Texas has, for many years, been at the heart of the Republican political coalition, occupying a spot analogous to California in the Democratic coalition. The state hasn’t gone Democratic since 1976. Democrats were targeted for extinction at the state level by the vile criminal Karl Rove, and he was, unfortunately, very good at his job. The Republicans run the Texas state government from top to bottom. Texas has looked pretty dismal for us.
But things are changing. Let’s take a look:
A. (By way of Kossack MD Roller)
Voter Registration In Texas Reaches A Record 16 Million
In 2014, Democratic groups accelerated their work to increase their numbers in individual counties, in spite of rule that throttled the state's voter registration numbers.
"Even Republicans have acknowledged that the work [Democrats] have done in places like Houston … really shows that the voter registrations are growing so much faster than even the population now, that it shows that they're finding those voters that they thought should have been registered before," Wallace says.
Democrats tell [Hearst reporter Jeremy] Wallace that younger voters make up a substantial number of the newly registered.
"I think it was about one-third of all new registers are under 25," Wallace says. "And younger voters are skewing Democratic right now."
TWO MILLION voters have been added since the 2016.
B. (By way of the esteemed poopdogcomedy)
Beto O’Rourke’s PAC shifts to next phase to help Democrats flip Texas House
Beto O’Rourke and his band of volunteers are entering the next phase of their effort to help Democrats win the Texas House.
Members of the political action committee, Powered by People, have met their goal of contacting more than 350,000 Democrats who recently moved to Texas but have not registered to vote here. It’s part of a broader plan to try to register about 1.4 million new residents who voted for Democrats in their former states.
They identified the new residents by examining change of address forms and matching them with voter records from their home states.
O’Rourke, the former El Paso congress member and Democratic presidential candidate, says getting 500,000 of those new Texans to vote for Democratic candidates in November would enhance the chances of Democrats winning the House — and former Vice President Joe Biden defeating President Donald Trump.
C .
The 2018 Senate race (from the mostly reliable Wikipedia)
On November 6, 2018, Ted Cruz defeated Beto O'Rourke. However, O'Rourke gave Democrats their best performance in a Texas statewide election since Ann Richards was elected governor in 1990.[206] In addition, O'Rourke flipped several counties in Texas that Donald Trump carried in 2016, including Williamson (includes Round Rock and Georgetown), historically conservative Tarrant (includes Fort Worth and suburbs within the DFW metroplex), Jefferson (includes Beaumont and Port Arthur), Nueces (includes Corpus Christi), sparsely populated Brewster (includes Big Bend National Park), and Hays (includes San Marcos). Cruz only flipped one county that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016, sparsely populated Kenedy (coastal region south of Corpus Christi).
D.
The trends in presidential voting
1980: +14 R
1984: +27 R
1988: +12 R
1992: +3 R (in a state where Ross Perot pulled in 22% and Clinton got 37%)
1996: +5 R (with almost 7% for Perot)
2000: +21 R
2004: +23 R
2008: +12 R
2012: +16 R
2016: +9 R
Counties that Clinton carried: Bexar (San Antonio), Brooks, Cameron, Culberson, Dallas (with 60%), El Paso (with 68.5%), Fort Bend, Frio, Harris (Houston, with 54%), Hidalgo, Jim Hogg, Jim Wells, Kenedy, Kleberg, La Salle, Maverick, Presidio, Reeves, Starr, Travis (Austin, with 65.8%), Val Verde, Webb, Willacy, Zapata, Zavala.
Counties where Clinton was within 10: Brewster, Hays (difference of .9%), Jefferson (difference of .5%), Nueces (difference of 1.5%), Tarrant (Ft.Worth), Williamson
From The Texas Tribune:
2016 Turnout in 10 Texas counties with largest voting-age populations
| County |
Voting age population |
Turnout |
| Harris |
3,341,196 |
39% |
| Dallas |
1,836,825 |
40.9% |
| Tarrant |
1,457,806 |
45.7% |
| Bexar |
1,414,221 |
41.4% |
| Travis |
886,368 |
52.2% |
| Collin |
727,332 |
49% |
| El Paso |
638,024 |
33% |
| Hidalgo |
616,934 |
28% |
| Denton |
604,372 |
48.5% |
| Fort Bend |
548,993 |
47.7% |
The 2016 result was the closest in a head-to-head race with only minimal third party voting. As President Obama said, Texas isn’t a Republican state, it’s a non-voting state. So where can we close the gap even more?
E.
