Talarico Ends 38-Year Drought, Becoming First Texas Democrat to Win a US Senate Seat Since 1988

In a ballroom-sized watch party in Austin, the state capital, supporters watched the television projections come in and then lost control of themselves. They hugged, they kissed, they drank to a result many of them said they had not dared to believe. Democrat James Talarico had won the US Senate race in Texas, defeating Republican Ken Paxton.

It is the first time a Democrat has won a Senate seat in Texas since 1988. It is also likely the single biggest upset for Republicans in this year's elections, and it helped cement Democratic control of the entire US Congress amid a wave of wins across the country. For decades, a Democratic statewide victory in Texas had felt like a pipe dream to the state's liberals. Texas is the second most populous state in the nation and a conservative stronghold, one that routinely tries out Republican policies later adopted elsewhere.

Talarico, a state legislator and former schoolteacher, was a little-known figure until last year. He built his campaign around the rising cost of living under Republican leadership. He leaned into his religious upbringing too: he is the grandson of a Southern Baptist preacher, spent time in a seminary, and sprinkled his stump speeches with biblical references. Before reaching the general election he beat a well-known rival, Dallas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, in the Democratic primary. He then held steady in the polls despite a barrage of negative advertising, including attacks on past comments in which he had supported transgender people.

Paxton tried to paint Talarico as too progressive for Texas and campaigned alongside Donald Trump on several occasions. He also carried heavy baggage. His own party impeached him in 2023 on corruption accusations, though the state Senate later acquitted him. He was also indicted on federal fraud charges brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which were later dismissed.

Money poured in. The contest became the most expensive US Senate race in history, with more than half a billion dollars spent. Elon Musk put $158m (£117m) into a super PAC backing Paxton, a fact Talarico used against him. Then two members of the Bush family, the Republican dynasty that has used Texas as its political launchpad, endorsed Talarico, a move that foreshadowed Paxton's defeat. Trump made multiple Texas stops, including in reliably Republican areas, a sign of how worried party leaders were about turnout.

Quardricos Driskell, a political science professor at George Washington University, told the BBC that Paxton was a major factor in the Republican collapse, calling him an "objectively terrible candidate". Driskell noted that the Senate result came alongside another Tuesday upset: Republican Governor Greg Abbott was ousted, the first Democratic win in a Texas governor's race since the 1990s. He called the night "absolutely historic" and described it as a bloodbath, saying it showed the country wants to go in a different direction.

The underlying frustrations were economic and personal. Voters complained about high consumer costs, including petrol prices, and largely blamed Trump's tariff policies and the Iran war. Hispanic voters, who make up a third of the state's population, were a particular worry for Republicans. Border crossings have plummeted under Trump, something that had been popular in Texas, yet surveys since late summer showed a majority of Texan Hispanic voters, many of whom had switched to Trump in 2024, now disapproved of him and favoured Democrats by a significant margin.

Many Texas Hispanics who spoke to the BBC before the election pointed to the immigration crackdown as the reason for their change of heart. They cited aggressive measures that led to citizens being detained and non-violent offenders being rounded up indiscriminately. Whether that shift in the Hispanic vote proves lasting is the question Texas politics now turns on.