Last week brought some bad news for Republicans, but one particular loss was richly deserved: Ken Paxton was thwarted in his bid to become a United States Senator. I said during the election that if I lived in Texas I would have held my nose and voted for Paxton. But while I am disappointing that James Talarico is now a U.S. Senator, I am still glad Paxton lost. Republicans deserved to lose this seat.
Paxton has endured a number of corruption scandals, and an overwhelming majority of his fellow Republicans in the Texas House of Representatives recognized he was unfit for office and voted to impeach him in 2023. Paxton was only nominated because of President Trump's personal grudge against Senator John Cornyn. Had Cornyn (who won by ten percentage points in 2020 and won by 27 points in 2014) been the nominee, he would have won that race easily. A stronger showing by Cornyn could have helped Greg Abbott be re-elected as Governor. Talarico is the first Democrat to win that seat since Lyndon Johnson won that seat in 1960.
Republicans have to stop throwing out solid Republicans and nominating bad candidates just because President Trump has his feelings hurt about something. President Trump lambasted Cornyn as "disloyal," so Republican voters picked a nominee who was a sycophant for the President. In doing so, they handed Democrats (who have not won a statewide office in Texas for 32 years) a historic victory. Hopefully Republicans in the Lone Star State will learn a lesson from this defeat, but I am not at all optimistic this will happen.
Shifting focus to Indiana, Congresswoman Victoria Spartz lost her seat despite representing a heavily Republican district. This shows that Indiana Republicans are lucky redistricting did not pass last December. It could have been much worse by weakening other seats by spreading Indianapolis Democrats across multiple previously solidly Republican districts. Indianapolis City Councilor Nick Roberts posted on Facebook and Twitter that with the 2026 results, Democrats could be looking at an 8-1 supermajority in Indiana's Congressional delegation had the gerrymandered map passed. A number of Indiana State Senators sacrificed their own seats and saved the Republican Party from itself. Hopefully this results in Rod Bray being re-elected in 2028.
The consistent theme I saw from Republicans going into the election was that "Democrats are bad." That is fine as far as it goes but it is often not enough of a reason to get people to vote Republican. Just because you think it's a good argument and because your circle of friends or your online community agrees with you does not mean it will resonate with voters. You may think that is wrong, and maybe it is, but the reality of politics is you have to convince people to vote for you and you have to tailor your message accordingly. Republicans have had a number of policy accomplishments over the last two years, so "Democrats are bad" was a puzzling message.
I would be careful not to engage in too much doom and gloom. Republican voters were unmotivated while Democrats were highly motivated. Democrats would be making a mistake to assume this is a broad endorsement of their policy agenda. President Biden thought he had a huge mandate going into 2021 and overreached, prompting a backlash. He was eventually forced out of the race for President by his own party leadership. The same thing happened with President Obama in 2009 and the 2010 Tea Party wave, and with President Clinton and the 1994 Republican wave that gave Republicans control of the House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years. If Democrats overreach, voters will react negatively.
Christians, especially, should resist the temptation to be depressed. King Jesus is still on the throne in Heaven and turns our rulers' hearts however He wills. (Proverbs 21:1.) Yes, Democrats can cause a disruption and will do some bad things, but a Democratic wave election in 2026 is not the end of the country. President Trump still has a veto pen and some of the swing districts in play in 2026 will be up again in 2028. Becoming despondent is a foolish and faithless response.
Democrats' primary influence in Congress will be with oversight of the executive branch. One positive reform they could work on is restraining the executive branch and restoring policymaking authority to the legislative branch where that authority rightfully belongs. I fully expect Democrats to abandon this principle if a Democrat is elected President in 2028 but taking positive steps now can create political momentum for additional reforms in 2029.
Now is not the time for despair. Now is the time to reorient ourselves and look at what is possible and what opportunities are presented moving forward.
