David Dewhurst (born August 18, 1945) is the 41st and current Lieutenant Governor of Texas, serving under Governor Rick Perry since January 21, 2003. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as Texas Land Commissioner from 1999 to 2003. Dewhurst announced on July 18, 2011, that he was running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by the retiring Republican U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in the upcoming 2012 election.

Dewhurst is a businessman, a rancher, and a community leader in Houston, where he has served on civic and charitable boards. He graduated from Lamar High School in Houston and earned his bachelor's degree and played basketball at the University of Arizona in Tucson, where he was a brother of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity.

He was previously an officer in the U.S. Air Force, an officer of the Central Intelligence Agency, and worked in the United States State Department. In 1981, Dewhurst and Mr. Ted Law re-established Falcon Seaboard, a Texas-based diversified energy and investments company in Houston that Mr. Law had founded in 1935. He breeds registered Black Angus cattle and rides cutting horses in American Quarter Horse Association and National Cutting Horse Association competitions.

David (Hebrew: דָּוִד, דָּוִיד, Modern David Tiberian Dāwîḏ; ISO 259-3 Dawid; Strong's Daveed; beloved; Arabic: داوود‎ or داود‎ Dāwūd) was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the second king of the United Kingdom of Israel and, according to the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, an ancestor of Jesus. David is seen as a major Prophet in Islamic traditions. His life is conventionally dated to c. 1040–970 BC, his reign over Judah c. 1010–1003 BC,^{[citation needed]} and his reign over the United Kingdom of Israel c. 1003–970 BC.^{[citation needed]} The Books of Samuel, 1 Kings, and 1 Chronicles are the only sources of information on David, although the Tel Dan stele records "House of David", which some take as confirmation of the existence in the mid-9th century BC of a Judean royal dynasty called the "House of David".

David is very important to Jewish, Christian and Islamic doctrine and culture. In Judaism, David, or David HaMelekh, is the King of Israel, and the Jewish people. Jewish tradition maintains that a direct descendant of David will be the Messiah. In Islam, he is known as Dawud, considered to be a prophet and the king of a nation. He is depicted as a righteous king, though not without faults, as well as an acclaimed warrior, musician, and poet, traditionally credited for composing many of the psalms contained in the Book of Psalms.

Rafael Edward Cruz, known as Ted Cruz (born December 22, 1970), is the former Solicitor General of the U.S. state of Texas, a position which he held from 2003 to May 2008. Cruz was appointed by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. He was the first Hispanic Solicitor General in Texas, the youngest Solicitor General in the United States, and had the longest tenure in the post thus far in Texas history. He is currently a partner at the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, where he leads the firm’s U.S. Supreme Court and national appellate litigation practice.

Cruz is a candidate for the 2012 Republican nomination for the United States Senate seat being vacated by Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Cruz previously served as the director of the Office of Policy Planning at the Federal Trade Commission, an Associate Deputy Attorney General at the United States Department of Justice, and as Domestic Policy Advisor to U.S. President George W. Bush on the 2000 Bush-Cheney campaign. In addition, from 2004-2009 Cruz was an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin, where he taught U.S. Supreme Court litigation.

Mark Reed Levin (born September 21, 1957) is a lawyer, author and the host of American syndicated radio show The Mark Levin Show. Levin served in the administration of President Ronald Reagan and was a chief of staff for Attorney General Edwin Meese. He is president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, has authored bestselling books and contributes commentary to various media outlets such as National Review Online.

Mark Reed Levin was born to a Jewish family in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and grew up in Cheltenham Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. He graduated from Cheltenham High School after three years. After high school, Levin enrolled at Temple University Ambler including summer classes and graduated in 1977 at age 19, magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. He also earned a juris doctorate from Temple University Beasley School of Law in 1980.

Beginning in 1981, Levin served as advisor to several members of President Ronald Reagan's cabinet, eventually becoming Associate Director of Presidential Personnel and ultimately Chief of Staff to Attorney General Edwin Meese; Levin also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education, and Deputy Solicitor of the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Daniel Patrick Pugh (born May 15, 1956), professionally known as Dan Patrick, is an American Sports Emmy-winning sportscaster, radio personality, and actor from Mason, Ohio. He currently hosts The Dan Patrick Show which is broadcast on radio on Premiere Radio Networks, and on television on The Audience Network for DIRECTV subscribers, co-hosts NBC's Football Night in America, and serves as a senior writer for Sports Illustrated. He previously worked at ESPN for 18 years, where he often anchored the weeknight and Sunday 11 PM edition of SportsCenter.

Patrick attended the University of Dayton in Dayton, Ohio. His brother, Bill Pugh, is a longtime sports radio executive, and is currently the head of programming at Clear Channel San Diego. Patrick was a basketball player in high school at William Mason High School, becoming an Ohio all-state selection his senior year. He attended Eastern Kentucky University on a basketball scholarship for two years before transferring to the University of Dayton, where he majored in broadcast journalism. Patrick is also an alumnus of the Eta Hexaton Chapter of the Phi Sigma Kappa Fraternity at Dayton.