Texas Republicans figured the Lone Star State was locked down for good.
Then the Senate polls tightened, and the President packed his bags for San Antonio.
And in front of a roaring arena crowd, Trump laid down one personal warning about Texas that nobody saw coming.
Thousands Packed the Alamo City Hours Before Trump Took the Stage
President Trump rolled into San Antonio’s Joe Freeman Coliseum on October 7 for a get-out-the-vote rally, his third trip to Texas since late September.
Breitbart Texas reported that the arena was nearly full while several thousand more supporters still waited outside, watching the speakers on a jumbotron. Some of those folks showed up in the morning and stood in the warm sun for hours, with food trucks and merchandise vendors working the grounds around them.
That’s a Texas-sized turnout by anybody’s count.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Republican nominee for US Senate, joined Trump at the event along with Carlos de la Cruz, a Republican running for the US House.
Then Trump got to the line that brought the house down. “I’ll never forgive Texas if Talarico wins,” he told the crowd, pushing conservative voters to max out turnout across the state.
Trump spent a good stretch of the speech on the border. He reminded the audience what the Biden years did to Texas, and he warned that the flood comes right back if Democrats retake Washington, DC.
“If they get in, they will open your borders and let the entire world pour in like they did before. We can’t let that happen,” Trump said.
He saved his sharpest jab for Paxton’s opponent, Democrat state Representative James Talarico. “A vote for Talafreako is a vote to turn Texas into a dirty, failing, crime-ridden third-world dumping ground,” Trump declared.
And he kept going. “The people of Texas are NOT going to let weak, gutless, self-hating, transgender-promoting FREAK SHOWS destroy everything that we’ve built.”
Outside on Houston Street, at least 200 protesters gathered. The Party for Socialism and Liberation, a self-described Marxist-Leninist group, organized the demonstration alongside the Bexar County Democrats, and plenty of the signs carried vulgar anti-ICE slogans.
The PSL’s online promotion accused the President of running a “campaign of terror through ICE” and complained that one in four deportations happens in Texas. Folks in border towns who spent four years watching the Biden crisis unfold might call that number the system finally doing its job.
Police kept the two crowds apart. The protesters stayed peaceful.
Washington Republicans Left Ken Paxton to Fend for Himself
So why does a President who carried Texas by 14 points in 2024 need three trips in a matter of weeks to fire up the base?
The polls tell part of the story. A New York Times/Siena survey put Talarico at 51 percent to Paxton’s 45. A Barbara Jordan Policy Research and Survey Center poll had it far closer, 47 to 46. A Beacon Research and Shaw and Company poll showed Talarico up 51 to 49.
But the numbers don’t come out of nowhere.
Paxton beat incumbent US Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) in a May 26 runoff after Trump endorsed him. Cornyn carried plenty of baggage with the base into that race. He served as the lead Republican negotiator on Joe Biden’s 2022 gun control law, and he backed 2018 legislation offering a path to citizenship for so-called Dreamers, which is amnesty no matter what anyone calls it.
And Cornyn has made clear he won’t lift a finger. He told the Texas Tribune, “Paxton’s a poor campaigner,” and he told Semafor that Trump “can spend his money” if he wants to help. Cornyn built a donor network worth hundreds of millions over his career. Not a dime of it is headed to the Republican nominee in his own state.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and the National Republican Senatorial Committee spent millions during the primary trashing Paxton. The NRSC insisted the fight for the Senate majority “should not be fought in Texas” with Paxton as the nominee. When summer came, Axios reported that Texas didn’t make the NRSC’s list of eight battleground races, and the Thune-linked super PAC left the state off its first round of ad reservations.
Meanwhile, Talarico raised $30 million in the second quarter of 2026. Paxton raised $9 million.
So Thune went on Fox News and asked the President to cover the tab. “All of our allies out there, including the President and his team and their resources, need to be brought to bear on Texas,” Thune said.
Read that one twice. The same leadership crew that spent months trying to keep Paxton off the ballot now wants Trump to pay for the seat they swore Paxton would cost them.
MAGA world answered anyway. Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc, placed a $10 million ad buy for Paxton in September, and Elon Musk’s America PAC has spent more than $1.6 million in the race.
Governor Greg Abbott skipped the San Antonio rally, by the way, citing a scheduling conflict. He spoke at a Republican event in College Station that same night. Make of that what you will.
Chuck Schumer Swallowed His Pride in Michigan
Now look at how the other side handles an insurgent nominee.
In Michigan, US Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) backed Representative Haley Stevens (D-MI) in the Democrat primary. Her opponent, Abdul El-Sayed, ran with endorsements from Bernie Sanders and AOC and campaigned openly on pushing Schumer out of leadership. “If you’re Chuck Schumer, I’m dangerous,” El-Sayed said during the race.
El-Sayed won the August 4 primary anyway.
Schumer and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee endorsed him almost immediately. When reporters asked whether the two had buried the hatchet, Schumer brushed it off. “Look, we have to win Michigan and we had a great and friendly meeting,” he said.
Democrats can’t stand El-Sayed’s attacks on their leader. But they still fell in line behind him within hours, because power matters more to them than pride. A Democrat Senate majority is the doorway to amnesty, court packing, and every other scheme to lock in a permanent electoral advantage, and Schumer knows it.
The Republican establishment watched a Trump-endorsed nominee win fair and square and responded by keeping its wallet in its pocket.
It’s hard to read that as anything other than payback for Trump’s endorsement. Thune and the Cornyn wing would like a Republican Party that looks a lot more like the one that existed before 2016, and a strong MAGA senator from Texas makes that harder heading into 2028. Maybe some of them would honestly rather hand the seat to a Democrat for six years than watch an America First Republican take it.
Maybe that goes too far. Then again, nobody in Washington has offered a better explanation for why the richest donor network in Texas politics is sitting this one out.
Even Willie Nelson recently put out a video endorsing Talarico, which tells anybody paying attention how much attention the Left is pouring into Texas.
Early voting runs from October 19 through October 30, and Election Day falls on November 3.
Trump made the race personal in San Antonio. The Washington crowd that should have been standing beside Paxton left that job to him.
Sources: Breitbart News, “Trump: ‘I’ll Never Forgive Texas if Talarico Wins,’ Speaking at GOTV Rally in San Antonio”; CBS Austin, “Trump heads to San Antonio to boost Paxton in tight Texas Senate race”; KSAT; FOX 4 Dallas-Fort Worth; Texas Tribune, reporting on Cornyn fundraising and Musk’s America PAC; Axios, “Thune to attend Paxton fundraiser”; Washington Examiner, “Thune-aligned PAC stays on sidelines as Cornyn slips in Texas runoff”; Texas Public Radio, “MAGA Inc. cavalry arrives for Paxton”; Daily Gazette/Texas Tribune, “Trump, Musk allies pour millions into Paxton’s GOP Senate bid”; WDIO/Associated Press; Fox News, “Dem insurgent turns on the charm with party establishment”; Daily Wire, “Schumer Endorses El-Sayed, Who Campaigned On Replacing Him”