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Pressure Builds on Beto O’Rourke to Run for President

November 8, 2018 at 8:35 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s closer-than-expected loss Tuesday has fueled optimism among his friends and allies — as well as Democratic admirers across the country — that he will run for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination,” CNN reports.

“O’Rourke huddled with senior campaign aides Wednesday in El Paso, but offered them no indication of future political plans — saying he first planned to spend time at home with his family after nearly two years on the road and process the election’s results before weighing what comes next.”

“Another source described having ‘very initial discussions’ with O’Rourke in recent weeks about the prospect of a 2020 bid and what it would take to scale a Senate campaign that operated largely on the candidate’s own gut, without pollsters or a massive team of consultants, up to the national level. But the source said it’s too early for O’Rourke to have made any decisions.”

Filed Under: 2020 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke

Could Beto O’Rourke Still Run for President?

November 7, 2018 at 12:15 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) narrowly lost his U.S. Senate race but Texas Tribune co-founder Evan Smith told MSNBC that he thinks O’Rourke could still run for president.

Said Smith: “Well he didn’t want to talk about it until after this race. He was planning on going to the United States Senate and he had committed to serving for six years so he didn’t entertain the conversation. You know there will be drumbeats about this guy for the next two years because he energized people not just in Texas but around the country in a way that was really quite remarkable.”

He added: “Could he do it? Does he have the experience to do it? Does he have the national profile to do it? We really don’t know. I think what he’d like to do probably, is if he does lose this race, is go back to El Paso for a while and chill out and then will entertain the conversation at that point.”

Filed Under: 2020 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke

Beto O’Rourke Concedes

November 6, 2018 at 11:30 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s (D-TX) impressive bid for the Senate fell short, but his concession speech shows why many don’t think his political future is over.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen


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Avenatti Tries to Raise Money Off Beto O’Rourke

October 12, 2018 at 3:57 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Daily Beast: “Michael Avenatti on Thursday tweeted a link to Democratic donation platform ActBlue that appeared to be an O’Rourke donation page, but the fine print on the page noted that, by default, half of the money donated would go to Avenatti’s Fight PAC.”

Filed Under: Campaign Finance Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, Michael Avenatti, TX-Sen

Texas Governor Calls O’Rourke ‘Cult-Like’

October 1, 2018 at 10:28 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) described Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) as “cult-like” in the way that he’s garnered attention in his bid to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), The Hill reports.

Said Abbot: “He’s been a cult-like, very popular figure the way that he’s run the campaign, but you don’t vote on cult, you don’t vote on personality when you get to the U.S. Senate. You vote on the issues.”

The Austin American Statesman reports O’Rourke held a rally over the weekend attended by more than 50,000 people.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Watch Beto O’Rourke Air Drum to The Who

September 24, 2018 at 12:24 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Beto O’Rourke showcased his air-drum skills following his debate with Sen. Ted Cruz as he rocked out to The Who’s “Baba O’Riley” while waiting in a Whataburger drive-thru line.

Said O’Rourke: “This may be the best song ever written.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

O’Rourke Could Have Down-Ballot Implications

September 7, 2018 at 7:36 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

David Wasserman: “There’s scant evidence that Beto O’Rourke’s 254-county tour has moved the needle much in rural Texas, where Democrats hope would-be Cruz voters will simply stay home. But it’s a different story in Texas’s upscale suburbs: private polling on both sides now shows O’Rourke substantially outperforming Hillary Clinton’s percentages in multiple highly college-educated districts near Houston and Dallas.”

“That’s serious cause for concern for Houston GOP Rep. John Culberson (TX-07) and Dallas GOP Rep. Pete Sessions (TX-32), who sit in seats Clinton carried and are already in the Toss Up column. But it also should be a wake up call for several other Republicans who haven’t had a competitive race before but sit in upscale suburban seats President Trump carried with less than 52 percent of the vote.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Beto O’Rourke’s First Album Found

September 3, 2018 at 7:24 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

The HuffPost got a copy of the first album from Texas U.S. Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke’s punk band Foss and concludes, “It’s not bad at all.”

The recording came from former bandmate Cedric Bixler-Zavala who said he stands behind O’Rourke: “I truly believe Beto to be the answer. He really gives a fuck.”

