15 Texas Dems Who Flipped Statewide Seats
All Won More Votes than Governor Ever Did
Capitol Inside
November 11, 2026
Armed with calculators and no apparent local knowledge, the conspiracy theory peddlers have determined that the Democrats couldn't have scored as many votes in Texas as they did at the polls last week without the fight being fixed. As customary, the stolen election aficionados like registered Texas voter Mike "Mr. Pillow" Lindell have no evidence beyond the numbers they say are simply too big to be true in a state they thought would be Republican forever.
But conspiracy chasers have intensified the spotlight on the amazing totals that Democrats posted when they won every statewide race on the ballot, flipped the Texas House, turned the State Board of Education blue and recorded a net gain of one seat on a congressional map that was drawn to yield a five-seat gain for the GOP.
The second midterm election on Donald Trump produced the biggest wipeout that either major party has ever suffered in Texas. The blue tsunami left the GOP in Texas in ruins with no reason for optimism for a comeback in the foreseeable future with a president whose unpopularity proved to be highly contagious in office for two more years. But it took more than a raging wall of water to do so much damage. The sky fell on the Texas Republicans at the polls last week.
Take the case of Governor Greg Abbott, who expected to be a shoo-in for a record fourth term as a springboard to the presidency in 2028. Abbott had the biggest war chest in Texas history, a big lead in the polls in the contest's early going and an ambitious plan to turn the monstrous location Harris County red. The Republican governor saw Democrat Gina Hinojosa as another token opponent who he chose to ignore for months while attacking Democratic U.S. Senate contender James Talarico constantly. Abbott apparently saw as someone who nobody knew outside Capitol City political circles when she entered the ring in a move that forced her to give up a safe seat in the Texas House.
But it was obvious that Abbott had fallen out of touch with the state and its voters when he failed to claim as many votes in last week's election as Oney Anyiam - a Democrat who flipped a seat on the Court of Criminal Appeals with the fewest amount of votes for a Democrat in a winning statewide race.
Anyiam spent a grand total of $7,190 on the CCA race in battle with Republican Thomas Smith, who shelled $218,434 for the fight that the Democrat won by more than 2 points with 4,839,230 votes and 50.03 percent of the last week.
Anyiam is one of 15 Texas Democrats who scored more votes than the Republican governor ever received in a race for a job he's sought at the polls four times in the past 12 years. Abbott was at his peak in 2018 when he claimed 4,656,196 votes in his first re-election race. The governor's total that year was all the more impressive as an election that produced a blue wave that cost the GOP 14 legislative seats and two in Congress. Abbott beat Democrat Lupe Valdez by 13 points while U.S. Senator Ted Cruz was edging Democrat Beto O'Rourke by fewer than 3 points at the top of the ballot in Trump's first midterm election in 2018.
Anyiam is a Dallas criminal attorney who'a married to a criminal district judge who ran for the Court of Criminal Appeals in 2024 and lost. Anyiam received 183,034 more votes in the lowest statewide race on the ticket in 2026 than the Republican Texas governor did when he had his highest count eight years ago. There's a bullet item for the resume.
Hinojosa sent Abbott into early retirement when she won 574,593 more votes last week than the governor did when he set a personal record that he would never break with almost 4.76 million eight years ago. Abbott claimed 4.4 million votes in 2022 after a dramatic remake from relatively moderate leader to MAGA warrior with the goal of inheriting Trump's support on the hard right.
Hinojosa won 706,262 more votes than Abbott did in last week's general election - ousting the incumbent who'd been all but prohibitive favorite at the outset in a fight she won by more than 7 points with almost 53 percent of the vote.
Talarico emerged from last week's election with 920,455 more votes than the governor received on the same ballot. The U.S. senator-elect claimed 788,786 more than votes than Abbott had with his all-time high in 2018. Talario defeated Republican state attorney general Ken Paxton by 1,195,609 votes based on the current tally at the Secretary of State's office. Talarico was credited with 5,444,982 votes at the ballot box last week.
While Talarico and all of the 15 Democrats who won statewide scored more votes than the Texas governor ever managed to do in four bids for the job he lost to Hinojosa, the Democrats didn't have his many votes as Trump and Cruz won here in 2024. Trump beat Kamala Harris by 13 points after scoring 6,393,597 votes in Texas in 2024. Cruz had 5,990,741
in 2024 en route to a victory over Democrat Colin Allred, who garnered 5,031,249 as a challenger in 2024.
The Democrats who received more votes than the third-term Texas governor did in 2026 and 2018 incudes three incoming members of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and four who flipped seats on the Texas Supreme Court. All of the other Democrats who emerged triumphant in Texas statewide contests on last week's ballot claimed more votes than the outgoing Texas governor ever received in a singular election.
After pouring more than $170 million into the losing fight with Hinojosa, who raised less than $40 million for her first statewide bid, won with 5,230,789 votes - new a record for a governor's race in Texas.
The election heist believers thought they smelled a rat based on the math that showed Talarico with more votes last week than any Democratic president nominee for governor ever claimed in Texas. They're claiming that the spike in support for Democrats in Texas came out of thin air. If they look a little closer after the shock wears off, they'll see that all of those extra votes that were cast for the Democrats in statewide races came from disgusted Republican voters. There were more of those than ever in Texas this year.
Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, who's headed to the exit with Abbott and the parade of other Republicans who lost seats last week, said Democrat Vikki Goodwin beat him "fair and square" on election night. This is the same Texas Senate president who played along with Trump's claims of election fraud after losing to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020.
Patrick sought to show his support for the president with the creation of a reward fund for evidence of voting violations that led to convictions. But the only bounty that Patrick end up paying out went to a Democratic activist who turned in a Trump loyalist who voted twice in Pennsylvania. Patrick made good on the promise and paid the guy $25,000 for ratting out the Republican in Philly.
more to come ...
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