Carrollton Democrat State Rep. Michelle Beckley announced Wednesday morning that she was suspending her bid for U.S. Congress, where she was challenging the incumbent Republican Congresswoman Beth Van Duyne for Texas Congressional District 24.
Beckley announced her candidacy back in July, while she was absent from her duties as a state representative as a part of the quorum break that kept the House of Representatives paralyzed for upwards of 37 days during the first and second called special legislative sessions.
In her statement, Beckley said:
The new Congressional maps drawn by the Texas Legislature simply make this impossible for me by placing my residence in the newly redrawn TX26.
The Effect of Redistricting
As the proposed redistricting maps depicting the boundaries for both U.S. Congress and the Texas House districts were being finalized by the Texas Legislature, it became apparent that Beckley no longer resided in the newly drawn 24th Congressional District.
Similarly, House District 65, which Beckley currently represents, was drawn in such a way to give a much larger advantage to a would-be Republican candidate, making Beckley’s potential re-election efforts increasingly difficult.
In the 2020 general election, Beckley won with 51.5 percent of the vote, compared to former Lewisville ISD trustee Kronda Thimesch’s 48.5 percent. In 2018, Beckley ousted former State Rep. Ron Simmons (R–Carrollton) by a vote of 51.1 percent, compared to his 48.9 percent.
Thimesch announced her candidacy again for House District 65 on July 6.
