This is an adapted excerpt from the Sept. 1 episode of “All In with Chris Hayes.”
In Texas, the Senate race between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton is tightening. On Tuesday, the MS NOW election desk changed its characterization of that race from “lean Republican” to “toss-up.”
This is not a decision our experts have made lightly. We all understand that the mirage of a blue Texas has left Democrats wanting for years. But this shift really does reflect the dynamic on the ground as our elections team understands it.
A number of factors are at play. Perhaps most significant is the disparity in candidate quality. Paxton, the state’s attorney general, who defeated incumbent Sen. John Cornyn in the primary, is a particularly bad candidate. He is comically scandal-ridden, including multiple past indictments (though he was never convicted) and a divorce on what his ex-wife referred to as “biblical grounds.”
That has provided an opportunity for Talarico potentially to become the first Democrat to win Texas statewide in more than 30 years. He has a fundraising advantage, at least for now.
Trump interfered, and now Republicans want him to own that decision.
And you can tell that Republicans are starting to sweat. The consensus among the party elite seems to be that this race is Donald Trump’s mess, and he needs to be the one to clean it up.
The president, after all, is the one who boosted Paxton over Cornyn in the primary. Had he not done that, and had Cornyn won the nomination, it is likely that this race would not be considered a toss-up right now.
But Trump interfered, and now Republicans want him to own that decision — specifically via the hundreds of millions of dollars in his super PAC, MAGA Inc. As Semafor put it, “Republicans are counting on President Donald Trump’s cavalry to carry Ken Paxton to victory — but it hasn’t come yet.”
Of course, one reason Trump might be hesitant to drop any money is that he would rather cheat than actually win an election. According to an anonymous federal whistleblower in contact with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., the Trump administration could be working with the United States Postal Service to prevent thousands upon thousands of Americans from casting their mail-in ballots.
According to that whistleblower, if just 1 ballot in a batch of 10,000 is flagged by the USPS as having a discrepancy — because, say, a voter recently got married and changed their last name — the entire batch, the other 9,999 ballots, would not be mailed out.
It is an outrageous voter suppression scheme, and it’s not all Republicans are doing.
On Tuesday, in Tarrant County, Texas, over the shouts of citizens and protesters, the Commissioners Court voted on party lines, 3-2, to close nearly 100 polling stations in a county that Kamala Harris won by 26 points.
There are 316 polling places in Tarrant County, which has a population of more than 2 million people, and that panel voted to close 92 of them. They say it’s about the budget, but it’s a pretty transparent effort to make it harder for people in the Fort Worth metro area to vote and to suppress support for Talarico in what is now a toss-up race.
The Republican Party is watching the same polling trends we are. And with Trump-backed candidates like Paxton on the ballot, they’re doing everything they can — short of actually convincing voters — to influence the outcome on Election Day.
Allison Detzel contributed.
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