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2022 Texas gubernatorial election

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

2022 Texas gubernatorial election
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For related races, see 2022 United States gubernatorial elections.

The 2022 Texas gubernatorial election took place on November 8, 2022, to elect the governor of Texas. Incumbent Republican Governor Greg Abbott won re-election to a third term, defeating the Democratic nominee, former Congressman Beto O'Rourke.[1] All statewide elected offices were currently held by Republicans. In his previous gubernatorial race in 2018, Abbott won with 55.8% of the vote.[2]

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The Democratic and Republican primaries were held on March 1, 2022. O'Rourke and Abbott won outright majorities in their respective primaries, and therefore did not participate in the May 24 runoffs.

Texas had not elected a Democratic candidate for governor since Ann Richards won a narrow victory in 1990. Additionally, Abbott had a strong approval rating on election day, with 55% of voters approving to 45% disapproving.[3] Beto O'Rourke, who gained national attention in 2018 for his unusually close and competitive campaign against Senator Ted Cruz, was widely viewed as a rising star in the Texas Democratic Party and potential challenger for Abbott, but a failed run for President of the United States in 2020 prompted criticisms of opportunism via Republican attempts to brand him as anti-law enforcement and his former stance and disavowed comments on guns.

Abbott won by 10.9%, a slightly smaller margin of victory than his 13.3% margin in 2018 in spite of a much more Republican national climate in 2022, making this the closest gubernatorial election in Texas since 2006, and the closest election of Abbott's entire political career since his first race for the Texas Supreme Court in 1998. Beto O'Rourke, meanwhile, performed 8.3% worse than his 2018 Senate run, but he still won the highest share for a Democratic gubernatorial candidate since Ann Richards received 45.9% in her unsuccessful reelection bid against George W. Bush in 1994. Abbott's raw vote total was less than his 4.65 million in 2018, while O'Rourke set a record of most raw votes for a Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate at around 3.55 million, but it was also less than his 4.04 million vote total in the 2018 Senate race.

Abbott carried 235 out of 254 counties, flipping the heavily Hispanic counties of Culberson and Zapata and becoming the first Republican gubernatorial candidate to win the latter in the state's history (though Zapata had earlier voted Republican in the 2020 presidential election), while O'Rourke became the first Democratic gubernatorial candidate to win the county of Fort Bend since 1974. O'Rourke outperformed Joe Biden two years prior among Latino voters, though his performance with them was still worse than past nominees.

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Republican primary

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On June 4, 2021, Texas Republican Party chairman Allen West announced his resignation as party chair.[4] West criticized Gov. Greg Abbott's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic in Texas.[5] The history of conflict between West and Abbott included a lawsuit by West and other Republicans challenging Abbott's extension of the early voting period in 2020, as well as a protest outside the Governor's Mansion over pandemic-related shutdowns as well as mask mandates.[6] On July 4, 2021, West announced that he would challenge Abbott in the 2022 gubernatorial primary.[7] Both West and fellow gubernatorial candidate Don Huffines were considered more conservative than Abbott.[8][9] On March 1, 2022, Abbott won the Republican primary by a smaller margin than in 2018.

Candidates

Nominee

Eliminated in primary

Withdrawn

Declined

Endorsements

Greg Abbott

U.S. executive branch officials

U.S. senators

State officials

Organizations

Don Huffines

U.S. senators

U.S. representatives

Texas state representatives

Local officials

  • Don McLaughlin, mayor of Uvalde (2014–present)[44]

Individuals

Allen West

Texas state representatives

Individuals

Polling

Graphical summary

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...
Hypothetical polling
More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Results

Thumb
Results by county:
  Abbott
  •   40–50%
  •   50–60%
  •   60–70%
  •   70–80%
  •   80–90%
More information Party, Candidate ...
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Democratic primary

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Candidates

Nominee

Eliminated in primary

Disqualified

  • Jack Daniel Foster Jr., teacher[14]
  • R. Star Locke, veteran[14]

Declined

Endorsements

Beto O'Rourke

U.S. senators

U.S. representatives

Local officials

Labor unions

Organizations

Newspapers and other media

Polling

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Results

Thumb
Results by county:
O'Rourke:
  •   O'Rourke—>90%
  •   O'Rourke—80–90%
  •   O'Rourke—70–80%
  •   O'Rourke—60–70%
  •   O'Rourke—50–60%
  •   O'Rourke—40–50%
Wakeland:
  •   Wakeland—40–50%
Barrientez:
  •   Barrientez—50–60%
No vote:
  •   No vote
More information Party, Candidate ...
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Green primary

Candidates

Declared

  • Delilah Barrios, environmental activist[95]

Libertarian convention

Candidates

Declared

  • Mark Jay Tippetts, attorney, former Lago Vista city councilman, and nominee for governor in 2018[96]

Withdrew/disqualified

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Independents and other parties

Candidates

Declared

Disqualified

Declined

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General election

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Predictions

More information Source, Ranking ...

