Houston Chronicle Editorial Board Calls On Beto O'Rourke To Drop Out Of 2020 Race

The Houston Chronicle editorial board has called on Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke to pull out of the 2020 race, return to Texas and run for senator.

In an editorial published over the weekend, titled, “Beto, come home. Texas needs you,” the newspaper said O’Rourke’s response to the mass shooting in his hometown of El Paso (and his subsequent criticism of President Donald Trump) made it wish he would “shift gears” and “take a new direction.”

“So Beto, if you’re listening: Come home. Drop out of the race for president and come back to Texas to run for senator,” the board wrote. “The chances of winning the race you’re in now are vanishingly small. And Texas needs you.”

O’Rourke failed to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) in the 2018 midterms, and the board acknowledged it “wouldn’t be easy” for O’Rourke to beat incumbent Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) in 2020.

“But a lot has changed since 2018,” the newspaper added. “You had a lot to do with that — and Trump is no longer rock-solid in Texas. Neither are the Republicans who support him.”

Read the full editorial here.