Offline with Jon Favreau - Texas: "Is This The Year?"

Episode Date: August 22, 2026

Every election cycle the question inevitably comes up - will Texas flip? But the biggest story in Texas isn't whether the state will turn blue. It's how the people who live there are redefining what Texas politics looks like. Jen, Mitch, and Errin travel across the state to explore immigration, education, faith, and the changing priorities of Texas voters through the voices of the people living those debates every day.Guests: State Rep. James Talarico, State Sen. Taylor Rehmet, State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, Benny Melendez and Mario Guerrero, Tarrant County Residents

Hey everyone. This week in lieu of our regular offline episode, I wanted to share a special limited series we just launched here at Crooked that I think you'll love about what it'll take for Democrats to win again in the South. It's called Long Play. And it's hosted by our pal Jennifer Paul Mary, our former White House colleague and the Emmy-nominated host of Showtime's The Circus. Jen's also joined by award-winning journalist Aaron Haynes and former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrew. Jen, Aaron, and Mitch have spent months traveling across the South from Georgia to North and South Carolina to Tennessee to Texas, where they've talked to voters, politicians, strategists, and organizers. In the episode you're about to hear, the crew travels to Texas to discover what it'll take to

finally turn Texas blue. They talk to voters in Tarrant County, home of Fort Worth, and one of the most important counties in 26, as well as Democratic gubernatorial nominee Gina Hinojosa and Senate nominee James Telerico. It's an excellent episode and an incredible series. Take a listen to the show right here, and if you like it, watch or listen to the full series wherever you get this. podcast. We'll post links to subscribe in the show notes. All right, here's Longplay. Nice to say you. Good morning. Nice to see you. Welcome to Texas, the second stop on our six-state road trip through the south. I'm Aaron Haynes, and I'm here in Laredo with my co-hosts, Mitch Landrew and Jennifer Palmieri, meeting up at another fabulous spot for local music, Hardin and Contreras.

I'm going to start talking about Laredo. Laredo is great. Isn't it great? Yes, it is so lovely. Beautiful town square. Town Square, very cool history of how this was the Republic of Rio Grande. For the second week in a row, we were at a music venue. It's got rock music, Dehanna music, like a lot of local acts. Continuing on the long play theme, friends. What time you perform it? Oh, God.

But that's not all we're here to see. Can we all say we are ready to take back Texas? Hey, Laredo, it's good to see y'all. to see y'all. We have traveled to every corner of this state. And I can't tell you the number of people who've come up to me at the end of these events and whispered, I'm not a Democrat. Like they're in the Witness Protection Program. That's Democratic State Rep James Talarico speaking at a rally here. Talariko is the latest in a long line of Democratic Senate hopefuls looking to make Texas into a true swing state. I can't tell you the number of young people who have

showed up at our events saying it's the first political event they've ever attended. That is how we change the politics of this state. We are uniting Texans onto one team to take on this broken, corrupt political system. Last election cycle, Texas swung the other way, with Republicans gaining ground among Latino voters, especially along the border in places like this, turning even Democratic areas like Laredo red. But two years later, are voters happy with their choice? This is Longplay, winning the South. Episode 2, Texas.

You know, every state's got its own ethos. It's got its own, you know, calling card. Texas is like, don't mess with Texas. Yeah. I mean, it's the only state in the country that was once its own country. Absolutely. You know, you just know that that history just still rings throughout this state. It is just, like, so independent.

It's huge. It's big. And it's a really diverse state. Texas is now a majority-minority state. People always think that demography that's going to be a predictor. I'm here to tell you, demography is not destiny. Right. It's basically been 30 years since Democrats have won here statewide.

