{"id":118987,"date":"2026-01-11T12:35:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T12:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/118987\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T12:35:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T12:35:06","slug":"democrats-go-statewide-in-texas-house-races","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/118987\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats go statewide in Texas House races"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">AUSTIN \u2014 For the first time in modern Texas politics, Democrats will field candidates in every one of the state\u2019s 150 House districts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">It\u2019s a milestone party leaders hope will boost turnout, money and organization up and down the ballot, even as Gov. Greg Abbott enters the cycle with a well-tested ground game of his own.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Democratic leaders say the move is less about flipping deeply red districts and more about expanding the electorate and forcing Republicans to defend territory they have long taken for granted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Houston Rep. Christina Morales, the new chief of the Texas House Democratic Campaign Committee, said a full slate of candidates creates infrastructure that can benefit statewide races, regardless of the odds in individual districts.<\/p>\n<p>Breaking News<\/p>\n<p class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__3beff secondaryRoman secondaryRoman-20 text-center text-gray-dark\">Get the latest breaking news from North Texas and beyond.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__8MgJa flex flex-wrap text-gray-dark secondaryRoman secondaryRoman-10 text-center justify-center\">By signing up, you agree to our\u00a0<a class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__lU9-l border-b border-gray-dark hover_border-0 focus_border-0 active_border-0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasnews.com\/help\/terms-of-service\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Terms of Service<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__lU9-l border-b border-gray-dark hover_border-0 focus_border-0 active_border-0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasnews.com\/help\/privacy-policy\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Campaigns that once existed only on paper now bring door-knocking, phone banking and voter registration efforts, she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Morales also is coordinating with national Democrats, trying to harness energy from Texas\u2019 high-profile Senate race, marked by a bitter GOP feud.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">In that primary, incumbent Sen. John Cornyn faces Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt of Houston.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">The Democratic Senate contest, featuring state Rep. James Talarico of Austin and U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Dallas, has drawn wide voter interest and donor support.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">But attention and money only go so far.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Abbott enters the cycle with a major advantage: a mature, statewide voter-mobilization network built over decades of Republican control.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">\u201cAbbott has made it his own,\u201d said longtime GOP strategist Thomas Graham, citing sustained relationship-building at the precinct level and focus on local concerns. \u201cDemocrats are still rebuilding a statewide party. The ground game heavily favors the governor.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUSTIN \u2014 For the first time in modern Texas politics, Democrats will field candidates in every one of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":80429,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,288,223,287],"class_list":{"0":"post-118987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news","11":"tag-elections","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}