Texas Public Lands Commissioner election, 2022
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| Texas Land Commissioner |
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| Election details |
| Filing deadline: December 13, 2021 |
| Primary: March 1, 2022 Primary runoff: May 24, 2022 General: November 8, 2022 Pre-election incumbent(s): George P. Bush (Republican) |
| How to vote |
| Poll times: 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Voting in Texas |
| Ballotpedia analysis |
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Texas held an election for land commissioner on November 8, 2022. The primary was scheduled for March 1, 2022, and a primary runoff was scheduled for May 24, 2022. The filing deadline was December 13, 2021.
Dawn Buckingham won election in the general election for Texas Land Commissioner.
Candidates and election results
General election
General election for Texas Land Commissioner
Dawn Buckingham defeated Jay Kleberg, Alfred Molison, and Carrie Menger in the general election for Texas Land Commissioner on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Dawn Buckingham (R) | 56.2 | 4,463,452 |
 | Jay Kleberg (D)  | 42.1 | 3,350,291 | |
 | Alfred Molison (G) | 1.7 | 133,034 | |
 | Carrie Menger (Independent) (Write-in) | 0.0 | 1,812 | |
| Total votes: 7,948,589 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary runoff election
Democratic primary runoff for Texas Land Commissioner
Jay Kleberg defeated Sandragrace Martinez in the Democratic primary runoff for Texas Land Commissioner on May 24, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Jay Kleberg | 52.9 | 254,273 |
 | Sandragrace Martinez | 47.1 | 225,964 | |
| Total votes: 480,237 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Republican primary runoff election
Republican primary runoff for Texas Land Commissioner
Dawn Buckingham defeated Tim Westley in the Republican primary runoff for Texas Land Commissioner on May 24, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Dawn Buckingham | 68.8 | 595,554 |
 | Tim Westley | 31.2 | 270,365 | |
| Total votes: 865,919 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Texas Land Commissioner
Sandragrace Martinez and Jay Kleberg advanced to a runoff. They defeated Jinny Suh and Michael Lange in the Democratic primary for Texas Land Commissioner on March 1, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Sandragrace Martinez | 31.8 | 313,780 |
| ✔ | | Jay Kleberg | 26.0 | 257,034 |
 | Jinny Suh | 21.9 | 216,238 | |
 | Michael Lange | 20.2 | 199,764 | |
| Total votes: 986,816 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Republican primary election
Republican primary for Texas Land Commissioner
The following candidates ran in the Republican primary for Texas Land Commissioner on March 1, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Dawn Buckingham | 41.9 | 679,125 |
| ✔ | | Tim Westley | 14.8 | 239,473 |
 | Jon Spiers | 12.6 | 203,879 | |
 | Don Minton | 10.6 | 171,001 | |
 | Victor Avila | 7.5 | 121,998 | |
 | Weston Martinez | 6.6 | 107,219 | |
| Rufus Lopez | 3.1 | 49,475 | |
 | Ben Armenta | 3.0 | 48,029 | |
| Total votes: 1,620,199 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Green convention
Green convention for Texas Land Commissioner
Alfred Molison advanced from the Green convention for Texas Land Commissioner on April 9, 2022.
Candidate | ||
| ✔ | | Alfred Molison (G) |
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| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Voting information
- See also: Voting in Texas
Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey responses
Ballotpedia asks all federal, state, and local candidates to complete a survey and share what motivates them on political and personal levels. The section below shows responses from candidates in this race who completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
Survey responses from candidates in this race
Click on a candidate's name to visit their Ballotpedia page.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
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Jay Kleberg (D)
I have the experience and the knowledge necessary to lead the General Land Office into the future – a future where Texas leads the country in the fight against climate change with a diversified energy portfolio and a strengthened grid. For too long, this office has been viewed as a stepping stone, and we have elected Land Commissioners without the necessary experience to do this job. This office is our state’s top environmental post, and our state is already feeling the effects of climate change. We cannot afford to elect another Land Commissioner lacking the experience necessary to do this job and do it well.
