US elections: who is James Talarico, who can defeat Trump in the Texas Senate race

James Talarico, a 37-year-old evangelical Democrat, is the favorite in the Senate race in Texas and could break the Republican Party's decades-long favoritism in the state.

By Luisa Belchior, g1

Democratic candidate for Senate for Texas, James Talarico, during a campaign event on October 30, 2026, in Texas. — Photo: Sam Craft/ AP

In an election in which the Republican Party placed the Christian faith as a central element of its campaign, it is precisely a Presbyterian seminarian who threatens to take over one of its most traditional strongholds from Donald Trump.

In the state of Texas, Democrat James Talarico, 37, leads the race for a seat in the Senate, according to the main polls of voting intentions. The current state deputy has become one of the big names in midterms, as elections are called in which North Americans go to the polls to renew part of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

Projections indicate that the Democrats, the party opposing Trump, are expected to regain control of the Chamber and could win a majority in the Senate — currently, the US president's Republican Party has control in both Houses.

An evangelical, Talarico used the Christian faith as one of the pillars of his campaign, but invested in a discourse contrary to the Christian nationalism that Donald Trump's government adopts. The Democratic candidate, state deputy since 2018, defends the diversity of religions, the rights of transgender people and the LGBTQIA+ population in general and has said that "God is non-binary".

He is a strong critic of Trump's anti-immigrant policies and says he uses his Christian faith to defend social policies.

Born on the outskirts of Austin, one of the most Democratic cities in Texas, Talarico was a Presbyterian seminarian and elementary school teacher and has a master's degree in theological studies. But he migrated to politics early.

After graduating in political science with a specialization in governance, he also completed a master's degree in educational policy at Harvard and, subsequently, ran for state representative and won four terms.

During this period, he built a solid base of support among Democratic but also Christian voters, which he now uses to try to break more than three decades of Republican hegemony in the state.

Tough dispute

The Democratic candidate for Senate from Texas, in the United States, James Talarico, during a campaign in the city of Dallas, on October 29, 2026. — Photo: Mike Segar/ Reuters

At the polls, Talarico faces Attorney General Ken Paxton, involved in corruption scandals but who won support from Donald Trump in the Republican primaries and US$150 million donated by Elon Musk to his campaign.

Polls show Talarico slightly ahead, in a race that promises to be fierce.

A victory for Talarico in a Republican state could signal a reconfiguration of the national political map. "We will shock the world when we take back Texas," Talarico said at a rally to a crowd two weeks ago.

The same day, his rival warned supporters: "If we lose Texas, we lose America."