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Friedman, the songwriter, mystery novelist, and humorist (and sometime TEXAS MONTHLY contributor) gained national attention for his campaign, the slogan of which was “How Hard Could It Be?” Yet despite attention from media outlets like the New Yorker and 60 Minutes, he finished a distant fourth.
Friedman: Rick didn’t really campaign a hell of a lot. He didn’t have to and he knew it. He had that election wrapped up. Money elects you in politics. By the time we spent the six million bucks we raised to get on the ballot we were pretty much broke.
He’s got really good people working with him. His campaign manager—that’s a guy that anybody would like to have. I think they do what they have to do to win. They don’t get into bitchy little battles with people when they don’t have to. I didn’t see a lot of snide comments coming from them about anybody.
Perry was a gentleman during the debate. But it was an off night for me; I was kind of off my feet. One reason is, I like Rick. I didn’t want to have to attack him the way you would have to attack someone when you know that he’s winning. I think Rick and I, although we disagree on a great many things, are incapable of resisting each other’s charm.
Race
2010 Republican gubernatorial primary
Opponents
Kay Bailey Hutchison, lost with 30 percent; Debra Medina, lost with 19 percent
A onetime state representative and treasurer who had won four elections to the U.S. Senate, Hutchison likely hoped that Perry, after ten years in office, would step aside and let her take the Republican nomination for governor. Instead, Perry ran again and beat the popular lawmaker handily. Hutchison declined to be interviewed about the race, as did multiple members of her campaign staff, many of whom are currently working for other candidates. Matt Mackowiak, her Senate press secretary at the time the campaign began, was a frequent commentator on the 2010 race, though he did not have an official role within the campaign.
Mackowiak: The individual issue attacks that Hutchison had—things like HPV, Trans-Texas Corridor, and the eminent domain issues—weren ’t breaking through or piercing the overall dynamic that Perry was able to create very early on. He did this partially by adopting the tea party identity before anyone really knew its full power. In April 2009 no one really knew what the tea party was. So it was something I think that Senator Hutchison wanted to be somewhat cautious about. She didn’t know what it was; she didn’t know what they were trying to do at the time. Of course she thought that the federal government was too big. Of course she thought that spending was too high. I think at some level she fully connected with the reasons the tea party came into existence, but she didn’t quite understand how to tap into it at that time. And Perry’s instinct was to tap into it immediately. I think that inoculated him from a tea party challenge. Medina could have been a much greater threat had he not adopted the tea party platform early on in a direct way.
One of the biggest surprises of the 2010 Republican gubernatorial primary was the strong showing by Medina, a nurse and small-business owner from Wharton. Despite being a largely unknown and inexperienced politician from the party’s libertarian-oriented Ron Paul wing, Medina impressed many with her debate performances.
Medina: I think a lot of people marveled at Perry’s campaign. It was pretty widely reported at the time that he didn’t do a lot of the traditional stuff; he went to more of a social media marketing model. I don’t know if that works for anybody that hasn’t been in office for twenty years, but it worked for him. He just took that “I’m the governor, I’m going to be reelected, and I don’t have to mess with you people from Texas” attitude. They took the position for a very long time that I didn’t exist, and I think it absolutely worked for them.
But I won both of the debates hands down. Perry’s demeanor when he initially came onto the stage the night of the first debate—it wasn’t serious. It was jovial, like “Great to be here!” It was almost comedic, you know? It was kind of a Three Stooge-y feeling. And that’s what was reported—that his answers were not good, he didn’t take the debate seriously, he may be a little arrogant. He was very confident in his place as the governor, and he got shown up. In fact, they both did. And I think that’s really the thing—that we had two people who spent almost their entire adult lives in service to our state who knew less about what was going on in our state than a nurse from Wharton, Texas.
His demeanor in the second debate was much more serious. But I still think I beat him.
After the primary election, I think, we initiated a call to Perry, and he agreed to take it, and we set up a time to talk. And I remember getting off the call and thinking, “I know why he wins campaigns; he’s a really smart guy.” People from all parts of the state were telling me to endorse him, and I was like, “Until he does something that’s consistent with the ideas that we have, how can I endorse him?” So I thought, he’s going to say to me, “You know, Debra, you really need to.” And he didn’t. He never did mention it. He didn’t put me in a position to tell him no.
Race
2010 gubernatorial general election
Opponent
Bill White (D), lost with 42 percent
Democrats who hoped that the popular former Houston mayor would break Perry’s nine-race winning streak were in for a disappointment. Despite frequent claims that White would make it a close race, Perry outmaneuvered him at every turn, refusing to debate unless White released all of his tax returns (which he did not do) and accusing White of profiteering off of Hurricane Rita. White lost by a thirteen-point margin.
White: Rick Perry has a justifiable reputation as somebody who lives and breathes politics and has a fierce determination to stay in office. [I met him] decades ago at a Texas Lyceum event when he was a young Democrat. He was a handsome young man who worked the crowd, but there were a lot of ambitious young people in the statehouse, and I don’t recall him sticking out particularly.
He raised more money than I did, but from a much smaller number of donors, and some of his donors gave millions. His principal handler is a Mr. [Dave] Carney, who lives in New Hampshire and is charging the campaign millions of dollars in fees, but he’s a real pro, and Perry tends to keep on the script that’s given him.
I sought to debate, but he did not want to debate and defend his record. He very rarely campaigned in person. When he did, he chose public appearances, where questions from the press would be limited. If his handlers had exposed him to more questioning, then he might have responded in a way that hurt him. One of the few—perhaps the last—impromptu sessions he had with a journalist occurred about six months before the election: After a meeting with BP executives he said that the oil spill might have been caused by an act of God. After that there weren’t many impromptu sessions with journalists.
His strategy was to claim that Texas government was in good shape, when, obviously everyone now knows, it was not. Perry ran massive amounts of advertising in Houston in the last six weeks. About two thirds claimed that Texas state government was in good financial shape and took credit for the fact that Texas had grown faster than other states, despite the fact that it has for one hundred years. The other ads had pictures of me and President Obama. Some, especially outside the Houston area, attacked Houston and my performance as mayor. Polls showed that he pulled into a lead after the massive advertising barrage principally because of the influence on independent voters who didn’t like the growth of government in Washington.
There were also some silly things that happened that are still hard to believe. One consulting firm of his created artificial people to tweet. [The campaign] wanted to question my support in the African American community, but they couldn’t recruit an African American person to do it, so on Twitter they used a stock photo of a black person. One of the people who supported my campaign clicked on the image and found out it was a singer from Atlanta. The Twitter address was registered at the same location as one of Mr. Perry’s political consultants.
Perry and I spoke briefly the night he won. I told him congratulations and that I hoped he would do well as governor. We both acknowledged that our wives are better people than we are.
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