Abbott kicks off his 2014 campaign for governor’s office at S.A. event
By Kens5.com Staff
KENS 5 San Antonio
July 14, 2013
SAN ANTONIO — Long-serving Republican Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott announced Sunday in San Antonio that he will run for governor in 2014.
“I will never stop fighting, and that’s why I’m asking you, the people of Texas, to elect me as your next governor,” he said to a crowd of cheering supporters at a campaign event at the Plaza Juarez in the La Villita Historic Arts Village.
Abbott has long been expected to run. He already has a formidable war chest of nearly $23 million.
Gov. Rick Perry announced Monday that he won’t seek a fourth full term next year, making Abbott a clear favorite for the GOP nomination.
In office since 2002, Abbott is popular among mainstream Republicans and tea party activists. He brags about suing the federal government on Texas’ behalf 27 times under President Barack Obama.
Abbott told the crowd that he was making the announcement on the anniversary — July 14, 1984 — of the day that he was struck by a falling tree that left him paralyzed.
But he said the doctors who pieced his spine back together brought him the strength to become a lawyer and eventually the state attorney general.
“I will use my spine of steel to fight for you and fight for Texas families every day!” he said to supporters.
He also said he had used the power of his office to fight for conservative principles.
“I didn’t invent that phrase, ‘Don’t Mess with Texas,’ but I have applied it more than anyone else.”
He cited court cases involving the Pledge of Allegiance, the Ten Commandments monument on the Capitol grounds in Austin and a high school student mentioning God in a commencement speech.