Democratic vice presidential candidate and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz encouraged Texas Democrats to rally behind U.S. Rep. Colin Allred to the Senate as his race against incumbent GOP Sen. Ted Cruz heats up.
Walz stopped by a fundraiser event at the HALL Arts Hotel Dallas, organized by Vice President Kamala Harris' victory fund on Monday. The vice presidential hopeful told a group of donors the race is within reach.
"You've got a senate race you can win in Texas," Walz said. "My God, just do it for America. Replace Ted."
Walz also highlighted a number of issues impacting the Lone Star State, such as abortion restrictions, which he said "creates a nightmare, and a dangerous situation," and ballot access laws, which he said were intentionally designed to keep Democratic voters away from the polls.
"For them, it's much easier to do voter suppression than voter outreach," he said.
Walz's remarks on voter suppression come as Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has come under fire for ordering to raid the homes of several Latino activists over concerns of election fraud. In response, the League of United Latin American Citizens issued a press release asking the U.S. Justice Department to investigate Paxton and "his agents for abuse of the elderly, children, violations of the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965 and more to be announced."
Texas is one of Democrats' top flip targets in the U.S. Senate along with Florida. Earlier in the race, Allred's chances of unseating Cruz, a controversial yet powerful race in the Senate, were small. But as Harris has taken the helm of the Democratic ticket, he has been able to narrow the polling gap.
For instance, a new study conducted by Emerson College and The Hill among 845 likely voters between Sept. 3-5, showed Allred trailing by four percentage points, at 44% to Cruz's 48%.
While still behind, as all polls so far have shown, the figures are an improvement for the Democrat when compared to previous studies, which had shown him behind between seven and 10 percentage points.
As Texas remains a deep red state, Allred has run a campaign different than most Democrats on the national level, focusing on his bipartisan voting record and not focusing on the matchup between Trump and Harris.
For instance, in a recent appearance at the Texas Tribune Festival, he criticized his party for promoting unrealistic energy policies and not cracking down on unlawful migration before.
"When you have a huge surge of migrants— we had a record number in December '23— you have to identify the crisis and respond to it with smart policy resources and have that sense of urgency, and I didn't see that for some time in my party," he said.
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