Ted Cruz says the Texas Senate race will be a $200 million fight, and he is not treating it like a routine contest. On Monday, the Texas Republican said he thinks Republicans will win the race, but that it will be expensive and hard-fought all the way through.
That matters now because Ken Paxton is entering the general election after a bruising primary and a fresh warning sign from the race ratings. Cruz said Paxton came out of a rough primary after facing so many attack ads that he was left a little bruised, and he added that Donald Trump’s last-minute endorsement helped carry him through to victory over John Cornyn in the GOP primary runoff in late May.
Cruz also said he will campaign with Paxton and that his PAC will boost the GOP candidate with funding. That is the kind of support that can shape a race expected to be among the most expensive Senate races in the country, especially with James Talarico now on the other side of the ballot and Texas having not elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1988. Republicans currently control 53 seats in the Senate, and Democrats would need to flip four seats while defending a handful of others to secure the majority.
The money is only part of the story. The Cook Political Report moved the race from likely Republican to leaning Republican after Paxton’s victory, then shifted it again to a toss-up last week, a warning that the map is less settled than Cruz wants to make it sound. Cruz said earlier this year that Talarico is “absolutely extreme,” that very few voters actually know his record, and that when voters hear what he is for, they do not support him.
He still framed the matchup in familiar terms, saying Paxton would be a strong fit for this fight in one state and not in another. The unresolved question is not whether money will pour in, but whether Cruz and Paxton can turn that money into a statewide argument strong enough to survive the bruising primary, the new toss-up rating and the cost of a race that could run to $200 million.
