The NPR Politics Podcast - In Texas Senate run-off, MAGA ousts the old guard

Episode Date: May 27, 2026

Republican Sen. John Cornyn was one of a few incumbents who lost their re-election bids in Texas’ primary run-off election Tuesday. We discuss what to make of the results and what to expect between now and November.This episode: senior political correspondent Tamara Keith, congressional correspondent Claudia Grisales, and Texas Newsroom reporter Blaise Gainey.This podcast was produced by Casey Morell and Bria Suggs, and edited by Rachel Baye. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Hey there, it's the NPR Politics podcast. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover politics. And I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And Blaise Ganey from the Texas Newsroom is also here. Welcome, Blaze. Yeah, glad to be here. So today on the show, takeaways from yesterday's primary runoffs in Texas. And let's start with the Republican Senate primary, where President Trump weighed in late to endorse state attorney general Ken Paxton over four-time incumbent Senator John Cornyn. Blaze, tell us how that. turned out and whether Trump's endorsement mattered? You know, it turned out with Attorney General Kim Paxson really dominating Senator John Corny, I believe he won by around 30 points. And it was really clear as soon as polls closed and results started to come out that he was going to win. And also, the Trump endorsement, it did matter. And, you know, if you're keeping, you know, tally of how many times he's endorsed somebody and they won. But in reality, these two guys are really well known in the state. They've been in elected statewide offices for nearly 10 years, if not more, if you're counting

Corny. Many more if you're counting Corny. Exactly. So therefore, Trump's endorsement, I'm not saying it didn't matter, but this came on, I believe, a Monday night or a Tuesday morning, already a day in to early voting. People in Texas already know these guys well and knew who they wanted to vote for. And the thought was that Paxton, the polling show, that Paxton was likely to win in a runoff. So really, Trump's endorsement sort of was like a stamp of approval more than like him saying, hey, voters, this is the person to pick.

I think his endorsement weighs more in races where people are not as known as a Ken Paxton or a John Cornyn. That's part of a raging debate today, too, in terms of did Trump motivate? more voters to come out for Paxton and Cornyn voters to stay home? Or did he see this race just tilting in Paxton's favor and weighed in at the perfect moment and say, Paxton's the one? And so it really is a valuable endorsement. Did it shape this race? Potentially, it brought more people out in the end. Cornyn is sort of the ultimate establishment Republican. He's been in the Senate for a very long time. Kin Paxton is definitely cut from the Trump mold. He is a more maggot individual. Blaise, do you see this is any sort of statement about where the Republican

party is in Texas? You know, I actually, I do. I think that is a bigger part of what you can tell from this election. And it really isn't this Cornyn-Paxon race, although, you know, it does show it a little bit. But really, if you look down the ballot, there's a statewide race for railroad commission where Beau French won versus an incumbent Jim Wright. Jim Wright was backed by the lieutenant governor and the governor of the state. But Bo French, who rarely talks about oil and gas, which is what the railroad commission is in control of and regulates, he rarely talked about that.

He actually talked more about deportations and anti-Muslim rhetoric. What we're seeing is a fight playing out that's been brewing for the last decade since President Trump and the movement came on the scene, which is MAGA-pushing establishment members, voters, supporters out of the party. That was the big argument Cornyn had on the campaign trail is that Paxton is part of the MAGA wing that's trying to shrink the tent. And Cornyn, Abbott, others want to grow the party as they have in the past, the establishment wing has for many decades before MAGA came on the scene.

And so this is definitely a power struggle for control of the party. at the same time we're seeing a hollowing out of the members of the middle. And there's a lot of concerns among Republicans today that they're going to be left with the most extreme members in their party to lead them. And Texas, as we know, is a very reliable and influential Republican state. So what happens in Texas, we can see happen nationally. And so just as we saw before this race, we saw Bill Cassidy pushed out, we could see more of these moderate members losing. in the future elections of this year. Okay, so you mentioned Bill Cassidy.

