The Fight For Texas Starts Now

Some Things Really Deserve The Fight

One of my most famous, and most frequently cited, failures is Blue Texas, and it is the call that is most frequently mentioned to diminish my views or my commentary still. "How can we take you seriously when you thought Texas would go blue?" is a fair question, one which there isn't a great answer to, unless I go into a level of "actually, the process was good," which is fairly crap. The actual reason I thought Texas was going to go blue is that I thought I was smarter than everybody else, which is a dangerous place to be.

There was a legitimate case that it was gonna be close - the 2018 Texas polls had been too high on Ted Cruz because they fucked up polling Hispanics. The New York Times/Siena poll of Beto-Cruz was bang on the money with whites, but just a mere 20% off with Hispanics - a singular example of a totemic problem. Apply that sort of logic again, and the polls - which showed white support at the levels Democrats would be considered favourites at - pointed to a blue win. It just turned out nobody could poll college-educated whites, both in Texas and nationally.

We all know that the Hispanic numbers were actually meaningful this time, as south Texas came in for the President in a way it hadn't come in for a Republican in a long time - or, in some cases, ever. It was a nightmare for Democrats, a failure that I - a white man without any connection to the places or people involved - cannot explain, nor can I suggest any solutions. I have no idea if it was a lack of canvassing or not that really hurt. I have no idea whether these voters were always Republicans, and just not turning out, or if they're gettable for Democrats. I'm able to diagnose what happened, but I cannot explain the why.

I even said in the runup to the election that if Harris County goes from 1.3M votes in 2016 to, say, 1.7M, that the voters who are left to turn out are going to be low propensity Hispanics. It's quite the accomplishment to be so right and yet so wrong, because I was right - Hispanic turnout surged. They just didn't break for Democrats like I expected. I was saying that as a sign of Democratic strength, and it ended up being a disaster for the party.

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Will Democrats flip Texas in 2022 or 2024? I haven't the foggiest idea. The very, very limited evidence from Georgia says that Hispanic turnout falls in a lower turnout environment, and that the fall is concentrated with Trump-supporting, low propensity Hispanics. But, that evidence comes from one race in a low Hispanic % state, so it would be interesting to see if it holds up in the special in the New Mexico 1st which will be held soon. NM-01, after all, is probably as good a test of Hispanic vote support as we are likely to get any time soon, and the person who solves the question of Hispanic vote intention solves the question of Texas' future.

What I do know is that some in Democratic politics have given up on the Lone Star State, deciding that it is just too red to focus on. That is, kindly, bollocks. The state is winnable, because 2018 was a truly impressive result. It will flip at some point - it is too urban and too young not to. Ted Cruz's Senate seat could - depending on how 2022 goes - be the skeleton key to holding the Senate after 2024. This state really matters, and it is worth fighting for. I'm not saying we will win it in either 2022 or 2024, but the surest path to losing it is to not try. 

Sometimes, people like me - nerds with spreadsheets, divorced from localities, and in my case the immediate consequences of election results - can be callous about those fighting the fights we deem unwinnable. It happens in Canada too - I've mocked those who soldier on in the name of delusion, supporting candidates who will not win but who routinely insist to me I'm missing something many times. I probably will again, in time, because I'm an asshole. But the way Texas is just relegated to the bottom of the heap of 2022 conversation feels wrong to me. It plainly is winnable, even if it isn't more likely than not to be won, and we're all acting like it's Nebraska. It's not.

Belief in things that have not yet happened, but in the promise of what might, is fundamental to humanity. I'm the guy whose football team just lost a heartbreaking game, the first time I really thought I could see my team win since the dark days of January 2011. I was in middle school then, and since then, I've harboured delusions of grandeur that never came to pass. And yet, every week, every game, every year I lived and died with the Packers, as I will again next year. The memory of the pain will only make the victory sweeter, when it comes.

I say this not to equate the importance of a sporting event and politics and elections - I know one matters, and the other doesn't. But I also know, more acutely tonight than I've ever realized before, that the rash and dismissive way that so many have treated people trying to flip Texas is somehow not the way that sports fandom is treated. My misery is understood, my pain cared about. There is none of that same grace afforded to those trying to do a so much more important goal.

It is entirely possible that Texas holds out until 2026 or even beyond to finally elect Democrats in wide numbers. It is entirely possible that this notion of a blue Texas feels a decade early by the time it ends up coming. It is possible that this all ends in heartbreak. All of that is possible. It's just that none of it should stop the fight to make Texas blue. Of all the possible sources of delusion and heartbreak, trying to do something that would indelibly make America a better place seems like a good place to start.

The fight for Texas is on - it's on all of us to win it.