WASHINGTON — In a high-stakes contest that could help determine control of the U.S. Senate, the candidates are crisscrossing Texas, and trying to make their case to voters one last time.
With less than a week until Election Day, Republican Ken Paxton and Democrat James Talarico are battling to convince their supporters to vote.
The GOP has dominated Texas politics for decades, and President Donald Trump wants to keep it that way. The president has campaigned in Texas multiple times for the Texas attorney general and other Republicans. Paxton promised to fight for more tax cuts.
His closing ad asks, “You decide, Talarico’s Texas or our Texas.”
Paxton argues that he is the best choice to protect Texans’ livelihoods and way of life, and that Talarico is too extreme and radical.
“If you vote for a guy like James Talarico versus me, we end up 3,000 miles apart, and that’s why these elections have become life-saving for the country,” Paxton said in Corpus Christi this week.
Talarico is trying to be the first Texas Democrat to win statewide in 30 years. To do so, the state representative from the Austin-area is tapping into voters’ frustrations with the economy and also tying it to a corruption crisis that he argues Paxton embodies.
In his closing ad, Talarico says, “Together, we can defeat the most corrupt politician in Texas.”
Talarico is calling for repealing the Republican tax cuts for the wealthy and enacting universal child care.
“I want to be a senator for every Texan who can’t afford one,” Talarico said at a rally at the University of Texas at Austin.
Political science professor Matthew Wilson said both candidates are closing primarily with arguments that their opponent is unfit for office, in hopes that will get their supporters to the polls.
“It is both more likely to change at least a few minds, and it’s what motivates people, particularly in the base, is their level of animosity towards the candidate on the other side,” Wilson said.
“Talarico, he needs strong turnout in minority communities, from African American voters and from Hispanic voters in Texas, including seeing Hispanic voters migrate somewhat back towards the Democratic Party compared to where they’ve been in the last couple of cycles. From Paxton’s standpoint, he needs at the end of the day Republican voters to come home,” Wilson continued.
It has been one of the most closely watched and costliest Senate races in history, with groups spending hundreds of millions of dollars on Paxton and Talarico. Election Day will show which message resonated with Texas.