On the menu today: Sure, Texas Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton has a slew of scandals, a messy divorce, was impeached as state attorney general, is a terrible fundraiser, and traditionally runs significantly behind the rest of the Republicans who are running statewide. But at least he’s lazy! Elsewhere, President Trump is sitting on a $400 million war chest for the midterms. Meanwhile, the president’s “gold card” immigration plan is wildly underperforming expectations, and the national debt is about to cross $40 trillion. Read on.
The Worst of Both Worlds
A Democrat has not won a U.S. Senate race in Texas since 1988. But all streaks come to an end eventually; even Cal Ripken took a day off after 16 years. And the odds of Democrat James Talarico — the reanimated Howdy Doody doll who argues that God is nonbinary, that there are six biological genders, that it is essential that we reduce our meat consumption, and that the American flag is a “complicated symbol for most of us” — beating Republican Ken Paxton look surprisingly, unnervingly good for such a deep-red state.
Yes, we’ve seen some high-profile polling misses lately. But four of the last six polls showed Talarico ahead, and another one showed a tie. Keep in mind, in 2018, not a single poll the entire campaign showed Democrat Beto O’Rourke ahead of Republican Ted Cruz. Cruz won, 50.9 percent to 48.3 percent.
Yesterday on the Three Martini Lunch podcast, Greg and I noted political commentator and podcast host Mark Halperin channeling Texas Republicans’ extreme exasperation with Senate candidate Ken Paxton:
Ladies and gentlemen, I’ll say again, I am the biggest skeptic for the last 25 years that a Democrat can win statewide in Texas. You can go check my record on this. And I’m telling you today, if Ken Paxton doesn’t come to Jesus on how to run for office, he will lose. I don’t care — I don’t care about the governor’s race, which will also be quite close. I’ve been talking to Texas Republicans who are not hostile to Ken Paxton. He is lazy. He’s a horrible fundraiser. He cannot answer questions about the controversies that reporters are going to ask him about. He has alienated suburban voters, including suburban women. And he’s running against a guy who’s pretty damn good as a candidate, despite not liking meat, despite all the things he said. And if nothing dramatic changes, it’s not just Paxton [who] has to get it in gear. If nothing dramatic changes, he will lose. It doesn’t mean Democrats will take back the Senate, but he will lose unless something dramatic happens. And most people I know don’t think he has it in him, because he’s a bad guy and a lazy guy. There, I said it. . . .
I’m not saying he [Paxton] can’t win. The governor may drag him over the finish line and Talarico may make some mistake in the debates. But I’m telling you, do not think of this race as tossup. Do not think of this race as, “Well, in the end, of course, the Republican is going to win.” That’s not the state of the race right now.
Halperin’s guest, radio talk-show host Larry O’Connor, largely concurred:
I’m hearing from people that they are starting to get worried about how it’s looking in Texas. And yes, the one thing that people keep relying on is, “Well, it’s Texas.” And that ain’t going to fly post-Labor Day. Something’s going to have to look good for Ken Paxton.
If you’re wondering about Paxton’s fundraising:
The campaigns of Talarico and Ken Paxton reported raking in $31.6 million and $9.3 million, respectively, in their last quarterly filing with the Federal Election Commission. Since the beginning of 2025, Talarico’s campaign has lapped Paxton’s several times over, raising a cumulative $72.0 million compared to $16.8 million by Paxton’s.
The Democratic Senate nominee ended June with $23.3 million on hand, more than triple his GOP rival.
You can’t be a terrible reprobate and be a lazy candidate. At minimum, you must be a hard-working terrible reprobate.
Back in 2013, South Carolina’s first congressional district held a special U.S. House election when Governor Nikki Haley picked Representative Tim Scott to fill Republican Jim DeMint’s vacant Senate seat.
The Republican nominee was former Governor Mark Sanford, attempting a comeback from his infamous scandal of claiming to be “hiking the Appalachian trail” while having an extramarital affair. The Democratic nominee was Elizabeth Colbert Busch, the sister of comedian and television host Stephen Colbert. Democrats loved their odds — a Republican associated with an embarrassing sex scandal up against a candidate with a famous celebrity sibling to help with fundraising, in a special election where turnout is usually lower.
But Colbert Busch was a rookie candidate, and out of what appeared to be wildly excessive caution, her campaign minimized her public appearances. Whatever else you think of Sanford, in that campaign, he absolutely outhustled his opponent. He did about ten events per day with voters, while she did about one event per day, reading from prepared remarks and not taking questions. A bit more than two weeks before the election, Public Policy Polling showed Colbert Busch with a ten-point lead. Their last survey, released right before Election Day, showed her ahead by a single percentage point.
