How do people square TX 2022 and 2024 results with eachother?

[ProgressiveModerate]

I think one of the biggest reasons why Trump's overperformance in TX was so shocking relative to CA/FL/NY for most is because in 2022, TX Dems actually had a fairly ok midterm.

They kept "the big 3" races (Gov, Lt Gov, AG) all to about R+10 despite almost no investment and being heavily outspent in the state by Republicans. Beto got or at least approached Biden numbers in most of the major urban cores and suburbs. We also saw a lot of Hispanic communities including RGV shift marginally back left from 2020 Pres.

I think many, myself included sort of assumed that 2022 was close to Harris's baseline in Texas, especially in these core urban and suburban counties which have historically seen downballot lag - surely in a Presidential year with more investment and presumably more even turnout dynamics, she'd do at least a little better. How could she lose Williamson County when Beto nearly won it?

However, in the end we all know what happened - TX lurched massively right and Trump carried the state by 14%. Trump made massive gains in non-white communities which didn't meaningfully budge in 2022 (and in some cases shifted left), and Harris struggled to make any meaningful improvements on Biden in whiter suburbs. It also seems like turnout dynamics somehow ended up being worse for Democrats than 2022 - turnout in key Dem bastions was just awful.

So I guess my question is relative to CA/FL/NY, why weren't the warning signs there in the 2022 midterms? Does Texas just have an abnormally high number of "Trump only voters" such that going forwards TX midterm electorates will be more Dem-friendly than Presidential elections? Was there something that happened specifically between 2022 and 2024 that pushed the state right? Did Trump get massively better persuasion than Abbot, Patrick, and Paxton?

[Arizona Iced Tea]

Abbott+11 was what I predicted back then and I don't know why people thought it was a bad result? Like sure he did a bit worse than 2018 but the Abbott of 2022 was much more polarizing, right wing, anti-immigration, and the state had a tough abortion ban in the aftermath of Dobbs. Beto was also a decently funded and a well known opponent. 2018 Abbott ran as a much more moderate figure and won by 13 against no name Lupe who was essentially a sacrificial lamb. Beto not even getting single digits was a pretty good performance for Texas Republicans.

[Crane]

Trump voters are very low-info and are less likely to be aware, or care, a non-Trump election is happening.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Abbott+11 was what I predicted back then and I don't know why people thought it was a bad result? Like sure he did a bit worse than 2018 but the Abbott of 2022 was much more polarizing, right wing, anti-immigration, and the state had a tough abortion ban in the aftermath of Dobbs. Beto was also a decently funded and a well known opponent. 2018 Abbott ran as a much more moderate figure and won by 13 against no name Lupe who was essentially a sacrificial lamb. Beto not even getting single digits was a pretty good performance for Texas Republicans.

It wasn’t necessarily a bad performance, but nothing that impressive either given the national environment - R+11 is about what you’d “expect” in a universal swing from 2020 Pres. But it’s also not the topline margins but the internal coalitions - like Beto and other statewide Dems doing fine with Hispanics and Asians while Dems in states like CA, FL, and NY struggled with those groups.

Does TX have an unusually high concentration of nonwhite voters who only show up for Trump? Were there a ton of Dem22/Trump24 voters in these communities? Did TX become fundamentally redder since 2022?

[Arizona Iced Tea]

Abbott+11 was what I predicted back then and I don't know why people thought it was a bad result? Like sure he did a bit worse than 2018 but the Abbott of 2022 was much more polarizing, right wing, anti-immigration, and the state had a tough abortion ban in the aftermath of Dobbs. Beto was also a decently funded and a well known opponent. 2018 Abbott ran as a much more moderate figure and won by 13 against no name Lupe who was essentially a sacrificial lamb. Beto not even getting single digits was a pretty good performance for Texas Republicans.

It wasn’t necessarily a bad performance, but nothing that impressive either given the national environment - R+11 is about what you’d “expect” in a universal swing from 2020 Pres. But it’s also not the topline margins but the internal coalitions - like Beto and other statewide Dems doing fine with Hispanics and Asians while Dems in states like CA, FL, and NY struggled with those groups.

Does TX have an unusually high concentration of nonwhite voters who only show up for Trump? Were there a ton of Dem22/Trump24 voters in these communities? Did TX become fundamentally redder since 2022?

Yeah so I think the theory for a while was that low propensity voters in Texas skewed more Dem than the midterm electorate. But I think that is no longer true. Trump got 77% of the first time voters in Texas, and based off demographics this is a majority minority crowd. Even if exits are off, he still clearly won them which bodes very bad for Dems in Texas. The midterm environment in Texas is still too red for them to win unlike the midwest, but now the high turnout they were waiting for countered in the opposite direction.

TLDR: The 2022 Texas electorate that participated in 2024 likely didn't budge from two years, but all of these low-prop voters and minorities broke to Trump on net and allowed him to improve his margins pretty much everywhere statewide.

