This article has been updated.
After getting crossways with his state’s Republican leaders, state House Rep. Steve Allison won’t be headed back to Austin next legislative session.
With 239 of 267 vote centers counted, Allison trailed challenger Marc LaHood in the GOP primary Tuesday night. LaHood had 53.9% of the vote to Allison’s 38.9%, and U.S. Army veteran Michael Champion had 7.2%.
Allison has represented the Northside House District 121 since 2018, and had his name on nearly every piece of conservative legislation to come out of the past several sessions: The state’s six-week abortion ban, a controversial new voting law, and a law to require transgender athletes to compete on teams that correspond to their sex at birth.
But Allison’s late 2023 vote to stop Gov. Greg Abbott’s school voucher plan, as well as personal disagreements with embattled Attorney General Ken Paxton, brought a storm of outside spending into a district that hasn’t seen a competitive primary since former House Speaker Joe Straus decided not to seek reelection in 2018.
At a watch party at the Barn Door restaurant, Allison’s campaign expressed confidence the race would go to a May 28 runoff. But the numbers didn’t improve.
In recent months Texas House District 121 had become home to a full-on proxy war between disagreeing GOP factions at the state Capitol.
After the House had already voted to impeach Paxton, Allison, a former Alamo Heights Independent School District board president, was one of 21 Republicans who joined Democrats in November to stop Abbott’s school voucher plan.
Abbott received an unprecedented $6 million check from a pro-voucher donor in Pennsylvania to deploy against those members. No challenger received more of the governor’s help than LaHood, a criminal defense attorney who ran unsuccessfully for Bexar County District Attorney in 2022.
Abbott spent $672,000 for LaHood in the final month before early voting.
Asked Tuesday night whether he made the right choice opposing vouchers even if it cost him the seat, Allison said, “Absolutely.”
But he expressed concern about the future of the House if an entire slate of insurgent candidates were to unseat seasoned incumbents over the issue.
“There’s going to be a wholesale lack of experience and qualifications,” Allison said. “Excluding myself, there are some tremendous members that are being affected by this.”
Much of Allison’s help came from House Speaker Dade Phelan, who was pushed into his own primary runoff Tuesday, as well as the Charles Butt Public Education PAC and other business groups.
At the Barn Door, Allison was surrounded by many longtime supporters who expressed disgust at the meddling of state GOP leaders. Though Straus was also pushed out by conservatives in his own party, several said they were disappointed to see Abbott stoop to attacking a popular incumbent.
Addressing his room full of supporters at the Angry Elephant bar Tuesday night, LaHood said Abbott had called him to congratulate him on the victory.
LaHood bounced around smiling and shaking hands as supporters clapped him on the back.
After spending the day at the Encino Branch Library speaking with voters, La Hood said he felt good about his prospects heading into the evening, having “put in a lot of hours on the ground.”
“I personally knocked on almost 1,000 doors, and my campaign team knocked on more than 9,000 doors,” La Hood told the San Antonio Report. “And what we saw — even before the governor, before any endorsements came in — because my messaging is very common sense, matter of fact — I’m more conservative than Steve.”
District 121 includes Alamo Heights, Olmos Park, Terrell Hills and portions of Hollywood Park. Under new maps drawn after the 2020 census it would have supported President Donald Trump by 2.3% in 2020, but includes many of the wealthy, suburban voters that GOP strategists say have been moving into the Democratic Party in recent years.
Laurel Jordan Swift, an orthopedic device salesperson,won the race for the Democratic nomination with 73% of the vote, defeating Shekhar Sinha, a retired IT specialist.
Reporter Lindsey Carnett contributed to this article.
