Pete Sessions

Russian Bribes And Election Interference-- The Texas ConnectionTexas Republican Pete Sessions has a well-deserved reputation as a complete sleaze-ball.

Giuliani is using a loophole in ethics laws to avoid disclosing where he's getting the money he uses to pretend he's working for the U.S. government while just operating as a reelection hack for the Trump campaign. If he's paying for all the work he's doing to reelect Trump himself, wouldn't he have to report it as an in-kind campaign contribution?

2010 was an anti-blue wave, just as 2018 is shaping up to be an anti-red wave. No doubt a failed clown like Ben Ray Lujan will try to "modestly" take credit for the great Democratic wins in November, regardless of the indisputable fact that there would be more wins if he was put into hibernation until November 9. The Republican who was in his place in 2010 was Pete Sessions, the corrupt and sleazy NRCC chairman from Texas.

Redistricting takes place at the beginning of every decade, after the census. But in 2002 Republicans won control of the Texas legislature for the first time in 130 years. They immediately set about redrawing the state's congressional districts-- absurdly in many cases-- to send more Republicans and fewer Democrats to Congress. AT the time, Democrats held 17 seats to the Republicans 15.

TX-32 was carefully gerrymandered district in the northern Dallas metro to specifically exclude minority voters in order to keep crooked GOP hack Pete Sessions safe. Last year the district PVI was R+10. Despite the gerrymandering that removed minority heavy areas around Irving and Grand Prairie, the new PVI is R+5. McCain beat Obama 55-44% there and Romney did even better-- 57-42%. But TX-32 was not Trump country in 2016.

While more Republican incumbents assess their party's-- and their own-- electoral prospects next year and respond by announcing early retirements, a flood of qualified Democrats are rushing to announce their candidacies across the country.

Ed and HillLast year the DCCC didn't bother recruiting a candidate in TX-32, Pete Sessions district in the suburbs north of Dallas, including Highland Park, University Park, Richardson, Garland and east to Lake Ray Hubbard and Lavon Lake. The DCCC hasn't paid any attention to Sessions and his district since he beat powerful Democratic incumbent Martin Frost there in 2004.

There have been a lot of rumors lately that Jared Polis may be contemplating ditching his safe Boulder, Colorado congressional seat for a very iffy gubernatorial run in a crowded field for an open seat. I wish him well. But he was just elected Regional Vice Chair of the DCCC for a region that includes Texas, likely to be one of the hottest 2018 battlegrounds. Ummm... likely... likely...

Regina Montoya is a successful attorney, chairwoman of Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings' Taskforce on Poverty and senior vice president and general counsel of Dallas' Children's Medical Center. In 2000. In 2000 she ran against Pete Sessions, who beat her 100,510 (54.0%) to 82,685 (44.4%). She was able to nearly match his $1,986,465 fundraising haul (with $1,642,494). Things have changed in TX-32 (North Dallas from Uptown, Highland Park and University Park, up to Richardson and Garland to the eastern shore of Lake Ray Hubbard).

Immature politicians have a tendency to view every problem through their own personal careerist agenda. And when those immature politicians are conservatives, you can add in a sense of victimization.