Under Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas has become perhaps the single most oppressive state in the entire country. His term in office has seen the open-armed embrace of legislation targeting the LGBTQ+ community, the immigrant community, pregnant people, voters, and anyone who doesn’t want to get shot to death. The degree to which Abbott has turned Texas into a petri dish teeming with conservative policy bacterium would, in anything resembling a sane world, offer Democrats ample electoral fodder ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. And perhaps it might, although preliminary evidence doesn’t look too promising for the Dems. Regardless, it’s hard to imagine someone more awkwardly suited to deliver that message than former Rep. Beto O’Rourke.
On Monday, O’Rourke announced his candidacy to run for Texas governor in 2022, with a decidedly non-bombastic campaign video that visually called to mind his much mocked Vanity Fair cover story ahead of the 2020 election. In his announcement, however, O’Rourke stressed a commitment to a slate of meat-and-potatoes issues he hopes will differentiate himself from Abbott and the Texas GOP’s slide into MAGA extremism, including fixing Texas’s failing electrical grid, attracting jobs, and legalizing marijuana.
