You may have heard by now that DeLay’s attempt to remove his ethics troubles from the campaign field by quitting the House race in his home district in Texas has been at least temporarily foiled by the courts. Quoting the Washington Post:
The Texas Republican Party must keep Tom DeLay’s name on the November election ballot, even though the former congressman has dropped his re-election bid, a federal judge ruled Thursday.
As you may recall, DeLay won a 3-way race for the Republican nomination, and then dropped out of the race, resigned his seat in Congress, and declared that his legal residence was now his house in Alexandria, Virginia, rather than his house in Sugarland, Texas, opening the door for Texas GOP folks to name a replacement candidate.
Naturally, Dems are happy that DeLay is going to be on the ballot, assuming the court ruling holds. Given his ethics troubles, DeLay stands a good chance of losing if he were to actually run.
However, Donklephant offers an enlightened thought on the circus:
The Dems should drop the suit and let the Reps name whatever replacement they want. Democracy is not served when a contest is essentially reduced to a one-party race because of legal technicalities. Sugarland voters deserve a choice in November.
I agree.
I also think that DeLay should have stepped down before the primary, rather than quite possibly using his primary campaign to generate funds to pay his defense attorneys. That would have avoided the need for this legal shenanigans, and given the voters of that Texas district every opportunity to choose their representative. However, that’s water under the bridge at this point, and it doesn’t make the dems’ gaming the system any better.