Tag Archives: runoff elections

local news, State news

Why must we have runoff elections at all?

A friend and I were chatting today about the upcoming runoff election in Texas House District 2 between Rep. Dan Flynn and challenger Bryan Slaton.

Flynn finished first in the Republican Party primary on March 3; but he didn’t get 50 percent plus one vote, which would have allowed him to win the party nomination without a runoff election. Slaton finished second, so he and Flynn will run against each other in May.

My friend wants to know: Why do we even need a runoff election? He said he would support ending this practice, which I mentioned to him is essentially a “Southern thing,” given that states in the South historically have required primary winners to win an outright majority, even in multi-candidate fields.

He poses a good question.

The House District 2 runoff will produce a hideously abysmal voter turnout. That’s the way it goes with these extended primary contests. The only folks who tend to vote in runoffs are the hyper-dedicated, the zealots. The rest of the electorate usually can’t find the time, let alone the interest, to vote in runoff elections.

We also have at least one important statewide race to decide in the runoff: two Democrats are running for the U.S. Senate seat, M.J. Hegar and Royce West.

Why, indeed, do we need to do this? These elections cost us all a good bit of money, but too damn few of us ever take part. A simple plurality during the primary ought to suffice.

I mean, c’mon … presidents of the United States are elected without ever gaining a majority of votes.

political news

No need to vote today … woo hoo!

Texans are voting today. Big deal, yes? Well, yeah, it is!

I won’t be among them.

Today is Election Runoff Day in Texas. Democrats are going to nominate someone to run against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott this fall: It’ll be either Andrew White (son of the late former Gov. Mark White) or Lupe Valdez (the former Dallas County sheriff).

Here’s the deal: I didn’t vote in the Democratic primary in March. Given that I am registered to vote — for now — in Randall County, I chose to vote in the Republican primary. Randall County is the unofficial capital of Texas Republicanism.

It was important for me to cast my vote for a key Texas legislative race, the contest for Senate Texas Senate District 31. I am happy with the result, which is that state Sen. Kel Seliger of Amarillo won the GOP nomination without a runoff against two primary opponents.

The runoff is important. I know that it’s critical for candidates who must run a second time for their party’s nomination to get the vote out. Texans don’t vote in huge numbers anyway in these primary races; the numbers plummet even more for runoffs.

That’s to our state’s voters’ shame.

We vote often in Texas. Our state constitution gives us plenty of chances to exercise our rights as U.S. citizens, as Texans. We need to do better at performing that duty.

Having said all that for the umpteenth time, I am glad to be sitting this one out.

My plea to the rest of you? Get out and vote! It’s important, man! Really! It is!

local news, political news, State news

Election runoff: a waste of valuable public money

I’ll admit right up front that this rant isn’t terribly important, what with Russian influence on our electoral process and the possibility that the president of the United States colluded with the former (or current?) Evil Empire.

I see all those “Ginger Nelson for Mayor” signs around our southwest Amarillo neighborhood. I hope she wins against her two opponents. As much as that, though, I hope Nelson wins outright on May 6 — and avoids having to campaign again against the second-place finisher, whoever it might be.

State law requires runoff elections when candidates fail to reach an outright majority the first time around. It’s true in our partisan primary elections, although not in our general elections; Rick Perry, you’ll recall, was re-elected Texas governor in 2006 with about 39 percent of the vote in a three-way contest.

These municipal and county elections require candidates to obtain majorities. Pluralities — even healthy ones — aren’t good enough.

The way I see it, if we can elect presidents of the United States without clear majorities, surely we can elect lower-level politicians with them, either.

I do understand that presidents need a majority of Electoral College votes to win, so perhaps this particular comparison isn’t entirely appropriate. We still elected a president in 1992 who received 43 percent of the popular vote.

Runoffs end up costing the public a bundle of money, particularly when the turnouts are beyond abysmal. It’s insulting enough in Texas and many other states — primarily in the South — where turnout is pitiful in these local and/or partisan primary contests.

To add insult to it all, we have runoff elections where the dismal turnout declines even more while saddling taxpayers such as you and me with the bill.

I get that we seem to love elections in Texas. If only we would participate in numbers that testify to such affection. So, let’s not do it quite so often.

Get rid of runoffs.