When even James Carville starts sounding like the adult in the room, you know Democrats have a problem.
The Ragin’ Cajun and longtime political operative Al Hunt delivered a blunt warning to Texas Senate hopeful James Talarico: stop pretending the old culture-war clips aren’t a liability and start explaining them before Texas voters do it for you.
For months, national Democrats have treated Talarico as the second coming of a Texas miracle — a fresh-faced candidate who could somehow thread the needle between progressive activists and moderate voters. After knocking off progressive firebrand Jasmine Crockett in the Democratic primary, party strategists practically began measuring the drapes for a historic upset.
Then came the inconvenient part: the internet. Suddenly, old comments on gender, race, religion and abortion started resurfacing. Republicans didn’t have to invent attack lines. They just hit “play.”
On their podcast, Hunt acknowledged the obvious. Republicans are already running ads featuring Talarico’s past statements, and some of the material is authentic. Carville didn’t disagree. “Some of it is true,” Carville admitted.
Hunt went even further, arguing that if Talarico really made comments such as claiming there are six genders, he’d better start explaining them immediately. “Yeah, but he said there’s six genders. Well, I don’t know whether he said it or not, but if he said it, God d— it, he better walk it back right now or explain it,” Hunt said. That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement.
The advice from the Democratic veterans was remarkably simple: own the mistakes, then change the subject. Hunt suggested Talarico tell voters, “Hey, I may have said some dumb things, but Ken Paxton has committed dumb, corrupt acts that hurt Texas citizens.”
In other words, Democrats are increasingly realizing that the “nothing to see here” strategy may not survive contact with actual Texas voters.
Talarico has already started inching in that direction. In recent interviews, he acknowledged that some past remarks “missed the mark” and conceded there are statements he regrets. He has accused Republican nominee Ken Paxton of selectively using old clips to distract voters from controversies surrounding the attorney general’s political career.
But the challenge isn’t simply whether Talarico regrets the comments. It’s whether voters believe the new version or the archived version.
That’s why Carville’s warning matters.
The veteran strategist argued that Democrats have nearly everything they could have hoped for in Texas. Republicans just endured a bruising primary. Democrats are energized. Massive amounts of money are pouring into the race. And Paxton enters the general election carrying years of political baggage of his own. Carville essentially argued that every favorable condition imaginable has lined up for Democrats, creating what he sees as a genuine tossup race.
Yet even with all those advantages, Democratic insiders are still nervously discussing Talarico’s old comments. Because campaigns can survive attacks. What they struggle to survive are attacks built around a candidate’s own words.
The Texas Senate race is shaping up as one of the nastiest and most expensive contests in America. Talarico is trying to frame the election as a referendum on Paxton’s ethics, while Republicans are working to make it a referendum on Talarico’s past statements and progressive record. Both campaigns have already launched aggressive attacks within days of securing their nominations.
Voters may forgive a bad quote. They may even forgive a cringey quote. But they rarely appreciate being told the quote never mattered in the first place. Carville appears to understand that.
