Texas Democrats head to convention with optimism, but questions about November remain

From The Texas Newsroom:

While they haven’t done so in more than three decades, Texas Democrats believe they have a real chance to win a statewide seat in November. That idea was backed up this week by a new Texas Politics Project poll that shows the races essentially at a dead heat.

They will have time to gameplan how they can come out on top when they meet in Corpus Christi this Thursday for a three-day convention stacked with a slate of statewide candidates and big names in the political arena from outside of Texas.

“I think it reflects optimism in the Texas Democratic Party and among national Democrats that believe that Democrats this cycle have a realistic prospect of breaking the losing streak that dates back to 1996,” Mark Jones, a political scientist at Rice University, told The Texas Newsroom.

On the list of speakers are U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, Tennessee State Rep. Justin J. Pearson and giving the final keynote speech on Saturday is U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.

University of Houston Political Scientist Nancy Sims says “they’re showcasing the wide spectrum of thought for the party.”

From the slate of Democrats running in the state, U.S. Senate hopeful James Talarico, Texas gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa, and candidate for Lt. Gov. Vikki Goodwin are all scheduled to speak.

But while attending isn’t required to be a bonafide or elected Texas Democrat, to some political scientists, the biggest thing that stuck was who wasn’t on the list.

“The notable absence in this convention is [Congresswoman] Jasmine Crockett,” Joshua Blank, a UT Austin political scientist, told The Texas Newsroom.

One of the goals of the convention is finding unity among Democrats after a hard-fought U.S. Senate primary between Talarico and Crockett. Crockett’s absence leaves many to question not only that, but whether Talarico is having trouble convincing her voters, specifically Black men and women, to vote for him.

“If you look at the margins, roughly 5% or so of identified Black voters in the poll suggest they’ll vote for the Libertarian rather than Talarico or Paxton,” Jon Taylor, a political scientist at the University of Texas at San Antonio, said. “That tells me Talarico has a problem he’s got to work on for a key constituent group for the Democratic Party if he’s gonna win in November.”

So while this weekend will be about setting the Democratic agenda moving forward in Texas, an underlying story will be how Democrats can earn the support from Black voters who were all in on Jasmine Crockett in the March primaries.

But Jones said in the grand scheme of things, “it’s probably not going to be the deciding factor in the race.” “But if Black turnout is a little lower than normal, that clearly hurts Talarico’s chances,” Jones said. “Especially with a Republican candidate like Ken Paxton, you’re looking at somewhere close to nine out of 10 of the Black votes going to Talarico.”

If Crockett were to come out and support Talarico before the race, Texas Southern University political scientist Michael Adams believes it’d give him a greater chance to win.

“If we have an election that’s a statistical dead heat, those voters who may opt to stay at home would be very important, and Jasmine Crockett was able to get them off of their sofas and out to the polls,” Adams said.

Republican unity shaky after GOP convention

Earlier this month, Texas Republicans met in Houston for their party convention. The event gave the party a chance to come together after a hard-fought primary.

For the most part, that happened. Gov. Greg Abbott gave a speech and House Speaker Dustin Burrows and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick all spoke about the future of Texas and how, in order to get to their goals, they’d need Republicans to turn out and vote in November.

But it wasn’t all positive. During Patrick’s speech, he called outgoing Sen. John Cornyn a “sore loser” for how he has handled the loss in the primary runoff — something the senior senator said in a recent interview with Semafor is “continuing to alienate” traditional conservative Republicans.

The event also featured a lot of attacks towards Talarico and his rise in the polls.

“I’ve never seen so much blasphemy from anyone running for office,” Patrick said about how Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian, talks about the Bible.

During the convention, Patrick released several new campaign ads where he can be seen wearing a black leather jacket, a move Taylor interpreted as “trying to make himself look tough.”

“The message that came across to me was that this is a party that… It may be in power, but it also, I think, is worried about where it’s going,” Taylor said. “And in particular about polls, about elections this fall.”

So while both parties are trying to come together, there is clear work to be done on both sides to truly bridge the gap between their intraparty factions.

Ultimately, political scientists say it’s a long time until early voting for the general election begins, and a lot can happen before then.

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