Texas Tribune by James Barragán May 24, 2022
Bush’s defeat in the race for attorney general could mark the end of a four-generation political dynasty, and the end of an era of Texas politics that began when the first George Bush moved to Odessa in 1948.
When George P. Bush burst onto the scene at the Republican National Convention in 2000, the handsome, 24-year-old nephew of presidential nominee George W. Bush had all of the makings of a future leader of the GOP.
He was already political royalty — heir to a dynasty that included his father, then-Florida governor Jeb Bush, and his grandfather, former President George H.W. Bush. The son of a Mexican mother, and a fluent Spanish speaker, he seemed poised to broaden the appeal of the Republican Party to a younger and increasingly diverse electorate in the 21st century.
“Que viva Bush!” he told the convention to roaring applause. “Y que vivan los Estados Unidos!”
On Tuesday, the 46-year-old badly lost his runoff primary challenge to two-term Attorney General Ken Paxton, a staunch conservative who was seen as the most vulnerable Republican incumbent on the ballot due to his mounting scandals, including a felony indictment and an FBI investigation into his office for allegations of malfeasance.
Bush’s loss marks what will soon be the end of an eight-year stint as a statewide elected official, after serving back-to-back terms as land commissioner. He continues to serve until the end of the year. But more significantly, it heralds a shift in the Texas Republican politics away from the pro-business establishment and toward a more populist, combative and harsh style of politics. Bush’s defeat also notches another victory for former president Donald Trump, who has clashed with the Bush family for years and who repeatedly expressed his support for Paxton in the attorney general race.
This defeat could mark the end of a four-generation political dynasty, and the end of an era of Texas politics that began when the first George Bush moved to Odessa in 1948.
“The Bush family name is essentially what the Romanov family name is in Russia,” said Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University. “There’s still somebody out there claiming to be czar but nobody’s listening.”
Twenty two years after George P. Bush’s debut at the RNC, the factors that once made him appealing to GOP voters have turned against him — the party has moved to the hard right, making opposition to immigration (both legal and illegal) a pillar of its agenda and eschewing the more genteel bipartisan consensus that the Bushes once seemed to embody.
Bush’s inability to get past such a troubled candidate as Paxton shows how much the Texas electorate, and the American electorate, has changed since his uncle, George W. Bush, was elected Texas governor in 1994 and then president in 2000.
An April poll by the Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation found that 40% of Republican primary voters said they would never vote for George P. Bush. Two-thirds of those voters said that’s because he’s a member of the Bush family.
“Texas politics have shifted so much in the last 20 to 30 years that the family that was Republican royalty have gone from that to basically being vilified for essentially being mainline doctrinaire conservatives,” said Jon Taylor, a political scientist at the University of Texas at San Antonio. “The Bush family helped to build the modern Republican Party of Texas.”
Much more here:
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/05/23/george-p-bush-loss-political-dynasty/
