Texas Early-Vote Gap Narrows to a Few Hundred as Patrick and Abbott Predict a Republican Comeback

Texas' two top Republicans say the Democratic surge that opened early voting will not last. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told CBS News Texas that Republicans still have a deep bench of reliable voters who had not yet cast ballots. "The Democrats have the early lead, but we have about 600,000 of the high-propensity voters who haven't shown up yet," Patrick said. "So, one of my messages to the Republicans is you need to get off the bench and get out and vote. We'll probably catch up and pass the Democrats sometime early next week, midweek."

Gov. Greg Abbott made the same case Sunday in Hutto, where he rallied supporters and joined volunteers on a neighborhood block walk, KVUE reported. "What we're seeing in the early vote is very predictable. There's going to be a big surge, early on, the first couple of days on the Democrat side, and then the Republicans pick up the pace," Abbott told the station. "Second week is going to be a very Republican week."

The numbers so far: nearly 4.5 million Texans voted in the first seven days of early voting, 23.4 percent of registered voters, according to secretary of state data reported by The Texas Tribune — ahead of the 2022 midterm pace but trailing 2018's 24.3 percent at the same point. Texas voters do not register by party, so analysts estimate the partisan makeup from past primary participation. Through Sunday, voters with a history of voting in Democratic primaries made up 35 percent of ballots, ahead of 33 percent for Republican primary voters, according to an analysis by Republican consultant Derek Ryan cited by the Tribune. By Tuesday, totals posted by the tracking site Theo Elections, sorting more than 5.1 million early voters by primary history, showed about 1.65 million voters with only Republican primary history and about 1.65 million with only Democratic primary history, separated by a few hundred voters, with nearly a third of early voters having no recent primary history at all.

"This is actually new territory," Ryan told the Tribune. "I don't think that I ever recall a point where voters with previous Democratic primary history have outnumbered voters with previous Republican primary history." Ryan said the test is the more than 2.1 million Texans who voted in one of the last four Republican primaries but have not yet voted: "We'll start really knowing what the picture looks like by Thursday or Friday." Patrick's Democratic opponent, state Rep. Vikki Goodwin of Austin, countered that many people in the long lines are new voters: "We have seen a huge increase in the turnout numbers, and it's really inspiring." Early voting runs through Friday, Oct. 30, with polls open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.