House Republican Incumbents Facing Primary Challenges

Twenty-two incumbent Republican House members have primary opponents in 2014. Who are these incumbents? 

First, the table below lists the incumbents and their district, their Lib-Con Scores, and their ratings on Empower Texas’s fiscal responsibility index.

District	Name	IDEAL Lib-Con	FR Index
1	George Lavender	0.29	62.6
4	Lance Gooden	0.29	89.1
6	Matt Schaeffer	0.68	100.0
8	Byron Cook	-0.07	42.0
11	Travis Clardy	0.07	49.3
12	Kyle Kacal	-0.09	33.6
18	John Otto	-0.20	35.5
55	Ralph Sheffield	0.14	52.3
59	J.D. Sheffield	-0.36	27.5
60	Jim Keffer	-0.15	35.3
64	Myra Crownover	0.06	48.7
71	Susan King	-0.10	46.4
72	Drew Darby	-0.07	35.7
83	Charles Perry	0.35	83.4
92	Jonathan Strickland	0.71	100.0
94	Diane Patrick	-0.17	36.7
102	Stefani Carter	0.20	90.0
105	Linda Harper Brown	0.16	64.8
112	Angie Chen Button	0.21	75.4
115	Bennett Ratliff	-0.04	41.6
134	Sarah Davis	-0.38	44.7
150	Debbie Riddle	0.06	52.9

The chart below depicts the incumbents’ positions on the IDEAL Lib-Con scale:

The following table contains biographical data from the Texas Tribune:

District	Name	Ethnicity	Party	Gender	DOB	Age*	Education	High School/College/University	Occupation	Tenure
1	Lavender, George	Anglo	Republican	Male	1955	58	MS,BA	U of Arkansas	Sales	2
4	Gooden, Lance	Anglo	Republican	Male	1982	31	BBA, BA	UT-Austin	Insurance Consultant	2
6	Schaeffer, Kenneth	Anglo	Republican	Male	1976	37	BA, JD	Texas Tech	Attorney	0
8	Cook, Byron	Anglo	Republican	Male	1954	59	AA	Navarro College	Businessman, Rancher	10
11	Clardy, Travis	Anglo	Republican	Male	1962	51	BBA, JD	Abilene Christian U, Pepperdine Law	Attorney	0
12	Kacal, Kyle	Anglo	Republican	Male	1969	44	BA, BS	TAMU, TCU	Rancher	0
18	Otto, John	Anglo	Republican	Male	1948	65	BBA	TAMU	Certified Public Accountant	8
55	Sheffield, Ralph	Anglo	Republican	Male	1955	58	HS Diploma	Richfield HS	Restaurant Owner	4.08
59	Sheffield, J.D.	Anglo	Republican	Male	1960	53	BS	Howard Payne University	Physician	0
60	Keffer, James L. "Jim"	Anglo	Republican	Male	1953	60	BS	Texas Tech	President, EBAA Iron Sales, Inc	16
64	Crownover, Myra	Anglo	Republican	Female	1947	66	BA, MA	SMU, TAMU	Banking, Oil & Gas	12.58
72	Darby, Drew	Anglo	Republican	Male	1947	66	BBA, JD	UT-Austin	Attorney, Businessman	6
83	Perry, Charles	Anglo	Republican	Male	1962	51	BBA	Texas Tech	Certified Public Accountant	2
92	Strickland, Jonathan	Anglo	Republican	Male	1983	30	HS Diploma	Tarrant County College & Parkland College (attended)	Consultant	0
94	Patrick, Diane	Anglo	Republican	Female	1946	67	BA, Med, PhD	Baylor, U of North Texas	University Professor	6
102	Carter, Stephanie	African American	Republican	Female	1978	35	BA, BJ, JD, MPP	UT-Austin, Harvard	Attorney	2
105	Harper Brown, Linda	Anglo	Republican	Female	1948	65	HS Diploma		CEO	10
112	Button, Angie Chen	Asian American	Republican	Female	1954	59	MA	UT-Dallas	Marketing	4
115	Ratliff, Bennett	Anglo	Republican	Male	1961	52	BS	UT-Austin	Civil Engineer	0
134	Davis, Sarah	Anglo	Republican	Female	1976	37	BA, JD	Baylor, U of Houston	Attorney	2
150	Riddle, Debbie	Anglo	Republican	Female	1949	64	AA	Southwestern University	Horse Breeder	10.75
	*Age at End of 2013					52.762				4.638571

What do the chart and table tell us about the challenged Republican incumbents? In ideology, their IDEAL Lib-Con scores are not far from the average for House Republicans in the 83^rd Texas legislature (0.13 for all Republicans versus 0.07 for the challenged incumbents). The list includes the most conservative Republican House member (Strickland) and the most liberal Republican House member (Sarah Davis). Of the twenty-two, four were freshman, but the average tenure was 4.6 years. Stephanie Carter drew the largest number of challengers (three); however, that can be explained by her announcement that she would seek the Republican nomination for a vacant seat on the Railroad Commission, which she later decided not to seek. She is also the only African American among the challenged Republican incumbents. Perhaps, the only conclusion that one can safely draw is that the filing fee of $750 makes a challenge fairly likely in the Texas House. Twenty-three percent of incumbent House Republicans drew primary challenges.

In a future post, we’ll look at the Republican challengers.