U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) speaks to reporters as she is joined by fellow House Democrats in the Rayburn House Office Building on December 13, 2023, in Washington, D.C. | Source: Kevin Dietsch / Getty
Incumbent Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee easily fended off a primary challenge on Super Tuesday by her former Congressional intern just a few short months after the Democrat lost her bid to be mayor of Houston in a lopsided runoff election.
The victory means Jackson Lee will advance to the general election to face a Republican challenger in a Congressional district that has faithfully elected a Democrat for more than the past five decades, virtually guaranteeing her reelection.
With a little more than 41% of the votes counted, Jackson Lee commanded more than 62% of voters’ support early on, according to the Associated Press.
Later Tuesday night, NBC News projected Jackson Lee to be the winner over Amanda Edwards, a former Houston city council member and former U.S. Senate candidate who in December was described by POLITICO as the race’s “frontrunner.”
Edwards garnered about 36% support. The next closest candidate had fewer than 5%.
Candidates on the Democratic ballot of U.S. Representatives TX-18 district, incumbent Sheila Jackson Lee, right, and challenger Amanda Edwards discuss their differences in front of the Houston Chronicle Editorial Board on Friday, Jan. 26, 2024, in Houston. | Source: Houston Chronicle/Hearst Newspapers via Getty Images / Getty
But that was weeks before Jackson Lee entered the contest fresh off a lopsided mayoral loss to Democratic state Sen. John Whitmire; a loss that Jackson Lee said “compelled” her to want to continue the job she started on Capitol Hill when she was first elected to represent the greater Houston metropolitan area in Congress back in 1995.
Jackson Lee, an esteemed member of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and former chair of the influential bloc of African American House Reps and U.S. Senators, has a record on Capitol Hill that speaks for itself.
It includes notable moments forever etched in history like introducing Articles of Impeachment against Donald Trump and introducing a bill to establish a commission to study and develop reparations proposals for Black descendants of American slavery.
Political analysts pointed to an “October surprise”-style report in the days ahead of the general mayoral election in Houston in December that irreversibly rocked her campaign – a revelation that likely helped Whitmire in the long run.
In that instance, a recording was leaked to the media purportedly containing audio of Jackson Lee insulting her staff with extremely disrespectful language.
The recording emerged nearly five years after one of Jackson Lee’s former interns sued her and the CBC Foundation over allegedly being sexually assaulted in 2015 by her male supervisor at the CBC Foundation. The lawsuit claimed that Jackson Lee fired the intern in retaliation after the intern threatened legal action.
Jackson Lee apologized profusely for the “alleged recording” that she never actually admitted was her voice and condemned it as “something trotted out by a political opponent, that worked to exploit this, and backed by extreme Republican supporters.”
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