Debates

More information No., Date ...

Post-primary endorsements

Greg Abbott (R)

U.S. senators

U.S. representatives

Governors

State officials

Newspapers

Organizations

Beto O'Rourke (D)

U.S. executive branch officials

U.S. representatives

State officials

County officials

Local officials

Individuals

Labor unions

Organizations

Newspapers

Polling

Aggregate polls

More information Source of poll aggregation, Dates administered ...

Graphical summary

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...
Hypothetical polling

Greg Abbott vs. Julián Castro

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Greg Abbott vs. Beto O'Rourke with Matthew McConaughey as an independent

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Greg Abbott vs. Don Huffines

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Greg Abbott vs. Matthew McConaughey

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Greg Abbott vs. generic Democrat

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Greg Abbott vs. generic opponent

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...

Results

Thumb
State house district results
Thumb
State senate district results
More information Party, Candidate ...

Counties that flipped from Democratic to Republican

Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic

By congressional district

Abbott won 25 of 38 congressional districts.[204]

More information District, Abbott ...
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Analysis

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Map of MECE (mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive) partition of Texas into 12 regions[205]

Texas Democrats hoped for Beto O'Rourke to achieve an upset over the incumbent Greg Abbott, which did not materialize. Abbott won by 10.9%, down from 13.3% in 2018. Abbott's margin was slightly larger than aggregate polling, but virtually in line with the last poll conducted. He won the vast majority of counties (235 out of 254), mostly rural, and by significantly wide margins. In particular, 34 counties, mainly in West Texas and the Texas panhandle, gave Abbott over 90% of the vote. This was the most by any Texas Republican gubernatorial candidate, and the most for any candidate since Democrat Allan Shivers' 1954 re-election.[206]

Abbott won the three largest metro areas in the state, which include Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington in North Texas, Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land in Southeast Texas, and San Antonio–New Braunfels in South-Central Texas. He also won all of the state's mid-sized metro areas outside of the Rio Grande Valley, which include Corpus Christi along the coastal bend; Waco, Killeen–Temple–Fort Hood, and Bryan–College Station in Central Texas; Beaumont–Port Arthur, Tyler and Longview in East Texas; Lubbock, Abilene, and Midland-Odessa in West Texas; and Amarillo in the Panhandle. Abbott also won an urban county, Tarrant, home to Fort Worth and did well in the suburban counties of the Texas Triangle, winning Brazoria, Galveston, and Montgomery counties around Houston; Comal and Guadalupe around San Antonio; Collin, Denton, Ellis, Kaufman, and Rockwall in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex; and Williamson in Greater Austin.[207]

In DFW and Austin specifically, Republican strength had declined somewhat in these metros, with Abbott carrying Collin, Denton, Tarrant, and Williamson by 10.07%, 12.81%, 4.11%, and 0.62% respectively, down from his margins of 19.48%, 20.60%, 10.64%, and 10.71% from 2018. Excluding the largest metro areas, Abbott improved on his 2018 margins.

O'Rourke, despite his loss, did best in most of Texas's urban centers. He carried Travis, home to the state capital Austin (72.6%-25.9%), his best performance in the state; El Paso, his home county, 63.4%-35%; Dallas (62.8%-35.9%); Bexar, home to San Antonio (57.5%-41.1%); and Harris, home to Houston (54%-44.5%). He also carried Hays, a rapidly growing county south of Austin which contains San Marcos and Texas State University along with fast-growing cities of Kyle, and Buda by 54.5%-43.7%. Despite improving on 2018 nominee Lupe Valdez's margins in these counties, he did worse in all of them compared to his Senate campaign in 2018, and, excluding Travis and Hays, worse than Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential race. The only county O'Rourke flipped was suburban Fort Bend outside Houston, which voted for Abbott by 0.2% in 2018, but voted for O'Rourke by 4.68% in this election.