Whether it be my upbringing on a working ranch in South Texas, my work conserving and managing wild lands in my role as Associate Director and Director of Conservation Initiatives with Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation, or the time I spent covering the state building Explore Ranches to maintain rural working lands, I have spent my working life in land conservation. I believe loving Texas and accepting the science behind climate change go hand-in-hand. Equipped with land management experience, a deep understanding of our state’s environmental challenges, and an MBA from the University of Texas, I’m ready to get to work.
The Texas Land Commissioner––as the state’s top environmental post––has the power and the responsibility to address climate change. Texas is the #1 emitter of carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas, in the nation. The GLO can help fight climate change in three specific ways: by employing large-scale carbon capture and sequestration storage on state-owned lands, by diversifying the GLO’s energy portfolio through geothermal and renewable energy, thereby reducing the states carbon footprint, and by increasing the standards by which we are investing in coastal resiliency to meet the demands of climate change.
Whether it be my upbringing on a working ranch in South Texas, my work conserving and managing wild lands in my role as Associate Director and Director of Conservation Initiatives with Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation, or the time I spent covering the state building Explore Ranches to maintain rural working lands, I have spent my working life in land conservation. I believe loving Texas and accepting the science behind climate change go hand-in-hand. Equipped with land management experience, a deep understanding of our state’s environmental challenges, and an MBA from the University of Texas, I’m ready to get to work.
The Texas Land Commissioner––as the state’s top environmental post––has the power and the responsibility to address climate change. Texas is the #1 emitter of carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas, in the nation. The GLO can help fight climate change in three specific ways: by employing large-scale carbon capture and sequestration storage on state-owned lands, by diversifying the GLO’s energy portfolio through geothermal and renewable energy, thereby reducing the states carbon footprint, and by increasing the standards by which we are investing in coastal resiliency to meet the demands of climate change.
Carrie Menger (Independent)
Securing a stable Texas future resilient in its handling of natural disasters like hurricanes necessarily means productive communication with state and federal agencies to optimize resource allocations for the mitigation of and recovery from perils that damage homes, infrastructure, and ecosystems. Fulfilling the requirements of the General Land Office entails working with agencies like NOAA, FEMA, and HUD to gain an edge over natural perils, regardless of party affiliations. Diligent attention to funding opportunities, grant writing, interagency collaborations, and the creation of innovative funding facilities promotes faster recoveries and science-based coastal resource management that KEEPS TEXAS PREPARED.
Texas schools should be safe, competitive, and inclusive within the global market. STEM curricula should be promoted with the expectations that no school be too small to be safe or too large to be socially-inclusive and bully-free. Building positive energy sector partnerships to build royalty-derived cash flows will enhance Permanent School Fund allocations. Enterprising corridors will also incentivize environmental protections through earned “Good Steward” awards that improving lessees’ operational leveraging potentials by accessing new unit expansion opportunities vis-à-vis new, separate unitizations. Partnerships and corridors that benefit Texas schools, the environment, and energy sector enterprising, synergistically, make sense.
The Texas Demographic Center projects a Texas population of 40 million by 2050 and the rates of land conversions from working agricultural lands to developments will likely overshadow rates of increased food and fiber production per acre of land. According to a Burleson County farmer, the conversions of large acreage farms to smaller acreage tracts diminishes agribusiness and timber profitability so much that the economic incentive to sell the land for development is greater than the return from retaining the land for continued use in agriculture. As Land Commissioner, I will prioritize Ag-use leases of state-owned lands set aside for food and fiber to offset working land conversions elsewhere in Texas and maintain positive cash flows.
Texas schools should be safe, competitive, and inclusive within the global market. STEM curricula should be promoted with the expectations that no school be too small to be safe or too large to be socially-inclusive and bully-free. Building positive energy sector partnerships to build royalty-derived cash flows will enhance Permanent School Fund allocations. Enterprising corridors will also incentivize environmental protections through earned “Good Steward” awards that improving lessees’ operational leveraging potentials by accessing new unit expansion opportunities vis-à-vis new, separate unitizations. Partnerships and corridors that benefit Texas schools, the environment, and energy sector enterprising, synergistically, make sense.
