Abbott – Accountability Escape Artist

During Greg Abbott’s nearly 20 years in political office drawing a state paycheck, he has spent only 30 minutes participating in public debates during general elections.

That’s right – 30 minutes in 20 years.

The only time Greg Abbott has been part of what can fairly be described as a debate was a 30 minute exchange with Democrat Kirk Watson in 2002. Since then Abbott has successfully employed a “dodge, duck, dip, dive, dodge” strategy.

He has a long and extraordinary record of escaping accountability – all while taking care of insiders without paying a political price.

In one election after another, Abbott has simply refused to make himself available to exchange ideas or defend his positions in a public forum where he can be questioned and contradicted.

While the political press may not like this, they have never really held Abbott accountable for his debate dodges.

Will Abbott Get Away with It?

The Texas Tribune published an outstanding historical recounting of past Texas gubernatorial debates. Hopefully, the Tribune’s focus on debates means that this time, the Texas political press will go beyond reporting the back-and-forth of debate negotiations and actually take a public minded point of view. Candidates like Abbott have a responsibility to participate in legitimate public exchanges with their opponent.

Last week, Abbott went beyond his usual dodge strategy and pulled a Houdini – trying to escape from a debate in which he had already agreed to participate.

Both Abbott and Wendy Davis had agreed to appear in a debate sponsored by WFAA TV to be broadcast statewide. WFAA TV has a large viewing audience, so Abbott would be exposed to voter scrutiny at a level far beyond his comfort zone. Rather than honor his commitment, Abbott bailed, citing problems with the debate format – a format he had earlier OK’d.

When criticized for backing out, Abbott made another move – this one even more telling. He meekly agreed to a lower profile, smaller audience debate sponsored by publicly funded station KERA TV.

Apart from the irony that Abbott turned to a publicly funded station as lead sponsor for a debate, his choice revealed that format issues had nothing to do with his reneging on the earlier agreement. His problem was that WFAA’s statewide audience was too large, too intimidating and would expose him to too many voters.

Abbott Insecurity

Abbott’s insecurity is not what voters want in a candidate for Governor of Texas. It certainly contrasts badly for him compared to Wendy Davis who even opponents concede is a person of extraordinary personal courage and conviction.

There is no reason to think Greg Abbott is not capable of participating and performing well in a debate with Wendy Davis. After all, he is a career politician in office for nearly 20 years who has no problem articulating his thoughts in non-confrontational settings.

However, Abbott, is apparently terrified by the prospect of exposing himself to the type of voter scrutiny and accountability that comes from widely watched debates and open press availabilities.

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