Houston Mayor Bill White, who's term limited out as of January 1, has now officially declared he's running for Governor. The fine folks at his campaign are live-tweeting the announcement speech, which is also streaming on the Bill White site. The field is now substantially clear for White, with Hank Gilbert dropping out to run for Agriculture Commissioner. Somewhat surprisingly, Gilbert is declining to endorse White, but is instead endorsing hair care magnate Farouk Shami, who's running a quixotic race for the nomination. Especially against Rick Perry, White, with his ability to fundraise and strong appeal in the Houston and San Antonio metro areas in particular, could actually be the first statewide winner for Democrats in Texas in years.
Meanwhile, over on the GOP side, it's going to get ugly. Rick Perry has now officially filed his reelection papers, putting an end to rumors that he might be bluffing in an effort to get something in exchange for stepping aside for Hutchison. Perry's justification for why he deserves a third term? "Mack Brown has been the head coach of the University of Texas for longer than I've been governor, and I don't hear anyone calling for him to step down." Of course, Brown has steered the Longhorns to a 115-26 record, a National Championship, and (barring an upset this weekend) a second BCS title game. (Also, Rick Perry is a devoted Texas A&M booster, making the analogy all the more amusing.)
Hutchison has yet to file her papers in the Governor's race, and there remains the possibility that she'll blink. Interestingly, while Hutchison overperforms Perry in all the general election polling I've seen, pretty much all the primary polling done to date shows Perry with a considerable lead. This is going to be an interesting purity fight within the GOP to watch, though even stranger lines than those we saw in NY-22 are going to be drawn, as Hutchison is endorsed and pushed by the old GWB apparatus, while Perry tries to take advantage of the Tea Party types.