Vol. II, No. 148 From Our Region to Yours
Politics

Dan Patrick Finds Texas Election Fair, Will Not Be Offering a Reward for Evidence Otherwise

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick lost to Democrat Vikki Goodwin and called it a fair election. In 2020 he offered up to $1 million to anyone who could show otherwise, and this time he is keeping the money.

By 1 min read

Dan Patrick in a red plaid shirt and jeans speaks into a handheld microphone on a stage, in front of a large blue backdrop that spells TRUST in white and red capital letters.
Dan Patrick in 2016. The backdrop has held up better than the bounty. Photo: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America / CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

AUSTIN, Texas — Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick lost his reelection bid Tuesday, and he has examined the result. He finds it fair.

Democrat Vikki Goodwin defeated Patrick, 52 percent to 46 percent, according to KPRC Click2Houston. The Associated Press called the race. With 99 percent of precincts reporting, Goodwin led by nearly 600,000 votes.

“It was a fair election, and I accept the majority will of the voters,” Patrick said in his concession, Click2Houston reported.

“This was a wave election in Texas and across the country,” he said, according to The Dallas Morning News. He listed affordability, gas prices, data centers and 765-kV power lines among the voters’ concerns.

The reward

Patrick has studied election fairness before. In November 2020, after Donald Trump lost the presidential election, he offered up to $1 million “to incentivize, encourage and reward people to come forward and report voter fraud,” Salon reported.

Reports leading to a conviction were promised at least $25,000. The first payout came in October 2021, The Dallas Morning News reported.

It went to a Pennsylvania poll worker. The poll worker had reported a Republican who voted twice.

This week no reward was offered. None was needed. The candidate investigated his own defeat overnight and closed the case himself.

The record

Patrick is 76. He served 12 years as lieutenant governor and nearly two decades in state politics, The Dallas Morning News reported.

Goodwin claimed victory around 11 p.m. Tuesday, with about three-quarters of the expected vote counted, the paper reported. She becomes one of the first Democrats elected statewide in Texas since 1994.

She will preside over the Texas Senate. Patrick ran that chamber for more than a decade.

The analysis

This reporter has covered many concessions. Few arrive with a price list attached from six years earlier.

My most trusted source, Deep Throat Lozenge, reviewed the bounty terms. “Nobody ever said it paid out for losing,” Lozenge said. “That was always free.”

The million dollars remains available. The lieutenant governor’s office does not.

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