans for Lawsuit Reform, a group that favors Republicans and pushes for limits on civil lawsuits.

"A third-party group dropped about $400,000 worth of negative ads against me and we still maintained strong support from voters," he said. "We're very excited about where we are and where we're going in this race."

[...]

Competition in the race was fierce as Mr. Sadler, Mr. Eltife and Mr. Merritt spent heavily on television and radio ads to gain an edge in a contest that didn't start in earnest until after New Year's Day. Nearly a million dollars had been raised by the candidates in early January.

Mr. Eltife was favored by the state's Republican establishment and received hefty donations from some of the chief GOP contributors in Texas. His latest campaign finance reports showed contributions of nearly $640,000.

Because he was not targeted, he also benefited from the negative ads that were run by third party groups against Mr. Sadler and Mr. Merritt.

Mr. Sadler counted on support from teachers and other educators as well as Democrats in the area to push his vote total up. He raised $440,000 in campaign contributions, including donations from leading law firms in the state.

Responding to the attacks from Texans for Lawsuit Reform, the Democrat ran one television commercial that featured three Republicans – President Bush, Mr. Perry and Mr. Ratliff – praising Mr. Sadler for his work on public education issues.

Paul Sadler is running a strong campaign. His approach is working. He's campaigning on traditional Democratic issues such as public education, health insurance for children, jobs and economic growth. And Paul Sadler has a record of accomplishment on those issues from his experience in the State House. In addition, Sadler is stressing his "East Texas values", co-opting more traditionally conservative issues such as gun rights (PDF file) and family and religion (PDF file). It's a solid campaign and Sadler can win the runoff next month if we chip in to help.

Update: Run-off elections are all about turnout. Here's a great example of a similar situation (mentioned in the comment threads) in the runoff election for LA-6 in December 2002 where Rep. Rodney Alexander went from 29% of the vote in the open primary. Republicans won 68% of the combined vote in the primary, but one month later, Alexander won the election with 51%. Here's the CNN results:

PRIMARY RESULTS: November 2002
Alexander DEM 52,451 29%
Fletcher REP 45,044 24%
Holloway REP 42,346 23%
Barham REP 34,325 19%
Melton DEM 4,534 2%
Wright REP 3,659 2%
Mouser Other 1,136 1%

RUNOFF RESULTS: December 2002:
86,718 50% Rodney Alexander, D Elected
85,744 50% Lee Fletcher, R Defeated

Special Elections are all about turnout. Sadler can win if Democrats get out and vote.

Posted by Byron LaMasters at January 21, 2004 12:26 PM | TrackBack