Trump’s success in RGV a boon for local GOP, a wake-up call for Democrats

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After Election Day, many wonder whether the Democratic Party’s stronghold in South Texas is over.

President-elect Donald Trump won all four counties in the Rio Grande Valley, a feat that seemed nearly impossible given political demographics and voting patterns in past elections. But there were signs of a potential shift given the president-elect’s popularity, which has seemingly grown with each presidential campaign.

“There was a national sweep,” Cameron County Democratic Party Chair Jared Hockema said. “I mean, this was a national election, and we saw similar results all across the country.”

Trump earned 60,925 total votes, or 52.54% of the total votes, in Cameron County. Vice President Kamala Harris earned 54,156 total votes, or 46.71%.

During the 2020 election, Trump received 49,032 total votes, or 43% of the total votes, while President Joe Biden received 64,063 total votes, or 56%. In 2016, Trump received 29,472 votes, or 32% of the total votes, and Hilary Clinton received 59,402 total votes, or 64%.

Hockema attributes Trump’s success in the area and throughout the country with the perception of voters, which he believes are “out of sync with reality.”

“The first thing that we have to take care of is economics,” Hockema said. “Although President Biden has been very successful in restoring our economy from the ravages of COVID, a lot of that benefit has not been felt by everyday people.”

He believes Trump’s success could be part of a cyclical pattern seen before when George W. Bush defeated Sen. John Kerry in Cameron County’s 2004 presidential election. Four years later, Barack Obama defeated Sen. John McCain.

“There’s always a place for optimism,” Hockema said. “There’s a lot of positive things to point to in this election. You know, the majority of our [Democratic] folks were reelected down here, or elected.”

One example is Sen. Ted Cruz who defeated Colin Allred statewide but was outpaced by his Democratic challenger in Cameron and Hidalgo counties. Cruz earned 53,328 total votes, or 46.64% of the total votes in Cameron County, while Allred earned 58,230 total votes, or 50.93%.

In Hidalgo County, Cruz earned 96,025 total votes, or 45.48%, while Allred earned 109,863 votes, or 52.03%.

U.S. Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-Brownsville, also defeated Republican challenger Mayra Flores, earning 57,323 votes, or 50.22%, over Flores’ 56,815 votes, or 49.78%, in Cameron County.

However, Republican Janie Lopez was able to secure a reelection victory, with a key endorsement from Gov. Greg Abbott, over Democratic challenger Jonathan Gracia. Lopez earned 28,047 total votes, or 55.89%, over Gracia’s 22,139 total votes, or 44.11%.

“I don’t think there’s just one factor that contributes to this, because it wasn’t just Cameron County that flipped red for the presidential election,” Cameron County GOP Chair Deborah Bell said. “It was Starr County, Willacy County and Hidalgo County. So then you have to look at a holistic picture. And I truly believe it was the messaging — the messaging and the issues that the American people cared about.”

She said that border issues played a large part in swaying voters to the right, including many issues that did not align with more family oriented values of Rio Grande Valley voters.

“I think if you look at history, the course of politics throughout the years, it is very much a cycle,” Bell said. “But I also think that the Democratic Party is going to have to reevaluate their messaging and what actually resonates with the American people. What is it the American people need? Because obviously what they provided on their platform was not it.”

She said that locally, the Republican Party began to focus more on the area by engaging the community with a boots on the ground strategy, including a visit from Texas GOP Chair Abraham George and the Texas governor.

“The Cameron County Republican Party has not been active in the past 10 years by any means at all. No headquarters, no infrastructure, no meetings, nothing,” Bell said. “I was elected in March. I took office in June. We immediately began to have meetings, and I’m not accrediting myself for this by any means, but we really began working the area.”

Shortly after a change in leadership, Bell said, volunteers started registering, contacting and engaging voters. The county also received financial support from the state’s GOP party, a partnership they plan to continue.

Hidalgo County’s Democratic Party described the loss of support in their area as a “sobering” reckoning.

In Hidalgo County, Trump earned 110,560 total votes, or 51%, while Harris earned 104,233, or 48.08%. This marked the first time that a Republican presidential candidate has won Hidalgo County since the 1972 Presidential Election, when Republican President Richard Nixon defeated Democratic Senator George McGovern.

“It was like a sucker punch almost,” Hidalgo County Democratic Party Executive Chair Richard Gonzales said. “We all anticipated the results to go the other way.”

During the 2016 Presidential Election, Trump received 48,642 votes, or 28% of the total votes, in Hidalgo County. Clinton received 118,809 votes, or 68% of the total votes. In 2020, Trump received 90,527 total votes, or 41% of the total votes — nearly doubling the number of votes from the previous election, while Biden received a total of 128,199 votes, or 58%.

Gonzales also pointed out the success of Democratic candidates in Hidalgo County and defended against the idea that the county is now red.

“In Hidalgo County, that did not happen. We were the only county in the Rio Grande Valley that did not flip to red, aside from the presidential race,” he said. “Every other Democratic candidate from the top all the way down won Hidalgo County. We did not lose to any Republicans.”

Mark Kaswan, who teaches political science at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, said that the 2016 election showed that there is potential in the Rio Grande Valley for Republican success.

“Think about it this way, the state of Texas has been red for quite a long time. For voters in the Rio Grande Valley, if there aren’t any real Republicans on the ballot, which was the case for a lot of the local races, Democrats would run unopposed or the Republicans would just have token opposition,” he said.

“So if you don’t really have a serious candidate in one of the local races that you want to vote for, why bother going out and voting at all?” he continued. “But once you start having contested races at the local level, then some of those Republican voters will start coming out. But what’s interesting, actually, is that it may also mean the same thing for Democrats — that Democrats might start coming out in higher numbers because now there are contested elections because their candidates are actually having serious opponents.”

As for Harris’ struggle to win over voters in the Rio Grande Valley, Kaswan theorized that she may have inherited Biden’s unpopularity.

“People in the Valley seem to really accept the idea that Biden had really messed up on the border,” he said. “So I think border policies were in there. And part of it is that Biden dropped out late. He was replaced by his vice president, and so there was no real primary process. She didn’t really have much ability to create distance between her and Biden. And Biden was very unpopular.”

Future elections will help clear up questions of party loyalty but with growing potential, Republican leaders look to continue carrying the momentum into the next round of elections.

“We’ll be doing what we’ve been doing all this time, which is getting the message out,” Hidalgo County Republican Party Chair Robert Cantu said. “I think people in the Valley are so used to voting Democrat, and that’s starting to change. And that change comes from working hard, getting the word out, block walking, phone banking, and getting people to see that what the Republican Party stands for helps people more.”

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