Donald Trump and Ted Cruz scored big wins in Texas, but the president-elect outperformed the senator on his own turf

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President-elect Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz dominated their respective races in Texas this year, widening their margins of victory compared to previous races by making considerable inroads across the state’s border counties, areas traditionally viewed as Democratic strongholds.

Trump bested Vice President Kamala Harris by 14 percentage points in Texas, a significant increase from his 5-point advantage over President Joe Biden in 2020 and his 9-point lead over Hillary Clinton in 2016. Cruz, meanwhile, defeated U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, a Dallas Democrat, by 9 percentage points, a more comfortable victory than his 2018 performance when he barely edged out Democrat Beto O’Rourke.

Trump and Cruz’s gains along the border came after the Republican party invested heavily in garnering support in South Texas, a majority Hispanic area where Democrats spent less time campaigning. Trump and Cruz both held onto their voter bases in red, rural counties and increased their share of votes from the border. Trump’s support in the border grew from 41% in 2020 to 55% in 2024 while Cruz’s increased from 33% in 2018 to 45% this year.

Trump’s edge over Cruz reflects a common trend of presidential candidates carrying the ticket and receiving the highest number of votes, said Joshua Blank, director of research for the Texas Politics Project. And it also reflects Trump’s unique advantage winning over young male voters.

“This is another example of how 2020 was a very odd election,” Blank said, noting that U.S. Sen. John Cornyn received more votes than Trump that year. “Cornyn’s performance was almost certainly a reflection of Trump’s handling of the pandemic, not a reflection of an underlying shift in the electorate.”

Blank added the relative strengths of the candidates Trump and Cruz faced may have also played into their different margins of victory. Allred, who was virtually unknown prior to his Senate campaign, presented himself as a moderate candidate who worked across both sides of the aisle. Cruz tried to portray Allred as a liberal candidate who wanted to let boys play on girls sports teams.

Harris, meanwhile, was seen as a liberal candidate, in part because of her background and her association with the Biden administration.

An October survey by the Texas Politics Project found that 80% of likely Republicans voters identified Harris as “extremely liberal.” In contrast, only 45% of likely Republican voters characterized Allred that way.

“Allred was a more palatable choice for people uncomfortable with Cruz than Harris was for people uncomfortable with Trump,” Blank said.

In big, blue, urban counties like Harris and Dallas, Trump managed to pull more votes than in previous elections, lessening Harris’ advantage in the state’s most populous regions.

Trump and Cruz also benefited from a drop in voter turnout this year in the Democratic strongholds.

In a handful of counties — including border counties such as Webb and Hidalgo as well as larger fast-growing areas like Williamson and Tarrant — the gap in support for Trump and Cruz resulted in a split ticket, where Trump and Allred both won.

For some voters in the Republican party, Allred was a viable alternative to Cruz.

“There are people in his own party who detest him, who think he’s insincere,” said Jon Taylor, a political science professor at the University of Texas San Antonio. “People remember that he fled to Cancun in 2021” during winter storm Uri.