Will. Texas. Flip.
Every few years, Democrats ask themselves this same question: Can they turn Texas blue? In 2026, they believe they have a really good shot. And a lot of strategists, including some Republicans, agree that it’s probably the best chance Democrats have had in decades — or will have again in the near future.
“If you’re a Democrat right now… this is about as good as it gets,” said Brendan Steinhauser, a Texas-based Republican strategist who has been critical of the president in the past. “If you guys can’t win this, then it’s going to be hard in the future.”
Democrats are competitive in the governor’s race, Senate race, and five very close House races: TX-35, TX-28, TX-15, TX-23 and TX-34.
“There’s no doubt that there’s gonna be a blue wave, because we’ve just been monitoring these voters for over a year,” said Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha, who is working on the Senate and governors races, and consulting on those House races. “What we don’t know is how high or how big it’s going to be.”
The Senate
The Senate race is the big ticket. Democrats have a strong candidate in state Rep. James Talarico, and Republicans have a very flawed candidate in state Attorney General Ken Paxton.
If you think you’ve seen this episode before and know how it ends, you’re partially correct: Beto O’Rourke came close to unseating Sen. Ted Cruz in 2018.
Both Democrats and Republicans point out, however, that Beto consistently polled below Cruz or within the margin of error. Talarico, meanwhile, has regularly polled above Paxton, sometimes outside of a poll’s margin of error. Six of the last 10 polls included in the RealClearPolitics Average showed Talarico ahead, three showed the candidates tied, and only one put Paxton up (by one percentage point). The current polling average has Talarico up by 2.5 points, which is still close — but strategists say Talarico’s more competitive polling makes this a different ballgame.
“Beto never led a poll, and Talarico has led the last 10,” said Rocha. “The price of gas in 2018 was $2.50 a gallon, everybody’s belly was full, and they were all fat and happy. They are not that way today.”
The House
After President Trump called for red states to rework their congressional districts to make more red seats in the U.S. House, the Texas legislature redrew the state’s congressional districts to produce five additional seats that should be won by Republicans. Four of those, however, have a high portion of Latino voters. Latinos swung toward Trump in 2024 but could swing away from the GOP this week.
“When we did redistricting, I was really concerned that we were getting our hopes up a little bit” that Latinos would stay with Republicans, Steinhauser told me. The big question is whether the shift in support would “transfer from Trump doing really well two years ago to every Republican doing well down there.”
The wave is shifting toward Democrats, Steinhauser said, but incumbency is still very important in South Texas. Incumbent Democratic Reps. Henry Cuellar in TX-28 and Vicente Gonzalez in TX-34, and incumbent GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz in TX-15, will all most likely win, Steinhauser told me. “Relationships and familiarity [are] really important down there … Relationships matter more than almost anything else.”
The 15th District race between De La Cruz and famous Tejano singer Bobby Pulido is one of the most-watched in the country, and GOP Latino strategist Mike Madrid believes Pulido will win. He told me in September that Republican support is sinking among Latinos, and that the nation should expect red-leaning Latino districts across the country (especially rural ones) to shift dramatically.
Madrid said it’s the same reason Democrat Johnny Garcia is competitive in TX-35, against Monica De La Cruz’s brother, Carlos.
“The Trump Republican collapse is just starting to hit so complete now,” Madrid said.
The Governor’s race
This is the sleeper race of the election. Democrats are hoping that a rising tide does indeed lift all boats, and that state Rep. Gina Hinojosa can beat out 3-term Gov. Greg Abbott. Abbott is not as flawed a candidate as Paxton, but he’s been in office for quite a while and Hinojosa is from a known political family and running a very populist campaign.
“Anybody who’s done politics for more than 10 seconds would be like, ‘There’s no fucking way she can win,’” said Rocha. “But here we are, a week before the election, and in most polls running the last two weeks, she’s tied or within the margin of error — which shows a possibility.”
Rocha said if Hinojosa wins, it’s in part due to the Talarico wave, plus her family political connections (her father was a state representative and former Texas Democratic Party chair), and rural East Texans mad about public education funding cuts.
Republicans are doing everything in their power to make sure Abbott succeeds: Elon Musk himself recently put in an additional $5 million, and Abbott is still polling three points ahead of Hinojosa, on average.
If turnout is down in rural areas, Steinhauser says, it doesn’t bode well for Republicans in statewide races.
“Those rural areas are going to have to save Ken Paxton,” Steinhauser explains, because Talarico and Democrats are looking good in suburbs like Williamson County (north of Austin) — where the majority of Texas’s growth is. “If certain suburban areas are turning out big, that’s probably not great this year for Republicans.”
Democrats need the Republican voters who usually sit out a midterm to remain home, and an additional 5-8 percent of reliable Republican voters to either stay home or cast a ballot for a Democrat, Rocha says, in order to win one or both of the statewide races.
If rural voters do turn out, there could still be another factor: the undervote, where voters leave some races blank. Steinhauser says it’s possible that Texans vote for Abbott and then a Democrat for House or Senate. But in rural Texas, it’s even more possible that Republicans vote for Abbott and a GOP House member but leave the Senate race blank.
“I think the undervote is going to be the story of the election,” Steinhauser said. “I think there’s a good possibility that there’s an undervote where Abbott really outperforms Paxton.”
If Latino voters hand Democrats a big wave in Texas this year, all three strategists caution that Democrats should not see this as a homecoming, where Latinos reliably return to the fold.
“They’re not running back to Democrats because they’re in love with us. They’re just frustrated with their lives,” Rocha said. “They’re becoming the new soccer moms of American politics.”
