Texas voters have re-elected Republican Greg Abbott, who will serve a third four-year term in the governor’s office after defeating Democratic candidate Beto O’Rourke in the 2022 race.
Mr O’Rourke centred his 2022 campaign around preserving abortion rights and combatting the proliferation of firearms, presenting an agenda in stark contrast to the governor’s.
Despite discouraging poll numbers throughout the campaign, Mr O’Rourke steadily outraised the governor in the final weeks leading up to Election Day, raising more than $10m in October alone, according to campaign finance records.
The race marked Mr O’Rourke’s attempt to prove he could win – and that Texans could rise to reject a far-right agenda – in a state where Democratic candidates have lost every statewide race for nearly 30 years.
His entry into the governor’s race came as Mr Abbott directed the state’s controversial response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a devastating energy crisis and the massacre of schoolchildren in Uvalde. He also enacted a sweeping anti-abortion law that went into effect eight months before the US Supreme Court revoked a constitutional right to abortion care.
The governor also has spent millions of dollars to bus migrants seeking asylum in the US to cities run by Democratic mayors.
The state’s anti-abortion law banned abortion care after roughly six weeks of pregnancy and allowed a $10,000 civil suit bounty on anyone who “aids and abets” those seeking care. After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, the state activated a law that made performing abortions under most circumstances a felony punishable by life in prison.
Governor Abbott’s attorney general Ken Paxton, who is also poised for re-election, drew international scrutiny after he issued guidance that led the governor to direct the state’s Department of Family and Protective Services to pursue child abuse investigations into families seeking gender-affirming care for their children.
Mr O’Rourke’s loss is his second unsuccessful statewide campaign since serving three terms in the US House of Representatives.
He also ran to unseat Republican Senator Ted Cruz in 2018 but lost by roughly two percentage points. Mr O’Rourke also briefly sought the Democratic nomination in the 2020 presidential race, but dropped out after failing to gain traction in early primary states.
In remarks from McAllen, Texas, the governor credited the Rio Grande Valley for helping secure his victory with a campaign that took aim at the US-Mexico border amid the GOP’s relentless focus on immigration and border security.
“Tonight, Texans sent a very resounding message,” he said in a victory speech. “They want to keep Texas a beacon of opportunity that we have provided over the past eight years.”
