The Dallas Morning News has live election results for local, state and national races.
Unofficial early election results show Texas Republicans and Democrats maintaining their partisan balance in Congress as vote counting continued Tuesday night.
Either party’s ability to flip a seat in Texas could upset the current balance of power in Washington, where Republicans hold a narrow majority in the U.S. House.
Heated election contests are playing out in South Texas, where redistricting and a changing electorate have put three seats in play.
Unofficial results showed Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, leading Republican Jay Furman by 3.8 percentage points. Cuellar has been considered a weakened incumbent after a federal grand jury indicted him on federal bribery charges in May. Cuellar has maintained his innocence.
Two other South Texas seats also could produce close contests, including the race between Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-McAllen, and former Rep. Mayra Flores, R-Los Indios, in District 34. Flores briefly represented the district after winning a special election in 2022, only to lose to Gonzalez later that year.
Early returns showed Gonzalez ahead by 3.3 percentage points over Flores.
Republicans have targeted the South Texas district as a key seat to build their majority in the House. Both national parties have invested in the race, and each candidate has spent millions on their campaigns.
Incumbent Rep. Monica De La Cruz, R-Edinburg, was projected to beat Democrat Michelle Vallejo. She declared victory in her race as her margin over Vallejo swelled to more than 16 percentage points.
“In 2022, we made history, and tonight’s outcome confirms that the change we brought to this community is here to stay.”
Across North Texas, newcomers will represent three districts after incumbents chose not to see re-election. Early voting in those races showed:
- Democrat Julie Johnson was projected to beat Republican Darrell Day, with Libertarian Kevin Hale a distant third. Johnson, a trial attorney, will be the first openly gay member of Congress from Texas. She served three terms as a state lawmaker, where she championed LGTBQ rights at the state Capitol.
- Republican Brandon Gill defeated Democrat Ernest Lineberger III and Libertarian Phil Gray. Gill, a former Wall Street executive, won a district that stretches from the suburbs north of Dallas to the Oklahoma border. The seat opened up with Republican Rep. Michael Burgess’ retirement.
- State Rep. Craig Goldman, R-Fort Worth, defeated Democrat Trey Hunt and will replace Rep. Kay Granger, who decided not to seek reelection. The longtime state representative voted to impeach Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton last year and faced competition from a Paxton-backed candidate in the primary. Goldman campaigned on a pro-business conservative platform to appeal to Fort Worth-area voters in his district.
None of those new projections would be a pickup for either party in Washington.
Currently, 25 Democrats and 12 Republicans represent Texas in Congress. The seat held by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, has been vacant since Lee died in July. Former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, a Democrat, was projected to win that election.
Many incumbents were ahead or won their races, according to The Associated Press, including:
- Rep. Beth Van Duyne, R-Irving, defeated Democrat Sam Eppler. Van Duyne, the former mayor of the Dallas suburb, won her third term in Congress. The hard-charging conservative has been a fierce critic of the Biden administration over immigration.
- Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, beat Libertarian Jrmar “JJ” Jefferson. The former public defender and civil rights attorney won her second term in a district that covers part of Dallas and the surrounding suburbs.
- Rep. Marc Veasey, D-Fort Worth, defeated Republican Patrick Gillespie. Veasey has served the Dallas-Fort Worth-area district since 2014. He was the second Texan and the first member of the Congressional Black Caucus to openly call for President Joe Biden to withdraw from the campaign, setting the stage for Vice President Kamala Harris to become the Democratic nominee.
- Rep. Jake Ellzey, R-Midlothian, beat Democrat John Love III to secure a third term in office. Ellzey, a retired Navy officer and former commercial airline pilot, defeated two other Republicans in the March primary to advance to the general election against Love. Texas’ 6th Congressional District stretches from the Dallas-Fort Worth suburbs through a large swath south and southeast of the area, including all of Ellis, Navarro, Anderson, Hill and Cherokee counties.
- Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Frisco, bested Democrat Simon Cardell. Fallon, a businessman from Frisco, secured a third term in office. Texas’ 4th Congressional District stretches from the suburbs north and east of Dallas north to the Red River boundary with Texas and east to the Arkansas state line.
- Rep. Lance Gooden, R-Terrell, defeated Democrat Ruth “Truth” Torres, who had made abortion rights a centerpiece of her campaign. With the victory, Gooden secured a fourth term representing the 5th Congressional District that stretches from east Dallas County into rural East Texas.
In addition, Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales won reelection Tuesday. The Navy veteran was elected to his third term in the border district, where he has clashed with members of his own party who cast him as too moderate. Gonzales was censured by the state party in 2023 over his support for same-sex marriage protections at the federal level and a bipartisan gun safety bill following the Uvalde mass shooting.
Gonzales also clashed with fellow Republicans in opposing hard-line immigration proposals. Gonzales serves on the House Appropriations Committee.
CORRECTION, 10:45 p.m. Nov. 5, 2024: An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of former Rep. Mayra Flores.
