Early-Vote Gap Narrows in Texas as Patrick and Abbott Predict a Republican Comeback in the Final Days

Texas' two top Republicans say the Democratic surge that opened early voting will not last. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told CBS News Texas that Republicans still have a deep bench of reliable voters who have not yet cast ballots. "The Democrats have the early lead, but we have about 600,000 of the high-propensity voters who haven't shown up yet," Patrick said. "So, one of my messages to the Republicans is you need to get off the bench and get out and vote." He predicted Republicans would catch up and pass the Democrats around the middle of this week.

Gov. Greg Abbott made the same case on Sunday in Hutto, where he rallied supporters and joined a neighborhood block walk, KVUE reported. "What we're seeing in the early vote is very predictable. There's going to be a big surge, early on, the first couple of days on the Democrat side, and then the Republicans pick up the pace," Abbott told the station. "Second week is going to be a very Republican week."

The numbers behind the argument are close. Nearly 4.5 million Texans voted in the first seven days of early voting — 23.4 percent of registered voters, according to Secretary of State data reported by The Texas Tribune — outpacing the 2022 midterm but trailing 2018's 24.3 percent at the same point. Texas voters do not register by party, so analysts estimate the partisan makeup from past primary participation: through Sunday, voters with a history of voting in Democratic primaries made up 35 percent of ballots, ahead of 33 percent for Republican primary voters, according to an analysis by Republican consultant Derek Ryan cited by the Tribune. "This is actually new territory," Ryan said. Totals posted Tuesday by the tracking site Theo Elections, sorting more than 5.1 million early voters by primary history, showed about 1.65 million voters with only Republican primary history and about 1.65 million with only Democratic primary history, separated by a few hundred voters, with nearly a third of early voters having no recent primary history at all.

Both parties are reading the same figures their own way. Ryan said the real test is the more than 2.1 million Texans who voted in one of the last four Republican primaries but have not yet voted: "We'll start really knowing what the picture looks like by Thursday or Friday." GOP strategist Vinny Minchillo told the Tribune he was "cautiously optimistic," while Democratic strategist Matt Angle pointed to urban turnout and a rural share below 25 percent of the vote as good signs for his party, though "we don't know how people are voting." Patrick's Democratic opponent, Austin state Rep. Vikki Goodwin, told CBS News Texas that many of the people standing in long lines are new voters without a primary history: "We have seen a huge increase in the turnout numbers, and it's really inspiring." Polling in her race is split — a University of Houston poll taken October 10-14 showed Patrick ahead 47 percent to 42 percent, while a University of Texas/Texas Politics Project poll taken September 25 to October 5 had Goodwin ahead 49 percent to 46 percent. In the governor's race, a Texas Public Opinion Research poll released October 23 showed Abbott leading Gina Hinojosa 51 percent to 48 percent, within the survey's margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points, KVUE reported. Early voting runs through Friday, October 30, with polls open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Election Day is Tuesday, November 3.