Fwd: [DemocraticResearch] FWST says "Bell won't quit governor race"

Posted on Thu, Dec. 22, 2005

Bell won't quit governor race

By JOHN MORITZ
STAR-TELEGRAM AUSTIN BUREAU
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/state/13464611.htm

AUSTIN -- A senior adviser to Republican gubernatorial hopeful Carole Keeton
Strayhorn said Wednesday that he made a "friendly phone call" to the wife of
Democrat Chris Bell suggesting that the ex-congressman abandon his own quest for
the Governor's Mansion and instead run for comptroller, the office Strayhorn has
held for two terms.

Bell, who began campaigning for governor nearly a year ago, acknowledged that
the call took place but said that he has no plans to change course less than
three
months from the March 7 primary.

"I guess I must have complicated someone's scenario, but I'm in this race to
stay." said Bell, who was a Houston City Council member before serving in
Congress from 2003 to last January.

Strayhorn operative Mark Sanders said he was not acting on the campaign's behalf
when he called Alison Bell last week and suggested that her husband would have
more financial and political support in the comptroller's race than in the
governor's contest. Sanders said that he has known Alison Bell since he and she
both worked for Republican Rob Mosbacher's unsuccessful race for lieutenant
governor in 1990.

"I made a friendly phone call, as I do from time to time, and said Chris is not
going to win this. No Democrat is," Sanders said. "I told her that he'd have
more support for comptroller."

Recent polls have shown Strayhorn lagging far behind Gov. Rick Perry among
Republican voters, and the
challenger's camp has made no secret that it hopes to
woo Democratic voters to the GOP primary in March by advancing the argument that
governor's race will be decided there.

But luring those Democrats would be more difficult if the out-of-power party has
a spirited primary of its own. Bell is facing former Texas Supreme Court Justice
Bob Gammage, who filed for governor last week, and perhaps Fort Worth educator
Felix Alvarado, who has announced his candidacy but has not yet filed.

Bell said he suspected that Strayhorn might want him out of the way so that she
could rejoin the Democratic Party and extend her fight with Perry until
November.

"The truth is, nobody knows what Carole is going to do until she does it," Bell
said. "All I can do is continue to advance my message that Rick Perry is not
getting the job done and I will."

Sanders, however, discounted the possibility that Strayhorn would go back to the

party she left in the late 1980s, or that she might launch an independent
candidacy like that of author/entertainer Kinky Friedman.

"She is a Republican candidate for governor," he said.

The fact that Bell would have the field to himself in the Democratic primary for
comptroller, the state's chief financial officer, 10 days before candidate
filing ends also speaks to the woes besetting Texas' once-dominant party. So
far, no Democratic candidate has filed in the races for lieutenant governor,
land commissioner or railroad commissioner. No Democrat has won statewide in
Texas since 1994.

Strategist Kelly Fero, who in 2002 helped recruit Laredo multimillionaire Tony
Sanchez into the Democratic primary for governor and popular Dallas Mayor Ron
Kirk into the U.S. Senate race, said the party should concentrate its rebuilding
efforts on increasing its numbers in the Texas Legislature, even if it means
giving the Republicans
a free pass in some statewide contests.

"There are quite of few [state House] districts that we can take back from the
Republicans with the right candidates and the right message," Fero said.

State Democratic Party spokeswoman Amber Moon said efforts were being made to
flesh out the field in the statewide races before filing ends Jan. 2.

"We are definitely working on filling all of the slots on the ballot," Moon
said. "A lot can happen between now and the second of January."

ONLINE: www.txdemocrats.org

www.texasgop.org


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          Regards, TOM BLACKWELL, PO Box 25403, Dallas, Texas 75225
                   href="http://pages.sbcglobal.net/tom.blackwell/">http://pages.sbcglobal.net/tom.blackwell/

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