Texas 2022 megathread

[Shaula🏳️‍⚧️]

Party with the lead for gubernatorial primaries by county - FINAL NUMBERS

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2,995,580 Texans voted in these primaries, 17.43% of registered Texan voters.

1,057,637 (35.31%) voted in the Democratic Primary
1,937,943 (64.69%) voted in the Republican Primary


Primary voting swing from 2018 gubernatorial primaries to 2022 gubernatorial primaries

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Turnout went up by 1.41% in the Democratic primaries and 25.11% up in the Republican primaries, as the total number of voters increased from 2.59 Million to 3.00 Million. In the 2018 primaries, the Republican primaries took up 59.8% of voters, which went up to 64.7% in 2022.


Blue for Democrats
Red for Republicans

RGV going R is a trend, not something specific to Trump, lockdowns or "disinformation" in 2020. It's here to stay.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

A nine pt lead in a Latino state isn't that large with nine MNTHS left the primary on the D side was non competitive and D's and Rs are gonna have everyone on the ballot in November just like in VA everyone wasn't on the ballot in 2022 our Federal candidates weren't on the ballot and we lost

[Benjamin Frank]

It doesn't really makes any difference, but in the end Louie Gohmert fell short of third place by just 8,000 votes.

[Unelectable Bystander]

Those El Paso numbers (and I think other populated counties too?) are huge and show that it’s not just Zapata county it’s swaths of people

[MT Treasurer]

Those El Paso numbers (and I think other populated counties too?) are huge and show that it’s not just Zapata county it’s swaths of people

Yes, this is why the narrative that it’s just some rural/small-town border counties in the RGV/South TX that will barely make a dent in the inevitable D trend and be completely overwhelmed by massive D shifts in the metro areas is flawed. If all those 'smaller' counties and El Paso/Hidalgo trend strongly to the right and Houston remains stagnant, even Dallas, Fort Worth, and Austin very likely won’t flip the state this decade.

We’ll see what happens, but right now, TX isn’t looking like "GA 2016" but more like a (more) Republican mirror image of MN. That could change, so Republicans can’t get overconfident, but I don’t think TX becoming a blue state any time soon is quite as inevitable as it’s made out to be.

[Real Texan Politics]

Oh so that's why it took forever to count the votes in my county. Absolutely disgraceful.
https://twitter.com/KennethRWebster/status/1502662360217133060?s=20&t=BCv0kW...

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Remember not to extrapolate too much on basis of primary turnout results.

[SpartanburgSam]

https://mobile.twitter.com/SwainForSenate/status/1504243316967174146

[ElectionsGuy]

Oh so that's why it took forever to count the votes in my county. Absolutely disgraceful.
https://twitter.com/KennethRWebster/status/1502662360217133060?s=20&t=BCv0kW...

I wouldn't go so far as to say "arrest her for election fraud", but stuff like this cannot continue to happen. It's one of the key reasons people have a distrust of elections. In a close general election, this is unacceptable. It doesn't even matter who it benefits to me, the normalization of delayed counting has damaged our democratic integrity. What's worse is the people who claim to care the most about democracy don't seem to care and in fact make excuses for it.

[ElectionsGuy]

Remember not to extrapolate too much on basis of primary turnout results.

Primary turnout is more predictive than polls at this point. It was one of the key indicators rebuffing the polling narrative in 2020. So forgive me if I don't think we should just forget about it. Obviously, the margins/turnout aren't predictive in of itself but comparatively, it is.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Remember not to extrapolate too much on basis of primary turnout results.

Primary turnout is more predictive than polls at this point. It was one of the key indicators rebuffing the polling narrative in 2020. So forgive me if I don't think we should just forget about it. Obviously, the margins/turnout aren't predictive in of itself but comparatively, it is.
[/quote

Lol the D primary had no competetive race and all D candidates will be on the ballot in Nov unlike in Primary when races were uncontested that's why we lost VA we had State races but no Federal races, there won't be this large difference in D v R turnout

Do you know how many votes pundits are predicting 140 M which helps D

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Remember not to extrapolate too much on basis of primary turnout results.

Primary turnout is more predictive than polls at this point. It was one of the key indicators rebuffing the polling narrative in 2020. So forgive me if I don't think we should just forget about it. Obviously, the margins/turnout aren't predictive in of itself but comparatively, it is.

Even assuming what you said was true (a rather dubious assertion), correlation does not mean causation.

[Unelectable Bystander]

Remember not to extrapolate too much on basis of primary turnout results.

I also don’t pronounce someone guilty just for being in the area at the time of a crime, but when there’s several other pieces of circumstantial evidence, it becomes concrete evidence. We keep seeing signs of the RGV transformation

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

9 pts in TX is nothing in 140 M vote turnout Election that's why Crist is completetive in FL and some polls Crist leads in

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/opinion/editorials/2022/03/15/florida-democrats-should-settle-now-one-candidate-face-desantis/7026921001/

This articles explain watch out for Latino vote in Red states

DeSantis is now the most overrated politician running for reelection that's why FL is turning back blue

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Sorry to tell Rs if FL is competitive and it is, TX is competitive too, I know a sweep is a stretch but if you have TX you have FL, something is going on, there are enough Latinos on both states that definitely want PR Statehood

[Sir Mohamed]

Sorry to tell Rs if FL is competitive and it is, TX is competitive too, I know a sweep is a stretch but if you have TX you have FL, something is going on, there are enough Latinos on both states that definitely want PR Statehood

Both won't be in single digits and are Safe R. Unfortunately.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Sorry to tell Rs if FL is competitive and it is, TX is competitive too, I know a sweep is a stretch but if you have TX you have FL, something is going on, there are enough Latinos on both states that definitely want PR Statehood

Both won't be in single digits and are Safe R. Unfortunately.

o
Do you know that the 12 pt poll was a University poll from FL both University of FL and St Leo poll have DeSantis up 12 the same QU poll that has Biden at 39 and had Biden ahead on the Final weekend, stop trusting University polls.

