Senate Appointee Faces a Crowded Field : Texas: Krueger is in battle against 23 other candidates in bid to retain Lloyd Bentsen’s seat.

Democratic appointee Robert Krueger battled 23 other candidates, including three GOP officeholders and a Ross Perot supporter, in a special election Saturday to fill Lloyd Bentsen’s Senate seat.

Krueger, who lost two previous Senate bids, hoped to hang on to the job given him by Democratic Gov. Ann Richards in January after Bentsen was appointed Treasury secretary. The Senate term expires at the end of 1994.

With a crowded field, Krueger was considered unlikely to win the majority needed to avoid a runoff later this month or in early June against the second-place finisher.

Among those with serious hopes of facing Krueger were three Republicans--state Treasurer Kay Bailey Hutchison and U.S. Reps. Joe Barton and Jack Fields.

Two other Democrats also had some support: Dallas investor Richard Fisher, a former adviser to independent presidential candidate Perot, and Dallas lawyer Jose Angel Gutierrez.

Secretary of State John Hannah predicted that fewer than one-third of the state’s 8.5 million registered voters would turn out. One poll showed 25% undecided only days before the election.

Some analysts said a public school funding referendum on the same statewide ballot, along with some mayoral and city council elections, were drawing more interest.

“It’s been very, very difficult for anyone to just overwhelmingly impress the voters,” said George Christian, an Austin political consultant and former press secretary to President Lyndon B. Johnson.

A poll of 829 people taken Tuesday and Wednesday by Mason-Dixon Political Media Research of Columbia, Md., and reported by KXAS-TV in Ft. Worth, showed Krueger and Hutchison at 27% each, Fields at 13%, Fisher at 8% and Barton at 6%. Results have a 3 1/2-point margin of error.

Krueger, 57, a former U.S. representative, lost Senate bids in 1978 and in 1984, when he missed a Democratic runoff by 1,000 votes. He won a statewide Railroad Commission race in 1990.

Once Richards appointed him, Krueger sought to build an anti-spending reputation. He cut his salary and office budget by 20% and voted against President Clinton’s budget. Despite that vote, the White House sent Vice President Al Gore to campaign on his behalf.

Krueger’s popularity at the polls was also seen as a test for Richards, whose first term expires next year.

Hutchison, 49, who won the treasurer’s post in 1990 and was temporary chair of the 1992 Republican National Convention in Houston, joined other Republicans’ anti-tax call but stood alone among them in favoring some abortion rights. She geared much of her campaign to women voters.

Fields, 41, portrayed himself as a blue-collar Republican who could appeal to working Texans.

Barton, 43, called himself the “proven conservative in this race,” strongly opposed to both abortion and Clinton’s proposal to allow homosexuals to serve openly in the military.

Fisher, 44, spent more than $2 million of his own money on the campaign. Like Perot, whom he advised, Fisher railed against traditional politics.

Gutierrez, 48, offered the most liberal message, chiding Krueger as a “closet Republican.” He reminded Texans that since the state backed George Bush in 1992, “We need a senator who will vote with President Clinton.” Gutierrez was a founder and president of La Raza Unida Party in the 1970s.