Outside the Texas Triangle and Trans Pecos, the only other area O'Rourke won was heavily Hispanic South Texas along the U.S. border with Mexico. His performance was worse than Valdez's and his own from 2018, which continued the trend of rural Hispanic voters away from the Democrats towards Republicans, but he did outperform Biden from 2020. Counties that voted for Biden by single digits like Duval (2.61%), Starr (5%), and Maverick (9.45%); voted for O'Rourke 11.02%, 17.85%, and 17.68% respectively. Despite this improvement from the 2020 presidential race, Abbott flipped two heavily Hispanic counties, Zapata and Culberson (in the Trans Pecos).

Exit polls according to NBC News showed Abbott winning male (58%-41%) and female voters (51%-48%), whites (66%-33%), and other races (67%-31%), voters over 45 (60%-39%), college graduates (52%-47%) and non-college graduates (56%-43%), and voters who denied the results of the 2020 presidential election (94%-5%). O'Rourke won black voters (84%-15%), Latinos (57%-40%), Asians (52%-48%), voters between 18 and 44 (54%-44%), Independents (49%-47%) and moderates (60%-38%).[208][209][210]

Fox News Voter Analysis exit polls showed Abbott winning male (59%-39%) and female voters (51%-48%); whites (68%-30%) and other races and ethnicities (53%-42%); voters over 45 (61%-37%); college graduates (54%-44%), non-college graduates (56%-43%); white men (70%-28%); white women (67%-32%). O'Rourke won African Americans (81%-18%), Latinos (56%-42%); African American men (76%-24%); African American women (85%-13%) and Latina women (61%-37%). O'Rourke also won Latino men (55%-45%).[211]

Voter demographics

Voter demographic data was collected by CNN. The voter survey is based on exit polls.[212] There were 4,327 total respondents.

More information Demographic subgroup, Abbott ...
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See also

Notes

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  1. Key:
    A – all adults
    RV – registered voters
    LV – likely voters
    V – unclear
  2. Harrison with 3%; Belew and Horn with 1%
  3. Harrison with 3%; Belew and Horn with 0%
  4. Horn with 2%; Belew and Harrison with 1%
  5. Someone else with 2%, Horn with 1%
  6. Belew, Harrison, and Horn with 1%
  7. Horn with 2%; Belew and Harrison with 1%
  8. Harrison and Horn with 1%; Belew with 0%
  9. Belew, Harrison, and Horn with 1%
  10. Calculated by taking the difference of 100% and all other candidates combined.
  11. "Someone else" with 4%; Tippetts (L) with 2%; Barrios (G) with 1%
  12. "Someone else" with 2%; Tippetts (L) with 2%; Barrios (G) with 1%
  13. Tippetts (L) with 1%; Barrios (G) with <1%
  14. Tippetts (L) with 2%; Barrios (G) with 1%
  15. "Another candidate" with 1%; "Not going to vote" with 1%
  16. "Someone else" with 3%
  17. "Someone else" with 2%; Tippetts and Barrios with 1%
  18. "Someone else" with 3%
  19. "Another party's candidate" with 1%
  20. "Another party's candidate" with 1%
  21. "Someone else" with 1%; "Refused" with 1%
  22. Tippetts (L) with 2%; "Someone else" with 2%
  23. Tippetts with 9%; Barrios with 3%
  24. "Another candidate" with 1%; "Not going to vote" with 1%
  25. Barrios and Tippetts with 1%
  26. "Someone else" with 6%; Barrios and Tippets with 3%
  27. "Another candidate" with 2%
  28. Tippetts with 2% and Barrios with 2%
  29. Tippetts with 1% and Barrios with 1%
  30. "Someone else" with 7%; Barrios and Tippetts with 3%
  31. "Someone else" with 4%; Tippetts with 3%; Barrios with 2%
  32. Tippetts with 2%; Barrios with 0%
  33. "Someone else" with 3%; Tippetts with 2%; Barrios with 1%
  34. "Someone else" with 8%; Barrios and Tippetts with 3%
  35. Tippetts with 2%, Barrios with 1%
  36. Subsample of likely general election voters from a survey of 1,400 registered voters (overall margin of error ± 2.2% including design effect)
  37. Tippetts with 2%; Barrios with 1%
  38. Behrman/Jewell with 2%, Barrios with 1%
  39. Behrman/Jewell and Barrios with 1%

Partisan clients

  1. Poll conducted for West's campaign
  2. Poll conducted for Abbott's campaign
  3. Poll conducted for the Defend Texas Liberty PAC.
  4. Poll conducted for the Democratic Policy Institute, a non-profit organization advocating for progressive causes.
  5. Poll sponsored by Univision.
  6. Poll conducted for Abbott's campaign
  7. Poll sponsored by the Defend Students Action Fund
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References

External links

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