The Texas Demographic Center projects a Texas population of 40 million by 2050 and the rates of land conversions from working agricultural lands to developments will likely overshadow rates of increased food and fiber production per acre of land. According to a Burleson County farmer, the conversions of large acreage farms to smaller acreage tracts diminishes agribusiness and timber profitability so much that the economic incentive to sell the land for development is greater than the return from retaining the land for continued use in agriculture. As Land Commissioner, I will prioritize Ag-use leases of state-owned lands set aside for food and fiber to offset working land conversions elsewhere in Texas and maintain positive cash flows.
Jay Kleberg (D)
The Texas Land Commissioner is our state’s top environmental post. Not only does the next Land Commissioner have the opportunity – and responsibility – to address and combat the effects of climate change, but they also have the opportunity to affect some other policy areas as well.
The General Land Office can contribute up to $600M annually to the Texas Permanent School Fund, which funds public K-12 education. In recent years, this office and its contribution to the Texas Permanent School Fund have been used as a political chess piece. I would push to not only allocate the full $600M annually to the Permanent School Fund, but work with the legislature to increase the limit on how much the GLO could contribute annually.
The General Land Office manages 9 veterans’ homes in Amarillo, Big Spring, Bonham, El Paso, Floresville, Houston, McAllen, Temple, and Tyler. During the COVID-19 pandemic, those nine homes lost 134 veterans and had a fatality rate of 25%, which is far higher than the statewide fatality rate of 11% among nursing homes. Under its current leadership, the GLO is failing our veterans and we must do better. If elected, I would put human and financial resources to serving our veterans, and work to ensure that the GLO has long-term funding from a diversified energy portfolio to keep our promises to our veterans.
Carrie Menger (Independent)
Public Service in a State Office is an honorable profession requiring deep knowledge of correct and appropriate execution of the duties of the Office to achieve broad and specific goals, within and across relevant jurisdictions, through diligent and wise use of resources, programs, and personnel in fulfillment of agency relationships among all relevant levels of state and federal governments to best serve our Texas stakeholders within the frameworks of state statutes, common law, the State of Texas Constitution and applicable Laws and Acts of the United States of America. Dr. Carrie Evelyn Menger is preparing to serve you and Texas Governor Greg Abbott in the capacity as Commissioner of the Texas General Land Office for at least the next four years. Why? POLICIES THAT INCREASE 1) state-owned asset-derived cash flows, 2) benefits to Texas Veterans and Military Service men and women through novel and existing Veterans Land Board programs, 3) funding opportunities and awards for scientific research and management of our precious Texas coastal resources, 4) Texas School Safety Center compliance to promote "No School Too Small To Be Safe," 5) core curricular education in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), 6) funding accessibility and transactional efficiency for wards, districts, precincts, municipalities and Texas counties vulnerable to disaster storms, and 7) conversions of bad electric grid components to subsurface facilities to KEEP THE POWER ON.
Carrie Menger (Independent)
I respect a number of local, national and foreign leaders, and some, not necessarily in their entireties. I select the positive traits demonstrated or exhibited by people whom with I interact or study and apply those better qualities where they can best be used in achieving good goals while avoiding personal issues, unless the interaction is basically personal or extra-professional. Interpersonal relationships, bonding, and imprinting are unique manifestations that sometimes get executives into trouble even through logically pursuing good intentions for a greater benefit to stakeholders. Sometimes instincts come into conflict with logic. Instinct should always be given credence and it implies reason to caution and reassess the logical approach or what is customary. When an executive rechecks, the quality of the information and the directions given may not always be the best or may even be false. Interpersonal relations are a part of Executive Risk, Accountability, and Integrity. Risks discounted by logic can still hurt you in hard ways - sometimes the harm is intentional and malicious. Other times, it is coincidental. Sometimes, an executive will face an angry crowd when her back is against the wall. You have to temper your responses to survive. Get away and assess. Remember, you are accountable to others as a role model. Fight to maintain your INTEGRITY. The angry crowd did not take INTEGRITY away - they just steal a little of your spirit. You relinquish your INTEGRITY. The late Gamal Abdel Nasser, former President of Egypt, is an international leadership I respect. Other leaderships I admire nationally and locally are the late former United States Presidents George H.W. Bush and George Washington, the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, Senator John Cornyn, the young bilingual Catholic priest at Sacred Heart Church, and my mother - they have seen or have experienced risks. Accountable - INTEGRITY.
