Why is this man celebrating?
Because everything is bigger in Texas, including electoral upsets
You may have missed the political earthquake that shook Texas on Saturday night.
A special runoff election for a state Senate seat saw Democrat Taylor Rehmet trounce his Republican challenger, Leigh Wambsganss. Not only did Rehmet flip the seat blue, winning by 14 points, he did so in a district Trump won by 17 points in the 2024 election.
That’s a 31-point swing. In Texas.
Now, one special election with low voter turnout cannot fully predict the future, but there are a lot of reasons why Republicans should be worried and Democrats should be looking for takeaways. Here are a few:
National Republicans didn’t ignore this race. They poured money into it — millions more than Democrats.
Donald Trump posted about Wambsganss three times, calling her “a GREAT Candidate and has my Complete and Total Endorsement.” He also encouraged Texans to get out and vote. Though after the loss, he told reporters, “I’m not involved in that. That’s a local Texas race.”
Wambsganss is a well-known, well-connected Republican activist. Rehmet is a machinist, a union leader, and an Air Force veteran who had never run for elected office.
The district is in deep red Tarrant County. It is known as a MAGA stronghold and epicenter of Christian nationalism. It has not been represented by a Democrat since the 1980s.
The district, just outside Fort Worth, is bigger than a U.S. congressional district, representing about a million people, with a sizable Latino population.
The race didn’t qualify for exit polling, so we don’t know exactly why Rehmet won. But Trump’s continued antagonism of his newfound friends in the Latino voting community surely added to Saturday night’s drubbing.
In the 2024 election, Trump made significant inroads with Latino voters, winning 48%, more than any previous Republican presidential candidate. The swing to Trump was mainly driven by his promise to fix the economy.
One year in, and many Latinos are souring on the president. On January 13, Navigator Research conducted a focus group of seven Latinos who voted for Trump in 2024. They all identify as independents.
The participants, who requested anonymity, cited his inability to bring down inflation, tariffs, his sudden international interventionist tack, and his aggressive immigration enforcement as reasons for their dissatisfaction.
They believe his deportation policies disproportionately affect Latino Americans. “You’re not just deporting people and ripping families apart, you are also creating an environment of hatred and feeding racism,” one woman said.
“He’s created his own Gestapo,” said a man. “He’s going after Hispanics now, but when he gets done with Hispanics, you know who’s next.”
The most recent national poll of Latinos was conducted back in October by the Pew Research Center. The poll found that 70% of Latinos “disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as President,” while 65% disapprove of his handling of immigration, and 61% believe his economic policies have made things worse.
Republicans may say they’re shocked and surprised by the results in Texas, but they shouldn’t be. The perpetual footage of a masked police force rounding up people, including children, is not playing well in Peoria or Fort Worth. Maybe, just maybe, the country has had enough.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Trump campaigned on arresting criminals who live here illegally. That is not what he is doing and not what we are seeing.
This strategy — if you can call it that — is disrupting everyday life. It is disrupting the lives of Americans, native-born and immigrants, but especially immigrants who do the work that most Americans can’t or won’t do, immigrants woven into the social, economic, and cultural fabric of our country.
Trump’s immigration policies and the worsening U.S. economy are interconnected. About 19% of the American workforce is made up of immigrant labor. That is down a percentage point since Trump took office. The U.S. lost more than a million immigrant workers between January and July 2025, according to the most recent Census data available.
Several industries — farming, construction, hospitality, and healthcare — are especially reliant on immigrants. Trump’s deportations are causing industry-shaking labor shortages. Immigrants who have remained in the country — those with legal status and those who are undocumented — are terrified to leave the house and go to work.
People are right to be afraid to simply walk the streets of American cities, particularly Democratic cities. Masked ICE agents have been patrolling and terrorizing people in Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans, Washington, New York, Minneapolis and now Portland, Maine for months.
Immigration enforcement in those cities is leading to an “ICE recession,” a phrase coined by Javier Cabral, editor-in-chief of L.A. Taco, a local news site that covers immigrant communities in Los Angeles.
“If you’re not directly affected because of your legal status, your morality and your soul and your general excitement to go out and try a new place is affected. It’s hard to compartmentalize and still have a glass of wine or beer. I’m seeing bars here just gasping for air,” Cabral told the SevenFifty Daily, a website that covers the food and beverage industry.
Chicago restaurant owner Mike Moreano said he has lost 50% of sales at his three locations. In Minneapolis, white workers are smuggling Latino co-workers to work under blankets in the back seat of their cars.
Trump’s extreme policies show no signs of abating. And there is every reason to believe they will continue to and through the midterm elections.
As stated above, one race does not make a revolution. But it isn’t just one race. Since Trump took office, Democrats have consistently and decisively outperformed Republicans in special elections and on Election Day.
In March, a Democrat flipped a Pennsylvania Senate seat that had been in Republican hands for a century. Democrats have won special elections in Kentucky and Iowa. They swept every major race in November. Though the Democratic candidate failed to flip a state House seat in Tennessee, the final tally in that special election was far closer than anyone predicted.
Momentum, optimism, and a desire for change are a powerful trifecta in American politics. Right now, Democrats have the upper hand in all three. And it does not appear that Trump is doing anything but doubling down on policies that alienate voters.
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Dan
I see a big blue wave comin'
It’s pretty obvious that Trump plans to steal future elections. Or just cancel them a.together and keep doing whatever HE wants.