February 7, 2005

Possible Rivals in Governor's Race
Sharing Stage at Fort Bend Event

By Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside

The tension could be thick when Texas Governor Rick Perry and U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison share the stage at a Fort Bend County event this week in a warm up for a possible head-on confrontation in next year's primary race for governor. Perry and Hutchison will headline the special guests list at a 2005 Lincoln Day Dinner that will feature conservative radio show host Michael Reagan and be held in U.S. Majority Leader Tom DeLay's hometown.

DeLay is also scheduled to appear at the event, which will begin at 7 p.m. Friday at the Sugar Land Marriott Town Square. U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla, a San Antonio Republican who plans to run for the U.S. Senate if Hutchison gives up her seat in order to challenge Perry, is slated to appear at the Fort Bend dinner as well.

The Sugar Land dinner will be the first of two Republican events this month that feature the potential contenders in a historic primary showdown for governor on the same program a year before the first votes are cast. Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, who's also weighing a gubernatorial race in 2006, won't be at the dinner in Sugar Land or a separate Lincoln Day event that Perry and Hutchison are both scheduled to attend on February 26 in Plano. But Agriculture Commissioner Susan Combs, who plans to seek the seat Strayhorn has held for the past six years, is on the list of honored guests expected to be on hand for dinner in Sugar Land this week. Supreme Court Justice David Medina is also on the program this week.

Perry is not the only high-ranking Republican official who might not be that excited about joining Hutchison at the table for dinner later this week. Combs, a Hutchison protégé and former aide to the senator, recently endorsed Perry for re-election next year. That decision probably did not sit well with Hutchison.

But Perry might be inclined to see Hutchison's appearance at the same event more as an intrusion by someone who's been living and working in Washington and is now contemplating whether to move back to Texas in order to try to end his political career. Until now, a Republican governor could expect to have the full support of an audience filled exclusively with GOP members. But Perry can probably assume now that some members of the audiences at the upcoming events in Sugar Land and Plano are the enemy and planning to get behind either Hutchison or Strayhorn if either tries to bring him down next year.

The Fort Bend County Republican Party is sponsoring the dinner event in Sugar Land. County Chairman Eric Thode said that less than 100 tickets were still available Monday after more than 1,000 had already been sold.

The audience in Sugar Land on Friday will contain leaders from the business and political communities including U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Clute, State Senator Kyle Janek of Houston, State Reps. Glenn Hegar of Katy and Charlie Howard of Sugar Land and the GOP's number one contributor in Texas, Houston home builder Bob Perry.