Texas Senate race could set national spending record
Texas voters will cast ballots in the 2026 midterm election, one of the biggest tests of Republican dominance in the state and Democrats’ best shot in decades at winning a key U.S. Senate seat. The marquee race pits Democratic state Rep. James Talarico against Republican Ken Paxton, the state’s attorney general and an ally of President Donald Trump. Voters will also elect a governor, U.S. House members in districts newly redrawn to favor Republican candidates, state and local representatives and judges, and decide on ballot measures.
The House contests could be decisive in Democrats’ bid to retake control of Congress. Paxton, who has promised to champion President Trump’s priorities if elected, secured the Republican nomination by defeating Sen. John Cornyn — the seat’s incumbent of over two decades — in a tight runoff after Cornyn lost favor with the president and Paxton received Trump’s last-minute endorsement.
Trump’s support has been both a crucial asset and a liability for the candidate. Paxton’s campaign website says he is “running to help President Trump finish the border wall” and states that he plans to help the president deport “criminal illegal aliens.” Texas shares more than 1,200 miles of border with Mexico, and the rising number of arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement risks alienating Latino voters, who make up over 30% of the state’s electorate.
Talarico has stressed the need for border security but also called for legal immigration to be made easier, saying in campaign materials, “our border should be like a front porch — it should have a welcome mat out front and a lock on the door.” Both candidates have made affordability central to their campaign messaging. Talarico has promised to cut taxes for the middle class, increase taxes on billionaires and repeal Trump’s tariffs on imports. Paxton has said he plans to cut taxes, reduce federal spending and remove regulations on energy companies that harm the economy.
Trump carried Texas in the last three presidential elections, defeating Democratic nominee and former Vice President Kamala Harris by more than 10 percentage points in 2024. The state has not elected a Democratic senator since 1988. Recent polls suggest a tight race.
The Texas race could become the most expensive Senate race in the country’s history. As of mid-October, Talarico had raised more than $146.3 million, eclipsing Paxton’s $22.3 million. But hundreds of millions more in independent expenditures have given Paxton the advantage in total spending. Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and a Texas resident, gave $158 million to the Republican-supporting Senate Leadership PAC, which donated the same amount to Texas PAC, a group supporting Paxton. Musk also gave $10 million to the Lone Star Liberty PAC, which supports Paxton.
Among the most competitive House races in the country is the one for Texas’ 34th Congressional District on the state’s southern Gulf Coast. Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez is running for reelection against Eric Flores, a Republican and Army veteran endorsed by Trump. Gonzalez won the district in the 2024 election by a thin margin of less than 3 percentage points, and its boundaries were redrawn in 2025 to advantage Republicans. In a possible sign of growing wariness of associating with the president, Flores’ campaign appeared to remove a reference to Trump from a section of his website.
Democrats are hoping to reclaim Texas’ 15th Congressional District, an inland strip in the southern part of the state and the only part of the Rio Grande Valley represented by a Republican in the U.S. House. Monica De La Cruz, the incumbent Republican, faces Democrat Bobby Pulido, a Tejano musician and political newcomer, in a newly redrawn version of the district that favors Republicans. De La Cruz won her 2024 reelection by a margin of nearly 15 percentage points.
Another race that has become increasingly competitive is the governor’s contest. Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who has held office since 2015, faces Democratic state Rep. Gina Hinojosa. Texas has elected only Republican governors since 1994, and Trump endorsed Abbott, but the most recent polls show a tight race — in what the Associated Press described as one of the most vulnerable contests of Abbott’s career.
Polls close at 7 p.m. local time, which is 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. ET. The ballot includes races for U.S. Senate, governor, U.S. House, lieutenant governor, attorney general, state Supreme Court, state Senate, state House, agriculture commissioner, comptroller, appeals court judges, land commissioner, railroad commissioner and the state Board of Education.
More than 8 million votes were cast in the 2022 race for governor, and about 68% of all ballots in that race were cast early or by absentee ballot. The vast majority of Texas counties are expected to release all or almost all of their early and absentee results in the first vote update of the night, in most cases before any in-person Election Day results are released.
In the 2024 election, the first results were reported starting at 8 p.m. ET on Nov. 5, 2024, as the first polls began to close. The state reached 50% of votes reporting at 8:29 p.m. ET and 90% of votes reporting at 12:17 a.m. ET on Nov. 6, 2024.
The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in the Texas races. It does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it determines there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory, while making clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explaining why. Recounts in Texas are automatic if there is a tie vote; a recount can be requested if the margin of victory is less than 10% of the winner’s votes or the race has fewer than 1,000 total votes. The AP may declare a winner in a race subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.