The field already included progressive activist Jessica Mason, who had $25,000 on-hand at the end of September, and attorney Abel Mulugheta, a former state legislative aide who launched his bid weeks before Johnson made her plans known. Also in the race is former state Rep. Barbara Mallory Caraway, who challenged Johnson in the primary in each of the last five cycles: Caraway’s highwater mark was in 2014, when Johnson still beat her by a lopsided 70-30.
A few other Democrats also began making their moves following the incumbent’s Saturday announcement. Veteran Democratic operative Jane Hope Hamilton, who was Joe Biden's state director for Texas' primary last year, began raising money back in May for an open seat race, and she confirmed she was in over the weekend; Hamilton had $34,000 to spend at the end of the last quarter.
Former Dallas City Council member Vonciel Jones Hill also filed with the FEC, while state Reps. Jasmine Crockett and Carl Sherman each expressed interest over the weekend. The Dallas Morning News also writes that former state District Judge Elizabeth Frizell has said in the past she could run as well, and the paper also mentions state Reps. Yvonne Davis and Toni Rose and Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley as possibilities.
One person who has taken himself out of contention, meanwhile, is state Sen. Royce West, who unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate last year. Johnson, for her part, said she would eventually be endorsing someone in this race, adding that she wanted a “female that is qualified.” The congresswoman also said, “Anyone who has already been rejected in this district will not be getting my endorsement,” a line the local media widely interpreted as a reference to Caraway.
Johnson’s retirement announcement marks the beginning of the end of a history-making career. The future congresswoman recounted how she was confronted with an “overt racism” she had never experienced after the Waco native moved to Dallas in 1956 to work as a nurse at the V.A. hospital, and one racist act motivated her to get into politics for the first time.
Johnson was furious when she learned that the store where she was shopping for a hat wouldn’t let Black customers like her try on clothing. In response, she organized a group called “50 Sensitive Black Women” in the early 1960s; she later said, “We bought cameras and took pictures for the newspapers of people that patronized stores we were boycotting. Eventually stores closed.”
Johnson considered a campaign for the state House in 1972, but she understood that this would force her to quit her government job at a time when she had to support her child as a divorced mother. Things changed, though, when Stanley Marcus, who was the rare liberal in the city’s conservative-dominated business world, offered her a job at Neiman Marcus on the condition that she run. Johnson won and became the first Black woman elected in Dallas County; she went on to serve in the Carter administration before returning to the legislature by winning a seat in the state Senate seat in 1986.
Johnson was the chamber’s redistricting committee chair in 1991, the last time Texas Democrats controlled the process, and she was instrumental in determining the boundaries of the new 30th District. She ran for that seat the following year and won without any serious primary or general election opposition, which made her the first African American to represent Texas in D.C. since the legendary Barbara Jordan retired 12 years before. Johnson, who was also the first nurse elected to Congress, rose to become chair of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.
Johnson only faced a serious re-election fight during her long career in 2012, two years after negative headlines detailed how she’d given Congressional Black Caucus Foundation scholarships to relatives. The congresswoman went up against attorney Taj Clayton, who raised a serious amount of money and aired several well-produced commercials; and Caraway, whose husband had recently served as acting mayor of Dallas. Johnson, though, turned back Caraway 70-18, and she had no trouble beating her during the following four cycles.