Donald Trump wins big: Key takeaways from Texas' primary runoffs

An expensive and bruising primary season finally came to an end Tuesday as voters made their picks for races for several rare statewide office openings. 

The runoffs set turnout records and showed Texas voters are geared up for a high-stakes midterm.

Here are the key takeaways:

Republicans the president backed in the runoffs handily defeated their opponents, showing his grip on the party remains as strong as ever. 

At the top of the list was Attorney General Ken Paxton. Trump backed Paxton just last week as early voting got underway. On Tuesday, Paxton trounced U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, whom Trump had slammed as “VERY disloyal” down the final stretch.

“President Trump is the leader of our party and his endorsement is the most powerful force in politics,” Paxton declared in his victory speech. 

Two Trump picks in Houston-area congressional races also sailed to victory, despite limited political experience. 

Alex Mealer beat state Rep. Briscoe Cain in the GOP primary runoff for the newly redrawn 9th Congressional District. Cain served nearly a decade in the state House, while Mealer is a relative newcomer, having narrowly lost a run for Harris County Judge in 2022. 

Jon Bonck, a mortgage banker with Trump’s backing, won the GOP runoff to replace U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt in Houston’s 38th Congressional District. Bonck easily defeated Shelly deZevallos, a pilot and former vice chair of the Harris County Republican Party. 

In San Antonio, Trump-backed Carlos De La Cruz defeated state Rep. John Lujan in the GOP runoff for the redrawn 35th Congressional District.

Decades of experience in office turned out to be a negative in Tuesday’s primary. 

Cornyn, who spent 24 years in the U.S. Senate and was running to be the longest-serving senator in Texas history, lost his seat to Paxton. 

In Houston, Christian Menefee, who joined Congress in February, beat out longtime U.S. Rep. Al Green to represent the city’s 18th Congressional District. Green has served in Congress for 11 terms, but switched districts after state lawmakers redrew his 9th Congressional District to give the GOP an edge. 

And while he hasn’t served as long as Green or Cornyn, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy’s departure from the House will not go unnoticed. The Austin Republican, who lost in the attorney general runoff to state Sen. Mayes Middleton, spent nearly a decade in the House, building a reputation as a hardline conservative with a habit of threatening to tank spending bills that didn’t align with his views. 

The supercharged runoffs — which set the stage for multiple statewide contests — drew massive turnout, suggesting voters are engaged heading into a high-stakes midterm election. 

More than 820,000 voters across Texas cast early ballots on the GOP side, more than triple the number of voters that turned out for early voting in the GOP runoff in 2024, according to state election data.

In Harris County alone, more than 76,000 Republican voters turned out for the runoff, more than in 2012, when Ted Cruz won the GOP contest for U.S. Senate over former Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. 

In 2022, when Paxton beat former Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush in the runoff for Texas Attorney General, 932,000 total votes were cast, half of them in early voting.

Within minutes of Paxton’s victory, Republicans were rallying behind him. 

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz called Paxton a “fearless conservative” and said he looks forward to “fighting alongside him.” Gov. Greg Abbott said he would “destroy” Democrat James Talarico in November. And state Rep. Jeff Leach, a Plano Republican who was among Paxton’s harshest GOP critics, vowed to do his part to help Republicans “quickly heal and unite from these bruising primaries.”

Even U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said he would “support the Republican ticket,” though he stopped short of explicitly endorsing Paxton. 

But Republicans weren’t alone in cheering Paxton’s victory. Democrats see his victory as an opening to win their first statewide race in decades. 

“Ken Paxton has spent decades in office abusing his power to serve special interests and enrich himself at Texans’ expense – and in November, we’re going to put a stop to his corruption," Texas Democratic Party Chair Kendall Scudder said in a statement. 

State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, an Austin Democrat running against Abbott, deemed the GOP slate the “most corrupt ticket in Texas history.”