The same University polls overpredicted Biden and now underpredicting him now

If it's trueky a 303 map Trump won FL by 3 not 12 pts

[Real Texan Politics]

Just an update, I'm expanding this thread to include other statewide/local races in Texas, not just the gubernatorial race.

This'll especially be useful for the AG runoff (and all the other runoffs) in May.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Don't extrapolate too much from this. Abbott will not win Harris County.

[Real Texan Politics]

Don't extrapolate too much from this. Abbott will not win Harris County.

Agreed, I’d expect it to be sorta like Cornyn 2020 but with better margins in south Texas and maybe a bit worse in some suburban counties like Collin.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Don't extrapolate too much from this. Abbott will not win Harris County.

Agreed, I’d expect it to be sorta like Cornyn 2020 but with better margins in south Texas and maybe a bit worse in some suburban counties like Collin.

Do you think Dems have a shot at Williamson County in 2022? It voted for Cornyn by 3, but is getting better for Dems at light speed, and Biden was narrowly able to win it.

Ft. Bend will also be interesting to watch IMO because if Rs outright win it or at least keep it close it would likely mean an R improvement amongst suburban higher income/education minorities.

[Real Texan Politics]

Don't extrapolate too much from this. Abbott will not win Harris County.

Agreed, I’d expect it to be sorta like Cornyn 2020 but with better margins in south Texas and maybe a bit worse in some suburban counties like Collin.

Do you think Dems have a shot at Williamson County in 2022? It voted for Cornyn by 3, but is getting better for Dems at light speed, and Biden was narrowly able to win it.

Ft. Bend will also be interesting to watch IMO because if Rs outright win it or at least keep it close it would likely mean an R improvement amongst suburban higher income/education minorities.

Certainly a shot dems win Williamson, especially as the Austin suburbs grow at a rapid rate. I'd put it as 50/50 now, but giving a slight edge to Abbott (would most likely be its last hoorah for republicans if he wins it).

Fort Bend only voted for Abbott by under 500 votes in 2018; it's almost guaranteed to flip in my opinion, red wave or not.

[ElectionsGuy]

My Very Early Estimate, (more or less)



Abbott - 56%
O'Rourke - 42%

All counties >70% are one color.

Abbott --> O'Rourke: Fort Bend
Valdez --> Abbott: Cameron, Willacy, Zapata (very possible: that area in general + Culberson)

The kinds of shifts I'm expecting (gueses)

Collin: 59-39 Abbott --> 56-43 Abbott
Williamson: 54-43 Abbott --> 52-46 Abbott

Zapata: 60-40 Valdez --> 53-46 Abbott
Duval: 62-37 Valdez --> 50-49 O'Rourke
Starr: 68-31 Valdez --> 54-45 O'Rourke

Hard to say how hard R the valley will swing, but I think it's very likely to swing R, but will lag Trump's performance a bit comparatively. Abbott may do better than Trump but mostly because he'll do better overall. I think he'll do better than Trump regardless in the urban counties (Cameron and Hidalgo), with the rural counties most likely to lag.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

We all know FL is more swingy than TX we are not gonna win FL we are targeting blue dog seats OH, MO Sen and FL Gov and LA Sen all blue dogs competitive, Fettetman is definitely working class a s so is Mark Kelly

[ProgressiveModerate]

Those El Paso numbers (and I think other populated counties too?) are huge and show that it’s not just Zapata county it’s swaths of people

Yes, this is why the narrative that it’s just some rural/small-town border counties in the RGV/South TX that will barely make a dent in the inevitable D trend and be completely overwhelmed by massive D shifts in the metro areas is flawed. If all those 'smaller' counties and El Paso/Hidalgo trend strongly to the right and Houston remains stagnant, even Dallas, Fort Worth, and Austin very likely won’t flip the state this decade.

We’ll see what happens, but right now, TX isn’t looking like "GA 2016" but more like a (more) Republican mirror image of MN. That could change, so Republicans can’t get overconfident, but I don’t think TX becoming a blue state any time soon is quite as inevitable as it’s made out to be.

in order for those shifts to matter though, the GOP has to actually be cutting into Dems net vote margins otherwise they're just stopping Dems from winning as many votes as they could have.

In 2020 for instance, Biden still net more votes than Clinton out of El Paso, even if it swung right.

However, in Hidalgo, Trump cut Biden's margin (from HRC) by ~35k votes which is pretty substantial. However, unless you believe the GOP will start outright winning the County, the 38k remaining votes in Biden's margin isn't a lot to cut into.

A reminder that in just 1 cycle, Biden was able to net about 100k more votes out of Dallas and Travis counties a piece, and still expanded on Clinton's Harris County margin by about 60k votes despite it's "stagnation". That more than cancels out Hidalgo.

If the GOP wants to hold Texas, Hidalgo doesn't do much unless it actually becomes strongly GOP leaning, but increasing raw vote margins in areas that already heavily favour them but have low turnout would probably go much further

You could use the same argument for Dems. It's probably not worth it to invest in rural Texas, but heavily minority parts of Dallas and Houston in particularly have quite poor turnout; juicing that up could really help them. Even if Houston stagnates, if turnout increases Dems can still net more raw votes out of it.

My guess is Texas is in reach for Dems going forwards but it takes a bit before it actually votes to the left of the nation.