Carrie Menger (Independent)
The wall separating East Germany and West Germany, its dismantling, is one of the first historically significant events I remember from my youth. It unified so many and a country - several countries, included the United States. Peoples reborn in new spirits of hope, peace, and expectations. As a young girl, I observed the United States of America saw the positive impact of representative democracy in Eastern Europe, even though it came with economic struggle. The legacies of Presidents Reagan and George H.W. Bush are preserved, in part, through demonstration of parts of this wall. Some of it remains, on display, in Texas, in Aggieland. Accessing the Brandenburg Gate, previously blocked by the Berlin Wall, but now opened through revolution, saw the uncountable occasions of entry and passage through this gate for the first time since the early 1960s. In the United States of America, there are still Berlin Walls. One that needs to come down really bad is the one that blocks the gate for members of the LGBTQ Community. The current leadership at Texas A&M University and parts of East Texas, and elsewhere, need a piece of this wall, too, showing that they can dismantle a barrier for a community and open the gates for LGBTQ to make entry and safe passage. Revolutions emerge because of what preceded that which commenced on the 9th of November 1989 - oppression. Friendship is not oppression. It is our foundation for innovations - it is our Texas motto. Let's solve.
Carrie Menger (Independent)
My first job was working on the farm and ranch taking care of vegetables and chickens, pigs, and cattle. However, the first job off of the farm I enjoyed for a summer prior to leaving for college was a technician assistantship position at a tractor and agricultural equipment dealership outside of La Grange, Texas. I learned so much in managing resources helpful to the shop and in helping the mechanics and the customers, both in the store and in the field. Two of my fondest memories from working at this dealership include wholesome learning experiences with two proficient mechanics. First, with Mr. Calvin Bohot, a huge man with an even bigger heart, I would work alongside in repairing and servicing combines in the shop or outside in rice country, Texas. Being a small lady, I could squeeze into compartments or get that fallen bolt in the nook behind the auger or under a sieve. Second, working with Mr. Larry Krenek, a friendly and modest-tempered gentleman, and the main diesel mechanic, I learned through a wise joke that weevils do not cause cavitation in piston heads! I learned, also from this job, how labor translates into payroll and how contributions to my country's general fund, Social Security and Medicare programs are supported by the work of the nation. I gained the knowledge that 401K and health benefits were earned rather than expected. Today, some perceptions of these types of benefits and their relative entitlement status are much different.
Campaign data
Campaign finance
General election
Democratic primary
Republican primary
Past elections
2018
General election
General election for Texas Land Commissioner
Incumbent George P. Bush defeated Miguel Suazo and Matt Piña in the general election for Texas Land Commissioner on November 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | George P. Bush (R) | 53.7 | 4,435,202 |
 | Miguel Suazo (D) | 43.2 | 3,567,927 | |
 | Matt Piña (L) | 3.1 | 258,482 | |
| Total votes: 8,261,611 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Texas Land Commissioner
Miguel Suazo defeated Tex Morgan in the Democratic primary for Texas Land Commissioner on March 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Miguel Suazo | 70.0 | 659,163 |
 | Tex Morgan | 30.0 | 282,387 | |
| Total votes: 941,550 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Republican primary election
Republican primary for Texas Land Commissioner
Incumbent George P. Bush defeated Jerry Patterson, Davey Edwards, and Rick Range in the Republican primary for Texas Land Commissioner on March 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | George P. Bush | 58.2 | 857,398 |
 | Jerry Patterson | 29.7 | 437,535 | |
 | Davey Edwards | 6.8 | 100,763 | |
 | Rick Range | 5.3 | 77,623 | |
| Total votes: 1,473,319 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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2014
Republican George P. Bush won election on November 4, 2014.
| Texas Land Commissioner, 2014 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Republican |  George P. Bush |
60.7% | 2,826,751 | |
| Democrat | John Cook | 35.3% | 1,645,696 | |
| Libertarian | Justin Knight | 2.7% | 126,406 | |
| Green | Valerie Alessi | 1.3% | 60,112 | |
| Total Votes | 4,658,965 | |||
| Election results via Texas Secretary of State | ||||
See also
| Texas | State Executive Elections | News and Analysis |
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External links
Footnotes
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