Democrat James Talarico (pictured at left) and Republican Ken Paxton (right) are competing in the Nov. 3 election for U.S. Senate in Texas.
Abigail Dollins
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
A new poll finds that the U.S. Senate race between Republican Ken Paxton and Democrat James Talarico is in a virtual tie.
Recent polls have given Talarico a modest edge over Paxton but show a close race as Democrats work to win control of Congress for President Donald Trump’s final two years in the White House. The latest survey from the Barbara Jordan Public Policy Research and Survey Center at Texas Southern University is no different, placing Talarico with a one point lead over Paxton in the Texas race.
Talarico, an Austin-area state representative, won 47% of respondents to the Texas attorney general’s 46% in the poll of 1,800 likely voters.
The poll was conducted between Sept. 15-19 and has a margin of error of 2.3 percentage points, meaning results may swing by that much in either direction.
The survey put Republican Incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott ahead of state Rep. Gina Hinojosa, his Democratic opponent, by four points.
In the race for lieutenant governor, Republican incumbent Dan Patrick leads Democratic State Rep. Vikki Goodwin by six points.
The tightest statewide race — after the U.S. Senate contest — is the election for railroad commissioner. Republican Bo French leads his Democratic opponent, state Rep. Jon Rosenthal, by two points, according to the poll.
French, a former Tarrant County GOP chair, has drawn criticism from some fellow Republicans in recent days for a Sept. 13 social media post targeting students of South Asian descent who attended a University of Texas football game.
French is seen as unfavorable by 32% of September poll’s respondents, an increase from the 14% of voters who saw him as unfavorable when surveyed in late July. At the time, 67% of likely voters said they didn’t know enough about French to have an opinion about him compared to 46% this month.
This story was originally published September 22, 2026 at 5:02 AM.
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Eleanor (Elly) Dearman is a Texas politics and government reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. She’s based in Austin, covering the Legislature and its impact on North Texas. She grew up in Denton and has been a reporter for more than six years.
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