Texas Republicans mocked the cover of the album in a tweet last week.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Beto O’Rourke Could Be the Next Obama

August 30, 2018 at 12:02 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Peter Hamby: “The hype emerging from the Democrat’s campaign points to something rather obvious: O’Rourke is good at this, way better than most of the Democrats sniffing around the next presidential race from the boring hallways of Capitol Hill. Whether he wins or loses his race—and yes, even if he loses—O’Rourke should be included in every conversation about the 2020 Democratic primary. That’s because, unlike most of the paint-by-numbers politicians in his party, O’Rourke actually understands how politics should be conducted in the Donald Trump era: authentic, full of energy, stripped of consultant-driven sterility, and waged at all times with a social-media-primed video screen in mind. O’Rourke is making a bet that running on his gut and giving voters a clear choice against Cruz, rather than just a mushy alternative, offers not just a path to victory in Texas but an antidote to the entire stupid artifice of American politics in the Trump era.”

“The most appealing thing about O’Rourke is both delightfully uncomplicated and extremely powerful: he talks about politics like you and your friends do.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Quote of the Day

August 16, 2018 at 4:57 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“When Amy and I were first talking about running for Congress in 2011-2012, we decided that we would do term limits, and not serve more than four years. In part it was, ‘I just don’t want you to be an asshole; I haven’t met somebody in this line of work who doesn’t become one, that doesn’t think that they are so important only they can do it.'”

— Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), in an interview with the Austin Chronicle, explaining why he supports term limits.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Why So Many Are Betting on Beto O’Rourke

July 27, 2018 at 12:55 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Town & Country: “It’s not just the toothy grin, the tall stature, and the shock of hair swept over his brow. With a disdain for highly paid consultants, a willingness to travel to unexpected places, and an inspiring message for an extraordinarily divided electorate, it’s hard to look at O’Rourke and not think of Bobby Kennedy in 1968. He has been to all of Texas’s 254 counties — including ones no Democratic candidate has seriously contested in decades. If he can meet every person, knock on every door, he thinks he can win.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

O’Rourke Raised Staggering Sum Last Quarter

April 3, 2018 at 8:18 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) raised over $6.7 million for his U.S. Senate bid in the first quarter of 2018, “a staggering number that poses a new category of threat” to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), the Texas Tribune reports.

“The haul is easily O’Rourke’s biggest fundraising quarter yet, more than double his next-closest total for a three-month period. It also is more than any Democratic Senate candidate nationwide took in last quarter, O’Rourke’s campaign said.”

[alert type=”general” dismiss=”no”]And that’s without taking any PAC money.[/alert]

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Is O’Rourke Overhyped?

March 8, 2018 at 9:26 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Karl Rove: “Just as the media buildup about Democratic early voting fell short, so did the party’s highly touted U.S. Senate hopeful, Rep. Robert F. ‘Beto’ O’Rourke. National Democrats have hyped the telegenic El Paso congressman as a strong bet to upset Ted Cruz, the state’s junior senator. Mr. O’Rourke spent $4.2 million to win his primary with 62%. But he lost 103 of the state’s 254 counties to Edward Kimbrough, a retired Postal Service employee, who spent $785 and received 15%, and Sema Hernandez, who spent nothing—zero, zip, nada—and still got 24%. (Ms. Hernandez did have a Facebook page.) Mr. Cruz received twice as many votes in his primary as Mr. O’Rourke did in his.”

“It has been 24 years since Democrats won a statewide race in Texas. Absent a major GOP scandal, they’ll continue that losing streak this year as their statewide ticket is lackluster and—with the exception of Mr. O’Rourke—underfunded.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

Can Beto O’Rourke Be a Giant Killer?

February 19, 2018 at 1:14 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

New York Times: “It has been so bleak for Democrats in Texas that they define victory in terms of the size of their losses. A running joke in Mr. O’Rourke’s speeches is that he has almost convinced his mother, Melissa, a Republican, to vote for him.”

“But there is power in the giant-killer narrative and signs that his anti-campaign playbook campaign is working. He raised $2.4 million in the last quarter, and gets applause when he notes that was $500,000 more than Mr. Cruz took in.”

“He has a restless energy that has put him in 217 of Texas 254 counties, driving tens of thousands of miles, fueled by bad coffee and Hostess cupcakes that supporters bring him.”

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, TX-Sen

O’Rourke Will Challenge Cruz

March 29, 2017 at 12:39 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), “a Democrat and ex-punk rocker who pulled a stunning upset to win his House seat six years ago, plans to declare his candidacy on Friday for the Senate seat held by Ted Cruz,” the Houston Chronicle reports.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Beto O'Rourke, Ted Cruz, TX-Sen

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About Political Wire

goddard-bw-snapshotTaegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.

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