Texas Demographic data
From The Texas Demographic Center:
The July 1, 2018 estimated population for Texas is 28,702,243, which represents a 14.9 percent increase from the census count of 25,145,565 in April 2010. Texas added over 3.55 million people between 2010 and 2018. However, growth is not evenly distributed across age and race/ethnicity groups. ...the 65 plus age category had the greatest increase (slightly more than one million) and grew at the fastest rate compared to the younger age groups.During this same period, all race/ethnicity groups saw increases in every age group, except for NH Whites. Specifically, NH Whites experienced population declines in the under 18 years and 45-64 years age groups, but had the most significant growth in the 65 years plus age group. Despite the greatest growth in the 65 years plus age group overall, NH Whites experienced a decline in the share of population among this age group (from 68 percent to 63 percent). In fact, NH Whites saw declines while Hispanics experienced increases in their share of the state population across all age groups, and all the other race/ethnicity groups saw relatively stable shares of the state population across all age groups. As a result, the Texas population has grown older, with its median age increasing from 33.6 years in 2010 to 34.9 years in 2018.
From The Texas Tribune:
Texas’ Hispanic population has grown by more than 2 million since 2010, according to new population estimates released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau, and the state's demographer now predicts that Hispanics will be the state's largest population group by mid-2021.
An annual gain of 201,675 between July 2018 and July 2019 pushed the count of Hispanic residents to more than 11.5 million, the census estimates show. Although annual growth has slowed slightly in recent years, the new figures put a sharp point on how quickly the Hispanic population continues to climb. The annual growth in Hispanic residents has outpaced the combined growth among white, Black and Asian residents every year since 2010.
Texas still has a bigger white population — up to 11.95 million last year — but it grew by just 36,440 last year and by about half a million since 2010. White population growth has been so sluggish this decade that the increase in the number of Asian Texans, who make up a small share of the total population, has almost caught up with the increase in white Texans.
F.
An example of a great candidate who needs our help! (H/T: Kossack Blue Tuesday)
Joanna Cattanach
G.
There are more than 16,000,000 registered voters in Texas, and 21,000,000 people of voting age. How do we get ‘em out to vote Democratic?
Here’s a big list of Texas Progressive Organizations.
Here’s the Texas Progressive Action Network.
Here’s the Texas Freedom Network.
If you want to help in Texas, try The Texas Organizing Project. If you’d like to go an additional route, there’s The Texas Democratic Party.
Flip the Texas House
Here is a big list of Texas progressive organizations from ActLocal.
Here’s the Dallas County Democratic Party.
Here’s the Harris County Democratic Party. (Houston)
Here’s Texas Democratic Women.
Here’s Turn Rural Texas Blue. (From Kossack sane)
Here is the largest Latino Democratic organization in Texas, Jolt. Note: One in three eligible voters in Texas are Latino!
And...as always:
Try these links.
POSTCARDS TO VOTERS.
VOTE FORWARD’S LETTERS TO VOTERS.
TEXT OUT THE VOTE.
THE MoveOn TEXT TEAM
And don’t close the door on canvassing just yet! There are safe ways in which this can be done!
Our Target Groups: WHERE THE VOTES ARE
ID REQUIREMENTS FOR EVERY STATE, HOW TO OBTAIN VOTER IDs
1. Information from The National Conference of State Legislatures, located here. This is an excellent source.
2. Information from Ballotpedia, here. This has a wealth of detail.
3. VoteRiders will help people obtain voter IDs. Take a look here.
ABSENTEE BALLOT REQUIREMENTS
Vote.org
Absentee and Early Voting
REGISTERING TO VOTE
1. State voting requirements can be found at U.S. Vote Foundation, located here.
2. You can register people to vote at Vote.Org, located right here.
3. You can not only register to vote at this site, you can check your current eligibility, right here.
WORKING WITH DEMOCRATIC GROUPS AT THE LOCAL LEVEL
1. Act Local put this guide out last year. It has plenty of good information, and I’m sure they’re already cranking up for 2020. Take a look here.
2. You want to be part of a fighting organization? Check out Indivisible, right here.
3. Check out Wave 2020, right here. Their list of local organizations is here.
4. Take a look at SwingLeft, right here. And their swing state project is HERE.
5. The Action Network has links to let you volunteer in key states.
FOR AMERICANS ABROAD AND MEMBERS OF THE MILITARY
And Democrats Abroad has valuable information.
And take a look here:
The Campaign Workshop: GOTV for Democrats
Nuts & Bolts, right here on DKos.
Progressives Everywhere
National Democratic Training Committee
Progressive Turnout Project
For the Win (county-wide GOTV)
Daily Kos Groups (from Kossack mettle fatigue)
Sister District Project (for winning state legislatures)
Joe Biden’s Take Action Page.
And MICHELLE OBAMA is ready to go BIG on GOTV!
Here are ALL of the state Democratic parties!
We need your help BIG TIME this year! Never think we’ve got this in the bag. We need to be fighting EVERY day.
And your money is vital as well. ActBlue is a handy-dandy way to contribute.
We can do this! WE CAN WIN TEXAS!! LET’S GO FOR IT!!