It feels like every cycle, the question is always, why isn't Texas more competitive? Trump's support among black men in Texas went from 19% in 2020 to 34% in 2024. And I mean, Latinos, he did even better. 38% in 2020. And in 2024, that number was 53%. This is a huge state, and it is a very conservative state,

and it's a very religious state. It's very hard for Democrats to win Texas. Culture wars issues are already kind of starting to play out here in a way that we've seen in some places in the rest of the country. But immigration in particular is front and center in this state. We have a very good person that was murder. Protesters took to the streets in Houston, outraged over the shooting death of Mexican immigrant Lorenzo Salgado Arruho. My father was a private man, a man who dedicated his life to work.

This is wrong. You're just driving and some unmarked car comes up to you? It's like someone took my uncle, someone took my cousin, my prima, my brother. When are they going to get us just because of our color? It's like, where do we go from here? This has to stop. We need to get united, all the Latin people, and fight for our rights, because we are human beings. We are no animals. The animals are in the government.

This summer, Lorenzo Salgado Arajo was shot and killed by ICE agents in Houston while on his way to work. He had been living in the U.S. for over three decades, working construction, and, according to his family was very close to obtaining legal status. The immigration debate in Texas, and especially Houston, is being shaped by this tragedy. And one of the places it's all playing out is the governor's race, where Gina Hinojosa, a Democratic state rep, is challenging Republican incumbent Greg Abbott. I met up with her to better understand how attitudes towards immigration and ICE may be changing. Representative Hinojosa, here we are in Houston, and it's a heavy time in the city.

Lorenzel Salgado Arajo was just shot and killed by ice. Texas just really feels like ground zero for immigration enforcement right now. Many of us in Texas come from mixed status families. My mother was not born in this country, my grandmother never became a citizen, but my experience is very similar to many Texans. And to see what happened to Mr. Salgado Arajo, to see and hear from his sons who are mourning, It hits home.

In April, Governor Abbott was threatening to withhold nearly $150 million to cities like Houston, Dallas, Austin, unless they were going to expand their cooperation with ICE. What I think that was was the governor intervening, the governor who has received lots of money from these private prison companies to his campaign. Connected dots for folks who may not understand what you mean about that. So now we have this profit motive behind these attacks on our country. communities and behind this aggressive approach to immigration enforcement that is very different from enforcing it along the border that is now in our communities with no accountability.

What I'm hearing from especially the border communities, it's not what people thought of when they voted for strong borders. To be clear, in Texas, we all want strong border security, but what is happening is not that. What is happening is making people angry. and afraid. Yeah. We are deeply patriotic people, Latinos in Texas, especially those of us from the border, to be treated as if you don't belong is an insult. We put in the work, we deserve the American dream.

Yeah. How do you think that might show up at the ballot box in a place like Texas, that sentiment that you're describing? What I'm hearing everywhere is Latinos, they want change. And to be clear, it is not that people are saying, yay, we are a democratic. Democrats now, no. What people are saying is whatever this is, we don't want it, we want change.

And it creates an opportunity for Democrats to win, and we can't blow it. We wanted to hear directly from some of those voters. So Mitch sat down with Benny Melendez and Mario Guerrero to construction business owners in Texas who have been outspoken about the impact of ICE detentions on their industry. We do residential construction and commercial.

Yes, sir. Y'all work together. every single day. That's good. Wait, wait, do y'all like each other? Sometimes. Yeah. Yeah.

Right? How many times did you vote for Donald Trump? I voted from every time he was on the docket. Every time. What about you? Only one time, this last time. What prompted you, not once, but three times? Yes, sir.

I think it comes down from, it was very natural for me to get home from school, have dinner with my old man, and one of the shows that we were watched is The Apprentice. I saw somebody that I thought that I could resemble to when it was a business owner, right? Actually, for me, well, Because I saw what Biden was doing on the border, and I didn't like it. We saw the thousands of people that were at the borders. It just looked like a humanitarian crisis.

It was not a good presidency. It just showed a lot of weakness. Weakness, yeah. I believe that the president of the United States should be the strongest figure that we should have as a nation. And you like that about Trump. He displayed strength. Yes, sir.

