There’s a sound that carries in it 38 years of dashed hopes, of close calls and complete wipeouts. It’s thousands of triumphant screams and gasps and cries of elation layered into one riotous wall of noise. It’s Democrat James Talarico becoming the next
senator from the state of Texas.
Attendees at Talarico’s election night headquarters in Austin wept at the sight of the yellow checkmark over his candidate headshot, declaring him the projected winner over the Donald Trump-endorsed Ken Paxton. They clung to each other and screamed “WE DID IT” at the top of their lungs. Seconds later, any remaining cobwebs of anxiety about how the midterms might go were wiped away as the networks projected the victory of Gina Hinojosa over three-term incumbent Republican Governor Greg Abbott. The crowd, several thousand strong, broke into a “U-S-A” chant, followed by a round of “Si Se Puede” — “Yes, We Can” — a nod to the force of Hispanic Texans, and the state’s first Latina governor.
Campaign staffers and pundits nervously warned that it would likely be a late night. Late polling gave Talarico the advantage over Paxton, but given the deep-red character of the state, virtually all agreed it would be a nail-biter. You could practically taste the anxiety in the November air as results came in on Tuesday evening. “I feel like Charlie Brown,” with “the football” every election cycle, one Talarico supporter told Rolling Stone early in the evening, referencing the running gag from Peanuts.
Republicans have dominated the state’s politics for the last three decades, and every time it has looked like Democrats might break their losing streak, they end up falling on their asses. If Talarico lost despite Trump and Paxton’s combined unpopularity, and the clear momentum behind his campaign, then there was perhaps truly no future for Texas Democrats.
Supporters were hopeful, but no one would have dared to jinx it by predicting a statewide sweep. Paxton was only the first Republican domino that fell over the course of the night, though. Abbott, thought to be in a far more secure position than his AG, was also voted out of office. Democrats took the lieutenant governorship and the state attorney general’s office, both extraordinarily powerful offices in the Texas government. They took the comptroller’s office, railroad commissioner, and agricultural commissioner. They even took control of the state House of Representatives. “I’m hearing Democrats may not even have enough people to staff all the new offices,” one college-aged Talarico supporter told Rolling Stone amid the festivities.
Texans did not just pull off a fluke win for a perfect-storm Democratic candidate running under just the right set of conditions — they led the country into a generational blue tsunami. The Lone Star State was the epicenter. Many of the Texans celebrating in Austin have lived their entire lives without experiencing a major Democratic win in their state, and vividly remembered the sting of Beto O’Rourke’s narrow loss in 2018. But Blue Texas was here. Armadillos had learned to fly. Longhorns had broken into song.
Talarico’s watch party, held at the Long Center on the banks of the Colorado River, had the light air of a fair. On the large outdoor terrace holding the majority of supporters, food trucks serving tacos and barbeque — and a long bar — kept attendees well provisioned. Local vendors were selling custom bejeweled “Talafreako” t-shirts, ceramics, embroidered bandanas, and face painting. As the audience waited for Talarico to take the stage and claim his victory, members of the crowd performed the wave. Campaign staffers and volunteers, misty-eyed and grinning from ear to ear, hugged each other in the aisles.
“Talarico was not campaigning by saying ‘I’m representing the Democratic Party,’” David Maxwell, a lifelong Republican, Texas Ranger, and whistleblower against Paxton, told Rolling Stone near the taco line. He, like other Republicans in the state, gave his support to Talarico partially as a rebuke to the self-dealing, corrupt record of Paxton — who has become a pariah within his own party. “[Talarico] said I’m representing the 31 million Texans,” Maxwell said.
It was a message Talarico would reiterate in his victory speech:
“To the Texans who didn’t vote for me, I will be your senator too. I always will. I will always serve you. I will always fight for you. This win is not about the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. It’s much bigger than that. We must bridge the divides between us and repair the ties that bind us. We forged a new kind of politics here in the Lone Star State. In answer to this decade of division, we showed that when working people come together across every dividing line, we can do extraordinary things.”
His supporters have been embracing that message for months now. When asked by Rolling Stone what they hoped would change in Texas under Democratic governance, attendees mentioned everything from corruption, to environmental regulations, to housing affordability and the protection of public education.
Through the early hours of Wednesday morning, after Talarico delivered his victory speech, Texans continued to shout their glee, from the streets, from out of their cars, from literal rooftops. Outside of the Texas Capitol building, a steady stream of revelers blasted music and cheered on vehicles engaging in celebratory honking — in the local fashion usually associated with victories for the San Antonio Spurs, not down ballot Democrats.
One junior Texas legislative staffer described himself as being in a state of “euphoria.”
“I thought this shit would be like 15 years in the future,” he said, as Bad Bunny’s “CAFé CON RON” blasted on a portable JBL speaker, with neighbors clad in all manner of Texas-themed paraphernalia dancing around the Capitol gates. “[I thought] that [winning] would be like a 50-50 squeak … I feel like this is kind of like the end of Trump — or end of MAGA to say the least —- because there’s no way a Democrat wins Texas by 15 points.”
Austin, a young woman from a small, deeply Christian town in rural Texas, told Rolling Stone that she was “so hopeful for America it scares me.”
“It feels even more euphoric than Obama in 2008,” she added.
Chants of “Fuck Greg Abbott” went up just feet away from the governor’s mansion — soon to be occupied by a Democrat for the first time since Texas legend and former Governor Ann Richards finished her term in 1995. Drivers, windows rolled down and sun roofs opened, waved pom poms and signs and shouted “VIVA LA LIBERTAD” as if they had just defeated the Mexican army.
At one point a young man runs through the crowd, frantically holding out his phone to anyone who will look. “ABDUL IS WINNING,” he announces, a temporary town crier bringing news from beyond the borders about Abdul El-Sayed’s Senate race in Michigan, which would be called for the Democrat a few hours later.
“It finally happened,” another man — speedwalking down the sidewalk — exclaimed at another, not even bothering to stick around to hear his reply.
“It finally happened,” his target practically whispered back in reply, almost to himself, like a reassurance that a blue Texas was no longer just a dream. Democrats no longer have to hope they can carve out a future in the conservative stronghold. As of Tuesday night, they are the state’s future.
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