FORT WORTH, Texas — The night of March 1, Greg Abbott ratcheted up suspense with an announcement on Twitter. "I will have some exciting news for you tomorrow," he said, as if the last two weeks had not been eventful enough.
The next day he'd announce the reopening of Texas and lift his statewide mask order.
The news — met with praise from some and ire by others — came just weeks after an historic winter freeze pushed Texas' electric grid to the limits, leaving 4 million-plus households without power. Nearly half the state endured boil orders and low water pressure. (Many Texans took to flushing toilets with snow).
Combined, these events in the last half of February and first week of March were enough to fill a year. And the governor was at the center of all of it. He dealt with a disaster that some would say was a product of his own making, added more fuel to the ongoing local vs. state conflict and managed to anger the left and pockets of the right in the process.
In some ways, this was emblematic of his seven-year tenure. Abbott is no stranger to crises in the state, from multiple mass shootings to Hurricane Harvey. But he's never been involved in so many consequential events and made so many consequential decisions in such an abbreviated time.
"Those two events are two of the most — maybe the two most — momentous events in his governorship so far," said Jim Riddlesperger, a Texas Christian University political science professor, of the outages and Abbott's COVID-19 response.
Abbott has been rumored as a presidential candidate for 2024. It seems clear he also plans to run for another term as governor in 2022. The decisions he made — and didn't make — in the last month may dictate his future chances for either venture.
The last month may define him.
Until the early hours of Feb. 15, things had been looking up for Abbott. COVID-19 hospitalizations and new cases were dropping from January pandemic peaks. Texas was improving its vaccination distribution, with more shots on the horizon given the anticipated authorization of Johnson & Johnson's vaccine.
Then, at about 1:20 a.m., while most were home asleep, Texas' power grid operators saw the potential for an uncontrolled blackout. They helped avoid a total collapse of the state's electrical grid, with 4 minutes and 37 seconds to spare, but millions were left without power. Then came the water shortages. The boil notices. The deaths.
Abbott, who declined an interview through a spokesperson, was quick to find subjects for his blame: wind power and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. The first was quickly debunked. But his finger pointing at ERCOT stuck, as some questioned why he wasn't also scrutinizing the Public Utilities Commission, whose commissioners Abbott selected.
Abbott himself may have been warned of potential blackouts. An executive for a top power generation company testified to lawmakers that he had expressed concerns to the governor's office on Feb. 12.
"We felt like it was not an if. It was a when that we were going to be short of power," said Curt Morgan, Vistra Corp. CEO.
To Matt Angle, director of the The Lone Star Project, which works with Democratic candidates, Abbott's response was indicative of an inability to back up his calm, collected demeanor with results.
"I think for the first time in a long time it's really piercing this illusion of competence," he said.
In the wake of the hearings, Abbott needed a distraction, and by Monday was teasing an "exciting news" from his personal Twitter account. It was a prelude to his announcement about relaxing COVID-19 orders. He made the decision without looping in all of his top medical advisers, according to The Dallas Morning News.
In the same post, he shared results from a late February Morning Consult poll indicating a 58% approval rating. By other measures, his popularity level has subsided since last year. And this wasn't just a case of Democrats piling on a political opponent. Dallas salon owner turned former Texas Senate candidate Shelley Luther and Republican Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller have been at the front of a right-wing pushback that has accelerated over the last month.
"(Abbott) seemed more focused on inoculating himself against a challenge in the Republican primary than worried about inoculating the public against the coronavirus, and that's just a bad look," said Cal Jillson, a Southern Methodist University political science professor.
Lifting the mask mandate was a way to shift the conversation, while still appealing to Republicans, Riddlesperger said. And while there's "no question" political motives were involved, the decision could be seen as Abbott taking "the responsible center path" since there is some discretion for local officials to go above state order.
"What you see from Gov. Abbott is again trying to navigate murky waters in a way that encourages economic development but does not ignore the realities of the threat of the disease," Riddlesperger said.
In the last year, Abbott has shifted back and forth on where his job ends and where the job of local officials begins, frustrating mayors and county judges. The aggravation continued in the outages — Houston Democratic Mayor Sylvester Turner said he did not hear from the governor in the storm's aftermath — and then again when Abbott reopened the state. Fort Worth Republican Mayor Betsy Price called the move "premature."
Whereas Abbott's past executive orders called for a mandatory imposition of restrictions when area hospital capacities reached a 15% threshold of COVID-19 patients, the new order makes it optional, based on a decision from a county judge.
So the job of imposing restrictions, and any potential blowback that may follow, now belongs to the local level.
Days before his reopening announcement, conservatives gathered in Orlando, Florida, for the Conservative Political Action Conference.
There, a straw poll was taken to see who's favored for president in 2024. Abbott, long one of the most popular governors in the country, got zero percent of the votes, placing him on par with Chris Christie, who has been out of work since 2018. Even Ted Cruz — fresh off his Cancun vacation as Texans froze — fared better.
The leading vote-getters, besides Donald Trump, were Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem. They had gained headlines for reopening their states ahead of the pack.
"I think that is what probably initiated the complete wake-up call for the governor," said conservative political consultant Luke Macias.
Macias is confident Abbott will run for president in 2024. And if he runs for governor again as expected, he may see primary challengers. Chad Prather, an internet personality and podcast host, has already announced he will run. Republican consultant Brendan Steinhauser believes Sid Miller could jump in the race or even state GOP Chairman Allen West.
"There could be a fringe candidate or two," he said. "There might be one to two people who jump in, or they coalesce behind one person."
To Jillson, the SMU professor, the governor is going through a "rough patch" and he's not as popular as he used to be. But Abbott is still respected by many Republicans.
Jillson would bet on Abbott winning come 2022 for two reasons: A robust political war chest and the lack of an obvious Republican opponent.
"He is weakened from what he was three or four years ago, but still, there's no one obviously stronger than him or better positioned," Jillson said.
It would be an "act of hubris" to predict what will be a major issue come 2022, Riddlesperger said.
"What people will remember moving forward is not so much what Gov. Abbott did, but whether there's a perception that Gov. Abbott was an enlightened, informed, responsible leader," Riddlesperger said.
Nevertheless, Abbott has shown signs of distress during this last difficult month, breaking away from his usual calm demeanor. On Wednesday, he appeared on Houston's NBC affiliate. Asked about President Joe Biden's dismissal of his executive order, he answered forcefully, raising his voice and pounding his hands together. When anchor Kris Gutierrez asked a question, he interrupted him.
This was not the usual Abbott. After the interview, Gutierrez said, "I've never seen the governor this fired up before."
