Here is why I think Democrat James Talarico has a chance to win the Senate seat in Texas. He speaks with many Texans' religious language, which also contrasts his persona with Ken Paxton's immorality and corruption.
While I am not a Texan, I am a native of the state more Texas than Texas: Oklahoma. It is from that perspective that I wrote in July 2025 on this blog that JamesTalarico was a unique Democrat who spoke the religious language of many in both states. He brought that to the table and was onto a potentially winning message.. He put his politics in Christian religious terms, even when his support of public policy deviated from the orthodoxy of the evangelical right. His morality is in sharp contrast to Ken Paxton's, and with Paxton's defeat of incumbent Sen. John Cornyn, he dumped the Bush era into the dustbin of history.
The contrast of Talarico with Paxton could not be more dramatic: The overwhelming win yesterday by Paxton in Texas gives Democrats an even better chance to brand the GOP as the MAGA party (the Bush era is demonstrably dead) and the party of corruption. Paxton's long and well-documented past of corruption was ignored as Texas Republicans followed the orders of Trump, who himself is blatantly corrupt, as his slush fund source and crypto gains are evidence. The question I have is, if Texas voters do not care about corruption, is that true of the rest of the GOP outside of Texas? The first test of that will be whether the GOP members of Congress put their OK stamp on the slush fund and the clause exempting Trump and his family from IRS scrutiny, or a significant number jump the Trump ship and vote to bury the most open, corrupt self-dealing and pocket lining attempt by a president in the history of the US.
My July 2025 post: There is a new messenger who speaks the language of many in red states...James Talarico, a state legislator in Texas. He is a devout Christian who actually reads the Bible and who puts his politics into how he sees it related to the religion that is the compass for his very fundamentalist belief. He sees as the most important message Jesus delivered: Love God with all your heart and treat your neighbor as you would like to be treated. That is not only a standard for his life as a preacher in training and the son of one, but he ties his beliefs to issues of the time.. He is a super articulate, young, and attractive spokesperson for his point of view.
Above all, Talarico is the polar opposite of the current leader of the GOP/MAGA movement, Donald Trump. Trump has no moral compass but is a self-serving, self-identified transactional person. That is his standard for life's decisions: to get the best deal to keep his power and wealth and gain more of both using his political office to do it. By inference, if people followed his unmoored, self-centered interest, they, too, will become richer and more powerful. Trump is a person who uses fear of his power to keep his followers and everyone he can in line, including cruelty and lack of empathy for how his policies harm "the least of these" and those trying to keep their daily lives above water.
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