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Senate Dem Clash Tops List of Texas Races
that Look Like Toss Ups Days Before Primary
Capitol Inside
February 28, 2026
Crystal Ball: Statewide, Congress, Legislature
With less than three days to go before the Texas primary election, the Capitol Inside crystal ball sees more than a dozen contests that are too close to call
with the Democratic showdown between Jasmine Crockett and James Talarico in the U.S. Senate race as the number one toss up on the first-round ballot. The Democratic primary in the most expensive Senate race in history is one of 16 fights on the Texas card that look like coin flips from the limited view here in the countdown to Tuesday's vote.
U.S. Senate - Democrats. The polling on James Talarico versus Jasmine Crockett has been all over the map in the past week or so. The odds for overtime appear increasingly slim based on the fact that a third candidate has been all but nonexistent in the polls. Crockett led by 12 points one day this week, Talarico was up by a dozen 24 hours later before the congressional member from Dallas had her biggest advantage by far on Friday with a new University of Texas-Tyler poll that showed beating the state representative from Austin by a jaw-dropping 18 points with 55 percent support.
Both candidates have internal polling that shows them ahead. A runoff could be in store if Ahmad Hassan gets 3 or 4 percent and the frontrunners are running neck-and-neck at the finish line. Crockett seems to be a slight favorite on paper for the Democrats in the Senate competition in the opening round of the 2026 midterm elections. While we have no clue who the Democratic nominee for the Senate will be at this point, we'd probably go with Talarico if we were forced to wager money on the outcome.
Comptroller - Republicans. Don Huffines appeared to be hovering in the 45 percent vicinity as the perceived leader who Governor Greg Abbott is spending record sums trying to beat. The minimal polling on the GOP primary fight for comptroller had Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick with the best shot at the second slot in a runoff with the incumbent Kelly Hancock way back in 3rd. But Hancock's chances for a late surge to keep his campaign alive for overtime appeared to be rising after the governor who appointed him to the post poured almost $3.4 million into his campaign in the closing weeks of the race. While a runoff is still a distinct possibility, Huffines has a chance to shut the primary competition down with an outright win on Tuesday with an endorsement he scored on Friday night from President Donald Trump in an epic snub for Abbott. Trump issued an almost identical endorsement to Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, who the governor has portrayed as corrupt while campaigning for challenger Nate Sheets. But Miller already appeared to be on track to win before Trump rallied behind him for the fight with the Abbott candidate. State Senator Sarah Eckhardt of Austin appears to be a shoo-in for the Democratic nomination in the comptroller's race. Huffines clearly as the inside track for the nomination in round one or a runoff. If we had to bet we'd put the money on Huffines to close it out on Tuesday with more than half the vote.
Railroad Commission - Republicans. One of the few polls on this particular contest had the incumbent Jim Wright running even with retiree Jim Matlock with three other candidates too far back to see. But one of the also-rans, the venerable Tarrant County GOP chair Bo French - has picked up substantial support in the stretch and could score a runoff spot - most likely with Wright. French's hottest issue in the race for the panel that regulates oil and gas has been fuel for fears about a Muslim invasion in the making. Christian nationalists have rallied late behind the French campaign with hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations in the past few weeks. The GOP field for this also contains Hawk Dunlap and Katherine Culbert, who lost to Craddick in the general election in 2024 when she was the nominee for the Democrats. This contest may be the hardest of all to predict on the Texas primary ballots. We'd go with French in a runoff with the incumbent in a runoff if we had to wager something on this.
Congressional - Republicans. A couple of Texas incumbents for the GOP - U.S. Reps. Dan Crenshaw of Houston and Tony Gonzales of San Antonio - are competing in two of the three primary fights that are too close to call from the vantage here for completely different reasons. Crenshaw is the only incumbent who Trump had refused to endorse before Friday - when he removed Gonzales from the list of Texans he'd endorsed for the primary election. Crenshaw hasn't spent the last two years on bended knee before the president like almost all of the other elected Republicans in the Lone Star State. Trump has endorsed State Rep. Steve Toth of Conroe for the GOP nomination in the race for the Congressional District 2 seat as the price of Crenshaw's independence and occasional defiance. We'd go with Crenshaw, nonetheless, if we had to bet on CD 2. The Congressional District 23 race is far more complicated. Trump gave Gonzales his complete and total endorsement in December with the vow to voters that he would not let them down. But then he did by unraveling in the past few weeks amid allegations of an affair with a married aide and mother who died last year after setting herself on fire. Gonzales' name no longer appears on the president's congressional endorsement list - but House Republican leaders have refused to demand his resignation like conservatives outside the chamber are doing amid their own admission that it would put the GOP majority at risk. While the incumbent appears to have handed the nomination to Brandon Herrera on a silver platter, Gonzales is a third-term lawmaker who's well known enough to corral a spot in a runoff that he could expect to have zero chance to win and no one to blame but himself. A third race is too close to call in Congressional District 32 - one of five seats that GOP state lawmakers targeted on a new map that they crafted at Trump's command. Jace Yarbrough looks like a solid bet for a runoff while Ryan Binkley, Paul Bondar and one of the nine-contender GOP field's other contenders all may have shots at OT. For the sake of sport, we'll go with Yarbrough and Binkley.
Texas House - Republicans. Five incumbents are fighting for political lives in re-election races in districts where challengers appear to have decent shots to win on Tuesday or in runoffs in the spring. The House Republicans who we see as most vulnerable in the hottest races during the weekend before election day are State Rep. Stan Kitzman of Pattison, Angelia Orr of Itasca, Cecil Bell Jr. of Magnolia, Terri Leo-Wilson of Galveston and Mark Dorazio of San Antonio. If we were forced to lay cash on these, we'd go with Orr and Dorazio and a trio of challengers with Dennis "Goose" Geesaman over Kitzman, Kristian Plaisance over Bell and Nathan Watkins over Leo-Wilson. A handful of open races for the House look like coin flips as well in districts where - if we were forced to bet on eventual winners - we'd take Armin Mizani of Keller, Josh Bray of Paris, Bob Mitchell of Pearland, Jorge Borrego of San Antonio and Holly Jeffreys of Bushland.
Editor's Note: Check back next week for the scorecard for the primary projections here for 78 Texas races in round one including 16 at least that appear too close to call in the countdown to the vote.
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