State elections continue in Texas
Air Force veteran MJ Hegar will now face off in November against incumbent Senator John Cornyn after defeating State Senator Royce West in the Democratic primary runoff. Hegar held a 4-5 point lead for most of the evening, even before the race was called, she’d already shifted her attention to the one person in her way from being the state’s first female democratic senator ever.
“John Cornyn has continually sold us out to his corporate donors and his powerful political allies. As Texans face COVID-19, what has Senator Cornyn done? He’s downplayed the seriousness of the disease early on and undermined health experts and the CDC,” says Hegar
There was a high voter turnout of about 1,000,000 democrats. I know that that’s what’s gonna cause John Cornyn to have a hard time sleeping tonight.
Austin Congressman Michael McCaul will face off against civil rights attorney Mike Siegal in November. This is the second time Siegal has made a run at the McCaul seat, but he lost back in 2018. Siegel has defeated Pritesh Gandhi to secure the Democratic nomination. Support for universal health care has been one of Siegel’s biggest platforms.
Former Travis County Judge Sarah Eckhardt has taken the top spot in the race to finish former state Senator Kirk Watson’s term, which comes to an end in 2022. Her 50% was not enough to prevent a run off against State Representative Eddie Rodriguez, who took about 34% of the vote. Coming in a distant third, former Austin City Council member Don Zimmerman, got 13%.
A current member of the Austin City Council will be moving on from City Hall. Delia Garza has beaten Laurie Eiserloh in the race for Travis County attorney. Garza says among her first orders of business will be to begin taking legal action against Governor Greg Abbott and state Attorney General Ken Paxton. She’s been a vocal supporter of deep cuts to the Austin police budget, and she will have no challenger on the November ballot.
Margaret Moore will not be continuing as Travis County’s District Attorney. Workers Defense Project executive director Jose Garza claimed victory by a pretty wide margin. Garza got 68%, Moore, got 32%. By 8 p.m. Moore issued a statement conceding the race. Garza will now face republican Martin Harry in November.
Austin Police Officer Justin Berry has defeated Attorney Jennifer Fleck in the republican runoff for State House District 47, comprised mostly of western Travis County and a little bit of southern Travis County too. Barry now heads into November against Vicky Goodwin, who’s held the seat since 2018 when she defeated Paul Workman, who at the time of his defeat was a four term republican state representative.
The race for outgoing Travis County Commissioner Gerald Daughtery’s seat has now been set. Republican Becky Bray, an engineer, will take on democrat Ann Howard, formerly of the Ending Community Homelessness Coalition. Last night, Howard beat former state representative Valinda Bolton to secure the Democrat candidacy. Daughtery has been the lone republican on the commissioner’s court for years,
No kids on campus until September
That’s the order from Travis County Health Authority, Dr. Mark Escott. Not only does he say schools need more time to prepare, but Escott also says they need clear guidance from the CDC.
“What is a reasonable mitigation that they need to implement in order to protect students and faculty and staff as much as possible?” Escott says.
September 7th is the earliest date to return, but that could change as the situation remains fluid. Meanwhile, Austin’s school district says it will not host in-person classes for the first 3 weeks. The group Education Austin would like that bumped up to at least nine weeks.
COVID-19 update
Travis County has seen an increase of 10 hospital patients from yesterday related to COVID-19. That number’s up to 469 this morning. 179 of the 16,000 cases confirmed since March have resulted in death. 12,400 of them have resulted in recoveries.
Texas has now reported its first decline in COVID-19 hospital patients in more than a month. Governor Abbott is continuing to take a much more cautious tone, telling NBC 5 in Dallas, one day doesn’t equate to a trend. For now, cities have to stay focused.
“They need to have them enforcing the mass requirement and the size in occupancy limitations that exist right now. If local officials will do that, we will assuredly slow the spread,” says Abbott.
About 16% of tests are coming back positive statewide. Abbott says anything above 10% is a red flag.
This news and more on News Radio KLBJ:
https://omny.fm/shows/klbjam-flash-briefing-1/am-newscast-7-15-20
