Texas Governor Woos California Donors While Vilifying State
Texas Governor Woos California Donors While Vilifying State
(Bloomberg) -- For years, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has vilified California for its liberal politics, high taxes and onerous regulation. That hasn’t changed during his quest for a third term in office.
“Don’t California My Texas!” Abbott’s re-election campaign website decries. Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke, the campaign warns, is raising “massive amounts of funds from California liberals with deep pockets” to try to unseat the Republican governor and dismantle his conservative agenda.
But when it comes to money, Abbott benefits from California as much as his opponent -- and then some. Since early 2021, when a re-election bid was already a given, Abbott collected about $1.6 million from California donors, while O’Rourke has pulled in $915,000 from the state since announcing his candidacy in November. It’s helped swell the governor’s campaign warchest to almost $50 million, seven times the size of O’Rourke’s.
Abbott, 64, has long made bashing California an important part of his political agenda, and he’s taken credit for luring California companies like Tesla Inc., Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. and Oracle Corp. to the Lone Star State. In November, he released a video urging California shipping companies to move to Texas ports. “Escape California, everyone is doing it,” the video declared.
Most of Abbott’s California cash comes from wealthy GOP patrons. Billionaire developer Edward Roski Jr., part owner of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team and Kings hockey franchise, gave Abbott $500,000 last June. Another developer and the founder of a private college each donated $100,000, the most recent campaign disclosures show.
The haul illustrates how California conservatives who might not have much hope for their preferred candidates locally can be cash cows for Republicans from other states.
“Candidates of all ideologies and from all regions go to where the money is,” said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of OpenSecrets, which studies money in politics.
Abbott has cast a wide net in California, raking in more than 7,100 donations since January 2021. Most gave $500 or less. Almost three dozen executives in real estate, finance and business donated $5,000 or more.
Of the 34 individuals who contributed more than $5,000 to Abbott, 14 previously donated to former President Donald Trump’s campaign. Developer Geoffrey Palmer gave Abbott $10,000, but has potentially much deeper pockets. He gave $10 million to a super PAC that backed Trump’s bid for a second term.
Roski, a GOP stalwart who runs a vast empire of commercial properties called Majestic Realty Co., has been Abbott’s go-to financier in California. He made $250,000 donations to Abbott in 2019 and 2020, long before the re-election race heated up. In February, two Majestic executives followed the boss, giving Abbott $5,000 each, disclosures show. Roski didn’t respond to a request for comment.
In late January, Abbott spoke at the Lincoln Club of Orange County, which describes itself as California’s largest conservative donor network. While there, he held a fundraiser where some donors doled out $25,000, according to the Houston Chronicle.
O’Rourke, the 49-year-old former congressman and presidential candidate from El Paso, also has depended on California for years, seeking to woo liberals who’ve supported his campaign for abortion rights, limits on guns and marijuana legalization. They’re repulsed by Abbott’s conservative social policies, like banning abortion at six weeks into pregnancy, classifying transgender care as child abuse and limiting the teaching of race in schools.
“Defeating Abbott is a huge draw for progressives,” Krumholz said. “He’s a lightning rod.”
Press offices for Abbott and O’Rourke didn’t respond to requests for comment.
During the unsuccessful 2018 campaign for Senator Ted Cruz’s seat, O’Rourke raised $6.8 million in California, according to OpenSecrets, almost triple the $2.3 million his opponent raised. He lost by 215,000 votes, the closest U.S. Senate race in four decades in Texas.
But since announcing a run for governor in mid-November, O’Rourke’s donors have been out-gunned by Abbott’s big patrons. O’Rourke’s largest California contributors gave $25,000, a fraction of Abbott’s most generous benefactors. More than 90% of his donations came in amounts under $100.
To be sure, O’Rourke has had less time to raise funds since his campaign just got started in November, and he’s is gaining on Abbott in California, money-wise. Since his November entry, O’Rourke has raised $915,000 in the state, compared with $760,000 for Abbott over the same period. State residents account for 7% of the $13 million O’Rourke’s campaign has raised compared to just 3% of the $45 million Abbott has raised since January 2021.
And polls show Abbott leading O’Rourke, though by a narrower margin than he won in his first two election campaigns. The governor has 50% support among likely voters versus 42% for O’Rourke, according to the latest poll from the Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation. In 2014, Abbott got 59% of the vote and in 2018 took about 56%. Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat to statewide office since 1994.
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