This year’s midterm elections concluded with Republicans receiving an unprecedented defeat. Democrats seized control of the U.S. House and Senate, and won by wide margins in previously untouchable GOP strongholds.
Texas was one of the most pivotal defeats for the GOP. State Rep. James Talarico defeated Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the race for U.S. Senate, and State Rep. Gina Hinojosa unseated Governor Greg Abbott. Democrats also won the races for Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Agriculture Commissioner, Railroad Commissioner, and gained a majority in the Texas House of Representatives. Republicans’ sole success in the state was retaining control of the Texas Senate.
Midterm election results were not an anomaly—the same pattern rippled across the nation with districts Trump won in 2024 swinging heavily to the left. The fact that the entire country shifted blue shows that this election was not primarily a matter of candidate quality, but a result of nationwide factors.
The main reasons for the swing in this midterm election were the unpopularity of the Iran war and affordability issues that were exacerbated by rising costs of gasoline and diesel. Exit polls confirmed this, with immigration being the sole issue where voters gave the advantage to Republicans. Nevertheless, Open Borders advocates are already hard at work trying to frame the election results as a referendum against ICE and deportations in order to set up an amnesty push.
Many amnesty advocates are opining that the only way forward is to step back deportations and work towards “Comprehensive Immigration Reform,” which almost always involves mass amnesty of illegal aliens. This claim is completely false. It ignores the primary factors leading to electoral defeat and assumes that the administration actually delivered on its promise of the largest deportation operation in American history.
While the Trump administration did close the border and largely ended catch-and-release, DHS secretaries Kristi Noem and Markwayne Mullin failed to reach the deportation benchmarks laid out by the Mass Deportation Coalition. They have consistently refused to release official statistics on deportations and continue to group returns at the border with interior removals, which paint a false picture of the progress towards undoing the damage of the Biden border invasion.
Republicans in Congress also failed to pass the SAVE Act or any policies to address the abuse of asylum and parole the Biden administration used to admit millions of legally-inadmissible aliens into the interior of the United States. Instead, many of the now-defeated Republicans in Congress signed onto amnesty proposals like the DIGNIDAD Act (which would grant legal status to nearly all illegal aliens who arrived prior to 2021).
The way to remain in power for any political movement is to deliver on its promises to the voters. It is clear that Republicans in Congress and even many in the Trump administration did not have the intention or the follow-through to do so, and voters focused instead on affordability and an unpopular war.
Now that Texas has a liberal Democrat as governor, Open Borders ideologues have a real chance to damage our state. Republicans can use the Texas Senate to block some of the worst policies from becoming law, but enforcement will suffer. Sanctuary jurisdictions are illegal in Texas, but with the governorship and the Office of the Attorney General in the hands of the Open Borders left, state-level pressure on blue cities and counties to comply with existing statutes will diminish.
Likewise, arrangements such as ICE detainers and the 287(g) program will also face renewed challenges. Governor-elect Hinojosa has already promised to end cooperation of Texas DPS and the Texas Military Department with ICE, which weakens border security without the need to pass legislation. When migrant caravans start lining up at the border, Gina Hinojosa and other Texas Democrats will welcome them with open arms.
Even our past victories in the legislature, such as SB 8, can be totally neutralized by an Attorney General who refuses to prosecute county sheriffs who fail to enter into 287(g) agreements with ICE. The new comptroller Sarah Eckhardt will almost certainly try to put additional strings on the grant program created for these sheriffs, similar to the restrictions Democrats in Congress have demanded in return for funding the Department of Homeland Security.
American border security will now face a wide range of threats at both the state and federal level. But we must not go away quietly. This election should be a wake-up call for every American who cares about the future of this republic and that of our children and grandchildren. We must fight the Open Borders radicals at every turn and support leaders who will actually deliver on their promises.
It is my promise to you as the President of Texans for Strong Borders that I will do everything in my power to continue to fight for this state. But we cannot do this alone: we need every patriot who still cares about this issue to do everything in their power to step up.