The Elections of 2024 are fast approaching, with less than three months until people head to the polls. That means new election polls continue to come out almost monthly, and the Texas Association of Broadcasters has released their National Handicappers Ratings of the statewide and congressional races here in Texas.
In the report includes polls from Cook Political Report, Inside Elections, and Sabato's Crystal Ball. Also included is The Hill's ratings of Texas races, along with the presidential and national congressional races. For context in the article, the races are predicted with a 'lean,' 'likely,' and 'safe,' score base. Heading into November, Texas has plenty of big races on the docket, but this new report shows things may not be as close as expected.
One of the most notable is for District 34 down in South Texas, where new Republican Mayra Flores is trying to unseat Democrat Vicente Gonzalez. The reports show Gonzalez with a likely to safe lead in that district, and Rice University political analyst Mark Jones agrees, for the most part.
"Vicente Gonzalez I would say is likely to win that district...but it is not a sure thing," he says.
Beyond that race, most of them are following their usual drumbeat. Democrat border Congressman Henry Cuellar is likely to retain District 28, as he is listed as safe in most polls. Any others tend to look the same.
"Only about one or two races total are competitive...and both are down in the valley," he says.
Republican Monica De La Cruz is also listed as the likely winner for District 15, holding an overwhelming 90 percent of the favorability.
Statewide, there is of course the big race between Senator Ted Cruz and his newest challenger, Dallas area Democrat Congressman Collin Allred. Cruz faces a legitimate challenge from Robert Francis O'Rourke in 2018, but even with Beto's grassroots visit to every Texas county, Cruz still ended up winning comfortably.
This time, the polls show he is likely to retain his seat once again. But Jones says there is a road for Allred to make some Beto-like noise.
"The problem Cruz has, is it is not an insurmountable advantage...if Allred has any chance, he needs to ride the coattails of Kamala Harris, especially for turnout from Gen Z," he says. "With the right forces, and a better campaign in terms of ground game...Allred could potentially defeat Cruz."
Nationally, all of the polls in the report show that Donald Trump has a lead over Kamala Harris and is projected as the likely winner. However, many of these polls are from June and July, before Kamala was anointed by the Democrats as their candidate.
But it is still close enough to watch.
"Most of the more recent ones...have Harris as the favorite right now over Trump, in the 55 to 45 range, some have Trump a little closer, or maybe flipped a little...but it is not an insurmountable lead on either side," he says.
And as with just about every election, it could come down to a few players.
"I think it really boils down to how well Harris and Trump do in key states like Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Arizona," says Jones.
The polls show Texas as likely to vote for Trump, which is no surprise. Texas has not voted blue in a presidential race since 1976.