Messing With Texas

For about twenty years now I have had the unenviable role of quashing Democratic fever dreams about turning Texas blue. In the early years it was about pointing out the college education divide and that White voters in Texas bucked that divide more often than not and voted far more in a bloc than not.

That is, Texas voters voted like white southern Christian conservatives regardless of whether or not they went to college.

“But the Latino voters, Mike!” the Democrats would push back on me pointing to the fastest growing segment of the electorate.

“Latinos in Texas aren’t like Latinos in California,” I tried to explain. “Demographics isn’t destiny”. (I have an informative YouTube explainer here about Latinos in TX and Ca that’s worth a few minutes of your time)

And sure enough, as all the right demographics moved in all the right directions, Texas moved farther and farther away from the Democrats grasp.

But something happened last night way down in Texas.

The political earthquake that rocked Tarrant County last night wasn’t supposed to happen. This was a deep red MAGA stronghold where Donald Trump crushed it by 17 points just over a year ago.

The seat had been held by Republicans since 1981. And yet Democrat Taylor Rehmet, a bearded blue collar union machinist and Air Force veteran, didn’t just win Texas Senate District 9. He demolished his ultra-MAGA opponent by more than 14 points, flipping one of the most conservative districts in the nation’s largest Republican county.

Taylor Rehmet literally looks like a blue collar union Democrat of yesteryear. The way they used to make them when I was growing up.

But I digress.

Let that victory margin sink in. A 31-point swing from Trump’s 2024 performance to Rehmet’s victory last night. In a special election. In January. In Tarrant County. In ruby red Texas.

There’s no putting lipstick on this GOP pig.

The Tarrant County Collapse was complete. Senate District 9 covers the northern reaches of Tarrant County from the Fort Worth’s suburbs, the affluent enclaves of Southlake and out to Keller, and North Richland Hills. These are communities that have defined Texas conservatism for a generation. The last Democrat to hold this seat switched parties to the GOP in 1981, during Reagan’s first term.

Rehmet’s opponent, Leigh Wambsganss, had everything going for her. She’s the CEO of Patriot Mobile, the Christian cellphone company that’s bankrolled the far-right takeover of Tarrant County school boards. She had Trump’s personal endorsement. In fact, the president posted three times urging voters to support her in the final 48 hours. She had endorsements from Governor Greg Abbott, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, and Senator Ted Cruz. She campaigned as “ultra-MAGA.” And she outspent Rehmet by more than $2 million.

None of it mattered.

Rehmet won 57% to 43%. In a district Trump carried by 17 points. That’s not a squeaker. That’s not a fluke. That’s a good old fashioned rout.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick knew what was coming. In the days before the election, he went on radio pleading with Republicans to vote. “I’m very concerned about this election,” he said. “I’m pleading with the people in Tarrant County, every Republican go out and vote.”

They didn’t.

Or more accurately, enough of them voted for the Democrat to create a result that should terrify every Republican strategist in Texas.

The Latino Story That Changes Everything

But here’s the part of this story that matters most for what comes next: the Latino shift in this district is staggering.

According to Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico’s analysis of the results, “the heavily Latino parts of the district shifted sharply to the left from 2024.” This wasn’t just about suburban swing voters or disaffected moderates. This was about Latino voters—who had been trending Republican in recent cycles—taking a hard look at what MAGA governance actually delivers and saying “no más.”

One of my favorite data guys and pollsters, Adam Carlson texted me late last night “There was a 50 point swing in Hispanic districts in Texas tonight.”

I’ve been doing campaigns for 35 years. I wrote a book called The Latino Century last year describing all of the reasons why this was possible and that number still left me speechless.

Remember, these same Latino voters gave Trump solid margins just over a year ago. The conventional Republican wisdom held that Latinos were completing their rightward migration, that economic populism and cultural conservatism were cementing a new Republican multi-racial coalition. The data from 2024 seemed to confirm their own biases.

One election cycle later, in the same communities, the bottom fell out.

