Forget a blue wave. Tuesday in Texas was closer to a blue tsunami.
“A blue-nami,” quipped Jon Taylor, the head of UTSA’s political science and geography department.
“You could even make the argument,” he continued, “this is close to an extinction-level event kind of thing in terms for Republicans, how much they got wiped out last night.”
Taylor attributed the loss more to ”a revulsion toward Republicans and Donald Trump specifically" than upswelling support for Democrats.
But either way, Democrats now find themselves with their hands on levers of power they haven’t held in decades.
Texas Democrats’ stunning sweep of statewide races — from governor to attorney general — appears to now be paired with a new majority in the Texas House.
Lt. Gov-elect Vikki Goodwin (D) will be at the head of the Texas Senate, but the majority of state senators remain Republican.
“I mean they’ve got to think about now how they’re going to govern,” Taylor said. “They’ve not been in charge of state government, in terms of governor, since 1994. They haven’t been in the state legislature, any part of it, since 2002.”
“They’ve got to start thinking right now ‘what kind of legislative agenda we’re gonna put together.’ Now we gotta start thinking about Governor (Gina) Hinojosa and Lt. Gov. Goodwin working with a Democratic speaker in the House and the kind of legislation that’s gonna go forward.”
Now that they have at least some power, Taylor expects the trickiest part for Democrats will be to avoid “overreach” and expects there will be compromise.
“And that actually may be a good thing, is that coming together, Republicans and Democrats, knowing that neither one has the power in some respects alone, as we’ve seen in the past, that you’re going to have to craft more thoughtful legislation that doesn’t run roughshod over people,” he said.
Taylor added that he believes the controversial school voucher program will get “major overhauls.”
The lieutenant governor position is powerful in Texas, but Sen. José Menéndez (D-San Antonio) said he’s heard “rumblings and threats that they’re going to try to strip the lieutenant governor of their power and set up sort of a minority, majority leader situation like they do in the federal government.”
“If that happens, they have the potential to gum up everything,” Menéndez said. “So I hope that’s not what happens. I hope they choose to govern with us instead of becoming obstructionist.
“Last night — if nothing else, we should learn from yesterday that people are sick and tired of people not getting anything done.”
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