Governor Greg Abbott’s war on rural Republicans who killed his voucher bill continues with one of his latest endorsees attempt to primary challenge the incumbent of rural Abilene without actually living there. She is challenging incumbent Stan Lambert for the District 71 seat.
According to The Abilene Reporter News, Abbott’s chosen candidate, Liz Case, has virtually no history of voting in Taylor County. She did vote during a bond election in November of last year, but there is no record of her as a voter before that.
In addition, she filed her homestead exemption on her 2023 property taxes on her house in Dallas County. In Texas, only a person’s primary residence can be claimed for the exemption. Case stated during a candidates forum that she and her husband moved to the house full-time during the pandemic.
The Texas Constitution states that someone must reside in the district they are running for at least one year to be eligible to serve. It’s possible that she has just made the legal deadline.
Regardless, it’s clear that Case is a Dallas transplant looking to pick up a seat against one of the representatives that thwarted Abbott during the 2023 legislative session. Seeking office in a location where the candidate has no real roots or connection is called carpetbagging.
Lambert is part of a group of 21 rural Texas House Republicans who voted against Abbott’s plan to use public money for private, mostly Christian schools. Many of these rural Republicans feared the program would defund their local public school, which are often the community’s biggest employers and social hubs. The fact that more than 90 percent of the schools that would be able to use the vouchers reside in suburban or urban areas further divided rural Republicans from Abbott’s agenda.
In response, Abbott has been waging a war of vengeance on Republicans who killed vouchers, targeting them in the primaries. He’s been aided in this by a collection of wealthy out-of-state urbanites like billionaire Jeff Yass and the American Federation for Children. The latter launched a recent flyer campaign accusing Lambert specifically of being insufficiently conservative to serve District 71.
Case has not responded to the carpetbagging accusations yet. She has been endorsed by Abbott, Sen. Ted Cruz, and former President Donald Trump.
The Texas Republican Primary takes place on March 5. Most of the high-profile races involve challengers backed by Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton looking to unseat Republicans that opposed vouchers or who voted to impeach Paxton for various misuses of his office. These challengers have big money behind them, but have so far not been very successful in the single special election held since vouchers were defeated. Abbott has also had some humiliating moments, such as when one of his endorsed candidates turned out to have donated money to Mothers Against Greg Abbott.