In the end, it wasn’t that close. Sanford won, 54 percent to 45 percent.
There are a whole bunch of factors that the candidate and his campaign cannot control: the national political environment, media coverage, the state of the economy, up-ticket races, down-ticket races, and support from the national party, among others.
But two factors that the candidate and his campaign absolutely can control are A) the candidate’s schedule and how many events he does and B) the amount of time he spends fundraising. Some veteran strategists argue that a political campaign’s most valuable resource is the time of the candidate, because it’s so finite. You can always attempt to raise more money. You can’t raise more time.
One other note on Paxton. Back in that 2013 congressional campaign, Sanford said he would answer any questions about the affair, and every now and then someone would give him an earful. But by and large, South Carolinians found the whole sordid mess too embarrassing and cringe-inducing to bring up, particularly when they had other issues on their minds.
Paxton held a telephone town hall recently, where a caller brought up the topic of his very messy extramarital affair:
Caller: Hi Paxton, it’s nice to meet you. I’m just wondering why did you cheat on your wife?
Paxton: Um, I’m not going to talk about personal issues that relate to my family, just like I don’t think you would want to discuss your marriage on a call with thousands of people. All I can tell you is that I’m proud of my kids. Got four wonderful kids. I’ve got seven grandchildren. Well, six and one on the way. And there’s a lot at stake. And so, while I care about this country, I’m not going to talk about things that would affect them. So, thank you much for your question.
First, I don’t think “you wouldn’t want to discuss your marriage on a call with thousands of people” is quite the sterling jujitsu defense that Paxton thinks it is. The caller might have a great marriage, or the caller might not even be married. Whatever the caller’s marital situation, the caller isn’t running to be a U.S. senator, Paxton is.
Second, if you’re a candidate who is infamous for pressuring other people to hire your mistress, among other scandals, you must be prepared for these sorts of questions. This is a country that elected Bill Clinton and Donald Trump twice. Voters are willing to forgive adulterous candidates, but they’ve usually got to look and sound contrite.
No doubt, some will scoff and insist that Texas is just too Republican a state to ever elect a Democratic senator, much less one who has said as many bizarre and controversial things as Talarico. I seem to remember similar confident assurances about the heavily Republican tilt of Alabama in the 2017 special Senate election when walking disaster area Roy Moore took on Democrat Doug Jones and lost.
Paxton is already saying that he isn’t getting enough support from national Republican groups. If he loses, get ready for a convenient, implausible, “It’s all the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s fault” narrative.
President Donald Trump’s super political action committee is sitting on $401 million in cash, more than any other super PAC, but has spent just $2.3 million — six tenths of one percent of that total — to help Republicans win elections.
Early voting in Texas begins October 19.
More Painful Numbers That No One Wants to Talk About
President Trump, during an address to Congress, March 4, 2025:
And, in the near future, I want to do what has not been done in 24 years: balance the Federal budget. We’re going to balance it. With that goal in mind, we have developed in great detail what we are calling the gold card, which goes on sale very, very soon. For $5 million, we will allow the most successful, job-creating people from all over the world to buy a path to U.S. citizenship. It’s like the green card, but better and more sophisticated. . . . We will now bring in brilliant, hard-working, job-creating people. They’re going to pay a lot of money, and we’re going to reduce our debt with that money.
At the time, the U.S. debt was around $36 trillion. To raise just $1 trillion dollars off this program, the U.S. would need to find 200,000 foreign citizens willing to pay $5 million each for a “gold card.”
As of April of this year, the White House said it had issued one gold card, for $1 million.
Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, Wednesday:
The United States has borrowed more in the first 10 months of fiscal year 2026 than it did in all of fiscal year 2025. Today’s Treasury figures show we’re already $1.8 trillion in the red, suggesting we’re on track to borrow over $2 trillion this fiscal year.
In July alone, we borrowed $432 billion — that’s $14 billion per day.
We are already feeling the consequences of this extreme borrowing — high interest rates, trillion-dollar interest payments, and looming trust fund insolvency that threatens benefits for Social Security and Medicare. As we are about to hit the milestone of $40 trillion in gross national debt, it is clear the time to restore fiscal responsibility is now. Although action is long overdue, it is never too late to start correcting course.
To be innumerate means to be unable to understand numbers and mathematics, the equivalent of illiteracy for words. We have an innumerate president, applauded and enabled by a largely innumerate Congress, elected by a largely innumerate public.
ADDENDUM: In case you missed it yesterday, the Trump administration has picked up the Kennedy Center name fight again, as the center’s board intends to inscribe President Trump’s name on the building beneath the main signage. Also, the Canadian province of Alberta is unlikely to declare its independence anytime soon.