Did Trump just lose it in Texas?

SPEAKER_1 (0:02)

This is a global production.

Donald Trump (0:04)

The people of Texas are not going to let weak, gutless, self-hating trends, gender-promoting freak shows destroy everything that we've built.

Jon Sopel (0:15)

A typically phlegmatic sounding Donald Trump there at a rally in Texas, indeed, I think he's third in a month. A rally where he sounded even more eccentric, put a bit less charitably, even more deranged than usual. Where he was booed repeatedly in a ruby red state. This is a place that the Republicans won by 14 points in the presidential election. And it's now looking like they might lose. And there are a number of other states where the same thing is happening. Is Donald Trump panicking now about the midterms? Welcome to The News Agents.

It's Jon. It's Lewis. And it is decades, I mean, literally decades since the Democrats last won in Texas. And yet, if you look at the polls now, the Senate candidate for the Democrats, a guy called James Talarico, is looking like he's well out in front.

And the Republican Party is having to pour tens of millions of dollars into this campaign to try to shore up support for their beleaguered candidate, Ken Paxton. And Donald Trump, as you say Lewis, has made his third visit to the state in less than four weeks. And all the signs are that the Democrats are going to take over this ruby red state, which would be a seismic shock in American politics, and signified that the high water mark of Trump and Trumpism is now in retreat, and perhaps dangerously so for his presidency. Yeah, indeed. I mean, Texas is, or it's felt like over the past few election cycles, it's the sort of bridesmaid, forever bridesmaid of democratic politics because of sort of changes in demographics and becoming more Latino, loads of younger voters moving from blue states, expensive states, California and the North and places in New York and other places in Northeast and so on. It's felt as if it might finally go Democrat at some point. And yet each time it's sort of fallen further out of reach. It's feeling different this time for all sorts of reasons that we might discuss. But before we do, here is the president again, giving his measured analysis on the democratic candidate, James Talarico.

Donald Trump (2:43)

And James Talarico, wherever he may be, we're looking for the guy who's been two weeks. Where the hell is he? What? Does anybody know where he might be?

He hates Texas values. He describes himself as a Christian who hates Christianity. That's nice. Says that God is transgender.

Jon Sopel (3:07)

I suppose God is kind of transgender in a way. I mean, in a way, God.

Kind of hard to put a gender, kind of spiritual, celestial thing. Very few people have ever seen his Gentles, as far as I'm concerned, or as far as I'm aware. I don't think we needed to have gone there, Lewis. But I mean, has James Talarico ever said any of those things that he is alleged to have said by Donald Trump? Well, of course not. And the other thing that really animates Donald Trump about James Talarico is that he accuses him, and this is as serious as it gets in Texas, of being a vegan.

And Donald Trump says, you know, he keeps saying vegan. He says, I don't know how to pronounce that word. I don't know what a vegan, I like steak. And everyone cheers. He probably thinks that vegan voted for him by 12 points in 2024 But I mean, the thing is, is that Texas is one state. And as you say, Jon, it would be really seismic. It would be really important for the electoral map in terms of the Democrats winning back the Senate, because this is a tough election cycle for the Democrats. These seats will last up in 2020

And that was a cycle where the Democrats did well. There aren't that many big pickup opportunities for them. And yeah, it isn't just Texas. The Democrats will need to get 51 seats in order to have a majority. And if you look down exactly the polling list at the moment, some extraordinary polls this week. Texas, 50, 44 to the Democrats. Ohio, which has been, used to be a swing state, but has been trending Republican year after year now. 49 Democrats, 45 for the Republicans.

Even in states like Kansas, Kansas has not elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1932, since FDR was limbering up for his first term, right? That is how long Kansas has been solidly Republican, how firmly in the red column that it's been. And even in a few other states like Alaska, states that have been in the Republican column for cycle after cycle for a decade now, there are polls and of course they're just polls and they may be wrong and there's always a margin of error of these things, but there can be little doubt, I think, that on the basis of this, there is the potential for a proper blue wave for the Democrats, which would sweep the Senate, take the House, even though it's been gerrymandered to high heaven, and you would in all for all intents and purposes, then even if the Democrats just took one of the chambers, the domestic agenda, the domestic presidency for Donald Trump would be over. That would be it. Nothing would happen without the Democrats say so.