The Field is Set in House District 23 Special Election
The race to replace Mandi Ballinger in House District 23 is officially on. The candidates are Bill Fincher, Brice Futch, Ann Gazell, Rajpal Sagoo, and William David Ware. Every one of them is a Republican, which after the PSC bloodbath is probably a good thing.
Most of those names are familiar to me. Fincher and Sagoo both lived in my old district and ran to replace me in 2020. That race went to a runoff and Brad Thomas ultimately won. Brice Futch just ran in the special election for Senate District 21 and came up short. Jumping right back into another race takes energy and persistence, but it could potentially create some momentum.
Gazell serves as the president of my local Police Department’s foundation and I only recall interacting with her online. And I think I remember speaking to Ware a long time ago when I was going door to door asking for votes, but I might be mistaken. I am starting to get old.
Early voting starts in 11 days. That is a really tight window.
When I ran in a special in almost the same part of the calendar, I pulled 46.4 percent in the first round out of just 3,225 votes cast, and won 60 percent in the runoff with only 903 votes. That was with an extra month to campaign. Contrast that with my last re-election campaign where my vote total was 19,403 out of 25,973 votes cast and as you can see special elections can be squirrely.
Voter fatigue after the Senate 21 race, its runoff, and the PSC election is going to be real. Add in Thanksgiving and it is hard to imagine a more difficult time to get people to show up.
This race will come down to who can get their friends and neighbors to the polls. Not only are these candidates going to need to get people to vote for them, they are going to need to educate the public that is already tired of voting that there is yet another election.
I do not live in the district, but I am grateful that each of these candidates have stepped up to run and wish them much success throughout the process. And I will add a personal plea; please, please, please go run really positive campaigns about why the voters should vote for you and don’t spend any precious seconds knocking each other down. Besides, if you go negative, all you are doing over the next 11 days is raising the name ID of your opponents.
Now go get em!