He is a member of what we at the NPR Politics Podcast are calling the YOLO caucus. You only lose once. He crossed President Trump and learned to face the consequences. But now he is more freely speaking his mind and standing up to the president on some of his policy aims. Where do you think Senator Cornyn is going to land? Is he going to join the Yolo Caucus? I am not expecting him to join the caucus when he was asked, will you vote for Paxton as nominee if he wins this runoff? And Cornyn repeatedly said that he would vote the Republican ticket. So that's a signal right there in terms of Cornyn's deep loyalty to this party. When we compare these establishment figures who've been pushed out of the party in just the last few weeks, Bill Cassidy voted to convict Trump in that last. last impeachment trial in the Senate. Cornyn would defend himself and say, I'm not a Bill

Cassidy. I didn't vote to convict Trump. And he thought that was going to give him a better shot. This is pre-endorsement to winning the runoff. Blaise, let's turn to this race. Paxton will face Democratic State Representative James Tala Rico in November. Tala Rico didn't have a runoff. He won in the first round. Blaze, what do you think this matchup is going to look like? I think it's going to be really dirty. A lot of mud slinging. We've already actually seen the mud slinging and name-calling coming from Paxon. He's given out a bunch of nicknames to Tala Rico.

One of them has to do with being a vegan, which Tala Rico actually isn't. Yeah, vegan in Texas could actually be quite an insult because it is a very pro-beef barbecue state. It is a big insult. I went to a rally for Paxon the day after the endorsement, and it was like, a victory party. People were dancing to YMCA. It felt like the beginning of the Trump campaign like a decade ago. People were so energized. And they were workshopping different nicknames for Tala Rico. That's what Paxton was doing with the crowd. I mean, this is just following like Trump's tradition of coming up with these nicknames. So they were trying to see, can we come up with one

first? And then they got into the vegan discussion. This was at an old school barbecue joint after all. And they were really hammering him for being vegan and not being able to experience barbecue. And Paxson said, at least Cordenin understands barbecue. So that's going to be one of the biggest attacks, believe it or not, in Texas in this race. But Blaise, Tala Rico is not a vegan? He is not a vegan. He was seen eating meat during his campaign. He actually posted a picture with, I think, a turkey leg in his hand. He has to prove it now. Yeah, yeah, now he's forced to eat meat. You know, no choice if he wants to win a race in Texas. For Tala Rico, he's really just talking about the facts that are out there right now, the fact that, you know, Paxton has been impeached,

although it didn't stick. Then you also have the fact that he's currently going through a divorce with allegations of infidelity on his side. And then also, when he was first elected, he faced a scandal around securities fraud charges, where he, he's, ended up having to pay around $300,000 in restitution, but did not have to admit guilt, which is a big part here. He still walks around and, you know, of course, claims his innocence in most of these situations. I mean, he does have a coating of Teflon seemingly in politics that is not unlike the Teflon that President Trump wears. Exactly. It's very much a facsimile of Trump in terms of that background. And also another interesting piece that we've seen in Texas when it comes to, baggage, criminal indictments, baggage that is personal, what have you. We've seen Paxton break that

mold in terms of being able to move past that. And instead, voters see him as a fighter. That's what I heard at his rallies that I went to. It just shows you he was reelected in the midst of all that. So it plays different in Texas. It'll be interesting to see if Tala Rico's arguments will play in that state. No, I totally agree. I mean, like you said before, Paxon, has been elected statewide since all this stuff has been out there. So it's not like this is new information and people are going to be shocked by it. It's just, you know, do you still want this guy representing you? It's the question.

The Cook political report shifted this race from likely Republican to lean Republican after Paxton won. That means they think that with Paxton as the Republican nominee, Democrats have a somewhat better chance of winning the Senate seat. But can a Democrat really win statewide? Texas, it has not happened in more than 30 years. Yeah, I think this is part of the blue mirage that is haunted Texas Democrats for decades. But this was part of the warning that Cornyn campaigned on is that there's a crack in the red wall in Texas and Democrats can move through it because Paxton is such an extreme candidate. And so there are, for Democrats, there is a wave of confidence that this could be their first shot in 30, 40 years to get a Democrat elected statewide.

Blaise, I feel like I've heard this before. Yeah, I totally agree. And I think a big part of that isn't just about what's happening here in the state, but what's happening across the nation and internationally as well with the war in Iran. Republicans are having a hard time right now coming up with reasons for the actions from President Trump and this most recent nearly $2 billion fund doesn't help that at all. Now, will Paxton have to answer for those? I'm not sure.

