Add two names to the Kay Bailey Hutchison political squad: Chad Wilbanks, former political director for the Republican Party of Texas and a veteran of previous Hutchison campaigns, and Keats Norfleet, who most recently helped Louis Gohmert, R-Tyler, unseat U.S. Rep. Max Sandlin, D-Marshall, in Congress, and who worked for Rep. Dan Gattis, R-Georgetown, in the state Legislature. The two have signed on a political operativess for the senior U.S. senator from Texas (Wilbanks as a consultant, and Norfleet as a staffer). Hutchison is flirting with a run for governor next year against Rick Perry, the incumbent fellow Republican now in that spot, while also keeping open the option of running for reelection. Several of Wilbanks' former colleagues at the Texas GOP would be on the Perry side of the race, if such a thing comes to pass, including former chairwoman Susan Weddington, who heads a nonprofit started by Perry, Wayne Hamilton, former executive director of the Party, and Robert Black, flack for the GOP then and for Perry now.

- posted @ 6:34 AM permalink