This is not surprising if you followed the Houston mayoral race:
Costello endorses Turner
Cites Turner’s policy positions on infrastructure, debt as determining factorsHOUSTON – Former Houston mayoral candidate Steve Costello today officially endorsed State Representative Sylvester Turner in the 2015 Houston mayoral runoff election.
“Although Election Day did not go as hoped for our team, I’ve always maintained that the issues and challenges facing our great city must come before personal politics,” said Costello. “In the course of the campaign, and through dozens of forums, I had ample opportunity to examine each candidate’s position relating to improving the state of city finances, prioritizing public safety and getting to work to fix our roads.”
“Sylvester and I agree that ReBuild Houston is a good baseline infrastructure program that can and must be improved to meet the needs and expectations of Houstonians,” said Costello. “We agree that our police force needs to be increased to match the city’s growth and growing needs, and that we must get back to community-based policing so officers are connected to our neighborhoods’ challenges and successes.”
“After leaving office in January, my focus will be on finding a path forward to position Houston for its next steps in mass transportation,” said Costello. “Sylvester Turner is the best candidate to connect all of Houston through multi-modal transportation, and I look forward to working with him on critical transportation issues like commuter rail.”
In addition to serving as chairman of the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s Transportation Policy Council through December, Costello will also continue his service as a member of the Memorial Park Conservancy board of directors and as a member of the Marathon Kids national board of directors.
“I am very grateful to have the support of Steve Costello,” said Turner. “His service to this city for six years as a City Council Member, his advocacy for a pay-as-you-go funding policy to repair our streets and lower our debt, and as chairman of the region’s transportation policy council will have a lasting and positive impact on our city’s traffic and street improvements. As an engineer, Steve knows that the foundation of a building is not a visible part of the structure but it’s makes the building stable. Steve’s work on the city’s finances and infrastructure have laid the foundation for Houston’s future success. I look forward to working with Steve as we unite Democrats and Republicans, business and labor and thousands of Houstonians to bring our city together and move forward.”
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I’m not someone that generally thinks endorsements make a big enough difference to matter. This one might be an exception to that because Costello is basically releasing his Republican supporters, as few as they were on election day, to pull the trigger for a liberal Democrat. Costello didn’t do well in the general election, that’s a fact and it is mostly because he simply had no base of support to rally. Democrats were more comfortable voting for a Democrat. The LGBT community, although they appreciated his support on the HERO, were savvy enough to know that he didn’t have a path to victory, so they went with Turner. Republicans in general ran away from him because he was the “architect” of the very unpopular and now illegal “Rain Tax”. But still, in a low turnout runoff, Costello releasing his supporters to vote for the liberal Democrat is fairly significant.
So, if I call Sylvester Turner a “liberal Democrat” what should I call Bill King? Moderate Democrat? Maybe but Turner’s legislative record suggests that he is actually more prone to listen to Republicans than King is. I mean, King mocks us for praying in public? King says that Catholics are backward, oppressive, and hostile? King thinks that humans are the predominant cause of the farce called “global warming”? Really?
Hey, beats me. I guess I’ll refrain from calling him anything.
BTW, on the day Costello supports Turner, King gets the support of Latinos:
BUSINESSMAN BILL KING AWED BY HISPANIC LEADERS ENDORSEMENT:
“THESE ARE THE PIONEERS OF THE LATINO BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN HOUSTON”Businessman Bill King today professed he was “frankly a little in awe” to receive the strong backing from Houston’s leading Hispanic business leaders, many of who were among Adrian Garcia’s strongest campaign supporters. Ten chairmen and chairwoman emeritus of the Houston Hispanic Chamber of Commerce; Chair Hipolito “Poli” Acosta and key members of Camara de Empresarios Latinos de Houston; former Houston City Council member Felix Fraga and James Rodriguez; and Greg Compean member of the Harris County-Houston Sports Authority all stood with King to endorse his mayoral campaign at Talento Bilingüe de Houston.
“Bill, I am here today with key Hispanic members of Adrian’s finance committee ready to join the team because we believe that Hispanic business owners will have a voice within your campaign, and within your administration,” said Massey Villareal, who just served as Adrian Garcia’s campaign treasurer. “Between now and election day, I am committed to making sure the Hispanic business community joins the effort and elects Bill King the next mayor of the City of Houston.” (Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lloNhfKbf7k&feature=youtu.be)
“Bill’s message is clear and is resonating with our small business owners who are tired of the inefficiencies at City Hall, tired of the neglect in our neighborhoods that over the years has not been taken care of, tired of the bureaucracy that makes it harder to start and run their businesses,” said Acosta. “I am proud to join many members of our community here, Hispanic leaders, in the effort to make sure we get the leadership of Bill King as our next mayor in Houston.”
King opened his remarks by noting that Hispanics serve at disproportionately higher rates in the U.S. military “because of their great love for this country.”
“The message we’ve carried throughout this campaign has been fairly straight forward, back to basics,” King said. “It represents what we have found visiting neighborhoods across the entire city — this incredible frustration about the city not delivering the basic services we all expect from municipal government. As mayor, I am going to put an end to the political games played at City Hall and start making sure our neighborhoods are treated fairly.”
List of today’s endorsers:
Houston Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
Lupe Fraga
George Gonzalez
Irma Diaz Gonzalez
Tony Grijalva
Gilbert Herrera
Rick Jaramillo
Gasper Mir
Armando Perez
Adan Trevino
Massey Villarreal.Camara de Empresarios Latinos de Houston
“Poli” Acosta, Chair
Polo Becerra
Abelardo Matamoros
Jacob Monty
Rafael Ortega
Jose Rivas
Abel SanchezFmr Houston City Council Members
Felix Fraga
James Rodriguez.Harris County-Houston Sports Authority
Greg Compean
Can’t say I’m not fair on dueling press releases. I will note that the “Latino” community still doesn’t bother to vote. Even the legal ones.