Talarico's Odds Vault on Prediction Sites
while Governor's Go Opposition Direction
Cook Political Report Poll Shows Democrat Ahead of Paxton by 5 in Texas Senate Race
as Vote Hub Estimates 6-point Edge for the Dem Based on First Two Days of Early Vote
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October 21, 2026
Texas Democrat James Talarico's odds in a U.S. Senate race jumped to all-time highs on the major prediction markets on Wednesday when a poll for the prestigious Cook Political Report found him leading Republican Ken Paxton by 5 points and the election tracking site Vote Hub showed him up by six based on the first two days of early voting.
As Talarico's probabilility of victory vaulted to 67 percent on both Kalshi and Polymarket, the Cook/New River Strategies survey found Democrats leading Republicans in Ohio. Iowa and the Lone Star State where the state representative from Austin received 49 percent support.
The Cook poll of 934 likely Texas voters October 8-13 showed Governor Greg Abbott with a two-point lead over Democratic challenger Gina Hinojosa with support from 48 percent. Rob Sand, Iowa's Democratic state auditor had an 11-point advantage over the GOP's Zach Lahn in the Cook poll of the gubernatorial competition there. Democrat Amy Acton led Republican Vivek Ramaswamy in the fight for governor in Ohio in the new poll on the battleground states.
The poll found Democrat Sherrod Brown up by 5 points on GOP nominee Jon Husted in the race for the U.S. Senate in Ohio. Democratic nominee Josh Turek led Republican Ashley Hinton by 2 points inthe Cook/New River Strategies survey on the Senate fight in Iowa. The Democrats will expect to reclaim the Senate majority with wins in all three states that were the focus of the Cook Report poll.
The Republicans got a reprieve on Wednesday night when a Fox News poll found the Texas governor with a 5-point lead while Paxton and Talarico were tied at 49 percent support each among likely voters. The Fox News survey showed the Democrat ahead by 6 points among a larger sample with registered voters in the Texas Senate race.
While Abbott was the only Republican on top in the six races that the Cook Report tested, the Texas governor's chances of keeping the post fell to their lowest point yet on the prediction platforms on Wednesday when Kalshi had him listed as a 66 percent favorite compared to 67 percent on Polymarket. Abbott's odds were in the mid-70s on both trading sites on Tuesday.
Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and Attorney General candidate Mayes Middleton both were listed at favorites in the low-to-mid 70s on Kalshi and Polymarket despite the Abbott downslide on both sides. Republican Bo French had a probability of a victory of 54 percent on both sides on Wednesday night in a fight for the Texas Railroad Commission.
Talarico's probability of winning the Senate seat was slightly higher tonight on the dueling prediction markets as Abbott's chances of securing a fourth term at the polls in the midterm election just 11 days from now. Talarico's odds had dropped five or six points on Kalshi and Polymarket immediately after news reports on Elon Musk dumping almost $160 million on the Paxton campaign in a desperation attempt to save the Senate seat for the GOP. But Talarico bounced back to match record highs on both trading platforms.
The election model platform Vote Hub gave Paxton and Abbott more cause for angst on Wednesday evening when it projected Talarico's lead in the Texas Senate race to be six points based on the first two days of early voting here. Vote Hub estimated Talarico's support at 56.6 percent at the high end of a range that begins at 47.2 percent. Paxton was projected to have scored 50.6 percent of the votes cast on Monday and Tuesday at the top end compared to 47.2 percent as the low. Talarico was up by a half-dozen points under both scenarios.
The Cook Political Report's new battlegrounds survey marked the 10th poll that's shown Talarico with the lead in the Texas Senate race in the month of October. Paxton was up by 1 point in one October poll on the contest while leading Talarico by half of one percentage point in another. But the race has remained close - with Talarico holding a lead of 2.9 points on average in the 12 polls on the fight here this month.
The Texas governor's battle has been even closer in the polls that were taken here in the first three weeks of October - with Abbott clinging to an average lead of 1.5 points in eight surveys on the race.
Abbott's camp has scoffed at polls that have shown Hinojosa catching up and running even with an incumbent who's had a monstrous advantage in funding and spent almost $150 million in the past 21 months. The governor's strategists claim the polling has been manipulated to prop up Democrats.
But the Cook Political Report had the Texas governor's race ranked as likely Republican for months before a shift to leans GOP in its rankings for the upcoming election. The Cook Report moved the Texas Senate race to the toss up category in the past month. The Cook Report has the governors' races in Iowa and Ohio where Republicans are on the defensive rated as leans Democrat and toss up respectively.
The Senate seats in the three battleground states were all still listed as coin flips on the Cook Political Report on Wednesday night.
more to come ...
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