Mark Davis: How did Texas Republicans crush it even while GOP ‘wave’ fizzled nationwide?

An 11-point victory margin for Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and a 20-point win for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis would have seemed like two major plot lines from the Republican wave expected to break across America for the midterm elections.

The Abbott and DeSantis wins happened, but the “red wave” did not. So why were Republicans able to craft such resounding wins in Texas and Florida while sputtering so broadly elsewhere?

Neither of Texas’ two senators was up for re-election, but in Florida, Marco Rubio was, and there’s little doubt that the DeSantis juggernaut fattened his Senate margin over Democrat Val Demings. In Texas, Abbott earned a third term on the strength of his record and overall voter satisfaction that the state is sufficiently well-run.

Since Republican voters fueled those victories, it is of no small value that Abbott and DeSantis spent a lot of time shielding their states from the agenda of Joe Biden and the Democratic Congress. For Abbott, the border became a battleground, delineating the difference between his policies and those of the White House. In Florida, DeSantis pushed back against COVID authoritarianism, woke indoctrination in schools, and the current compulsion toward gender obliteration. These strategies insulated them against the tools Democrats deployed to dissipate the wave in other states.\u0009

Republicans across America spent a lot of time highlighting our ailing economy and growing crime wave, but many did not sufficiently articulate an inspiring message that invited voters to turn to them for solutions. Voters told exit pollsters that inflation and law and order were high priorities, but they did not blame Democratic incumbents nor reward Republican challengers in their quest for solutions.

Other unpleasant surprises loomed. The “election denier” label, affixed to any candidate expressing the slightest doubt about the 2020 presidential result, found some traction. Voters showed fatigue over constant hand-wringing about the past when so many problems plague the present. While abortion rights backlash did not fuel a blue wave, the Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling overturning Roe v. Wade clearly motivated some Democrats. One can point all day to the factual absence of abortion rights in the Constitution, but the bottom line was that a right that had been familiar throughout the lives of millions of voters was gone, and some of them wanted payback.

Texas has plenty of Democrats, most of whom were similarly driven, but there simply were not enough of them to mount the slightest threat to Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick or Attorney General Ken Paxton, all of whom won comfortably.

Patrick’s win was a foregone conclusion, but beating Mike Collier by more than double the margin he did in 2018 is an eye-opener. So is the comfortable victory by supposedly endangered Attorney General Ken Paxton, who dispatched Rochelle Garza by 12 points after a win of less than 4 percentage points four years ago.

In the last election, Patrick and Paxton faced closer margins because they came up against the phenomenon of Beto O’Rourke’s Senate campaign against Ted Cruz, a surprisingly close finish that conferred instant star status. But his 2020 presidential bid sputtered quickly, creating curiosity as to how much appeal he had left in the tank for a run against Abbott.

That answer is in. With all of his name recognition, money and campaign acumen, O’Rourke drew virtually the same number of votes as Abbott’s last opponent, former Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, a novice statewide campaigner virtually unknown outside North Texas.

Three failed campaigns in four years leads many to write O’Rourke’s political epitaph. That would be unwise. While he is unlikely to target Cruz again in 2024, if Sen. John Cornyn retired, O’Rourke could take a shot at an open seat in 2026, a far lower bar than taking out a popular incumbent.

Incumbency is strong armor when the political breezes are blowing beneficially. Texas remains a booming state that is the envy of the nation on many levels. It was the job of Democratic challengers to paint the state as a troubled backwater with a rickety power grid to boot. Voters just didn’t accept that our top officials deserved to be fired.

It’s not that Texas Democrats ran bad campaigns; Republican Lee Zeldin put up a great effort against New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and lost by about six points. The reason: it’s New York. Usually, a state is what it is.

And Texas, at least for now, remains firmly red.

Mark Davis hosts a morning radio show on 660-AM and at 660amtheanswer.com. Follow him on Twitter: @markdavis.