More than 6.3 million Texans had voted early heading into Friday, the last day of early voting, in a Senate race between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton that polls still show as a toss-up. That figure, as of Wednesday, is a 50 percent increase from the 4.2 million Texans who had voted at the same point in 2022, according to a Newsweek analysis of voting data. Nationwide, more than 43 million Americans had voted early in person or by mail, nearly 10 million more than four years ago.
Democrats are chasing their first statewide win in Texas since 1994, while Republicans, who hold a 53-47 Senate majority, are counting on a late push from their own voters, who tend to wait, to offset heavy early turnout in the state's big Democratic-leaning counties. Newsweek reached out to the Talarico and Paxton campaigns for comment via email on Friday. In Harris County, which includes Houston, 862,700 people had voted as of Wednesday, compared with 564,500 at the same point in 2022, according to voting records reviewed by Newsweek.
The county set a midterm record on the first day of early voting, when more than 127,000 people cast ballots, while Dallas County logged more than 88,000, its most on an opening day for any election, The Texas Tribune reported. Harris County has voted Democratic in recent elections by varying margins. In 2024, former Vice President Kamala Harris carried it by nearly 6 percentage points over Trump, while Democratic Senate candidate Colin Allred won it by roughly 11 points over Republican Senator Ted Cruz.
Turnout in Tarrant and Denton counties hit about 32 percent of registered voters by early this week. The Rio Grande Valley was running about 64 percent ahead of its 2022 pace, though all four counties there trailed the state average, and Starr and Willacy sat near 17 percent. Texas also has a record 19 million registered voters, 7.7 percent more than before the last midterm.
The Secretary of State's office is expected to post Friday's totals over the weekend. Democrats keep measuring this year against 2018, when Beto O'Rourke came within 2.6 points of Republican Senator Ted Cruz on the back of unusually high midterm turnout. About 53 percent of registered Texans voted that year, and nearly three-quarters of ballots were cast early or by mail.
Against the last midterm, 2026 is well ahead. By the 10th day of early voting, 31.4 percent of registered voters had cast ballots in person, compared with 22.36 percent on the matching day in 2022, according to state data. The gap was there from the start: 4.12 percent on day one this year, 2.7 percent four years ago.
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