Donald Trump has long dominated Texas politics, using his sway with the state’s Republican voters to dramatically shape elections at all levels.
Even then, this year’s primary stands out. Trump has backed over 130 candidates ahead of Tuesday’s primary, making it the biggest test of his intraparty strength in Texas yet. While he has stayed out of some of the blockbuster contests — most notably the U.S. Senate primary — he has otherwise spread his endorsement generously in an effort to further remake the state in his political mold.
“We’ve got to win the midterms,” Trump said Friday during an event in Corpus Christi that was ostensibly meant to discuss energy policy but doubled as a de facto pre-primary rally. “We brought this country back. We don’t want to lose the midterms.”
Texas has been ground zero for Trump’s efforts to preserve his party’s slim majority in the U.S. House. He successfully pushed GOP state lawmakers to craft five new districts that favor Republicans, touching off a national redistricting war. He has endorsed candidates in the primaries for all five new seats; he brought three of those candidates onstage in Corpus Christi.
Many of Trump’s primary endorsements, however, go back to July, when he issued a blanket endorsement of more than 100 members of the state House and Senate who supported Gov. Greg Abbott’s priority school voucher plan. While those endorsements have drawn less attention in recent weeks, they have helped quell primary challenges at the state legislative level, especially compared to 2024, when Abbott, with Trump’s backing, went on the warpath against intraparty opponents of the voucher proposal.
Now, Trump is testing the power of his endorsement a little over a year after he carried Texas by 14 percentage points, his widest margin through three presidential elections. Eighty-one percent of Texas Republicans approved of his job performance in the latest polling from the University of Texas at Austin, a remarkable figure given that a plurality of Texans writ large disapproved.
The power of Trump’s endorsement suffered an early blow in January, when the candidate he backed in a special election for a state Senate seat, Leigh Wambsganss, lost in a major upset that reverberated nationally. Trump distanced himself from the result, falsely saying he was “not involved” in the election and downplaying it as “a local Texas race.”
Having GOP loyalists in Texas has paid off tremendously for Trump. It made it possible for him to push through the redistricting scheme with little resistance, for example, as opposed to other red states where state lawmakers were less willing to go along with such a brazen political power play.
Trump has been doling out endorsements in the primary up through Friday night, when he backed former state Sen. Don Huffines of Dallas for comptroller and Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller for reelection. Those endorsements were especially notable because Abbott is backing one of Huffines’ opponents for the open seat, acting Comptroller Kelly Hancock, and Miller challenger Nate Sheets.
For the candidates who win Trump’s endorsement, a major challenge is getting out the word, especially if the endorsement arrives late.
Huffines’ campaign, as an example, was ready. It had prepared ads for a variety of platforms in anticipation of a possible endorsement and was able to start deploying them within half an hour of Trump’s announcement. They even were able to get a new TV ad on the air in some broadcast markets.
“We’re firing on all cylinders, working around the clock to make sure every voter knows President Trump has endorsed this campaign before election day,” Huffines campaign spokesperson Noah Betz said in a statement.
Of course, it has been just as notable who Trump has not endorsed. Despite relentless lobbying by all campaigns, the president has stayed out of the blockbuster primary for U.S. Senate, where incumbent John Cornyn is fighting for his political life against two challengers who have pitched themselves as more pro-Trump, Attorney General Ken Paxton and Rep. Wesley Hunt.
Trump has said he feels torn between all three candidates and has suggested he could get involved after Tuesday. Polls suggest Cornyn and Paxton could head to a runoff.
“Maybe I’ll wait to see what happens in the primary before I do anything, because you still have a race against a Democrat,” Trump told a Corpus Christi TV station after his stop there. ”I will be very much involved. Maybe I’ll wait until after the primary. Maybe I won’t.”
Trump has also declined to endorse U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Houston, for reelection as he faces a tough challenge from state Rep. Steve Toth, who has gathered the support of Sen. Ted Cruz and the Trump-aligned conservative group Turning Point Action. Crenshaw is the only House Republican from Texas whom Trump has not backed for another term.
And while Trump endorsed another incumbent, Tony Gonzales, for reelection in December, he has appeared to back off his support for the San Antonio Republican after recent revelations about an alleged affair between Gonzales and a staffer who later died by suicide.
Trump also has withheld his endorsement in the competitive primary for attorney general, where U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin, who has clashed with Trump at times in Congress, is a leading contender. One of Roy’s closest competitors is state Sen. Mayes Middleton of Galveston, who has used his immense personal fortune to run ads branding himself as “MAGA Mayes.” Roy has aired ads showing a Trump trip to Texas last year where the president said of Roy, “He’s not easy, but he’s good.”
Trump’s endorsement has been far easier to find in the primaries for the state’s six open U.S. House seats that are currently GOP-held. He has made picks in all of them except for the 19th District, where U.S. Rep. Jodey Arrington of Lubbock is retiring. Endorsements by House Speaker Mike Johnson and other House GOP leaders have often followed in the days after Trump weighs in — as well as withdrawals by some rivals.
Fourteen minutes after Trump endorsed Jessica Steinmann, a former lawyer for the Trump-aligned think tank America First Policy Institute, in the open primary for a Houston-area seat, a rival candidate who had self-funded his campaign to the tune of more than $2 million dropped his bid, noting that Trump “has now made his wishes clear.” The day after Trump endorsed Trever Nehls to succeed his twin brother, U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls of Richmond, former state Rep. Jacey Jetton ended his campaign, saying he “respect[s] President Trump and the direction he has signaled for this primary.”
Many of the Trump-endorsed congressional candidates are pushing hard to win Tuesday without the need for a runoff. But most of them are in crowded fields, and some — like Trump’s pick in the new 32nd District, Jace Yarbrough — are up against rivals who have self-funded lavishly while also claiming the pro-Trump mantle. In the primary for comptroller, Huffines’ main opponent, Hancock, has gotten millions of dollars in support from Abbott to run ads that hug Trump closely.
“Trump. Abbott. Hancock. The conservative team securing the Texas border,” a narrator says in one pro-Hancock TV ad funded by the governor’s campaign.
While Abbott and Trump were closely aligned in the 2024 primary, they have split their endorsements in some key races Tuesday. In addition to being at odds in the primaries for comptroller and agriculture commissioner, they are on the opposite sides of two U.S. House primaries where Abbott is backing state lawmakers he knows well.
Some of Trump’s primary interventions have left other candidates frustrated, especially after they clocked years of loyalty to him. In the 34th District, Trump passed over former Rep. Mayra Flores, whom he endorsed twice before, for former prosecutor Eric Flores (no relation), who is pitching himself as a surer bet to unseat Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-McAllen, in November. In the 21st District, where Roy is not seeking reelection, Trump also picked a political newcomer, former pro baseball player Mark Teixeira, over a more traditional loyalist in Trey Trainor, a former Trump appointee to the Federal Election Commission.
Democrats are watching the GOP battle for Trump’s support as they look to a general election where the president likely will not be as much of an asset.
Taylor Rehmet, the Democrat who won the state Senate special election upset, said he did not worry about Trump’s involvement in his race — and is unconcerned about it in November, when he will face Wambsganss in a rematch that Republicans are more confident they can win.
“Endorsements, like money, can make headlines, but they don’t replace hard work,” Rehmet said in a statement. “When a community comes together around real issues that matter to them, outside influence just doesn’t carry the same weight.”
Disclosure: University of Texas at Austin has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
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