Talarico noted that Rehmet likely exceeded 55% in a district where Beto O’Rourke’s 43.6% in 2018 had been the high-water mark for Democrats. That’s more than an 11-point improvement in eight years and most of it came in this single election, concentrated in the Latino precincts that shifted dramatically from their 2024 performance.

As I have been screaming at the top of my lungs - Latinos are the only true swing voter left in America…and there’s a lot of us.

This is the story. Not suburban moms. Not college-educated whites. Latino voters—the demographic both parties have been both ignoring and claiming to be fighting over—just sent a message that should reshape the entire 2026 landscape in Texas.

The Talarico Factor

No candidate stands to benefit more from last night’s results than James Talarico.

The Austin state representative is running for U.S. Senate in what most observers consider a long-shot bid against either incumbent John Cornyn or, more likely, Attorney General Ken Paxton. Recent polling shows Talarico leading Representative Jasmine Crockett in the Democratic primary, with particularly strong support among Latino voters (59%) and white voters (57%).

But here’s what matters: Talarico actively campaigned with Rehmet. He endorsed him. He tied his own political fortunes to exactly the kind of working-class, public education-focused, economically populist campaign that just won in a Trump +17 district.

The down-ballot state legislative seats that Talarico has been organizing around—the ones Democrats need to flip to make any real progress in Austin—look a lot like SD-9. Suburban districts with growing Latino populations.

They look like the Latino districts where Latino pop culture phenom Bobby Pulido is running to turn the GOP gerrymander into a large scale dummymander. Bobby and James have been campaigning together and last nights results are looking really positive for both of them.

Their message resonates in communities where public schools are a central issue. Places where economic anxiety meets cultural conservatism, and where the right Democrat can thread the needle.

Blue collar working class neighborhoods that used to believe the Democratic Party fought for them but too often got no results. Or worse results for them being in office.

If Rehmet’s coalition holds—and particularly if the Latino shift is durable—then suddenly a bunch of seats that looked safely Republican start to wobble. The Texas House has a narrow Republican majority. Flip a handful of Tarrant County-style districts, and Democrats could actually make the legislature competitive again.

Talarico is building his entire campaign around the thesis that this is possible.

Last night gave him Exhibit A.

The Special Election Caveat (That Doesn’t Matter)

Yes, this was a special election. Yes, turnout was low—only about 15% of registered voters. Yes, Rehmet and Wambsganss will face each other again in November, when turnout will be higher and the dynamics different.

All of that is true, and none of it changes the fundamental story here.

A 31-point swing doesn’t happen because of turnout quirks. It happens because something fundamental has shifted in voter sentiment. Wambsganss herself acknowledged this in her concession, calling it “a wakeup call for Republicans in Tarrant County, Texas, and the nation. The Democrats were energized. Too many Republicans stayed home.”

But “Republicans stayed home” is just another way of saying “Republicans weren’t motivated to vote for us.” And in a midterm cycle where the party in power typically gets crushed, that’s a catastrophic problem for the GOP.

The national Democratic Party certainly isn’t treating this as a special election fluke. DNC Chair Ken Martin put it bluntly: “Tonight’s results prove that no Republican seat is safe. From now until November, Democrats are keeping our foot on the gas and organizing and competing everywhere, including in Texas and the rest of the Sun Belt.”

That’s not spin. That’s strategy.

And it’s backed by real money—VoteVets alone spent $500,000 on ads for Rehmet. They showed up and fought for a seat where Republicans outspent the Democrats by any millions of dollars and their investment made a difference.

The Blue Texas Mirage (That Might Not Be)

Let’s be clear: Texas is no guarantee to turn blue in 2026. Not by a long shot.

Democrats have been Lucy-with-the-football’ing themselves about Texas for decades. Every cycle brings new hope…changing demographics! Beto-mentum! Latino realignment!…and every cycle ends with Republicans winning every statewide race. The last time a Democrat won a statewide election in Texas was over thirty years ago.