When did things start changing for you and why? because of the actions that are happening with the ICE enforcement that we're seeing. He started not respecting the dignity of the community of my people. Lorenzo Sogato was killed in Houston. They called him in the paper. Right.

Ice killed an illegal person. Ice killed a human. Ice killed a human. And his name is Lorenzo Salgado. This illegal people, there are friends. There are neighbors. There are workers. they're part of our community already.

Have you been on a work site that ICE have come on to? Yes, once. Man, I was furious. I was furious. I did express myself with one finger. And with one finger in their face. And I'm being honest. That's good.

You're being honest. I'm just being honest. How has ICE changed like the typical day on a construction site? I mean, obviously in the association, what is it called? The South Texas Builders Association. The South Texas Builders Association. You have businesses that are reporting this to you. Oh, yes, sir.

Do you have an idea how many people that have pulled off of jobs? Just today was like nine, right? What we're seeing is that it's not just a person that has no documentation that is being picked up, it's also the people with the proper documentation. That's what's putting the fear into people. And that's what's causing for job sites to be empty nowadays. I can say that I've had construction companies call me and tell me, I'm building my last house.

Do you think that the Republicans understand how angry, Hispanic voters are. I'm sure they do. Right now? I'm sure they do. So I feel like they just don't care. It's not that they don't care is that our government went from one extreme with Biden to another.

So why is your response to that I'm going to vote Democrat as opposed to I'm just not going to vote at all? What are the options that we got? We have to vote. No more than ever. I'll tell you that. I caught up with Jen and Mitch to reflect on what we heard from those voters. And another issue that's breaking through on the ground.

in Texas. What's happening here is that the cost of living issue is running head on into the immigration crackdown because it's affecting businesses and economies here. And I think how that factors into what they do at the ballot box is going to be really interesting to watch. Like, should Democrats only be focusing on winning statewide when there are victories that we are seeing in progress that is happening down ballot? Democrats are doing better in down ballot races in Texas. Tarrant County, Fort Worth is the battleground of battleground. There's something happening with women in Tarrant County who are really frustrated by education. Education is something Gina Hinojosa brought up when we spoke in Houston.

Our schools are shutting down all over this state. We have over 150 school districts operating at four days a week because they can't afford to operate five days a week. Whole school districts. On the national level, there is scant conversation about education at all. Taylor Remit flipped a state Senate seat that was a plus 30 for Donald Trump. by focusing on the issue of education, which is what the people in that district wanted him to focus on.

Mitch is talking about Texas Democrat Taylor Remitt, who was elected to the state senate this year in a special election and is running to keep his seat this fall. He represents Tarrant County, including Fort Worth, which is where Jen went to meet Remit to talk about the race and what Texans are looking for right now. So you flipped a Senate's seat in the county, it has an elected Democrat in...

For 30 years. Yeah. Why do you think you were able to change that? I'm a veteran. I'm a labor union leader. And I fought for my country. I fought alongside working taxons. You're machinists?

I was a similar aircraft mechanic and machinists for that 35 fighters. I want to go from the shop floor to the center floor and give them a seat at the table. A lot of times the Democrats run in this state. They have put Trump at the forefront to galvanize Democratic Get people excited. That is not something that you did. Here's a thing. Trump doesn't live here.

He's not a Texan, so I'm focused on Texans. Yes, I'm a Democrat. However, I have to represent a lot of Republicans in my district. And I'm honored that they trusted me to do that, because at the end of the day, it's people over party at this point. You're the incumbent. Is it going to be a tough race? Every race in Texas, especially as a Democrat, is tough.

Does the Democratic Party put some head with wins in your way. I haven't worked too closely with the state party, and especially the national party. Seems like that is a smart thing to do here. Well, just trying to keep this a Texas authentic race. What do you think Democrats have gotten wrong about Texas? They don't approach politics organically. I'm just being blunt. Yeah, no, please do. I mean, if you want to help Texans, you have to actually talk to Texans and listen to them. The Texans here are going to be much different politically on the Democratic side. than New York or California.

