At James Talarico’s first rally after Ken Paxton became his opponent in their US Senate race, one of Texas’ most prominent Black leaders, Rodney Ellis, acknowledged he had supported Talarico’s opponent, Rep. Jasmine Crockett, in their hard-fought Democratic primary.
“That was then, this is now,” Ellis said on Wednesday. “There’s too much at stake to be petty.”
It was a notable vote of confidence from Ellis, a Harris County commissioner and former state senator from Houston. Yet it also showed how Talarico is still building inroads with Black voters nearly three months after they overwhelmingly favored Crockett, a bloc that the state representative desperately needs if he wants to have any chance at a historic breakthrough for his party in Texas.
After losing to Talarico, Crockett called on Democrats to unite behind all their nominees. But she has not campaigned with Talarico yet, and her team made clear in a new statement to CNN that she believes Texas Democrats have considerable progress to make if they want to end Republican rule.
The statement, from Crockett spokesperson Karrol Rimal, said it would be “foolish to underestimate” Paxton and that there is “still a long road ahead to November.”
“Tough decisions will need to be made about where Democrats are prioritizing their spending – do they invest in a Texas longshot or double down in states where they’ve won statewide such as Alaska and Georgia?” the statement said. “Texas Democrats have nominated a slate of candidates where the top three spots are filled with lawmakers from Austin. They’ll have to do a lot of work outside of Central Texas and to resonate with constituencies across our state which is one of the largest and diverse in the world.”
The statement added that Crockett still believes turning Texas blue “lies in energizing the Democratic base,” including voters of color. Democrats “can chase disaffected Republicans all day but there simply is not enough of them to change the outcome,” the statement said.
While Crockett’s spokesperson said her team isn’t directing criticism at any specific candidate, Talarico has long said he wants to win over Democrats, independents and Republicans fed up with their party. On Tuesday night, after Paxton defeated Sen. John Cornyn in their party’s runoff, Talarico made an explicit appeal to Cornyn supporters, telling them in an X post that they “have a place in our campaign.”
No Democrat has won statewide in Texas since 1994.
“I’m proud of the work we’ve been doing all across Texas to bring our coalition together — because our state deserves a Senator that will deliver for Black Texans,” Talarico said in a statement to CNN. “As the candidate at the top of the ticket, it’s on me to earn the trust and support of Black voters that have been taken for granted by the national Democratic party for far too long.”
Talarico emerged from his contentious primary well aware that he needed to mend fences with Black voters who backed Crockett.
Since the primary, Talarico has given the commencement address at Paul Quinn College in Dallas, the oldest historically Black college in the state; visited another HBCU, Prairie View A&M University outside Houston; and rolled out a plan to combat maternal mortality, which disproportionately impacts Black women.
He’s held meetings with groups of Black leaders in the Dallas area, Houston and Austin; and he’s met individually Fort Worth civil rights activist Opal Lee and Dallas pastor Freddie Haynes, the Democratic nominee to succeed Crockett in the House. And earlier this month, Talarico made a surprise visit to an Austin taco shop with the best-known Black Democrat in the country: former President Barack Obama.
“I really believe he is doing everything that he can do,” said state Rep. Christian Manuel, a Black Democrat and former Crockett supporter who represents Jefferson County in southeast Texas, where Crockett won nearly 80% of the primary vote.
If there is a problem, he said, it is “people who are in the social media stratosphere [who] are still stuck in what happened in January, in February, in March, and the rest of us are trying to move on and drag as many people as possible” to turn out in November.
Manuel added that some Black Democrats have been lobbying Talarico’s campaign to “throw in an extra place” on his campaign swings to reach communities of color. “They’ve been responsive,” he said.
The second stop of Talarico’s post-runoff tour took him on Thursday to Nacogdoches, in the heart of East Texas, where Crockett carried most counties in the primary. He was introduced by a Black county commissioner, Sandy McCorvey, who said Talarico “understands this community matters,” and that he is “energizing a Democratic base” as part of his campaign strategy.
Talarico continues to make progress in uniting the party. He met after the primary with the Texas Organizing Project, a statewide progressive organizing group that backed Crockett, and is set to receive the group’s endorsement in the coming days, according to a source familiar with its plans.
Brianna Brown, the group’s executive director, said in an interview earlier this month that members were relatively unfamiliar with Talarico because the group does not operate in Austin. But she had a chance to get to know him better after the primary, she said, and emphasized to him that there is a “path to victory that is not about centering White swing voters.” She said they had “some back and forth” on the topic, but he was “receptive” and demonstrated he had done his homework about the group.
“The thing about Jasmine’s race that is really encouraging is there was a whole new wave of voters who came out because they were excited about what she represents,” Brown said, adding that Crockett had an “immediate kinship” with Black voters and that “needs to be valued and respected and poured into by James.”
Polls conducted ahead of the March primary had Crockett leading Talarico by a substantial margin among Black voters. Crockett swept the 10 counties with the highest share of Black residents, winning those counties by a margin of about 24 points. In Jefferson County, which has the largest share of Black residents in the state at about 33%, Crockett won by nearly 60 points.
There were sharp tensions between Crockett and Talarico supporters during the primary, and they often centered on race. Former Rep. Colin Allred, who dropped out of the Senate race as Crockett entered, slammed Talarico after an influencer alleged that Talarico had privately referred to Allred as a “mediocre Black man”; Talarico said it was a “mischaracterization.” And days later, after a pro-Talarico super PAC started running ads questioning Crockett’s ability to win in November, she bluntly called the line of attack racist. (Talarico himself said he thought she could win.)
After Talarico won the Senate nomination, Allred said he would support him. Allred went on to win a US House primary runoff on Tuesday against Rep. Julie Johnson where Crockett campaigned for Allred and Talarico for Johnson.
After Talarico won the Senate primary on March 3, Crockett said she called him to congratulate him and said Democrats “must rally around our nominees and win.” She has not yet campaigned alongside him, instead focusing her political efforts on helping other Texas runoff candidates, including Allred and Christian Menefee in the 18th Congressional District.
Crockett has also been traveling to other states to stump for candidates, including California for Xavier Becerra for governor.
Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, whom Democrats nominated for Senate in Texas in 2018 and governor four years later, said Thursday on CNN’s “Laura Coates Live” that winning over Black voters in the state is “the ball game” for Talarico. He said Talarico’s outreach to Black voters so far is “very encouraging” but noted he would like to see Crockett campaign with him.
“She has more star power than anyone I can think of in Texas, apart from James Talarico,” O’Rourke said. “When she uses that to connect with the electorate here, I think James is going to have more than an even shot of winning this in November.”
Manuel, the Texas state representative, said he felt confident Crockett was supportive of Talarico and suggested it was more important for Black voters to “meet and know him” than to see the congresswoman stump for him.
The feeling is mutual among other former Crockett supporters. Grand Prairie City Councilman Junior Ezeonu, one of the Black leaders who met with Talarico in Dallas after the primary, said he and most others in their meeting had been Crockett supporters, but they understood the need to unify for the November election.
At the same time, he said, they emphasized Talarico has to “run on issues” important to Black voters “and fight for people like us.”
“We just can’t assume that Black voters will turn out en masse because Trump is in office because we’re mad at Trump,” Ezeonu said. “We’ve got to give them a reason to vote. … He has to make that case every single day.”
CNN’s Edward Wu contributed to this report.
This story has been updated with additional information.