But here’s the thing: the math is changing in ways that make a competitive Texas actually plausible…if Democrats make the right choices.

Start with the Republican primary. John Cornyn and Ken Paxton are essentially tied in recent polling, with neither cracking 30%. A May runoff looks almost certain. Paxton—who’s been impeached, criminally indicted multiple times, and is beloved by the MAGA base precisely because he’s been impeached and criminally indicted multiple times—polls dead even with both Talarico and Crockett in general election matchups (46-46 in the latest Emerson poll).

Cornyn does marginally better, but he’s toxic to the Trump base. His sin? Supporting a bipartisan gun safety bill in 2022. In today’s GOP, that’s disqualifying.

If Texas Republicans follow their fever dreams and nominate Paxton, and that’s a real possibility, then Democrats get to run against a scandal-plagued, hard-right culture warrior in a midterm election where Trump’s approval is already underwater in Texas (48-46 in the latest polling).

Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, if primary voters choose strategically and nominate Talarico—a former teacher, Presbyterian seminarian, eighth-generation Texan who polls better statewide than Crockett—then you’d have a matchup between a broadly acceptable Democrat and a deeply flawed Republican in a state where the fundamentals are finally shifting.

That’s not enough to make Texas a lock for Democrats. But it’s enough to make it competitive. And making Texas competitive changes everything about American politics.

A Democratic victory in the lone star state is equivalent to cutting the head off the snake.

Imagine this scenario: Paxton wins the Republican primary in a brutal, expensive May runoff that divides the party. Talarico wins the Democratic primary with strong Latino and crossover appeal. Suddenly, the GOP has to defend Texas…Texas!—in a midterm cycle.

That means money that would go to defending actual swing states like Arizona and Nevada gets diverted to keeping Texas red. It means Trump has to campaign in Houston and Dallas instead of Philadelphia and Milwaukee. It means down-ballot races in the Texas House suddenly get national attention and funding.

Even if Democrats ultimately fall short in the Senate race, forcing Republicans to spend $200 million+ defending what should be a safe seat (which is what Senate Leadership Fund estimates it would cost to defend Paxton) would be a massive strategic victory.

And if they actually win? If Talarico pulls off what would be the biggest upset in modern Texas political history? Then the entire electoral map gets redrawn. Texas and its 40 electoral votes would be in play for 2028. The Republican Party would face an existential crisis.

That’s not happening tomorrow. But last night in Tarrant County, we saw the first real evidence that it could happen. Latino voters shifted dramatically. Suburban voters rejected MAGA extremism. Public education voters showed up in a special election because they actually care about their schools.

Taylor Rehmet won by running on public schools, workers’ rights, and affordability. No culture war garbage. No defensive crouch. Just a working-class veteran saying “I’ll fight for you” and meaning it.

That’s a formula that can work in Texas. We just watched it work in the state’s largest Republican county.

What Comes Next

Rehmet and Wambsganss face each other again on March 3rd in their respective party primaries (both are unopposed), and then in the November general election for a full four-year term. The Republican establishment will pour money into the rematch. Trump will campaign for Wambsganss. Every conservative PAC in the state will make this ground zero for preventing a Democratic wave.

Good. Let them.

Because here’s what last night proved: when Democrats run candidates with authentic working-class credentials, when they focus on kitchen-table issues instead of consultant-driven messaging, when they organize in communities that have been written off as unwinnable, they can compete anywhere.

The question is whether Democrats learn that lesson. Whether they nominate candidates like Talarico who can build the kind of coalition Rehmet just assembled. Whether they’re willing to invest in Texas the way Republicans have had to invest in defending it.

The blue dreams that have crashed on Texas shores for decades weren’t wrong about the destination. They were just premature about the timeline and delusional about the path.

Last night, we saw what the actual path looks like. It runs through Tarrant County. It’s paved by Latino voters rejecting MAGA governance. And it’s wide enough for Democrats to finally, actually, compete in Texas.

If they’re smart enough to take it.

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