Read the latest election and political headlines on the Vote 2024 page
A trio of Republican candidates have set their sights on the seat of long-time GOP state Representative for District 44, John Kuempel.
Texas House District 44 includes Guadalupe and Gonzales counties.
Kuempel, a Seguin native, has been a reliable Republican vote in Austin for 13 years.
That’s until last year when Governor Greg Abbott asked lawmakers to tackle school vouchers for Texas parents to help them pay for private school. Kuempel joined Democrats, and two dozen other Republicans, to torpedo Abbott’s school voucher push in April 2023.
Four special sessions later, no school voucher legislation made it to Abbott’s desk for him to sign, infuriating the governor, who promised to go after the rebellious Republicans in the March Primary election by supporting the challenger(s) over the incumbents. That includes Kuempel.
Three men threw their hats in the ring, to take on Kuempel. Greg Switzer, David Freimarck, and a former lawmaker who is coming out of retirement for this election: Alan Schoolcraft.
According to his campaign website, Switzer is a retired marine who served three decades. After he worked on number of political campaigns, including Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. More recently, Switzer worked on Don Huffines’ 2022 bid for Texas governor.
Freimarck lives and works in Guadalupe County in IT and communication services. He is a graduate of Texas Tech where he was a member of the Young Conservatives of Texas.
Schoolcraft served as a state Representative for districts 57 and 121 from 1981-1993, which is in Bexar County. He has been lawyer and businessman. He has not been in office since then, but has come back for this race, and has the endorsement of Governor Greg Abbott.
Political ads airing in this race have not always been for a particular candidate. Many of them have been against the incumbent, Kuempel.
Kuempel has fought back with ads of his own.
But this is looking increasingly like three against one, with the results on March 5 leaving two men out, and two men in a runoff for the Republican spot on the November ballot. And, if Abbott gets his way, John Kuempel will not be one of those men in the May 28 runoff.
Get more election coverage on KSAT’s Vote 2024 page: