Statesman endorsement process of County Judge tilted in favor of Democratic incumbent, complete with mystery quote

That the Austin American-Statesman did not endorse the Republican candidate at the top of the countywide ballot is no surprise.

Even if the Houston Chronicle broke loose of the usual gravitational pull toward Democratic candidates and endorsed Republican contender Alexandra del Moral Mealer over Democratic incumbent Lina Hidalgo, the Statesman's top editors predictably held on to their familiar ground in the left-leaning capital of a conservative state.

Yet Travis County Judge challenger Rupal Chaudhari was right to be hopeful. Change is in the air, for reasons already predicted in numerous media outlets in the weeks leading up to this election. The issues she has raised are not the typical red versus blue struggles in D.C., or under the Pink Dome for that matter. Chaudhari has outraised and from what we can tell outworked Democratic incumbent Andy Brown. She's a candidate for the people, and to that there has been little to no questions throughout the entire year of her campaign.

But as expected, the Austin American-Statesman endorsed Brown in an Oct. 23 op-ed. Chaudhari, though given due consideration for her advocacy for better options for Austin's homeless, was portrayed as not quite as knowledgeable or experienced as Brown (e.g. "lacked specificity") -- which seemed to be the basis of the board's endorsement decision. Brown was given a little more of the spotlight, including a quote regarding mental health (see below for snippet as the editorial is behind a paywall).

Statesman editorial endorsement interviews were once video-recorded and shared. Since the Sept. 26 interview was not recorded by the Statesman, we rely on a personal recording taken of the proceeding.  According to the recording shared with the Tracker, the quote attributed to Brown at the top of the screenshot above was not spoken in the interview. However, similar statements were made here and there. This leads us to believe the quote was from a private discussion, a separate interview, or crafted for some purpose (maybe transcribed from notes and mistaken for a quote). Chaudhari said she received no further communication from the editorial board.

In addition to this enigma, we would point out a couple of gaps in logic from the editorial board: 

• In the not-so-distant past, Brown was also inexperienced. He came to the office from being in the campaign world. Like any newly elected official, he learned on the job and surely with a lot of help from county staff which often carry over from one administration to the other. Why not give Chaudhari the same consideration as a newcomer?
  
  
• On the well-known policy failures of Austin and Travis County, Brown's response seems to be along the lines of he's working on it. Rather than an indicting him for failure or rubber-stamping the agenda of the City of Austin on numerous fronts, the Statesman offers a generous helping of patience and trust that he's on top of every public policy crisis pointed out by the Chaudhari campaign.

(We detected one sentence structure error in the editorial, but we'll let that one go, even if they walk with more of a safety net then we have!)

If this is the way the Statesman's editorial process goes, then any credible Republican candidate should be honored to be passed over by the newspaper. We would go further to suggest that the Chaudhari campaign should make the lack of an endorsement a selling point on today, the last day of voting in the 2022 gubernatorial election. And with all due respect to the hard work newspaper editors do on a daily basis, we will too.

* * *

Here are the Statesman's other endorsements followed by our recommendations. Vote accordingly.

County Judge: Andy Brown (we recommend Rupal Chaudhari)

County Clerk: Dyana Limon-Mercado (we recommend Susan Haynes)

Austin Mayor: Celia Israel (we recommend Jennifer Virden)

Austin City Council:

Natasha Harper-Madison for District 1 (we recommend Clinton Rarey)

Jose Noe Elias for District 3 (we recommend Yvonne Weldon)

Ryan Alter for District 5 (we recommend Gen. Bill Welch)

Paige Ellis for District 8 (we recommend Richard Smith)

Ben Leffler for District 9 (we recommend Greg Smith)

For Proposition A

Austin ISD Board of Trustees:

Roxanne Evans for District 1 (we recommend leaing blank)

Kathryn Whitley Chu for District 4 (we recommend Clint Small)

Andrew Gonzales for District 6 (we reccomend leaving blank)

Arati Singh for District 9 (we recommend Heather Toolin)

FOR Propositions A, B, and C (we oppose B and C and are neutral on A).

ACC bond proposal: For (we are against the proposal -- way too ambitious for one election during uncertain economic times)

Don't get us started on the Austin Chronicle, which refused to correct an error that there were no county Republican candidates who filed in December (e.g. "the local GOP is not contesting those races" when actually there were and are).