On running again

For candidates who didn’t garner the most votes, we don’t think of them as losers.

Reporters and politicos from across the nation turned their eyes to Houston and waited Tuesday night to see the results of the first primary election of the year.

And they waited. And waited. And waited.

Harris County’s notoriously slow election results and outdated county clerk website garnered complaints and mockery all night long. A coalition of civil rights groups also called for the county to address a broken election system that frustrates voters with long lines and confusing locations year after year. Add the Houston Chronicle editorial board to the list of institutions calling for a better election process.

But when the final votes were announced around 1 a.m. the next day, questions that had lingered for months were finally answered. No, not one of Texas’ statewide Republicans was forced into a primary runoff.

Yes, Republican state Rep. Sarah Davis defeated her challenger, who was backed by Gov. Greg Abbott.

No, $6 million worth of mailers and television ads apparently wasn’t enough to send Kathaleen Wall to the Republican primary runoff in the 2nd Congressional District. Maybe next time she’ll spend $7 million.

And yes, state Sen. Sylvia Garcia’s primary victory in the Democratfriendly 29th Congressional District probably means Houston will have our first Hispanic representative in Washington.

In the most disappointing news of the night, two impressive incumbent judges — Jay Karahan and Theresa Chang — lost in their Republican primaries to underqualified challengers.

Let us now offer an encouraging observation to good candidates who fell short in this month’s primary elections: Even Rocky Balboa lost his first fight.

Remember that George W. Bush lost his first election and ended up living in the White House. Sylvester Turner lost his first two races for mayor, but he’s now sitting in the big office at Houston City Hall.

The lesson for aspiring elected officials is simple. Even successful politicians sometimes lose elections.

The editorial board has spent the past few months interviewing scores of candidates who took the initiative to run for public office. Even if they had no hope of winning, even if their qualifications have been questionable, their commitment has been inspiring.

A cancer researcher decided to run this year because he thinks America needs more scientists in public office. An ethics expert put his name on the ballot because he’s bothered by cronyism in our state capital. A retired rock ’n’ roll disc jockey went to a women’s march and came to the conclusion she needed to campaign for Congress. A woman who lived in an RV in Austin so she could lobby state lawmakers decided to run for the Texas Legislature.

We met some mighty impressive citizens who put their reputations on the line and their names on the ballot but ended up losing their primaries. Indeed, many of them faced such stiff competition they didn’t even win our endorsement. But some of them have been so compelling we want to encourage them to stay in politics. They deserve a second mention, because we hope we see their names on the ballot again in the future.

Jason Westin has dedicated his professional life to curing cancer — he’s an oncologist and researcher at the MD Anderson Cancer Center — but the state of American politics bothered him so intensely he decided to run for Congress. His boyish appearance and political inexperience may have led a lot of people to underestimate him when he started campaigning for the Democratic primary in the race for Republican John Culberson’s seat in Congress. But his calm command of the issues earned him not only a growing base of voters impressed with what they heard him say at community forums but also the respect of Democratic political insiders and campaign contributors. At a time when far too many politicians pander to anti-intellectual simplicity, it’s noteworthy that Westin also got a lot of help from something called 314 Action — a group whose name represents the approximate value of pi — dedicated to electing more scientists to public office.

Jason Westin, please run again.

Silky Malik walks and talks like the future of the Democratic Party in Houston. She’s a Montrose resident with an MBA from Texas A&M who ran in the primary for the congressional seat now occupied by Ted Poe. She’s lively and smart and she speaks with uncommon passion, particularly when she explains why millennial voters are looking for honest and authentic candidates who won’t sell them out to special interests. “I think we can have leaders who inspire people the way FDR inspired me,” she told us.

Silky Malik, please run again.

Trey Blocker is a conservative Republican lawyer and lobbyist who’s deeply concerned with ethics in government. “Having worked in politics for more than 20 years, I’ve seen a lot of things,” he told us. “But I can honestly say this last legislative session, I saw more corruption and crony capitalism than I’ve seen in my entire career. And I finally decided I’d had enough of it, and it was time to do something about it.” Blocker ran against the man he considered the poster boy for unethical behavior in Austin. Somehow, Agriculture Commissioner Sid “Jesus Shot” Miller managed to win the GOP primary despite his record of playing fast and loose with taxpayer dollars. Still, Blocker fought the good fight for good government, and we hope he stays in the arena.

Trey Blocker, please run again.

Beth Barron is an assistant district attorney who has helped more than 10,000 victims of family violence obtain protective orders against abusive husbands and fathers. Her peers so profoundly respect her expertise in this field, the Texas District and County Attorney Association uses her published family violence guidelines throughout the state. Choosing between her and the equally impressive Barbara Stalder may have been the toughest decision our editorial board had to make in this election cycle. Barron won our endorsement, Stalder won the primary, and voters couldn’t lose in a contest between two exemplary lawyers doing noble work.

Beth Barron, please run again.

David Bridges has been a justice on the Fifth District Court of Appeals for more than two decades. He’s written more than 2,000 opinions while serving on the court, and he’s board certified in both criminal and criminal appellate law. He’s also a former assistant district attorney and staff lawyer for the State Bar of Texas, where he took action against crooked members of his own profession. He ran but lost a GOP primary campaign for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which reviews not only cases from all 14 Texas courts of appeals but also all death penalty sentences handed down in trial courts. His campaign website discreetly suggested voters Google the name of incumbent Justice Sharon Keller, whose outrageous rulings in a couple of high profile cases have led countless lawyers to publicly call for her removal from the bench. Bridges could have run an entirely negative campaign blasting the incumbent’s troublesome record. Instead he chose to run on his own considerable reputation, displaying the temperament of a fine jurist.

David Bridges, please run again.

Adrian Ocegueda runs a private equity firm in Dallas. He grew up in El Paso, where he served as an economic policy adviser to the city’s mayor. Ocegueda is a thoughtful Princeton University graduate with an MBA from Southern Methodist University. As a Democratic candidate for governor, he talked about big issues and fundamental structural problems facing state government. For example, Ocegueda had the foresight to call for retraining Texas workers who are about to lose their jobs to automation, from forklift operators to long-haul truck drivers. And he had the courage to touch the third rail of Texas politics, suggesting the state needs to seriously discuss introducing a state income tax.

Adrian Ocegueda, please run again.

Armen “Hammer” Merjanian publicly called a judge a “tyrant” for behaving more like a prosecutor than a jurist. Instead of just complaining, he decided to run for county criminal court judge. Merjanian is an idealistic young lawyer whose five years of experience barely exceeded the statutory minimum for the bench he sought. He’s a passionate advocate for criminal justice reform and ending mass incarceration. Someday, he could become a fine judge.

Armen “Hammer” Merjanian, please run again.

And you can see a full list of candidates who should run again at HoustonChronicle.com/opinion.

Every election has only one winner. These candidates didn’t garner the most votes, but we don’t think of them as losers. We’re grateful they ran, and we hope Texans will have a chance to vote for them again.