Bo French Defeats Railroad Commissioner Jim Wright in GOP Primary Runoff

By Carlos Nogueras Ramos / The Texas Tribune

AUSTIN, TX — Bo French defeated Railroad Commissioner Jim Wright in the primary runoff Tuesday night, prevailing in a campaign where French prioritized issues like fighting DEI and Sharia Law over traditional regulatory issues. 

French will face Democratic state Rep. Jon Rosenthal in the November general election. A Democrat has not held a seat on the railroad commission in decades. 

“I am deeply grateful for the support of TX Republicans across our state.  Our campaign focused on defending oil and gas, and putting America First—and that’s exactly what I will continue fighting for as we turn our attention to radical Democrat Jon Rosenthal,” French said in a social media post.

The race for the typically under-the-radar office emerged on Tuesday as one of the closest contests of the night, with French leading with early voters but Wright narrowing the gap as the Election Day vote trickled in.

If he wins in November, he will join the three-commissioner panel presiding over the railroad commission, a century-old regulatory institution tasked with overseeing the state’s oil and gas industry, an immense enterprise that produced nearly half of all U.S. oil last year. 

A former Tarrant County GOP chairman, French espouses some of the most extreme views among Texas Republican officials, even as the party has pivoted further to the right in recent years. Earlier this year, French called on his party to more openly embrace Islamophobia and said the U.S. should deport 100 million people, nearly a third of the country’s population and a number that suggests he wants to deport U.S. citizens.

He has drawn the ire of members of his own party for his unapologetically offensive posts on social media often using slurs to refer to people with mental disabilities and LGBTQ+ people. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called on him to resign from his county chairmanship after French posted a social media poll asking whether Jews or Muslims were a bigger threat to America.

Patrick, Gov. Greg Abbott and House Speaker Dustin Burrows, R-Lubbock, all endorsed Wright.

The race attracted a flood of money, not typical of the down ballot contest. Donors from across the political spectrum and the private sector have helped the two Republicans fundraise more than $3 million dollars since February. The contributions showed a split across ideological lines, with big oil companies and trade groups throwing hundreds of thousands of dollars at the incumbent. French’s benefactors, in turn, were prolific conservative megadonors who have used their wealth in past elections to advance conservative causes in Texas. The Texas Freedom Fund for the Advancement of Justice, a political action committee funded by oil tycoons Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks, spent about a million dollars on his campaign — more than 60% of his war chest. 

At the outset of the race, French, whose campaign website says he is an energy adviser for a company in the Middle East, said the railroad commission and Wright allowed China and Islam to overtake Texas oil fields. Under the commission, he said diversity efforts ran rampant. 

Throughout the race, he accused Wright of allowing “Sharia law” within the agency, and nicknamed him “Jihadi Jim.“ 

The six-year term coincides with a period of uncertainty and instability for the Texas oil and gas industry. Oil prices have fluctuated dramatically. Energy companies have laid off thousands of workers. Wright must also shepherd its regulators amid growing concerns about industry wastewater, which could stand to disrupt production and wreak environmental damage should the state fail to find a solution. The commissioners will oversee a $593 million budget, the highest in years.