Dallas Fundraiser Giving Ex-Hutchison Supporters Chance to Make Amends and Contributions to Perry
May 12, 2010
By Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside Editor
Pair of Straus Lieutenants The Dallas-Fort Worth area is home to more than 20 Texas House Republicans and almost a dozen state senators and congressional members who represent the GOP in Austin and Washington. But the only two Republican lawmakers from the state's second largest metropolitan area on the host committee for a VIP fundraiser for Governor Rick Perry in Dallas later this month are two of House Speaker Joe Straus' top allies - State Reps. Dan Branch and Jim Pitts. Branch, the House Higher Education Committee chairman who's one of Straus' closest friends, represents the Highland Park area where the Perry event is set to take place at Harlan Crow's home on May 26. Crow and several of the co-hosts listed on the invitation to the fundraising reception for Perry have been major contributors to Branch. Pitts, a Waxahachie Republican, is arguably the lower chamber's second most powerful member behind Straus as the House Appropriations Committee chair. While the House's chief budget writer may not want to talk shop at the Perry fundraiser, he could use the event as an opportunity to try to persuade the governor to drop his opposition to casino and slot machine legislator that Pitts has endorsed as one of the ways lawmakers can tackle a state budget that he says could be as high as $18 billion when they convene in January. While a number of the host committee members for the upcoming Perry event in Dallas are returning to the fold after defecting to support U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in the GOP primary in her bid for governor this year, Pitts and Branch were wise enough to stay out of the gubernatorial showdown in 2010. |
The late train is scheduled to make a stop in Dallas this month when several wealthy investors, a famous former football star and other Republican luminaries seek political absolution at a fundraiser for Governor Rick Perry after supporting U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in her unsuccessful bid to unseat him in the GOP primary this year.
The Perry fundraiser will be held May 26 at the Highland Park home of Dallas real estate development magnate Harlan Crow, a major Hutchison donor who's chairing the reception just three months after he sponsored a similar event for the state's senior U.S. Senate member when she was challenging the incumbent in one of the most bitter primary feuds that's ever unfolded in Texas.
As Perry prepares to defend the job he's held longer than any governor in Texas history in the face of opposition from Democrat Bill White, the list of 50 individuals and couples who are featured as co-hosts on the invitation for the Dallas event includes several other Republican heavyweights who contributed major sums of money to Hutchison for her gubernatorial campaign such as Louis Beecherl and Ray Hunt.
The host committee for the Perry fundraiser next month also features ex-Dallas Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach, who hosted a fundraising event for Hutchison at his home and donated $10,000 to her campaign last year before endorsing her at a press conference in February at a time when she appeared to have lost hope for a possible come-from-behind victory in the primary election several weeks later.
Several other former Hutchison backers including ex-Texas Republican Party Chairman Fred Meyer, Dallas real estate icon Ebby Halliday and Jeanne Johnson Phillips are co-hosting the fundraiser for the incumbent governor as well. Meyer led the Texas GOP from 1988 until 1994 when George W. Bush ousted Democrat Ann Richards from the governor's mansion. Meyer had served as the Dallas County GOP chair for nine years before taking over the state party organization.
Halliday, who celebrated her 99th birthday less than a week after Perry defeated Hutchison and Debra Medina in the March 2 primary election, contributed $15,000 to the U.S. senator for her gubernatorial bid. Phillips, a former George W. Bush ally who worked as an advisor to Hutchison's campaign, was a major fundraiser for Bush and chaired the committee for his inaugural in 2001 before he appointed her as U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a group of 30 nations that worked together to confront economic, environmental and social challenges.
Hutchison has enjoyed strong support in Dallas partly as a result of the fact that she's called the area home for more than 30 years since moving there when she married Ray Hutchison, an attorney who entered the Texas House in the early 1970s at the same time his future wife arrived in Austin as a new state representative from Houston who was known then simply as Kay Bailey.
Meyer, Beecherl and Crow were all on the list of statewide co-chairs for Hutchison when she made it public in January 2009 after forming an exploratory committee for the gubernatorial campaign a month earlier. Beecherl and Hunt gave Hutchison $100,000 apiece in 2009 while Crow donated $160,000 to her last year for the governor's race.
Crow, Hunt, Beecherl and others on the host committee for the upcoming Dallas fundraiser for the governor had all been Perry supporters before Hutchison decided to challenge the incumbent. But the big sums of cash that they donated to Hutchison didn't stop Perry from eventually beating her with 51 percent of the March vote while she finished with a disappointing 30 percent and Medina placed third with less than 19 percent.
Staubach - a former Heisman Trophy winner who led the Cowboys to five Super Bowls including two that they won in the 1970s - had been the subject of a recruiting drive aimed at drafting him to run for governor himself early last year before saying he wasn't interested in the post and favored Hutchison instead.
The group of Dallas residents who are co-hosting the Perry fundraiser at Crow's house after backing Hutchison for governor includes Ruth Altshuler, a philanthropist and former Southern Methodist University board chair who was a major contributor to Bush after supporting H. Ross Perot for president in 1992.