Democratic state senate District 23 meets, and caucuses, and it’s a disaster

by Michael Hogenmiller of of Minor-League Politico

AUSTIN — Friday afternoon's senate district caucuses came to order at 3pm, and Dallas' own Senate District 23 was certainly not short on local political celebrities. Attendance included judicial candidate Ken Molberg, State Senate candidate Rain Minns, Chris Bell (former candidate for Governor), Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Elba Garcia, State Representative Rafael Anchia, State Representative Lon Burnam, and State Senator Royce West.

With all of this political muscle in attendance, you would have thought that the District would run a tight ship, elevating its alternates to fill the void left by Hillary delegates that didn't show up, voting in the delegates it'll be sending on to Denver, and finalizing their District business before going into general assembly.

Instead, what emerged was a drastically unorganized mess, spurned by incomplete delegate data and confusion among those running the district caucus, and while other Districts have completed their business and are currently milling around the convention hall, 23 is still sitting at a stand still, unable to decipher its delegate rolls while Anchia & co. patiently look-on, undoubtedly wondering what the hell the grassroots people are doing and why they seem unable to conduct the basic votes that other Districts cruised through.

I can't help but wonder if the lack of organization is a product of the large number of new Obama delegates who are participating as first time Convention goers, or if it's to be blamed and the nearly overwhelming number of people involved in the District 23 Caucus. All seem plausible until I wandered over to the other huge caucuses from Travis County and Tarrant County, and I was dumbfounded by how quiet and orderly those meetings were.

Almost 2 hours into the caucus, District 23 was still fumbling to fill the 53 empty delegate slots left by Hillary no shows, and one can only hope that the Party folks will step in and save the district's caucus leadership from further embarrassment in front of its star politicos.

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