{"id":41737,"date":"2020-03-17T23:23:41","date_gmt":"2020-03-17T23:23:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=41737"},"modified":"2020-03-17T23:23:41","modified_gmt":"2020-03-17T23:23:41","slug":"this-gop-contest-is-a-mind-boggler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=41737","title":{"rendered":"This GOP contest is a mind-boggler"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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BLOGGER’S NOTE — This item was published originally on KETR-FM’s website, www.ketr.org<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s fair to wonder about the upcoming runoff election for a Northeast Texas legislative district seat: How does someone as conservative as state Rep. Dan Flynn face a primary challenge from the right?<\/p>\n

Flynn, a Van Republican, is running against Bryan Slaton, a businessman from Royse City. The two are running for the House District 2 seat that Flynn has occupied since 2003.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s be clear about this point: Flynn is about as conservative a legislator as there is among the 150 men and women who serve in the Texas House of Representatives. He touts his conservative credentials with pride. That hasn\u2019t dissuaded Slaton from challenging Flynn twice already. He lost narrowly to Flynn in the 2016 and 2018 Republican primaries. He\u2019s back at it again, having forced a runoff with Flynn, by denying the incumbent \u2013 along with a third GOP contender \u2013 the outright majority he needed to win the GOP nomination outright on Super Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The word is that Flynn, despite his conservative voting record in the Texas House, allegedly has compromised himself by being too close to the Austin political \u201cestablishment.\u201d Well, to those of us who\u2019ve been watching state politics for some time, the Austin \u201cestablishment\u201d usually comprises those on the left and far-left end of the political spectrum. I mean, they don\u2019t call it \u201cThe People\u2019s Republic of Austin\u201d for no reason, if you get my drift.<\/p>\n

How conservative is Rep. Flynn? Consider that he once proposed legislation that would have required that all public documents be published in English only<\/em> as a way to get all Texans to speak English. He aimed the legislation at non-English-speaking Texas residents, who comprise an ever-increasing percentage of the state\u2019s total population.<\/p>\n

Then came a bit of controversy surrounding a bill he proposed during the 2017 Legislature. Flynn wanted to allow members of the Texas State Guard \u2013 which is not a military organization \u2013 access to veteran benefits. Flynn, by the way, happens to belong to the State Guard. Legislators who are veterans rose up to defeat the bill by the largest margin of any bill defeated during the 2017 session.<\/p>\n

After defeating Slaton in the 2018 GOP primary, Flynn promoted the idea of allowing public<\/em> school teachers to display the Ten Commandments in their classrooms. Progressives argue that such displays violate the U.S. Constitution\u2019s First Amendment ban on mixing government institutions with religion. Flynn doesn\u2019t see it that way, arguing that teachers should be allowed to espouse the \u201cvalues\u201d contained in the Ten Commandments.<\/p>\n

This is a bit of a curious runoff contest, given that intraparty challenges usually pit challengers against incumbents who tilt in opposite directions. Flynn and Slaton look to me as if they\u2019re far more alike<\/em> than otherwise.<\/p>\n

The runoff is set for May 28.<\/p>\n

However \u2026 and this is another factor worth considering, but the coronavirus pandemic might forestall the runoff from occurring if the Texas secretary of state determines there is too heavy a risk to voters and election judges who will be mingling at polling places.<\/p>\n

I guess we\u2019ll just have to stay tuned to see how this medical emergency plays out. It might give us all more time to make sense of a curious Republican Party contest.<\/p>\n\n

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BLOGGER’S NOTE — This item was published originally on KETR-FM’s website, www.ketr.org It\u2019s fair to wonder about the upcoming runoff election for a Northeast Texas legislative district seat: How does someone as conservative as state Rep. Dan Flynn face a primary challenge from the right? Flynn, a Van Republican, is running against Bryan Slaton, a … Continue reading This GOP contest is a mind-boggler<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1965,9266],"class_list":["post-41737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-gop-runoff","tag-ketr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41737"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41737\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41739,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41737\/revisions\/41739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}