Interesting fact about Abbott in 2018 is according to the exit polls he actually did worse than Trump with whites, 40% margin vs 43% for Trump but did better statewide because he did a lot better with black and hispanic voters. The county by county shift backs this up, he did much better than Trump in heavily hispanic areas whereas he basically matched or under-performed Trump in the whiter areas of the state.
If I recall correctly, Abbott came within single digits in the three "Fajita Strip" districts of South Texas-those of Gonzalez, Cuellar, and Vela. He did significantly better in those districts than Cruz. Abbott of course, also won Will Hurd's district by a solid margin as well.
Abbott also won TX-7 and TX-32 by 5+ points.
Well, yes, but Dems had basically conceded the race by October. If anything, the surprising part was he only won by 12 instead of 20.
I really think the moderately pro-life Dem who lost the primary runoff could have won it JBE style.