We are Texans. Does it feel like there's a change that's already happening at the local level that things might be loosening up? I think that yes, in some part, we're seeing some unexpected winds, one of them being mine. And really, it's not that I come from a district

that's red or blue. To me, it's people trying to build a life with dignity and respect. Do you feel like there was one issue that broke through more than others? Probably the fact that our education system, people feel like it's under attack. The TEA, Texas Education Agency, is taking over these schools, but they don't bring any extra resources.

They don't provide any extra support. And so anytime the government comes in and tells the community, y'all don't know what you're doing, we're going to fix everything, just get out of our way. That doesn't make anybody feel good. After talking to Remit, Jen met up with three parents, Mandy McClure, Ali Stiles, and Aaron Montgomery to hear more about the schools from their point of view and why they've decided to get more involved. We're in Tarrant County. Right. And you had children that went to public schools here.

You both have kids in public schools. You ran for the school board. Your term ended in 2021. Yeah. I think really for our district as well as many other districts, COVID opened the door to the very far right. I think it galvanized, like she said, the far right, to get them interested in the schools,

and then they never stopped getting interested in the schools. Why are these kids wearing masks? Why are we online learning? There was the accusation that there was pornography in our schools. He said that kids were dressing up as animals and wanted to use litter boxes. And it worked on even people like me who I was a new mother. There you go.

When did you realize that you'd been dup by culture war? culture wars in this school. I started to see it once my son entered kindergarten and I got involved in PTA. And I'd be doing the copies for the teachers of all of the worksheets that they were going to do with the kids for the following week. And there was nothing on it about politics or gender

or sexuality or anything like that. It was ABC's in one, two, three. So sort of anti-will politics come down to the school district level and exploded here in Tarrant County. I just started to frustrate me because I kept hearing people raging about these issues. And then I'd say, well, can you show me the example? And then when you're debating people and they'd say, oh, you liberal snowflakes, you, and I would say, I'm a Republican. I'm a registered Republican. I was a moderate Republican. We like having

all the voices at the table. And now you feel like your children are paying the price. I mean, maybe you're saying. Well, you're sucking the money away from the schools. They want your kids in private school. Wait, what are you saying here in this interesting? that you think they're the... So last year, our state passed a voucher program, and it allows people to take a voucher and use it toward private schools. If there's any question about what the motivation is

and whether it's to drive children out of the public school, in the state of Texas, a student who's enrolled in a public school gets $6,000 in change given to the school to educate that child for the year. That same child, if they're put in private school, or homeschooled is eligible for a voucher between $10,000 and $16,000. So if you feel like it's not about making the public schools better, they're... No.

I think we're 47th in the nation, Texas for funding for students. We're severely underfunded. It seems to be this systematic dismantling where they want to almost, to use the phrase, burn it all down and then rebuild it the way they want it. These are people that I may have supported. And I felt like I held a chunk of responsibility for what was happening. And now I'm going to do my damnedest to turn it around. To get them out.

I mean, make school board make it boring again. Yeah, please. Show of hands, who voted for Governor Abbott in the past year? I won't the past year. I will not be voting for him again. I mean, it's definitely not prioritizing public education. And you are all three women who have been Republicans for most of your voting lives. Who's voting for James Telerico?

Also gave him my money. Yeah. I like him. Yeah. He was a middle school teacher in public school in Texas, and they started cutting all his funding. And he said, well, if I can't change my school, then I'm going to need to change my state.

And that's so becoming of a leader. I want a middle school teacher who's like, hey, this is broken. Somebody needs to fix it. Why not me? And I never send money to state people. But this year I did. I'm like, not only I'm going to vote for you,

I'm going to give you some money. I think Republicans are having a lot of moments like that where we're saying, This is not what I signed up for. Give me somebody who's not extremist. I don't care what party they are. I'm going to vote for whoever is the most common sense and who I think would be the most likely to protect my kids.

