I wrote about West Texas Congressional Races not long ago, and while we’re still in the filing period (it closes Monday, December 14th in Texas), I thought I’d move on to cover East Texas. I don’t expect to see much change in the filings for the region before the deadline.
CD-1
Louie Gohmert is the incumbent Republican, and he’s facing a primary challenge from Simon Winston. On the Democratic side, Shirley McKellar has filed again to run for the 1st.
Covering the counties of Angelina, Gregg, Harrison, Nacogdoches, Panola, Rusk, Shelby, Upshur, Smith, Sabine, San Augustine, and Marion, this district is nestled up in the top east corner of the state. The lasts time McKellar faced off with Gohmert in 2012, she garnered 26.9% to his 71.4% (1.6% Libertarian). I fully expect Mr. Gohmert to win his primary, and we’ll see how the rematch goes.
CD-5
Jeb Hensarling is the incumbent Republican in TX-05. He is running for reelection, and is currently unopposed for the primary and the general. He is essentially reelected already.
CD-8
Kevin Brady is the incumbent Republican, and he faces three primary challengers in Andre Dean and Steve Toth (UPDATE: Craig McMichael filed after my initial post). No Democrat filed.
CD-36
Brian Babin is the Republican incumbent, and he has no opposition in either the primary or the general. He’s essentially reelected already.
To wrap up: We have one lone Democrat in East Texas. She’s run before, and has garnered respectable enough numbers to not be embarrassed, but it’s unlikely to be a pick up for a long time, despite the fact that the incumbent steps on his tongue regularly. We’ve gotta get our people to the polls, folks!
The filing deadline closes in about half an hour. If anything changes, I’ll update.