Rep. Pete Olson (R-TX) announced that he will retire at the end of this term, creating a prime pickup opportunity for Democrats in a district experiencing rapid demographic change.
According to the Texas Tribune, he only held onto his seat by five points against Sri Kulkarni last year. Kulkarni is running for the seat again.
Chairman of the House GOP campaign arm Tom Emmer (R-MN) immediately took shots at the Democratic Party.
“I’d like to thank Pete for his years of service to Texas and the nation and wish him well in his retirement,” Emmer said in a statement. “Whoever the socialist Democrats nominate will be forced to defend their party’s radical agenda of socialized medicine and killing oil and gas jobs with the Green New Deal in a solid Republican district.”
Democrats snarked back.
“Republicans across Texas are terrified of losing their seats in 2020 and we can’t blame Pete Olson for choosing to retire instead of being thrown out of office next year,” said Avery Jaffe, a spokesperson for the Democratic counterpart. “That’s why we added him to our Republican Retirement Watch List in February.”
That’s great but we need more Dem Senators.
Nice parroting there but if this 56-year-old’s district was so solidly Republican he probably wouldn’t be throwing away his rifle and pack and running off the battlefield.
He moved here from Virginia in 2007 to run for Tom DeLay’s old seat. That was TX-22 and he was my Congressman until redistricting after the 2010 Census. He’s not even a Texan. Good riddance. Edit to add: What he did in 2007 was buy a house in TX-22,have all the utilities and taxes,including homestead exemption,put in his name,get a Texas driver’s license with that address on it and change his voter registration to match that address. He never was a Texan.
Ooooh, rats leaving the ship, cracks in the wall…
One of my fondest hopes is seeing TX turn blue. After looking at the map from 2018, it may be happening sooner than you think.
About time.
Yup. But we’ll take more reps too.
Tom Emmer
blah blah blah
hold your breath till you see blue. lol