Democrats can look at Florida and Texas in a couple of ways. From one angle, the states are both places where victory has been just out of reach — a tantalizing “what if?” From another, they offer an unlearned lesson in heartbreak, a constant loop of Lucy yanking the football away from Charlie Brown at the last second.
For now, the former point of view is winning out as Senate Democrats look to hold on to their slim majority. A new wave of money and interest has begun to pour into Florida and Texas as polls show tightening races and Election Day fast approaches. And with incumbents like Republican Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas as their targets, it’s not hard to see why Democrats see going on the offense as a risk worth taking.
With incumbents like Republican Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas as their targets, it’s not hard to see why Democrats see going on the offense as a risk worth taking.
The electoral map was never a good one for Senate Democrats this cycle, forced to defend far more seats than their Republican counterparts. With the GOP set to claim a seat from retiring Sen. Joe Manchin, I-W.Va., the upper house is already starting from a 50-50 split. The odds for Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., pulling off an upset in his now deep-red state have continued to narrow, forcing Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to look elsewhere for a path to a majority. And that road requires knocking off at least one of the two least likable members of the GOP caucus.
Things are looking tight in Texas again this time around, with Democratic Rep. Colin Allred closing in on Cruz. Most polls still have Cruz ahead by around 3 points, but an outlier run by Morning Consult had the congressman up by 1 point. That’s still within the margin of error, but the numbers have galvanized Democrats’ hope that the state might be a jump ball. Accordingly, the Cook Political Report shifted the rating in that race from “likely Republican” to “lean Republican” on Tuesday, reflecting Allred’s momentum.
Cruz at least is extremely aware of his own vulnerability. He roared into the Senate in 2012 and quickly made a name for himself as a darling of the far-right tea party movement. But his bid for president in 2016 faltered and his first re-election bid in 2018 ended up a squeaker that he won by less than 3 points. In the last two years, as he’s prepared to face voters again, Cruz has sought to refashion himself as a bipartisan moderate, a hard task when you’ve built your whole brand on being a provocateur and ideological bomb-thrower.
Scott, on the other hand, hasn’t bothered following Cruz’s lead in playing for the middle (despite winning his seat that same year by just 0.1 points). Instead, the first-term senator is angling to replace Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., at the top of the GOP caucus and take the title of majority leader, if all goes according to plan. But his time at the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the most recent midterms wasn’t exactly a wild success, nor was his bid to pounce against McConnell last year.
Former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell isn’t faring quite as well against Scott as Allred is against Cruz, but she is gaining traction. Five Thirty Eight’s polling average has Scott up by 4 points, which is half of the lead he held over the summer. Mucarsel-Powell has also been set on making the race into a referendum on reproductive rights. In doing so, she’s hoping to draw enough support from the abortion amendment on the ballot to negate any benefit Scott could get from riding former President Donald Trump’s coattails.
The two biggest unknowns in these races are factors outside of the individual candidates’ control: infrastructure and demographics.
The optimistic view is that each contest could be won with either more dedicated discipline from local Democrats or greater resources and attention from the national party. But recent history has shown that neither is a guarantee of success. Cruz’s challenger in 2018, former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, was popular both locally and nationally, seen as a real contender at finally winning a statewide race in Texas after a more than 20-year drought for Democrats. Likewise, former Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., transformed her race in 2022 against Sen. Marco Rubio into a national referendum on the GOP, but neither managed to unseat their opponent.
Those two races raised — and spent — a jaw-dropping amount of money in the process. O’Rourke’s campaign drew in a staggering $80 million, the most a single U.S. Senate candidate has ever raised. Demings managed to raise almost as much for her race, considerably outspending Rubio in the process. This year, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee announced in late September that both Mucasal-Powell and Allred will get support in the form of a multimillion-dollar ad buy in their states, but the DSCC has yet to disclose exactly how much is going to each candidate.
The two biggest unknowns in these races are factors outside of the individual candidates’ control: infrastructure and demographics.
Florida was once the biggest swing state in the country but has shifted to the right in the last decade, producing blowout wins for the GOP in the 2022 midterms. It doesn’t help that the Democratic Party there has been a bit of a mess, if we’re being honest, which has left a vacuum for Trump to fill in his new home state. And Scott, who has already spent $8 million of his own money in this race, is sure to keep shoveling in cash to offset the DSCC’s investment.
Conversely, Texas is deep Republican territory that Democrats have spent the last decade trying to transform into a purple state. An influx of people into the Austin and Houston metro areas has come with a boost in liberal voters. A major question mark hovers over how the state’s Latinos wind up voting this year, as the GOP has been making major inroads with border communities. Meanwhile, Texas’ Republican attorney general has been cracking down on voting rights, potentially alienating Latinos in the process.
With less than four weeks to go, this is not an ideal scenario for Democrats. There’s plenty of reason for cynicism in the face of these odds and so many prior disappointments. But with this much on the line, there’s little choice but to square up and take a running start at that football again. Better to land flat on your back than be left wishing you’d taken the chance at dispatching the likes of Scott and Cruz.