Democrats Can Win Texas

Three lessons from a messy, important night in Texas.

The long, incredibly divisive Texas primary is finally over. James Talarico defeated Jasmine Crockett by about 7 points, with some votes still to be counted.

Because this was the first primary in what is going to be a year of hotly contested Democratic primaries in states like Maine, Illinois, Michigan, and Massachusetts, the Texas race received a lot of national attention and became a subject of intense debate.

In many ways, it became a proxy for the larger battles raging within the party over ideology, electability, identity, and what it means to be a Democrat. The stakes were ratcheted up when Kamala Harris came off the sidelines to endorse Crockett at the last minute.

In the end, this race was an imperfect fit to litigate all of those issues. Talarico and Crockett have very different styles but very similar positions on nearly every issue. Most of the discourse was people outside of Texas projecting their own views onto two candidates who didn’t really ask for that role.

With the race called, the hot takes are flying fast and furious as everyone tries to fit the result into their preexisting narrative. To make matters worse, we don’t even have exit polls to give us a clearer picture of why people voted the way they did. So much of this punditry is just guesswork. Beware the takes.

That said, there are some takeaways from the Texas race.

1. Democrats Can Win Texas

It won’t be easy, but it is very clear to me that Democrats can win Texas. Winning the Lone Star State has been a pipe dream for as long as I’ve been in politics. Other than Beto O’Rourke coming close in 2018, we have been getting our asses kicked for a long time. A Democrat hasn’t represented Texas in the Senate for 38 years. A Democrat hasn’t been governor for more than 30.

But the stars have aligned in a way that gives us a real shot.