Talarico campaign receives record $30M fundraising haul; Paxton posts $9M quarter
The U.S. Senate campaign for state Rep. James Talarico says the Democratic nominee raised $30 million in the last three months, tripling the fundraising haul announced by his opponent, Attorney General Ken Paxton.
The Talarico campaign announced it has taken in over $30 million since April, thanks to donations from “over 780,000 individuals” who donated to the campaign. “We’re uniting Texans onto one team to take on this broken, corrupt political system,” the campaign shared in a social media post on Wednesday.
According to a campaign statement, the second-quarter total is the “largest amount ever raised by a U.S. Senate candidate in the second quarter of an election year” and brings Talarico’s fundraising total to over $70 million since he announced his Senate bid in September.
“I’m honored to stand alongside more than 780,000 neighbors who are tired of being divided into teams — red versus blue, left versus right, rural versus urban,” said Talarico. “We are uniting Texans onto one team to change this broken, corrupt political system and bring down costs for working families.”
Talarico’s opponent in the high-profile Senate race also says his own fundraising record was broken.
Paxton, who deafeated incumbent Sen. John Cornyn in a May 26 primary runoff, thanked his supporters Wednesday after announcing he raised $9 million in the same quarter — roughly one-third of Talarico’s haul, but enough to mark what Paxton’s campaign said was the “largest fundraising quarter for any non-incumbent GOP Senate candidate.”
The state attorney general released a statement on social media, which read: “Thank you to all my supporters! We raised over $9 million in one quarter thanks to your hard work and dedication. This would not have been possible without you, and we will continue the hard work until the very end.”
The fundraising benchmarks for both campaigns came with roughly four months left until the November election. A June 30 New York Times/Siena poll found Talarico has what the Times called a “serious chance” to win the Senate seat over Paxton, with both candidates hovering around 47%.
And while Talarico continues to surge with 61% of Hispanic voters in Texas, the Times noted that Talarico’s lead among independents was the key factor in forcing the race into a “virtual tie” with Paxton, who the paper acknowledged was “crushing [Talarico] two-to-one everywhere else.”
Last month, Texas Democrats voiced their support for Talarico at their state convention by declaring “we’re all going to Hell” in solidarity with him over some of his unorthodox views on the Christian faith.
More than 5,000 Democrats gathered in Corpus Christi for the Texas Democratic Party’s 2026 State Convention. There, Benjamin Flores, the Democratic nominee for land commissioner, called on party members to support Talarico.
“They say that James is trans, we’re all trans," Flores said, referencing a comment made by White House senior adviser Stephen Miller in May that referred to Talarico as Democrats’ “first transgender Senate candidate."
"When they say James is a gay, tofu-eating vegan, we’re all gay, tofu-eating vegans,” Flores said. “And when they say James is going to Hell, we’ll say we’re all going to Hell.”
