Could O’Rourke Take Another Shot at the Senate?
Democrats wrestle with redistricting battles, foreign wars, and a wide-open 2028 race
While Putin and Trump were meeting in Alaska, Texas Democrats were booking their flights home, returning after the special session called by Governor Abbott came to an end.
Yet, since Abbott can call another special session in less than a month, Democrats are counting on the state government not detaining them before the next vote. Still, new polling out of Texas suggests the person Democrats are really looking toward is Beto O’Rourke.
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Polling from Texas Southern University measured favorability ratings for several Democrats at the start of August. Among Texas Democrats, O’Rourke led the field with 94 percent, compared to Allred at 85 percent and Crockett at 83 percent.
Only two Democrats fell below 80 percent favorability, Castro and Talarico, though both had much higher levels of uncertainty than their national or statewide peers.
The poll’s head-to-head matchups offered a few surprises. Allred edged out both Castro and Talarico, winning by seven points against Talarico and by eleven points against Castro. But when matched against O’Rourke, Allred was soundly defeated, losing by twenty points while O’Rourke approached 60 percent support.
Whether O’Rourke enters the Senate race again remains unclear. He has shown interest but made no commitments. His past performance is mixed. He lost to Abbott in 2022 by more than ten points but came within three points of unseating Ted Cruz in 2018.
If the ballot ends up being Ken Paxton versus O’Rourke in a Democratic-leaning year, O’Rourke’s chances could be good. But this is still Texas, and your enthusiasm should be curbed.
While redistricting battles continue, the conflicts abroad remain far from resolution.
Trump’s failed meeting with Putin in Alaska ended with the Russian president walking away with little more than a photo-op alongside a U.S. president. In the middle of a war of aggression that has made Russia a global pariah, even that was a symbolic win for Putin.
Americans are not optimistic about the war’s end. A YouGov poll found that 38 percent expect Russia to keep some of Ukraine’s territory, while 21 percent believe Russia will eventually control half or more of the country. At the same time, 68 percent say they want Russia to receive none of Ukraine’s land, while an unsettling 5 percent favor giving Russia half or more.
As the war in Syria showed, such conflicts can drag on for years. The war in Ukraine is already in its eleventh year when factoring in the Donbass insurgency, which Russia has backed since 2014.
The war could end before 2028, but it may just as easily still be ongoing when the next presidential election arrives. Whoever the Democratic nominee is will likely need a clear plan to address it, alongside the other foreign policy challenges that the Trump administration has mishandled in its first seven months alone.
Domestically, the latest Echelon poll shows Kamala Harris leading the Democratic field with 26 percent. Her recent announcement that she would not run for governor of California has fueled speculation she may be preparing another presidential bid.
If she does, she could be the new Joe Biden in a crowded 2028 primary, much like the 2020 race, though her win may be much less certain than his was. The poll found Gavin Newsom at 13 percent and Pete Buttigieg at 11 percent, with Newsom gaining ground thanks to his highly public fight against Republican redistricting.
Other notable names include Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at 6 percent and Cory Booker at 5 percent, though a large share of Democrats and left-leaning Independents remain undecided or are backing smaller candidates.