From Tuesday’s Texas primary, the Republican primary for Texas Railroad Commissioner (TRC) has led to a runoff that might be the raciest election campaign of 2022.
An editorial note, first and foremost,
SUPPORT LUKE WARFORD,
the D candidate
even while watching the R runoff (with one candidate clearly better (or, well, not as bad)).
As to Luke, here is his campaign kickoff ad
As quick background, the Railroad Commission of Texas (RCT also known as TRC) is one of the more (most) important energy and environmental bodies (certainly at state level) in the United States (and hasn’t had any regulatory authority over railroads since 2005). The RRC, essentially, runs energy issues — outside electricity — in Texas with, critically for climate-change issues, the power to regulate and enforce regulations as to methane (“natural gas”) wells (including purposeful dumping of methane and leakage from production). To say that they have been underwhelming in protecting the public and addressing climate change issues in their duties is a gross understatement of the problems. This year’s RRC election and whether the Republican incumbent remains in office could have a major impact on this in the coming years.
The racy Republican runoff
From Tuesday’s Texas primary, the Republican runoff for the Texas Railroad Commission is one of the juiciest stories in this year’s electoral cycle.
Wayne Christian, the incumbent and TRC Chair, is pretty close to outright corrupt (surprise, surprise).
His R opponent, Sarah Stogner, comes off almost like a somewhat conservative D rather than a Republican with her focus on ending corruption and open discussion of environmental impacts (regulating, inspecting leaking wells as well as “clean” as part of energy mix considerations) as core to her campaign.
Texas needs regulators who understand the operational realities of exploring for and producing clean, reliable, and affordable energy. Environmental stewardship and economic success can coexist. Many industries have successfully merged the two. We are Texans, and nothing is too big for us to achieve.
As the Houston Chronicle put it in Lady Godiva of the Oil Patch
“Stogner strikes a populist pose against what she considers corrupt politicians. She complains of crony capitalism, promises to hold big corporations accountable, and demands greater protection for average Texans.”
To make this ‘juicy’ (racy), even more, Stogner used near nude photos in her campaign.
This led to at least one newspaper engaging in “slut shamming” in revoking their endorsement of Stogner.
Wow ok. I wish you would wait and hear what I have to say before making that decision,” Stogner said on Facebook in response. “We have radiation in our water. But me scantily clad is where the line is drawn.” …
It feels very much like slut-shaming,” Stogner said. “We were just goofing off. We had the footage from last year and I said, ‘I’m going to make my own Super Bowl commercial.’ If I had gone off and shot machine guns and screamed about the border, they wouldn’t have had a problem with it.”
The longtime oil and gas lawyer said the incident is another example of preconceptions of how women are forced to fit into a male-dominated industry. “If me and a middle-aged dude walk on a location in field equipment, they’re going to assume he works there and I’m along for the ride,” Stogner said.
Her questioning is on point: why are people “more triggered by the female form than they are by corruption and pollution”?
While Luke Warford would make an excellent Commissioner, keeping fingers crossed that Stogner sends Christian packing.