Talarico raises record $30M in second quarter
Progressive policy ambitions meet practical realities as Americans weigh costs and consequences.
Thirty million dollars in a single quarter for a Texas Senate race that hasn't even hit the general election yet. That number should tell you something, and it's not that James Talarico has suddenly cracked the code on winning statewide in Texas. It's that Democrats outside Texas are treating this seat like a lottery ticket, and they're buying a lot of them.
New Republican Times Editorial Board
The campaign of Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico raised more than $30 million in the second quarter of this year, as the 37-year-old looks to become the first Democrat from the state elected to the upper chamber in nearly four decades.
In a release, Talarico’s campaign said it raised the most money of any
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New Republican Times Editorial Board
Thirty million dollars in a single quarter for a Texas Senate race that hasn't even hit the general election yet. That number should tell you something, and it's not that James Talarico has suddenly cracked the code on winning statewide in Texas. It's that Democrats outside Texas are treating this seat like a lottery ticket, and they're buying a lot of them.
Money like that doesn't come from Waco and Lubbock. It comes from small-dollar donors in California and New York who've watched Beto O'Rourke torch nine figures chasing this same seat before losing by double digits, twice, and somehow concluded the third guy will be different because he's younger and quotes scripture on TikTok. Talarico is a talented communicator, we'll give him that. But talent isn't the constraint in Texas. Math is. No Democrat has won a Senate race there since 1988, and that streak hasn't survived because Republicans out-fundraised them. It survived because Texas voters, including plenty who don't love the GOP, keep deciding they'd rather not send a national Democrat to Washington.
What this really tells you is where the energy and anxiety in Democratic politics currently live. When your base is more excited about a longshot in a red state than about the incumbents actually running your party, that's a signal worth reading. It's not enthusiasm for Talarico specifically. It's a way of venting frustration through a checkbook.
None of this means Republicans should get complacent. Money translates into ads, and ads move low-information voters in close races. But $30 million buys attention, not an electorate. Texas has punished that assumption before.
Commentary written with AI assistance by the New Republican Times Editorial Board.