Democrat James Talarico has flipped a US Senate seat in Texas, defeating Republican Ken Paxton to pull off the first statewide victory in more than 30 years and sending a jolt through a longtime Republican stronghold that President Donald Trump carried by double digits just two years ago.
The 37-year-old state legislator, former schoolteacher and Presbyterian seminarian will become Texas’ first Democratic senator since 1993, laying bare how voter frustration midway through Trump’s second term imperilled Republicans deep inside typically safe turf.
The victory is a rejection of Trump’s pick for the seat and threatens Republicans’ control of the Senate, where Democrats needed to gain four seats to retake the majority.
A large crowd in erupted in cheers at Talarico’s watch party in downtown Austin on Tuesday after the race was called.
His victory was part of a breakthrough night for Democrats in Texas, where Republicans’ three-decade hold on the governor’s office ended when Governor Greg Abbott was ousted by Gina Hinjosa.
Hinojosa will make history as the first Hispanic elected to lead the state.
No Democrat has won statewide office in Texas since 1994, the longest drought in the nation.
Talarico will become the Senate’s youngest member and replace longtime senator John Cornyn, 74, who lost a bruising Republican primary to the scandal-plagued Paxton, whose nomination bolstered Talarico’s appeal to Republican and independent voters.
The heated campaign in Texas, one of the most expensive of the midterms, became partly a referendum on Paxton’s legal, personal and ethical troubles that have shadowed much of his three terms as the state’s attorney-general.
That included a federal corruption investigation, which did not result in charges, and impeachment by his own party in the Texas House over accusations of abusing his office to help a political donor.
He was later acquitted in the state Senate.
Democrats have spent much of this century on a sputtering quest to win in Texas, and finally achieving victory could offer a roadmap in states where the party has struggled to compete.
Talarico found success in a campaign with scant partisanship, TikToks that racked up millions of views and a railing against billionaires he said were corrupting politics at the expense of everyday Americans – a target that included Elon Musk, the world’s richest person and a Texas resident, who spent heavily backing Paxton.
For Republicans, whose governance in Texas has seen the rollback of abortion rights and offered the Trump administration a blueprint for immigration crackdowns, the defeat to a Democrat who once ran as a proud Austin progressive threatens to deepen partisan infighting.
Senate Republican leaders warned early on that Paxton and his baggage would jeopardise the seat in an already difficult midterm landscape for Republicans.
But Trump, trusting his instincts, endorsed his loyal ally in the primary over Cornyn.
with Reuters
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