Why the Texas Senate Primaries Matter

Heads up: We have a live show scheduled for Wednesday, March 4 at the Comedy Cellar in New York City! Nate Silver, Clare Malone, and I will share our reactions from the Texas primaries and much more. You can get tickets here.

Primary season is starting with a bang in just three weeks. Texans will decide which Democrat and Republican they’d like to see face off in a potentially competitive Senate election this fall.

Arkansas and North Carolina will also head to the polls on March 3, but few contests across the country compare to the matchups in Texas. On the Democratic side, the race is primarily between state Rep. James Talarico and U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett. On the Republican side, it’s incumbent Sen. John Cornyn, state Attorney General Ken Paxton, and U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt.

Both primaries feature some similarities: a better-funded, more mild-mannered establishment favorite on one side — Talarico and Cornyn — and a more bombastic presence known for riling up the base on the other — Crockett and Paxton. Of course, there are plenty of differences, too, which we’ll get into. For one, the Republican primary appears likely to head to a runoff.

All of this comes shortly after a special state Senate election in historically Republican Tarrant County resulted in a 30-percentage-point swing to the left. Democrat Taylor Rehmet won by 14 points in a district Trump carried by 17. That gives Democrats some hope in their pursuit of winning a Senate race in Texas for the first time since 1988, though there’s plenty of disagreement within the party over what that path might look like.

Today, we take a look at both Senate primaries in Texas, as well as the broader political environment in the state at a time when one of Republicans’ biggest success stories — gains with Latino voters — looks seriously imperiled. With me to do that is Patrick Svitek, a political reporter who has long covered Texas at The Texas Tribune and the Houston Chronicle and most recently covered national politics at The Washington Post.

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