Governor Perry capitalizes on anti-Obama sentiment in Lone Star State.
(Al.com)
Governor Rick Perry won the Texas Republican primary tonight. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison conceded the election at 9:30. Truther-Tea Party candidate Debra Medina took about one-fifth of the vote.
The AP reported:
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison conceded the Republican nomination for Texas governor to Gov. Rick Perry on Tuesday following a heated primary battle that highlighted the growing anti-Washington mood among voters in midterm elections.
Hutchison was once seen as the candidate who could deliver Perry’s first election loss in a lifetime of public office, but the governor, a darling of the social conservatives, forcefully painted the senator as too entrenched in Washington politics.
Speaking at his election night party in Driftwood after Hutchison conceded, Perry said he would unite a fractured Texas Republican Party in the November general election and stressed that Washington politics had no place in the Lone Star state.
“From Driftwood, Texas, to Washington, D.C. we are sending you a message tonight: Stop messing with Texas!” Perry said.
Perry, Texas’ longest-serving governor, had 51 percent of the vote compared to Hutchinson’s 31 percent, with nearly three-fourths of precincts reporting Tuesday night. About one in five voters cast ballots for a third candidate, Debra Medina, a GOP party activist who was backed by some in the state’s tea party movement.