You're never going to vote for a candidate that thinks exactly like you unless you run. You need to get on the bus that's driving closest to where you want to end up. Talariko, I find him to be pretty moderate. And I think that is telling of what's happening in the state of Texas. The Republicans should be worried.

Back at the bar, Jen, Mitch, and I talked about what these shifts could mean for the Senate race between Democrat James Talleyco and Republican Ken Paxton. What these moms evidently telling everybody is on the ground where we live, there is an issue that we care about. And if you address that, we're going to listen to you. We now have a statewide race that could go blue, James Talariko versus Ken Paxson for the United States Senate. Another midterm, another conversation about, is this going to be the year that Texas turns blue? James Talleyco is the guy who's pretty charismatic, right? I mean, he's a Presbyterian, seminarian. He is a former Teach for America teacher, you know.

You've got Paxton already trying to kind of frame him as too woke. My opponent is the most extreme radical that Democrats have ever nominated. Tala RICO is actually going to be very hard to attack, which is why they're saying things like, you know, he doesn't eat meat. Some people know him as tofu Tala RICO. Kim Baxter is coming out with a troubled past, a lot of ethics problems. I think he's been impeached once but not convicted. He's been indicted but not found guilty.

He's got like seven lives. And you got a guy like Tala Rico that by all Mrs. History should not be within striking distance that's dead even. That means you got a real race. Laredo, before we end tonight, I just want to talk about what happened yesterday in Maine. In El Paso, I talked about Lorenzo Salgado And then just two days later, it happened again.

A three-year-old girl watched ICE murder her father. Jesus says, blessed are you who weep? So if your heart is breaking as you watch what's happening to our beloved country, it means you still have a heart. I want you to trust that, because that is what's going to get us out of all of this. Thank you for being. here. After Tala Rico wrapped his rally in Laredo, Mitch sat down with him to learn more about his views on the biggest issues facing the state. The Republicans have done a good job of taking this big

banner of faith family and country, and Democrats have been fighting to get all three of those things back. And I really wanted to talk about the role that faith plays and why it's important. My Baptist preacher granddad told me when I was real little that as Christians we're supposed to follow two commandments that Jesus gave us. Sure. Love God and love neighbor. You know, Part of my faith teaches me that every person is a child of God. And I think that teaching to love your enemy is the key to saving the American experiment. You're on an immigration tour. That's right.

Can you talk a little bit about what you're thinking about immigration and how the people of Texas are thinking about this right now? Yeah, we laid out my plan for common sense border security because we've seen extremism in both political parties. And what most Texans want is they want to secure the border. they want an orderly process to know who's coming into the country. That is a reasonable thing to ask for. And they also want a pathway for those who have been here for years and decades to come out of the shadows. And that's what we don't have right now. We had a bipartisan group of local sheriffs and local elected officials who were all endorsing my common sense border security plan.

You did something very interesting tonight. You started talking about Ken Paxton. I have a legislative record. Ken Paxton has a criminal record. That's the difference in this race. And you talked about corruption. For 50 years, mega donors and their puppet politicians like Ken Paxton

have been stealing from us. Our leaders are giving tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country at our expense. Ken Paxton single-handedly blocked an increase in overtime pay for Texas workers, all because he takes corporate special interest money. Explain just kind of your view of where Texas is, where it might go,

and what it means or what it doesn't mean. Whenever you have one party rule, whether it's the Republican Party or the Democratic Party, that one party rule always leads to extremism and corruption because there's no competition. Competition forces politicians to compete for our support, and that makes better public policy. My party talks about turning Texas blue.

The Republicans talk about keeping Texas red. I honestly think the best color for Texas is purple. I think she would look great in purple. It always feels like things are shifting here in Texas. They call it the border lands because that border has not always been there. Probably no place in America whose destiny is not bound up more together. From left-right and crooked media, watch Longplay on YouTube at YouTube.com slash at longplay series. Or listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Episode three, North Carolina, comes out next Monday. Thank you.