SOUTHEAST TEXAS RECORD

In Jefferson County, more Democrats than Republicans voted in the March 4 primaries.

Incumbent John Cornyn had seven Republican challengers for U.S. Senate, and 56 percent of the Republicans voting in Jefferson County want Cornyn to return to Washington, D.C. He received 5,813 votes out of 10,369 cast in Jefferson County. County voters like Cornyn almost as much as voters statewide, who gave Cornyn 59.44 percent of Texas Republican votes.

The Democrats had five candidates on their ballot for U.S. Senator. A total of 9,550 residents cast their votes in that race. And just as it was statewide, none of the candidates had a majority, but most of the votes went to Kesha Rogers (3,722 votes in Jefferson County) and David Alameel (2,972).  The runoff winner will face Cornyn in the fall general election.

Jefferson County voters cast their votes for Wendy Davis as Democratic candidate for governor.  She did better in Jefferson County than she did statewide. Jefferson County voters gave her 87.75 percent of the votes, or 9,322 votes of 10,623 total votes, whereas Davis received 70 percent of the statewide votes.

Of the 10,512 votes cast for governor on the Republican ballot in the county, 95 percent of them went to Greg Abbott, the current Texas Attorney General. Each of the other three candidates received between 160 and 180 votes in the county.

The statewide contest for Lieutenant Governor resulted in a runoff between Dan Patrick and current Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. That trend was also reflected in Jefferson County, where 3,689 residents voted for Patrick and 3,389 voted for Dewhurst.  Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples and Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson each received about 1,600 votes from Jefferson County Republicans.

Democrat Leticia Van de Putte received 7,958 votes from Jefferson County voters to face the winner of the Republican run off for lieutenant governor.

The Republicans had three candidates on their ballot for attorney general. Of the 9,669 total votes cast in the race, 46 percent went to Ken Paxton (4,458 votes), 27.84 percent went to Dan Branch (2,692 votes) and Barry Smitherman received 26.05 percent (2,519 votes). The GOP will have a run off between Paxton and Branch in May.

On the Democratic ticket for attorney general, attorney Sam Houston was unopposed and received 8,242 votes in Jefferson County.

A software glitch caused problems counting the Jefferson County ballots on Tuesday night and then votes from a polling place in west Beaumont were late being delivered to the counting site in Mid Jefferson County. Early voting numbers were not available until about 10 p.m. with final tallies after midnight.