Republican Voters More Likely to Break Ranks in Texas, Poll Finds

When most people look at a political poll, they see how candidates would perform in a head to head race. That’s what usually captures headlines, but there’s so much more under the surface that can better predict the outcome of an election.

Texas Southern University recently conducted a poll on statewide races in Texas that shows some fascinating information that should have Republicans very alarmed. Not only are all of the statewide races a bit too close for comfort, Independent voters are siding with the Democrats by double digits in every race. That can spell disaster if the GOP does not spend resources to connect with independent and unaffiliated voters.

For example, while Republican Governor Abbott is leading Democrat Gina Hinojosa by a 49-43 margin in the poll, Hinojosa leads 53-30 among independents. The same story is true in the Lt. Governor race (35-22 in favor of the Democrat), the Attorney General race (37-22), and even the Railroad Commissioner election (30-19).

The other area of concern is that Republican voters are more likely to break ranks on high-profile races than their Democrat counterparts. This is most evident in the US Senate race, where 97% of Democrat voters indicated that they would vote for their party’s nominee, as opposed to just 85% of Republican voters who would back the GOP candidate in November. While the margins were closer in all other statewide races, Democrats hold a more firm grasp on their voters by a margin of 3+ percentage points across all races. This could be the difference between winning and losing in tight elections.

The Republican Party has been much more open to differences in opinion than the Democrats. This is good for our country and should be celebrated. At the same time, it does make it harder to unite our fellow Republicans to support the whole ticket in November. The poll results show a clear trend on that.

This is further evident when looking directly at crossover voters in each race. Not a single voter in the poll who indicated support for a democrat candidate in the Governor, AG, or Lt. Governor races said that they would vote for Republican Ken Paxton in the Senate race. In contrast, anywhere from 2-4% of Republican voters indicated each race said that they would be voting for Democrat James Talarico in November, with the highest number being 4% of Governor Abbott’s voters crossing over to vote for the Democrat in the Senate election.

These are big problems as these races get tighter. The Texas GOP is simultaneously having to convince its own voters to vote straight ticket and having to convince independents to vote Red in November. The fact that 6 Texas Republican Congressmen still refuse to publicly support the Republican Senate nominee is further indication that there’s a lot of work to be done if Republicans want to sweep the statewide races again this November.