Summary
Odessa, Texas voters ousted three City Council members a month after they passed an anti-trans bathroom ban.
Craig Stoker, the city’s first openly gay council member, won an at-large seat with 56% of the vote, defeating Denise Swanner, whose campaign attacked his sexuality.
Stoker focused on infrastructure issues, while Mayor Javier Joven, a supporter of the bathroom ban, also lost reelection.
The controversial ordinance imposes fines and lawsuits for violations, sparking backlash. The local GOP declined endorsements, citing LGBTQ+ and abortion issues as state matters.
So the correct moral of this story is “reasonable people win elections when partisanship is removed”.
Which I can vouch for. The county I live in made their elected positions (sherriff, county commissioner, a few others) all nonpartisan positions elected via a top-two runoff election about 15 years ago . All of a sudden, the overtly racist backwater shitheels started losing every single election and the people who gave a shit started winning.