But ultimately, it doesn't necessarily matter if Paxton has to answer or not. When people go in to vote sometimes, they see that are next to it and they automatically, definitely since he's endorsed by Trump, will associate him with Trump. And he's already said he will support everything Trump's doing. And so if you don't like what's been happening, if you don't like where the economy is, then some people may say, you know what, I just want to steer towards Democrats. And I think that is what right now, why Democrats feel Texas is even, you know, something they should be pouring money into a race in Texas is because right now you have sort of the perfect storm of the economy's bad. We're in a war.

And then you also have a president that is Republican in a midterm. This is, you know, if Democrats don't win this time around, I think they will feel as though. they lost this instead of, you know, they just got beat out because of the numbers in the state. This is exactly what I heard from a Democratic strategist I spoke to, Chuck Rocha, and he said the headwinds that Republicans are facing that Blaze just mentioned, as well as kind of this very sour taste that this Republican fight has left for the party and questions about whether they can unite after such a slug fest. as well as they're seeing Latino voters coming back to Democrats because they're unhappy with Trump administration policies on immigration and they're worried about the economy.

And Rocha definitely pointed out the gas prices because there's so many trucks and so little public transportation, that's an even bigger deal in Texas. Everything is farther apart in Texas. All right, we're going to take a quick break and we will have more in a moment. And we're back. Texas was the first state to redraw its congressional long. lines in this mid-decade redistricting arms race that's been going on. Republicans are seeking advantage in an effort to maintain control of the House. And we saw the effects of that strategy in some of these primary runoffs. Blaze, what did you see? I mean, the redistricting job done by

Republicans was very strategic. Over in Houston, you had Christian Menofie, who had just become a congressman in a special election running against Congressman Al Green, who's been in his seat for decades. So two incumbents essentially running against each other. And Al Green ended up losing his seat. Not really sure why, but I will say in that specific district, a lot of representatives have run and passed away while in office. Menefi is 38 and Green is 78. Green, though, has pushed back against critics who make note of his age. But voters seem not to buy that.

and very clear in yesterday's results. Yeah, there's also this hunger for the Democratic Party. I think this is a theme we're going to see play out with them all year long, is that kind of President Biden regret in terms of not bringing in a younger candidate. We saw it with Janet Mills, who had to drop out of the race in Maine, before even getting to the contest with Graham Platner there. So it's clear that Democratic voters want a fighter to, too. We're hearing this from both sides. And they know that this is getting to be a bigger struggle in terms of the party and its future and the country's future. And so that's what we're seeing. And I think we're going to see a lot more of that where Democrats are growing impatient with these older candidates.

Yeah. I mean, is there just an anti-incumbent sentiment? I think it really depends. You know, I do think, for example, Republicans are more forgiving of candidates. candidates in older age. I think Trump has kind of just blazed the trail for that in terms of these older candidates. And incumbents are protected. The bigger problem for Republicans in terms of winning in primaries is, are you MAGA enough? Well, Blaze, before I let you go, there is one Texas House race that we haven't gotten to that was getting national attention for all the wrong reasons. Democrats were alarmed at some of the anti-Semitic views expressed by Maureen Gildo, one of the candidates in one of these congressional races. She ended up losing in the primary to Johnny Garcia. What happened there?

I think ultimately Democrats are probably excited that Johnny Garcia walked away with a victory here because this is a district that while it does lean Republican, Democrats think that they have a chance to win. and it would have been really hard to win with somebody that had anti-Semitic views. I mean, you know, coming into the race, you want to have about as clean of a sheet as you can. And this person spouting those things does not help definitely when you want to bring in money from outside races. And we just talked about how the Tala Rico race is going to, the Senate race, is going to cost a lot of money. There's not going to be a lot to go around to these other races. And so putting money behind somebody that's not much. Maureen Golendo will be a lot easier than putting money behind a person that has said the sort of thing she said.

All right. Let's leave it there for today. Thank you for joining us, Blaze. Yeah, I'm very glad to be here. And before we go, if you love the NPR Politics Podcast, then hang out with this on the NPR app. It's the best way to catch every episode. And if you turn on notifications, we'll let you know the second a new conversation drops. Download the NPR app. And let's keep talking. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover politics.

And I'm Claudia Grisalius. I cover Congress. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.