By Brad Brooks, Andy Sullivan and Arathy Somasekhar
HOUSTON, Texas, Oct 21 (Reuters) - Texas Democrats' best chance at a statewide win in more than three decades is facing a wall of Republican money, with Elon Musk and other donors pouring hundreds of millions into a late effort to rescue Senate candidate Ken Paxton.
With two weeks until the November 3 election and early voting under way, however, it is unclear how much impact the spending can still have. Polls show few undecided voters remain, and Republicans
say their biggest challenge is turning out their own voters, many of whom are frustrated by the cost of living and the war with Iran launched by President Donald Trump, who has endorsed Paxton.
"The money being spent now isn't for persuasion. It's for mobilization," said pollster James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas. "In most of the statewide polling we've seen, Republicans are suffering from an enthusiasm gap."
Republican strategists say internal polling shows that gap has narrowed considerably.
"We've seen it collapse, thank God. It was one of our concerns," said Dave Carney, a longtime Republican strategist and chief adviser to Texas Governor Greg Abbott.
That turnout challenge helps explain the tone of Republican advertising. Rather than focusing on inflation and the economy, which polls consistently show are among voters' top concerns, Republicans in Texas and other battleground states have leaned heavily on culture-war themes to energize their base.
Republican groups have spent more than $100 million nationally since August 1 on more than 200 ads accusing Democrats of backing “sex change” procedures for children, according to an analysis of AdImpact data by FactCheck.org.
TEXAS-SIZED SPENDING
Combined advertising spending in the race between Paxton, the state's Republican attorney general, and Democrat James Talarico has topped $500 million, according to ad-tracking data, putting it on pace to become the most expensive US Senate contest ever.
Talarico has held a small but consistent lead over Paxton, though generally within the margin of error, making it Texas' most competitive statewide race since 1994, Henson said.
Outside groups backing Paxton have spent about $239 million, more than five times the roughly $45 million spent by the largest Democratic-aligned groups. Texas PAC, a Republican super PAC, alone has accounted for nearly $149 million.
The group was launched by the Senate Leadership Fund, the main Republican Senate super PAC.
Musk, who lives in Texas and has relocated SpaceX, Tesla, X and other businesses there, has contributed $158 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, which subsequently transferred matching sums to Texas PAC, according to federal filings.
Talarico has offset the outside-spending disadvantage with grassroots fundraising. His campaign says it raised $64 million from July through September, more than triple Paxton's total, with 97% of donations under $100.
He spent $61 million on ads through September, according to AdImpact, while the biggest Democratic outside group, Lone Star Rising PAC, has spent $19.3 million.
The influx of Republican money arrived relatively late in the campaign, with Trump's MAGA Inc. super PAC not beginning major spending until early September.
"I think the cavalry arrived just in the nick of time for Paxton," said Republican donor and oil businessman Dan Eberhart.
GOING NEGATIVE
Much of that spending has funded attacks portraying Talarico as out of step with Texas voters on culture-war issues. Independent fact checkers say the ads distort Talarico's record, and Henson said their goal is “arousing negative sentiment among Republican voters” to boost turnout.
Texas PAC ads tell voters that Talarico is "for they/them, not you" and accuse him of supporting taxpayer-funded sex-change surgeries for minors. PolitiFact rated that claim false, noting that while Talarico opposed a 2023 ban on gender-transition care for minors, he has said he opposes gender-reassignment surgery for children.
A Paxton campaign ad featured an AI-generated Talarico reading from a fictional "King James (Talarico) Bible" that combined excerpts of his past remarks, including one describing God as "nonbinary." FactCheck.org said the ad lacked key context.
Talarico has responded by casting Paxton as "the most corrupt politician in Texas."
Paxton was impeached by the Republican-controlled Texas House in 2023 on abuse-of-office allegations but was acquitted by the state Senate. Separate state securities-fraud charges dating to 2015 were dropped in 2024 under an agreement requiring community service, ethics training and restitution. Paxton denied wrongdoing.
The Paxton campaign did not respond to requests for comment. It has previously said Talarico raises the allegations to distract from his own record.
Some voters say the Republican attacks are unconvincing.
Sal Anthony Rodriguez, a 32-year-old Houston operations manager who voted for Trump in 2020 and 2024, said he now supports Talarico, partly because of what he views as misleading attacks.
"I've seen a lot of ads saying that he is in 100% support for transgender surgeries on kids, and a quick Google search showed that that was not accurate," Rodriguez said.
Democrats argue the focus on cultural issues reflects Republican difficulty addressing voters' economic concerns.
"Voters are really pissed off about the state of their lives right now, and you can only run so many trans ads at people who are sick of paying $6 for diesel," said Chuck Rocha, a senior adviser to the Talarico campaign.
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Colorado, Andy Sullivan in Washington and Arathy Somasekhar in Houston; Additional reporting by Dawn Kopecki in New York and Alexandra Ulmer in San Francisco; Editing by Michael Learmonth and Cynthia Osterman)
