Talarico announces record-breaking $64 million fundraising haul

Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico raised a record-breaking $64 million in three months — more than any Senate candidate ever in the third quarter — his campaign announced Thursday.

The campaign said that brings Talarico’s total fundraising to $134 million since he announced his candidacy last year.

His Republican opponent, Attorney General Ken Paxton, said earlier this month that he had raised $18 million in the same period. Talarico broke Jamie Harrison’s record of $57 million, raised during the third quarter in his unsuccessful 2020 Senate campaign in South Carolina.

Although a Democrat hasn’t won a Senate election in Texas since 1988, Democrats there have been powerhouse fundraisers. In 2018, candidate Beto O’Rourke raised a then-record $38 million in the same three-month period. 

Recent polls have shown Talarico with a slight lead over Paxton. 

Incumbent GOP Sen. John Cornyn, a prolific fundraiser, lost the primary earlier this year to Paxton, who has long struggled as a fundraiser. Republicans have dumped hundreds of millions into the race to support Paxton, even as there have been leaks of audio clips of Paxton appearing to disparage national involvement in the race.

President Trump, who backed Paxton in the primary against Cornyn and is a longtime ally, has traveled to Texas three times in a month to campaign for Paxton. 

CNN hosted a town hall with Talarico on Wednesday night, and said Paxton had been invited but declined to respond. CNN and CBS are both owned by Skydance.  

At the town hall, Talarico drove home the economic theme of his campaign, telling voters, “We have an affordability crisis because we have a corruption crisis.” He also addressed issues ranging from abortion to his recent absence from the campaign trail, confirming that he had the flu and slamming online conspiracy theories about it. 

“That decision to stay home for a week sent my opponent and his conspiracy theorists spiraling. I opened up social media and learned that I had apparently dropped out of the race, flown to a mental health facility in Ohio, that I had died,” Talarico said. “This is crazy. I mean, these false claims got millions of views online.”

Paxton announced Wednesday that his campaign is kicking off a two-week bus tour this weekend near Fort Worth that will wrap up the night before Election Day at the Alamo.

Early voting starts Monday in Texas.