[有爭議嘅領土 of The Figgis Agency]

It wasn’t necessarily a bad performance, but nothing that impressive either given the national environment - R+11 is about what you’d “expect” in a universal swing from 2020 Pres. But it’s also not the topline margins but the internal coalitions - like Beto and other statewide Dems doing fine with Hispanics and Asians while Dems in states like CA, FL, and NY struggled with those groups.

Does TX have an unusually high concentration of nonwhite voters who only show up for Trump? Were there a ton of Dem22/Trump24 voters in these communities? Did TX become fundamentally redder since 2022?

It's generally a pretty bad sign for a D candidate in a statewide race if their R opponent is winning 48% of Asian voters in the exit poll- especially in a plurality Non-Hispanic White state like TX. This would be considered "sh**tting the bed with nonwhite voters" in any state where the benchmark for D success is better than "not losing by double digits".

Until someone can demonstrate otherwise with precinct level results, my default assumption for why the Texas Triangle was so R this cycle will be 1) bad D turnout of pre-2021 voters of all backgrounds + 2) good R persuasion of swing voters, indies, and post-2021 new voters of all backgrounds.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Was TX-GOV being less close than NY-GOV supposed to be a good sign for Democrats? It's still crazy that NY ended up being the closest state of the big 4 for President.

[ottermax]

Looking at things regionally I think the warning signs were pretty clear along the border and in Houston in 2022.

The one place that stands out the most to me is Austin. Of all the metros it should've stayed more stable because it attracts more Democratic migrants - or at least I assumed that to be true. I'm really shocked that it swung pretty much in line with the rest of the state. Similar but maybe less shocking for DFW and San Antonio.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Looking at things regionally I think the warning signs were pretty clear along the border and in Houston in 2022.

The one place that stands out the most to me is Austin. Of all the metros it should've stayed more stable because it attracts more Democratic migrants - or at least I assumed that to be true. I'm really shocked that it swung pretty much in line with the rest of the state. Similar but maybe less shocking for DFW and San Antonio.

What "clear warnings" - RGV shifted left and O Rourke did fine in greater Houston given the national circumstances and that these races were never taken seriously.

Travis and Hays counting shifting left 2020 Pres --> 2022 Gov was also such bait.

[iceman]

All I’ve thought that Texas was an “anti-Trump” state as he only got 9% and 5% in 2016 and 2020 respectiively. It ws one of the places where I thought would buck the trend this year as the nation swings right. But in the end, I was astonished how it went to Trump bu 14%. That is even more surprising for me than Trump’s 13% win in Florida.

[ottermax]

Looking at things regionally I think the warning signs were pretty clear along the border and in Houston in 2022.

The one place that stands out the most to me is Austin. Of all the metros it should've stayed more stable because it attracts more Democratic migrants - or at least I assumed that to be true. I'm really shocked that it swung pretty much in line with the rest of the state. Similar but maybe less shocking for DFW and San Antonio.

What "clear warnings" - RGV shifted left and O Rourke did fine in greater Houston given the national circumstances and that these races were never taken seriously.

Travis and Hays counting shifting left 2020 Pres --> 2022 Gov was also such bait.

RGV still voted much closer than normal in 2022 and shifted quite a lot towards Abbott compared to 2018. He did do fine in Houston - I think I mixed that up with the general 2016-2020 shift being a disappointment there.

[lfromnj]

Looking at things regionally I think the warning signs were pretty clear along the border and in Houston in 2022.

The one place that stands out the most to me is Austin. Of all the metros it should've stayed more stable because it attracts more Democratic migrants - or at least I assumed that to be true. I'm really shocked that it swung pretty much in line with the rest of the state. Similar but maybe less shocking for DFW and San Antonio.

What "clear warnings" - RGV shifted left and O Rourke did fine in greater Houston given the national circumstances and that these races were never taken seriously.

Travis and Hays counting shifting left 2020 Pres --> 2022 Gov was also such bait.

Yup the only county that moved right was Cameron , Mayra Flores actually did really good in Brownsville TX in 2022 .

[CentristRepublican]

Abbott+11 was what I predicted back then and I don't know why people thought it was a bad result? Like sure he did a bit worse than 2018 but the Abbott of 2022 was much more polarizing, right wing, anti-immigration, and the state had a tough abortion ban in the aftermath of Dobbs. Beto was also a decently funded and a well known opponent. 2018 Abbott ran as a much more moderate figure and won by 13 against no name Lupe who was essentially a sacrificial lamb. Beto not even getting single digits was a pretty good performance for Texas Republicans.

Seems like Abbott was a reverse Kemp in some ways...Kemp came off as a hyperpartisan, strongly MAGA, hard-right R who polarized a lot of Ds. By 2022 he came off as more of a (relatively) reasonable Republicans, had much more goodwill with Dems, and therefore did quite a bit better.

Also, yeah, I think abortion was def much more important in 2022 than 2024, esp in states like Texas. The longer these anti-abortion laws are on the books, the more ppl and politicians will adjust themselves to them, and the less of an issue the laws will be.

Trump voters are very low-info and are less likely to be aware, or care, a non-Trump election is happening.

Which is why Rs did a lot better in 2022 than 2020? C'mon, you can do better than this.