The heir of a political dynasty faces a tough battle in his bid for Texas attorney general.
Republican challenger to incumbent Attorney General Ken Paxton, George P. Bush, is the son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, and grandson and nephew of two former presidents, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, respectively. He’s running for attorney general after a controversial tenure as commissioner of the Texas General Land Office (GLO), the oldest agency in Texas.
Bush, who says he is a conservative and who served as Texas Victory Chair for President Donald Trump in 2016, says he’s not relying on “a vast political dynasty to pull out a win.”
Instead of relying on name recognition, he says, he’s “taking an approach to the statewide race that’s reminiscent of Democratic Beto O’Rourke’s remarkable run for U.S. Senate in 2018.”
O’Rourke, a progressive who ran a campaign for U.S. Senate on a platform that included pledging to take away Texans’ AR-15’s, lost the race to incumbent Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican. O’Rourke famously traveled to all 254 counties in Texas during the campaign. He’s now running for governor after he failed to win the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination in 2020.
Traveling around the state as part of a “Texas First” tour, Bush says as attorney general he’ll “work with the Governor to deploy more National Guard troops to the Texas/Mexico border, toughen criminal penalties on drug smugglers and human traffickers, and finish President Trump’s wall.”
A native Houstonian, Bush first ran for political office in 2014 and won. Within in a year of being in office, controversy began that continued throughout his tenure as commissioner.
Within a year of being in office, he fired the Daughters of the Republic of Texas from managing the Alamo, prompting them to sue. According to their complaint, the GLO claimed it owned the Daughters of the Republic of Texas Library collection, including an historic artifacts collection, and Bush ordered its staff be locked out of the library, The Dallas Morning News reported.
The GLO and the group settled in 2016, only for Bush to come under fire again for spending “nearly $1 million in taxpayer money to entice dozens of people fired by his administration to agree not to sue him or the agency,” the Houston Chronicle reported.
In 2018, after receiving criticism from state lawmakers over the GLO’s management of the Alamo and its restoration effort, Bush resigned from his position at the Alamo Trust, the nonprofit that runs the historic site’s daily operations. Critics accused him of “mishandling the Alamo Restoration Project’s finances and not being sufficiently transparent about its plans for the historic site,” Texas Public Radio reported.
Still, the battle continued over the Alamo Cenotaph monument between a range of groups and Bush, prompting Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick to suggest another agency take over the project.
“Nobody has put the @OfficialAlamo at more risk than @georgepbush with the outrageous ‘reimagining’ plan, lousy management, lack of transparency and moving the cenotaph,” Patrick tweeted in 2020.
The Alamo is the quintessential landmark representing Texas. The battle over its preservation became a symbolic one among Republicans who voted in 2020 to support Proposition 7 by a vote of 97.3%. The proposition prioritized preserving Texas monuments and keeping the Alamo Cenotaph where it stands.
In 2021, Bush and Paxton were sued by Gulf Coast Texas landowners alleging he violated state and federal law when he issued an order that “unconstitutionally and illegally takes, seizes, and deprives the plaintiffs of real property.” The plaintiffs, represented by the Pacific Legal Foundation, argue his order increased their liability, eroded their privacy rights, and limited their ability to use and repair their properties. They also were never offered any compensation for their land being taken, according to the complaint.
J. David Breemer, a senior attorney at the foundation, said Bush’s order was illegal. The state can acquire public beach access easements on private land only by first proving a public right in a court of law or by purchasing the property – according to state law and affirmed by a 2012 Texas Supreme Court decision.
Breemer argues that Bush and others “must abandon this illegal attempt to grab private coastal property for public use without just compensation, due process, or respect for Texas law.”
Bush, who was endorsed by Trump in 2018, prioritizes securing the border, government accountability, fighting for survivors of human trafficking, and defending law enforcement as his priorities. He includes a list of accomplishments and endorsements on his campaign website.
The Republican primary also includes U.S. Rep. Louis B. Gohmert Jr. of Texas’ 1st Congressional District and Eva Guzman.
Gohmert was first elected to the U.S. House in 2004. He won re-election every two years, garnering more than 70% of the vote in 2018.
Guzman was a former Texas Supreme Court judge, nominated to the bench by former Gov. Rick Perry in 2009.
The race is expected to go to a runoff election with the two highest vote-getters advancing. According to a Feb. 14 University of Texas poll, no candidate running for attorney general is expected to receive 50% of the vote.
The primary is March 1.
