\n
![\"Newsletter](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1788864251_579_Newletter_signUp_Small.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nDuring a podcast conversation with Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick released Wednesday, Trump said Paxton would be a major focus of the convention.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to get him elected\u201d over \u201cthis weirdo, this freako,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
Talarico has dismissed the name-calling and said he will make appearances around Dallas during the convention, pushing his proposals on housing, healthcare, the border, jobs and the economy.<\/p>\n
Paxton has offered fewer new policies while trashing Talarico over gender, religion and other issues Republicans believe could cost him votes.<\/p>\n
Trump and other Republicans are expected to pile on the Democratic state representative at the convention.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s the over-under, 100?\u201d asked GOP consultant Vinny Minchillo, who has worked for Trump\u2019s campaigns, predicting how often speakers will invoke Talarico. \u201cYou\u2019re going to hear his name a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Talarico entered the summer with a $21.5 million-to-$1.8 million cash-on-hand advantage and largely had the airwaves to himself, running glowing biographical ads.<\/p>\n
\u201cPaxton and his team know they have not done enough,\u201d Minchillo said. \u201cThey are about to let the hounds out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paxton sounded an urgent note at a recent Parker County rally. \u201cWe\u2019ve only got one Texas,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we lose our one Texas, there\u2019s nowhere else to go.\u201d<\/p>\n
Talarico stepped up his response last week, airing his first negative TV spot, calling Paxton corrupt and unfit for office.<\/p>\n
Talarico told The Dallas Morning News that as Republicans hang out with mega-donors at the convention, he will be traveling across North Texas and talking about \u201chow we can get this economy back on track.\u201d<\/p>\n
Partisan push<\/p>\n
Paxton, a veteran of statewide campaigns, has spent much of his political career dogged by legal and ethical problems, including his 2023 impeachment by House Republicans and acquittal in the Senate. He remains a favorite of MAGA conservatives but his bruising primary against Cornyn drained his financial resources and slowed his campaign against Talarico.<\/p>\n
Cornyn has continued to knock Paxton, saying he\u2019s a \u201cpoor campaigner\u201d who is \u201clazy and doesn\u2019t raise money.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paxton responded that he was working 18-hour days. \u201cJohn Cornyn doesn\u2019t know my schedule,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Democratic voters, meanwhile, have turned out in force this year, increasing the pressure on Republicans to mobilize their own.<\/p>\n
Paxton has sought to do that, portraying Talarico as a \u201cdeceiver,\u201d mocking him as \u201cSix-gender Jimmy\u201d and denouncing his 2021 remark that \u201cGod is nonbinary.\u201d<\/p>\n
Talarico now says there are \u201ctwo sexes, men and women\u201d and that his comment about God meant that God cannot be defined by human categories.<\/p>\n
Veteran GOP strategist Dave Carney said Republicans have plenty more to tell voters about what they see as Talarico\u2019s support for boys playing in girls\u2019 sports, open borders and high taxes.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou need to educate them on his positions,\u201d Carney said. \u201cMight it scare some people? Sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paxton has given voters less to chew on about his own plans. He has made curbing voter fraud a priority and released an economic plan, but spent only a few minutes discussing it at its unveiling before turning to Talarico.<\/p>\n
Crossover challenge<\/p>\n
Talarico, in his first statewide campaign, is trying to build a coalition of Democrats, independents and Republicans, taking aim at the influence of billionaires and promising to put working people first.<\/p>\n
He has packaged his proposals under the banner of the \u201cNew American Dream,\u201d promising less expensive housing and healthcare, more jobs in emerging industries and greater government accountability.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not a politics of division\u201d but of unity, friendship and love, he said of his plan. \u201cThis new kind of politics can change our state. It can change our country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Talarico needs strong Democratic turnout and a sizable share of independents and crossover Republicans to break the party\u2019s three-decade losing streak in statewide races.<\/p>\n
He also must unite Democrats after a divisive primary against U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Dallas. Crockett endorsed him the next day but said she would focus on down-ballot candidates.<\/p>\n
Talarico has pledged $25 million for Black voter outreach and last week announced a Black voter engagement team.<\/p>\n
Paxton has not yet challenged Talarico on television, but national Republicans and allied groups are expected to spend heavily against him.<\/p>\n
Ray Washburne, a former national finance chairman of the Republican National Committee and a leader of the Dallas Host Committee helping stage the convention, expressed confidence in Paxton\u2019s ability to finance his fall campaign.<\/p>\n
\u201cKen will be able to raise the money,\u201d Washburne told The News and NBC5 in a joint interview. \u201cAnd now the summer\u2019s over, and people are looking at the alternative, and they\u2019re coming in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, who lost a Senate race to Cornyn in 2002, said Talarico should not let Republicans pull him away from his economic message.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe needs to stay focused on what\u2019s important, and that\u2019s the economy,\u201d Kirk said. \u201cThey\u2019re going to try to drag him into that swamp, and if I was him, I just wouldn\u2019t go in there with them.\u201d<\/p>\n
For all the back-and-forth, the candidates still have no debate scheduled. Talarico has accepted three televised invitations. Paxton has said he\u2019ll debate but has yet to agree to one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ken Paxton has spent much of the Texas Senate campaign telling voters what he thinks is wrong with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":429480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103],"class_list":["post-429479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429479","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=429479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429479\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/429480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}