Although Texas has been “reliably red” for decades, this year’s Senate race has old-school conservatives sweating in their chaps. And even if the closest you’ve gotten to the Lone Star State is singing On the Road Again at karaoke night, this race could determine which party controls half of Congress… so you might want to pull up a barstool.
Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton are vying for a seat Republicans have held since the year JFK was sworn in as president of the United States. At this point, the GOP practically has its name embroidered on it. The trouble is that Talarico has been tied with or leading the sitting Republican attorney general in a string of recent polls. In Texas political terms, that’s roughly equivalent to Buc-ee’s announcing it’s replacing the brisket with locally sourced lentils.
James Talarico isn’t some middle-of-the-road Democrat, either. For those of you lucky enough to live outside the algorithmic hellscape of nonstop Texas Senate commercials, Talarico is a 37-year-old Presbyterian seminarian best known nationally for saying things like “God is nonbinary,” “There are six biological sexes,” “God is not a Christian,” and “Jesus was a radical feminist”—comments he’s attempted to walk back to various degrees but nevertheless make excellent Republican campaign ads.
Paxton is the three-term state attorney general whose political biography could reasonably be titled Oops!…I Did It Again. He was impeached by the Republican-controlled Texas House in 2023 on corruption allegations and acquitted by the state Senate. A separate FBI investigation was later dropped. He has also acknowledged an extramarital affair. None of it prevented him from defeating incumbent Republican Sen. John Cornyn in the primary with Donald Trump’s backing, because apparently Texas Republican voters looked at that résumé and said, “Finally, someone with experience.”
Clearly, what this race really needed was a possible vote-buying investigation.
Enter the Texas Majority PAC, a Democratic group hell-bent on turning Texas blue. Last month, conservative outlet Townhall released undercover video of Sky MacAdams, then an organizing manager for the PAC, explaining a program in which Texans are paid to [*checks notes*] learn about voting. Ahem.
“We are paying people $25 to attend a one-hour Zoom class to learn why voting is important and why the Republicans are causing all these bad things,” is how MacAdams puts it in the video. This is where he apparently forgot that when you’re explaining to a stranger why something is perfectly legal, it’s generally advisable not to add, “So it’s like a roundabout way of paying people for their votes.”
Hey, everybody has a first rodeo.
“You can’t pay someone to vote for someone,” MacAdams went on to helpfully explain. “You can’t be like, ‘Here’s $25, go vote for me.’ You can say, ‘Attend a one-hour class and you can receive $25.’”
And then, because sometimes God simply hands a columnist a gift:
“If I was a Republican, I would be pissed. I would be like, that’s shady as f—.”
Texas Majority PAC promptly fired him, then rushed to explain that MacAdams had wildly mischaracterized what was, in fact, a perfectly ordinary “relational organizing program.” The group says Texans are paid for political outreach—which is code for learning how to nag friends and family into voting, and then annoying them to death with reminders. That part is legal. They are not being paid to vote a certain way themselves, the PAC promises. That would be illegal. Not to mention shady as f—.
Which leaves us with the sort of distinction lawyers put their children through college arguing about.
LEGAL: “Here’s $25 to spend an hour learning how to persuade people to vote.”
ILLEGAL: “Here’s $25 to vote.”
POTENTIALLY UNHELPFUL WHILE BEING SECRETLY RECORDED: “Basically, we found a clever way to do the illegal one.”
Even though Texas Majority insists everyone is making a federal case out of one guy’s spectacularly unfortunate choice of words, the Justice Department is—literally—making a federal case out of it.
Lest anyone mistake this particular election for just another entertaining little political dumpster fire, the stakes are real. Paxton is running as a staunch social and fiscal conservative: lower taxes, mass deportations and a completed border wall, gun rights, and restrictions on abortion and transgender policies. He spent the Biden years suing the administration more than 100 times over immigration, abortion, vaccine mandates, energy policy, and other assorted forms of federal overreach—so his platform is less campaign rhetoric and more résumé.
Talarico is running as a woke radical wingnut progressive populist: higher taxes on billionaires and corporations, expanded health coverage, continued support for Ukraine, and greater protections for LGBTQ+ rights. He’s argued that abortion doesn’t conflict with Scripture and called parents who don’t transition their kids “abusive.” In other words, he’s about as compatible with traditional Texas values as tofu at a UT tailgate.
Is Paxton a prize? Hardly. Would I pick him over the guy who voted to fund the surgical mutilation of children? All day every day.
This is not two guys fighting over whether the city needs another stop sign or whether it should be shaped like a tiny Ten Commandments monument. Whoever wins could help determine which party controls the Senate and, with it, what legislation has even the faintest prayer of surviving Congress.
FWIW, netizens are convinced the polls are fake—presumably except the brand new one showing Paxton finally taking the lead—and that there’s no way Texas—Texas!—would ever elect a guy like James Talarico. I pray they’re right. I left California for a reason, people. I’m too old to have to find another red state with reasonable taxes and decent breakfast tacos.
ACK! FORGOT THE POLL REDUX FOR FINICKY PHONES! *LATE ADD.
Could Texas actually turn blue?
I’d start packing.
The purple’s making me nervous.
TEXAS? HELL NAW, Y’ALL.
[*drops to knees*]
*combo/unsure/other
lol!! I thought for sure that your poll was going to ask us who our favorite drag queen is. The idea that this is a mere possibility tells us that the polls are fake. It's all friggin fake. You can't have fair elections in an environment of fraud and corruption, especially when the voting machines themselves are rigged.
Jenna, TN has no income tax and great brisket. You’re welcome here anytime.