AUSTIN (KXAN) — Gov. Greg Abbott officially announced over the weekend that he’ll be running to keep his role as the leader of Texas. He joins a pool of 12 people who have already thrown their names in the hat to take his job.

Brian Smith, a professor of political science at St. Edward’s University, says the number of people running for Texas governor this year is comparable to what we’ve seen in years past. He says many people promise themselves they’ll run for that role — and if you’re going to toss your name in, he said Texas is the state to do it.

“There are a lot of candidates running but you always get that in Texas, because if I am a third or fourth or fifth candidate on the ballot, I still have the chance of a runoff,” he explained. Still, Smith says this race doesn’t have the same caliber of candidates we’ve seen in previous races.

“They’ll [Allen West and Don Huffines] be interesting and they might open up some avenues of attack for [Beto] O’Rourke, but I don’t see either of them being able to take it to a runoff or beating Greg Abbott head-to-head right now,” Smith said.

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How did you do? If you need a candidate refresher, check out our meet the candidates for Texas governor in 2022 story.