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Sen. Ted Cruz smiled Wednesday when an interviewer raised the obvious point about his deriding an opponent for using a nickname: Cruz uses a nickname too. Shortly after the polls closed Tuesday in Texas' first-in-the-nation primary, Cruz tweeted a 60-second country jingle targeting his Democratic challenger, U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke of El Paso.
This year's midterm elections officially began on Tuesday as Democratic and Republican primaries were held in Texas. Democrats are hoping Texas could become a key state in the party's effort to retake control of the Senate and the House.
The first national test of the Democrats' surge of voter energy and their ability to influence the November election came to a head in Texas on Tuesday. The biggest race of the night for the party goes to a runoff, setting up months of conflict between the establishment and its progressive wing and leading to questions about whether or not the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee should have publicly interfered in the contest.
The 2018 midterm election cycle kicked off with a surge in voter enthusiasm for both parties in Texas, although the gains were bigger for Democrats. It boosted a slew of women candidate and helped Republicans who had drawn direct support from President Donald Trump.
Abbott easily clinched his party's nomination Tuesday and has a campaign war chest worth around $43 million, more than any gubernatorial candidate nationwide. Republican Gov. Greg Abbott is striking a cautious tone despite sailing to victory against little-known challengers in Texas' first-in-the-nation primary.
The ad says O'Rourke "wants to take our guns" and calls him "liberal Robert," referring to his given first name, and says he "changed his name to Beto." U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz's newest ad targeting his Democratic challenger is a country jingle that warns, "If you're going to run in Texas, you can't be liberal, man."
Texas Democrats have turned out in force ahead of their state's first-in... . FILE - In this Feb. 27, 2013, file photo, Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington.
In this Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2018, photo, campaign T-shirts are stacked on a table at a Republican congressional candidate forum, in New Braunfels, Texas. Texas holds the nation's first 2018 primary elections Tuesday, March 6, 2018, and the campaign is providing a vivid exhibition of the Trump effect in GOP politics.
It's primary season for the 2018 midterm elections, and voters in Texas are the first in the nation to head to the ballot box. There's a surge of energy among Democrats that's enough to concern Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who has his own primary race to deal with Tuesday.
This year's midterm elections officially kick off Tuesday with the Texas primaries, where voters will sift through jam-packed fields of Democratic candidates vying to take on vulnerable Republican members of Congress. Polls open at 7 a.m. CST and close at 7 p.m. CST.Democrats are running in all of Texas' 36 congressional districts for the first time in 25 years.Democrats have an edge in early voting, a notable, though limited, gauge of voter enthusiasm in what's been a reliably red state.Candidates must top 50% in their primary, or the top two finishers will head to a runoff election in six weeks.Incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Democratic Rep. Beto O'Rourke are likely to win their respective primaries.
There probably won't be any surprises in the Senate race there: Incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Democrat Rep. Beto O'Rourke are clear favorites to win their respective primaries. So the bigger question after tonight is whether O'Rourke, who outraised Cruz last quarter and has been aggressively campaigning throughout the state, can ride a blue wave to victory in November.
San Antonio's former Democratic mayor Julian Castro predicts that Tuesday's primary election in Texas will be the first sign of growing Democratic strength ahead of the 2018 midterm elections. "What we're going to see on Tuesday is a tremendous amount of Democratic enthusiasm," Castro, who served as Housing and Urban Development secretary under President Barack Obama and is considering a presidential run in 2020, told ABC News' Rick Klein on the Powerhouse Politics podcast.
The 2018 U.S. primary elections kick off on Tuesday in Texas, where Democrats hope record-high levels of early voter midterm turnout and anger over President Donald Trump's policies will help them flip congressional seats from Republican control. Democratic turnout in the state's largest 15 counties hit 465,245 in early voting, according to the Texas secretary of state.
Texas kicks off primary season ahead of the 2018 midterm election, with implications for Democrats and Republicans alike in an election year that could alter the direction of Congress and statehouses around the country for the final two years of President Donald Trump's term. Democrats remain underdogs to knock off Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, but there's been a surge among Democratic candidates and voters that reflects nationwide momentum for the left since Trump's election.
Texas Democrats turned out in force ahead of the first-in-the-nation primary Tuesday in what could be an early hint of a midterm election backlash against President Donald Trump, but their party remains a longshot to make much of a dent in Republican political dominance of the state. Democratic early voting across Texas' 15 most-populous counties, the only figures available, more than doubled that of the last non-presidential cycle in 2014, while the number of Republican early ballots cast increased only slightly.
"What we're going to see on Tuesday is a tremendous amount of Democratic enthusiasm," Castro, who served as Housing and Urban Development secretary under President Barack Obama and is considering a presidential run in 2020, told ABC News' Rick Klein on the Powerhouse Politics podcast. Castro, who recently founded Opportunity First, a super PAC that supports young candidates for federal and state offices, said he will decide on a White House run by the end of 2018, but that right now his sole aim is to get Democrats elected.
More specifically, as we inch our way toward the 2018 midterms, you can start talking about Beto O'Rourke, the newest heartthrob of Texas Democrats and beyond. "It's happening again," Mimi Schwartz wrote in the New York Times last May. "The stirring of the heart.
U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke , an El Paso Democrat, once again reported raising more money than Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz in what is shaping up to be an intense general election matchup. Over the first 45 days of 2018, O'Rourke raised $2.3 million - almost three times more than Cruz's $803,000, according to new reports filed by Cruz and O'Rourke with the Federal Election Commission.