I Still Can’t Believe What Happened in Texas Tonight

Politics The Dream of Blue Texas Is Here For so many years, we guarded against hope. The winning candidates. Photo by Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Going into Tuesday night, all I could think was that the last time I felt this hopeful about the political future of my home state of Texas was when I was still in college. I was a student journalist at the University of Texas at Arlington, helping cover the exciting 2018 midterm elections. Beto O’Rourke had made a stop at the university when he was running against Sen. Ted Cruz. At the time, I was extremely hopeful O’Rourke could win. He was crisscrossing the state, hopping on Facebook Lives to showcase where he and his team were campaigning. He felt so close to us young students. I remember thinking if we were ever going to see any positive change, it was going to be then. Then O’Rourke lost by 2.6 points. It may have been the closest a Democrat had come to winning a Senate or governor’s race in Texas in recent history, as my colleague Jim Newell puts it, but to me it felt like any potential progress had been ripped from our hands. I vowed to not let myself get that excited again. At the start of tonight, the energy and anxiety in my home in east Austin, just shy of ten miles from where James Talarico’s watch party is taking place, was high. We wanted to believe, but we had been here plenty of times before. For a solid few hours, every other sentence between my roommate and I was “I want to throw up” and “Is this real?” As the numbers started to come in, I was hesitant to go all in. That is, until I saw how Denton County was leaning. Early numbers showed Talarico was leading Paxton. That’s when I felt like I could let myself have a deep sigh of relief. Denton County, one of Texas’ largest, has been historically red since the ‘90s, although it’s gradually shifted more left the last few elections. Seeing early numbers roll in, thinking the blue wave was going to happen in Texas—tonight it wasn’t just a dream we had to wake up from the next day, it was our new reality. Watching Steve Kornacki on NBC call the senate race between Talarico and Ken Paxton felt like a dream but it isn’t. It’s the first time a Democrat has won a Senate race in Texas since 1988, when Lloyd Bentsen won. Then, Gov. Greg Abbott conceded in the race against Gina Hinojosa, before any major network had even officially called the race. That’s when we started hearing popping sounds outside. Gunshots or fireworks? I guess we’ll never know for sure. But that sounds about right after we got two wins in one night in Austin, an overwhelmingly blue city. I was less hopeful about the governor’s race. If Abbott had gotten re-elected, he would’ve been on track to be the state’s longest-serving governor. Instead, Rick Perry currently holds that title. And Hinojosa is the first Latina governor of Texas. And yes, I cried happy tears when I saw the news. It’s the first time Texas has had a Democratic senator and governor in my lifetime. This is historic for a state whose demographic makeup is more than 40 percent Latino. For me, what feels so meaningful after what we’ve lived through during these past couple years is that Talarico and Hinojosa have both been vocal about their opposition to ICE operations—and especially the separation of children from their family members who are detained. In January, I went to a rally Talarico organized in East Austin when he was speaking out against the detention of 5-year-old Liam Ramos and his father, who were being held at a Texas correctional facility. It was clear then he was the one to watch during this race, but Hinojosa was also there along Talarico. That’s when I started following her more closely. Seeing a Latina become the governor of Texas who believes in expanding women’s health care rights and supporting a pathway to citizenship, both issues personal to me, gives me hope that things will change in the state that’s long been controlled by Republican men. My mom has been texting me all day, asking me how I felt, if Texas really was going to turn blue As the day progressed, I could feel her getting more hopeful, mainly because the amount of emojis she was using was increasing. “Mija, it’s going to happen.” I was hesitant all day, but she was right. My roommate and I never threw up. My mom ended her night with one more text. “Ya escribió la historia en Texas.” “History has been written in Texas.” Democrats Texas 2026 Midterms