Neil Bush, brother of former Republican President George W Bush, has said that he voted for the Democratic candidate James Talarico in a crucial race for the United States Senate. In a social media post on Tuesday, Bush said he voted for Talarico due to concerns about the Republican candidate, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Talarico and Paxton are in a tight race for Texas’s open Senate seat.
Democrats are hoping to seize control of the 100-member Senate in the November 3 midterm elections, when 35 seats will be on the ballot. Bush’s endorsement of Talarico is the latest sign of division among Texas Republicans. Bush comes from a prominent Republican family: not only was his brother a president, but his father, the late George HW Bush, was too.
Before serving in the White House from 2001 to 2009, George W Bush was governor of Texas. But George W Bush’s daughter Barbara Bush has also shown her support for Talarico by donating to a political action committee backing his campaign. Texas has long been considered a Republican stronghold, and Democrats have not won a Senate race in the state since 1988.
But polls show Talarico locked in a close race with Paxton, who defeated incumbent Senator John Cornyn in the Republican Party’s primary run-off on May 26. Paxton had secured an endorsement from Trump on May 19, days before the run-off. In a statement, Trump criticised Cornyn as “not supportive of [him] when times were tough”, while praising Paxton as a “MAGA Warrior”.
Some Republicans have expressed frustration over Trump’s intervention on Paxton’s behalf, given the vulnerabilities posed by his state impeachment and other scandals. A Marist poll released on October 14 found Talarico winning 47 percent of the vote compared to 45 percent for Paxton.
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