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Story of the race:
Republican Paxton knows his party has been winning statewide races in Texas for more than 30 years.
Texas State Representative James Talarico, a former schoolteacher and Presbyterian seminary student, is the latest Democrat hoping to break his party’s long losing streak.
Texas Republicans are facing a daunting combination of headwinds. It is a challenging national political environment for conservatives and there are several state issues like data centre construction and aggressive immigration enforcement that have cut against their party. Added to that is a controversial candidate, Paxton.
The campaign has been acrimonious, with Talarico targeting Paxton’s 2023 impeachment by the Republican-controlled state House of Representatives for alleged corruption, bribery and abuse of power. Paxton denied the charges and was later acquitted by the state Senate, calling the impeachment a “politically motivated sham from the beginning”.
Supported by more than $170m in funds from tech mogul Elon Musk, Paxton has attempted to paint Talarico as a liberal who is out of touch with Texans on issues like transgender rights, law enforcement, immigration and energy policy.
A Democratic victory here might indicate America’s second-biggest electoral prize in a presidential election could be within their reach in 2028 – a notion that could dramatically reshape the nation’s political landscape.
How they got here:
Before he entered public service, Paxton spent 14 years launching and building his own law firm. He served in the state House and Senate before becoming the chief legal officer in Texas.
Talarico taught at a middle school in San Antonio, in a neighbourhood he has described as one of the poorest in the state. He has studied theology and names Pope Leo as a “spiritual hero”.
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