High hopes for Democratic gains in Texas in 2020 were dashed when the Lone Star State did what it’s done every four years since 1980 and delivered its 38 electoral votes to former President Donald Trump. Progressives had hoped that a long-promised blue shift in the state would finally materialize, but that’s at least another election cycle away
Democrats and activists on the ground are setting up to take aim at the GOP in 2022 for the midterms and in 2024.
Here’s what they’ll have to do to make that happen.
The Challenge
Gerrymandering and a political culture that prioritizes ideas of self-reliance and libertarianism leave Democrats at a natural disadvantage in Texas, a sprawling state that’s been a GOP stronghold for a generation.
But there’s reason to hope. In 2020, as Pew Research detailed, voters chose Trump over President Joe Biden by slightly fewer than 700,000 votes—a decrease from 2016, when Trump beat Hillary Clinton by more than 800,000 votes, itself a decline from 2012’s Mitt Romney win over Barack Obama by around 1.27 million votes. The dropping gap between the two parties on the federal level represents a changing state with a growing urban population that’s swinging left.
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Texas election results
There’s still a need for caution. As Progress Texas Executive Director Ed Espinoza told The Hill, GOP dominance outside of the cities indicate that the climb for progressives may well prove daunting. The liberal group is taking aim at voting rights across Texas in anticipation of a hard-fought midterm election.
Espinoza noted that even Harris County, which includes Houston and is seen as a Democratic stronghold, “delivered 545,000 votes to Republicans in 2016 and 700,000 votes in 2020. I did not think they could get beyond 600,000 on a good day, and they added 150,000 there.”
Texans have a natural mistrust of institutional power, said Greg Casar, a city councilman in Austin and a progressive Democrat. But they’re familiar with Republicans—a challenge that needs to be overcome. “There is very little trust in the state amongst persuadable voters that either party will improve their quality of life, but when people show up to the polling booth every two to four years, they vote based on what they know,” Casar told Blue Tent via email.
With 38 electoral college votes to hand out, Texas is a prize Republicans can’t lose and Democrats desperately want to win. Republicans have a roughly three-point lead in affiliation in the state and have easily won the presidential vote in past years, though the gap is narrowing and a burgeoning population could help close the gap.
The state’s Latino population is exploding, according to Pew, which shows 5.63 million eligible voters for 2020, an increase of around 800,000 from 2016. In 2012 and 2016, fewer than half of those potential voters cast a ballot. (Turnout data is not yet available for 2020.)
But Mary Beth Rogers, whose 2016 book “Turning Texas Blue” lays out a campaign manager’s blueprint for flipping the state, cautioned against reading too much into those shifts. Rather, Democrats face a challenge to be “more strategic and effective in their efforts” to keep the Latino vote on board.
“The 2020 presidential election once again proved that Democrats can no longer take the Hispanic vote in Texas for granted,” said Rogers. “This key demographic group is increasingly diverse and cannot be addressed with a simple one-size-fits-all campaign.”
What Party Leaders Say
The challenge ahead is clear, said Rogers, and the state party needs to be ready to meet it.
“Texas Democrats are going to have to reassess strategies, organizational tactics, candidates, leadership and messages to move closer to turning the state blue after all the hype and hopes invested in the 2020 election,” said Rogers. “That’s going to be a huge challenge for the 2022 statewide elections, as well as for the next presidential election in 2024.”
But there are some signs that a progressive message could turn over some voters or activate those who sat the last few contests out. Casar pointed to 2020 successes in Austin in spite of a poor showing statewide as evidence that there’s an opportunity for Democrats if they’re willing to take it. That requires talking to people and addressing their material needs.
“We passed our own local Green New Deal, we increased Biden’s margin of victory by a greater share than any other Democratic city in the state, and progressive champions won up and down the ballot,” said Casar. “We did this by recognizing that progressive movements and policies that actually help working people are more popular than politicians themselves.”
Groups like Beto O’Rourke’s Powered by People are planning “year-round” strategies to turn out voters, the former congressman told supporters in a post-election letter in November.
“Nothing beats meeting your voters, eyeball to eyeball,” O’Rourke wrote. “We should always find a way to canvas directly at the voter’s door. There is a safe way to do this, even in a pandemic.”
What Activists Say
To Christian Archer, a Texas-based political strategist who has worked for Julian Castro and other Democrats in the state, the challenge ahead for Texas progressives is one they can meet.
“Local organizations like MOVE Texas, Battleground Texas, and a few others continue to break voter registration records each cycle,” Archer told Blue Tent.
Archer also pointed to Democratic success in Georgia in January, where picking up two Senate seats flipped control of the upper chamber, as evidence that there’s untapped potential in Texas. Texas and Georgia have a lot in common, he said.
“The numbers are there to win,” Archer said. “The Georgia results showed us that if we recruit exciting candidates up and down the ballot and continue investing campaign dollars in every corner of Texas, the Democrats can take the Texas House.”
Rogers agreed, calling Georgia indicative of what could be done if state Democrats listen to what works.
“Texas Democrats need to take a closer look at the kinds of multi-year organizing and messaging efforts developed by Stacy Abrams and others in Georgia,” said Rogers. “It is not too early now to begin incorporating similar efforts to expand and build a new Democratic base vote in Texas.”
Multiple groups, including the Texas Organizing Project, are looking to turn activist energy into tangible electoral gains. Liberal cash is flowing into the state to turn as many congressional seats as possible in the midterms and truly get out the blue vote in 2024.
“Our goal is to transform democracy in Texas, and if we can do that, we can transform the country,” the group’s Deputy Director Brianna Brown told The Guardian. “But before we can even start that fight, the lines have already been drawn, limiting our ability to build a democracy that looks like us and shares our values.”
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Texas Latinos
The Path to Victory
For Texas to take advantage of this moment, it’ll need a lot of things to break right. Organization on the ground, taking lessons from city and local elections, and appealing to the broad, diverse electorate will all be part of flipping the state blue.
“Progressive movements and policies that actually help working people are more popular than politicians themselves,” Casar said. “No one knows that better than local elected officials. Whether it’s talking to constituents at the grocery store or at the bus stop, we have to inspire people to get to the bottom of the ballot. Doing so demands local electeds fight for them and their families.”
That’s not necessarily going to be easy in a state where most counties are a sea of red.
“Although all of the major cities and some of the suburbs are producing victories for Democrats, progressives have consistently failed to develop realistic strategies to shave Republican margins in rural areas, as well as in mid-market cities throughout the state,” Rogers said. “The potential is there, but Texas will not turn blue until those efforts are successful.”
O’Rourke, in his election postmortem, noted that Texans—and Americans in general—are wise to the kind of messaging that lacks a genuine core.
“People are smart,” wrote O’Rourke. “They can smell a focus-group-tested message, talking points derived from polls, a campaign derived from polls, from a mile away.”
Rogers sees the struggle as one that could turn the tide if everything goes right.
“Texas still has the potential to become a swing-voter state, proven by major shifts in the cities and suburbs over the past two election cycles, and I continue to be hopeful that Texas can make that shift by 2024,” she said. “But it’s going to take hard work and clear thinking to make that possible.”
